Twisting Topeka

by Lissa Staley

  August 1st 1938

  German Troops Deploy to Czech Border (Washington Post)

  Frank Knox slammed his fist hard on the table. To my surprise, Landon didn’t budge one fraction. Knox’s voice was low and steady. “This is just a ploy, Alf. Hitler wants the Sudetenland. It’s the first domino; a prelude to war. He’s been preparing this for years.”

  Landon, never one to argue openly, looked at his clasped fingers for a moment. “I think Mr. Chamberlain has it all under control; we don’t need to get involved.”

  Knox wasn’t going to be brushed aside so easily. “Then don’t get involved, Mr. President, but send me! Send a statement without making an official play. We don’t need to fight over there again, not if we deal with this now. The French are being pussy-cats, and Chamberlain hasn’t got a spine. We all know that. He’s been fawning over Herr Hitler for years.”

  Veins stuck out on Frank’s neck. He’d been in France in 1918, at the thick end.

  The two shared a long stare then Alf lowered his head. “Fair enough, Frank. Go to Czechoslovakia.”

  Over the last week I had watched a similar contest in the Oval Office, and it seemed Knox, the bulldog, had at last gotten his way.

  Knox turned to me. “Michael, get it arranged. I want to speak to Chamberlain, Daladier in France, but first get me an audience with Milan Hodža. I fly tomorrow morning.”

  Not exactly an easy task, getting audiences with three Prime Ministers, but as a nation we had considerable clout. The leaders in Europe were at their wits end; they welcomed a new player on the scene.

  We arrived in Prague two days later, and Frank immediately spoke live on Czech radio with Hodža.

  I cringed when Frank went off-topic. Landon would tear a strip off him when we got home, but it didn’t matter. The words were out of the bag.

  “We will stand firm with the people of Czechoslovakia,” Knox said. “We will not let Herr Hitler bully Europe into submission!”

  The European newspapers took the ‘bully’ comment and ran wild with it.

  ‘Bully’ Hitler Steps Away From Showdown (London Times)

  With his speeches repeated in France and England, Knox returned home as a hero, the champion of America, forging an uneasy peace between Czechoslovakia and a frustrated German army.

  Frank Knox, the Hammer of Democracy (Washington Post)

  Trust one American newspaper to take it one level further. It didn’t matter. We’d stopped a war.

  September 1st 1939

  Japan Prepares to Strike into Indochina (NYT)

  “Why do we get our news from the damned papers?” Landon gave each of us accusatory looks, his eyes sweeping slowly round the room.

  “With respect, Mr. President,” I began. I had the power; I had the shoulders to take the weight of the challenge. “We have said for weeks that you should speak against the Japanese show of force.”

  Our eyes locked for a second, then Landon relaxed. “Yes, Michael, I do recall that.”

  “We could embargo oil.” Hector Williams, the Secretary of State, had pushed such a measure before. “A stranglehold would bring them to their knees.”

  “That would just attract their anger towards us.” Landon shook his head. Frank Knox stood behind, saying nothing, knowing that Landon had repeated his own words. “We need the Japanese to focus their energy on China, not look over here.”

  “But, sir,” Williams persisted. “That makes it look like we’re openly aiding them against China.”

  “Who do you want to go to war with, Hector?” Landon asked, staring down the Secretary of State. “China? With six million men? Or Japan? With one of the best navies in the world?”

  Williams backed down, knowing he was on the ropes. “Point taken, Mr. President.”

  “What can we do, Frank?” Landon asked.

  Knox, an advocate of preparedness, had his answer ready. “We send the Pacific Fleet on a good-will tour to Singapore. Make a big deal of it. We have enough battleships sitting idle in Pearl Harbor to do a dozen tours. In the meantime, we tell Hirohito that we’ll still supply oil to the Japanese nation. We just make sure he gets the idea that Indochina is one step too far.”

  Landon looked at me. “Michael, you heard the man; get the speech ready.”

  I smiled, nodded my head. It had already been written, and was sitting on my desk. Frank had already endorsed it. It made the headlines of every major newspaper in the world.

  September 12th 1939

  President Landon Forces Japan to Think Again (Los Angeles Times)

  September 13th 1939

  Landon Puts the Brakes on Japan (The Times)

  November 8th 1940

  Landon Will Have a Second Term (NYT)

  It was hardly a fight. With our diplomacy quelling a war with Japan, Landon won in forty-one states. The bright democrat, Harry Truman from Missouri, never really got in a punch. The Jesse Owens card could never be played again, but I did suggest that in September Owens be appointed a sporting ambassador, raising awareness of the importance of physical fitness in all schools. We didn’t directly replay the Owens card, but we sure got his name back in the papers at election time. America doesn’t forget easily. It wasn’t my best moment, but it helped get the result.

  December 7th 1941

  President Landon visits Philippines (Los Angeles Times)

  We all knew it was more than a photo opportunity. Japan had again flexed their military muscles against the Chinese, and with their fleet gathering in the Yellow Sea, we needed some kind of military presence in the area. I didn’t like the flight, the stop-off in Hawaii, the sweltering heat of summer on the islands, but I did see the point in having our main battleships paraded in the harbor. We organized a party on board the USS Arizona for General Douglas MacArthur and the high staff of the Japanese Embassy; a show of strength for our war-crazy friends.

  September 1st 1943

  Germany Invades Poland. Poles Crumble (The Times)

  We all knew it had to happen sometime, but in September 1943, Germany eventually invaded Poland; we knew Hitler had not worked for ten years to posture in his own backyard. I took some credit for managing to subdue his rage for over four years. Outfought and outgunned, Poland fell in twenty days. As a Government, we were too late to act and, for once, far too slow to react. When Stalin invaded the Poles from the east, we braced ourselves for world war. Yet for almost a year, a moment in time, the two behemoths stared at each other over a line on a map. For a whole Russian winter, Hitler waited, assuring Stalin that old treaties still stood.

  June 6th 1944

  Germany and Japan Invade Russia, the Bear Reels (Washington Post)

  With Britain and France poised on the Maginot Line against Nazi incursion, the German powder keg blew surprisingly eastwards. On June 6th 1944, Blitzkrieg, the new name for mechanized war, thrust into Russia.

  As one, the Japanese attacked from their territories in northern China.

  The United States Government had faced the Japanese down over Indochina, and had promised sanctions when they threatened the British colony of Singapore.

  But when their eyes turned towards Russia, we stayed mostly silent. Frank Knox had always thought of Stalin as the ultimate enemy, and few of our allies held any empathy for the Russian dictator; it was widely known he’d imprisoned and executed millions of his own subjects.

  On the Japanese front, few Americans knew where Manchuria was. To be honest, I had to look it up just to make sure. In a matter of days Stalin faced the might of Germany and Japan; a pincer movement of the highest degree.

  The rest of the world looked on as the three mighty nations warred for four years, throwing millions of lives into the meat grinder. We could hardly call it a world war, but in truth, with Russia’s size, it did encompass ten time zones.

  November 7th 1944

  A Democrat in the White House (NYT)

  Overshadowed by the war, Alf Landon drifted into the history books as the 33rd president of the United Stat
es of America, succeeded by the man he’d beaten four years previously; the bright Democrat senator from Missouri, Harry Truman.

  Alf returned to Topeka, Kansas, stretched his farm, and rode horses for the rest of his life. As president, he would always be remembered as the ‘world statesman’.

  November 11th 1948

  ‘Peace in Our Time’ (London Times)

  Chamberlain, the Prime Minister of Britain, announced Peace in our Time, as hostilities between the three world powers stumbled to a halt.

  On November 11th, 1948, an uneasy truce was called in the Russian steppes, neither of the three combatants willing or able to fight through another Russian winter. The troops stood over ground held, warmed their hands over fires in the snow, and the leaders spoke of peace.

    The three countries, once military giants, now staggered against each other like exhausted boxers in a bloody three-way bout, punch-drunk, bruised and broken, and a threat to no one.

  Alf Landon, the unknown Governor of Kansas, and Jesse Owens, the Buckeye Bullet, had indeed changed the world.

  My part? Michael Holt?

  I get a footnote in history; that’s all Press Secretaries ever get.

  Happiness Is a Cold Pistol

  Paul Swearingen

  Sherry leaned back on the bench in the bus kiosk and sighed. It had been a long, rough week at the office, and now all she wanted to do was to get home and see what her two boys had cooked up for supper. They might be little pains at times, but she’d taught them to read between the lines in recipes, and nearly all of their meals were quite tasty.

  At least she didn’t have to worry about negotiating Topeka traffic on a Friday. Maybe in that respect having the muffler fall off her car as she was on her way to work this morning was a godsend, but on the other hand being told “Sure! We can have that ready for you by five this afternoon” and then getting a phone call at 4:30 and hearing “Oh, your car is one of those models which we have to special order mufflers and tail pipes for from Kansas City. But we can have it for you Monday with no problem.”

  The muffler problem seemed to be the climax of what had been a less-than-stellar week. On Monday, one of their longest-running IT services customers suddenly filed for bankruptcy with no warning. The next day, the office next door caught fire – something about a short in a copier – and they had to evacuate the building for a couple of hours. Then on Thursday her husband had come down with something at work the day before, and she’d kept him home for a day, coughing and hacking. She’d taken the bus to get home yesterday, too. At least it had been warmer then.

  They’d had to cut back on Christmas shopping this year, too. The boys seemed to understand, although the youngest had a rather painful look on his face as he turned away from Sherry and his father after they’d explained that with the downturn in business they had barely enough income to get them through the rest of this year, much less blow money on a load of Christmas presents. They’d just have to come up with something else instead.

  The chilly breeze rustled through the dead leaves of the tree a few feet away, and she pulled her coat around her more tightly and wrapped her fingers around the cold handle of the .38 revolver she always carried with her in her coat pocket. Another woman carrying a large purse walked up to the bus kiosk, eyed her, and then elected to stand outside, the wind flipping her light-brown hair occasionally.

  Sherry glanced around again, checked the time on her cell phone, and then leaned back and closed her eyes. Another eight minutes until the bus was due. Even if she dozed off, she’d still hear the air brakes and wake right up. Or maybe this woman standing next to the sign would nudge her? Hardly. You didn’t just casually approach strangers in Topeka and nudge them, as friendly as most people here were. They still liked their space, no matter what.

  Somehow, she knew that she wasn’t really somewhere back east, hiking through a skiff of snow along a ridge. But the background sound of the traffic transformed into the sound of the wind, and the sun on her face warmed her slightly. She was all alone, but she knew that she was safe.

  The sun in her face became brighter and brighter, and she blinked and covered her eyes with her left hand to shelter it from the blazing light from reflections of the sun in dozens of windows from the building across the street. The wind and noise seemed to increase, however, and she almost didn’t hear the strangled sound as a small, dark man pulled at the strap of the waiting woman’s purse.

  Sherry pulled her hand away from her eyes, took in the scene in a split second, and then said one word as she stood, took three steps forward, and pulled her pistol and pointed it at the man, cocking the hammer in the same motion. “No!”

  His eyes opened wide, and he collapsed at her feet. “Please. Don’t shoot me.” His eyes turned upward, and he stretched a hand towards her as if to pluck a bullet out of the air before it could reach him.

  Suddenly, the woman whose purse he’d tried to snatch kicked him in the side – once, twice, three times. He screamed, rolled over, and limped away, holding tightly to his side, looked back once and then ducked his head and moving away even more quickly.

  Sherry stared at the disappearing man and then at the woman’s sharply-pointed pumps. He would be lucky to get away with bruised ribs, she thought.

  “You could have shot him, you know.” The woman glared at her through tightly-compressed lips.

  Sherry uncocked the revolver, shook her head, and slid the pistol back into her pocket. She met the woman’s glare and then glanced down the street. You’re welcome, she thought, little man who may not realize that he had just received the most significant Christmas present of anyone in Topeka. And she knew that if she’d shot him there would have been repercussions that could have stretched for years. No, happiness was definitely a cold pistol, not a warm one.

  Psychic Shift

  Annabelle Corrick

  “The act of creation … a double-minded transitory state of unstable equilibrium where the balance of both emotion and thought is disturbed.”

  —Arthur Koestler, Act of Creation

  Callie and Pam set out for their first-ever hike on the kind of gorgeous spring day that all moderately well-to-do children in the Midwest in the 1950s took for granted as to be enjoyed. But for Josh Brindsly, even though he walked in the most expensive shoes money could buy from Gucci, not to mention his grey cashmere sweater and wool-blend slacks; the beauty of the day hardly mattered. It was to be his last.

  He had not enjoyed any day for too long a time. The years of psychoanalysis had only proven that his demons would not go away. He had tried his best to destroy himself with alcohol and drugs, but his parents had intervened. They had sent him to the middle of nowhere--to the pricey “Psychiatric Center of the World” in Topeka, Kansas so that he would be cured. They were willing to shell out big bucks for as long as it took, paying the Menninger Clinic as well as their own security apparatus to make sure he stayed for however long it would take.

  *****

  “Let’s head west on Sixth Street,” Callie suggested excitedly. Her slender, agile frame skipped ahead while her heavier friend trudged to keep up. They both lived on Seventh Street, just one cross street apart.

  “Sure, okay,” Pam agreed. They carried satchels with necessary getaway items including water and goodies to share on their adventurous journey.

  Callie wore jeans along with tennis shoes recently purchased for her summer lessons at Hughes Courts. Her T-shirt, however, had been handed down from older siblings. Even with some natural shrinkage, it hung as loosely on her slight frame as a Halloween sheet. Her blondish hair looked disheveled, the barrette her mom had employed long since gone AWOL.

  Pam wore saddle shoes good for everything including school and hopscotch. Her pedal pushers and matching blouse, handmade for the eldest, looked overly frilly on her large-boned frame. Only a few wiry, dark locks dangled off from her braided pigtails.

  Neither girl looked appropriately dressed and groomed for each other or for th
e pristine grounds to the right.

  “Let’s explore over there,” Pam waved northward. They had continued walking west. “I like the looks of this side street. It’s an entrance to something.” They turned into the grounds, staring at the low-clipped grass and finely-shaped spirea bushes bordered with rows of pink tulips, yellow daffodils, and orange marigolds. The air hung thick with the aroma of spring pollens. The bushes had already sprouted white buds.

  “Wow! Looks real neat,” Callie exclaimed. Across to the south ranged blocks of small houses where crabgrass and weeds sprang randomly here and there. Both girls had seen the plain State Hospital grounds to the east where neighborhood boys gathered to play baseball and football, but neither they nor the boys had ever ventured onto the more secluded Menninger Foundation’s premises. Nor had much knowledge of the place ever entered the minds of these fifth graders.

  “Look over there at that path.” Pam pointed right where a swath of white gravel curved eastward. They walked deeper into the grounds. The background chorus of buzzing insects and chirping birds ratcheted up a couple of decibels, seeming to mute their words.

  “Hey, weird,” Callie called out. “It stops at that big hedge.” The girls stared at the distant sight—evergreen bushes rising above their heads contrasting with the lighter spirea leaves and brightly-colored flowers. They crept along the path until they heard a whistled tune. Pam pulled Callie off the path, finding a decorative boulder to hide behind. A caretaker emerged from a side path and strode by, unaware of the rapt attention he had evoked.

  “Okay, he’s gone,” Callie whispered into her friend’s ear.

  “So why not talk out loud?” Pam jabbed her friend while they resumed their stealthy progress.

  “Because this is a place where we’re not supposed to be,” Callie giggled. “But I love it. I know there’s something behind that hedge. What? What will we find?”

  *****

  Josh Brindsly heaved the shoulders of his angular, tall frame. Why didn’t the public go for his perfect looks? Why did his agent say his perfection was too much—too sharply refined for today’s leading male roles? Nowadays, moviegoers preferred rough and tough-looking guys like Humphrey Bogart, Richard Burton, and Marlon Brando. What was with all this anti-hero stuff anyway? Everything had gotten so confused. Only ten years ago he would have been the next Robert Taylor. Why not now? Taylor himself was hardly extinct. He had starred not so long ago in Ivanhoe and Quo Vadis. Josh knew his own acting expressions were as good or better. Why was his agent so dismissive?