A little preview of my short story for the 2026 Tom Burnett Library Anthology… 1920s Texas is the basic premise…
Comments and recommendations requested as always!
Kurt Schlagle stuck his finger in his collar again, trying to stretch it out so he could breathe, as he stood outside the Cattleman’s Restaurant in downtown Amarillo in late August, 1926. “What the hell am I doing here,” he mumbled to himself, “I ain’t a driller or roughneck anymore, and sure as hell ain’t goin’ back to that. And I ain’t never heard of Phillips bein’ around here.”
Just then, a Model T truck pulled to the curb, and two men got out. One, well-dressed, older, going bald and wearing glasses, looked impatiently around as the younger man got out carefully and limped around the front of the truck. The younger man smiled and said, “Kurt! Glad you made it!”
Kurt lifted a hand. “Jake Sanchez, I said I’d be here.” As the older man walked up, he stuck out his hand. “Kurt Schlagle, sir.”
The old man shook his hand once, with a strong grip. “Frank Phillips. Let’s go in and eat. I just got in from Bartlesville and I’m hungry.” Jake was already pulling the door open as Phillips turned away from Kurt.
Kurt cocked his head at Jake, who grinned ruefully and motioned for Kurt to follow. As Kurt passed, Jake said sotto voce, “He’s the boss man. Doesn’t hold with wasting time. And he’s got a temper.”
After the waiter delivered their coffee and took their orders, Phillips got right down to business. “Schlagle, Sanchez says you’re a good pipeline man. I talked to some folks at the Texas Company and they say you know what you’re doing and don’t waste time. We are buying the American Refinery up in Borger, and are going to start refining oil up there. I need pipelines from the storage sites around Borger to the refinery. I want eight-inch lines, buried at least thirty inches, and Sanchez has already looked at potential routes. I want you to go out with him and give him an estimate of how long it will take to get them in.”
Kurt swallowed. “Um, Mr. Phillips, you’re aware I actually work—”
Phillips stared at him. “I know you’ve been working for the Texas Company. I’ve already talked to Joe Cullinan, and he can spare you and your crew, if I think you can do the job.”
The waiter brought the steaks, ending the conversation as all three men dug in. Twenty minutes later, Frank Phillips sat back, mimed paying the bill, and said, “Two days should be enough time to check what Sanchez has picked for routes. I will expect to see you Monday morning at my hotel by seven am with your proposed estimate.” The waiter arrived with the bill, Phillips paid it, and said, “Let’s go Sanchez, I’m tired.”
Jake said, “Kurt, where are you staying?”
“I’m out at the tent camp on the north side of town. First right toward Panhandle.”
“Pick you up at seven?”
“Sounds good.” Kurt stood. “Good night, Mr. Phillips.”
Phillips nodded and started for the door, as Jake limped after him, shaking his head.
***
Kurt stood outside the cook tent, dressed in his normal khaki shirt, pants, and boots. His sap and brass knuckles were in their respective pockets, with his H&R Handi-Gun in his bag, along with his notebook, pencils, and tape measure. As Leroy, Tiny, and Shorty came out of the cook tent, Leroy asked, “Goin’ somewhere, boss?”
“Yep, want you guys to go, too. Going up to Borger to look at some short-run pipelines for the refinery up there. I’m not real confident it’ll go real fast, based on what we did on that Texas Company line we finished Thursday. We got any problems this morning?”
Tiny’s basso profundo voice seemed to come from his boots as he said, “Usual drunks. Ingram, Tristan, and McQuarry are in the hoosegow up in Borger. I’ll go get them later this morning. They got in a fight with them McCormick guys again.”
“Dammit! Do we really need them? This isn’t the first—”
Shorty held up a hand. “Boss, you know how hard it is to find good tar guys. And they’re good!”
A Model T truck rattled up and a horn honked, stopping Kurt from responding. He sighed, spun around, and saw Jake Sanchez sitting behind the wheel. He walked over and Jake asked, “We taking your guys, too?”
Kurt nodded. “If we can, I’d rather be safe than sorry.”
Jake smiled. “Yep, belt and suspenders.” He glanced over and realized Shorty was standing there. “Shorty! Kurt hasn’t fired your sorry ass yet?”
Shorty snapped around, then laughed. “Ah, screw you, Sarge! You know I’m a good worker!”
“Well, pile in the back and let’s get going!”
Tiny asked, “What about Ingram, Tristan, and McQuarry?”
Kurt snorted. “Another day won’t hurt ‘em, and it might get their attention. Let’s go!”
As Sanchez drove toward Borger, he glanced over at Kurt. “Phillips is willing to spend money to get what he wants. But he’s not an easy man to work for. Him and his brother just bought the refinery, and he’s got a crew from Oklahoma coming in Monday to take over.”
Kurt leaned back as much as he could. “Yeah, I noticed last night. I thought they were just up in Oklahoma.” He glanced down. “How’s the leg, Jake?”
Jake shrugged. “Never going to get any better. I was surprised we survived the Saint-Mihiel battle, and then they threw us into that cluster at Côte de Châtillon. Jake banged his hand on the steering wheel. That fucking far, and I get a damned bullet in the knee when we were supposedly safe! If you hadn’t dragged my ass out of there and got that tourniquet on—”
Kurt shook his head. “It’s the past, Jake, drop it. I did what anybody would have done.”
Meanwhile, in the back of the truck, Shorty was regaling Leroy and Tiny with what he knew about Jake Sanchez, and added quietly, “Boss don’t know it, but I saw him fight once. It was a smoker between the Thirty-Seventh and Seventy-Ninth Divisions. He was just a sergeant then, before Black Jack gave him a battlefield promotion, but…” He shuddered. “He just beat our best fighter in the ground, and didn’t hit him but three times. Broke ribs with two body shots, and a right cross that laid Irish McGonagall out cold in about fifteen seconds. He didn’t even break a sweat.”
Tiny nodded. “Yeah, he’s one o’ them Texas Germans, from Fredericksburg. You don’t cross them boys.”
Two hours later, Sanchez pulled up at a tank farm on the east side of Borger. Everybody got out and stretched, looking around. A number of derricks fed four tanks in front of them, and a Model T tanker was pumping from the tanks. “This one is pretty active, and it’s the first one I’d do, as they get four tankers a day out here.”
Kurt kicked at the dirt, hitting rock a couple of inches down, and looked at Leroy. “This…is not easy to cut down thirty inches.”
Leroy walked over to the berm around the tanks and came back. “Yeah, gonna have to use them poppers like we used over at Tyler. I still got McMurtrie on my crew and I’m pretty sure we’ll need some more giant powder.” Leroy looked at Sanchez. “Where we gonna run the pipeline?”
Sanchez pointed south to the ridge. “South to the base of the ridge, then follow the base of it to the refinery. It’s basically downhill all the way, so no pumping.”
Leroy shook his head. “Shit! Definitely gonna have to use poppers. What’s the distance?”
“A little over a mile,” Sanchez replied.
“Five or six days, Boss.” Leroy said with a sigh.
Kurt wrote that down in his notebook, along with the other notes he’d already taken.
***
By four o’clock, they had looked at the other four tank farms that Phillips wanted pipelines from and Kurt had filled six or seven pages with notes. Sanchez dropped them back at the tent camp a little before six o’clock, and Kurt gathered them in a corner of the cook tent. “Anybody think we can do more than a thousand feet a day?” All three of his team leads shook their heads, and Leroy said, “We might be lucky to get a thousand feet a day, Boss.”
Kurt sighed. “I don’t want to relocate up to Borger, that is a corrupt town, and old man Borger has everybody under his thumb, including the cops. Hell, there are more bars up there than I ever saw in France, and we’ve had prohibition for what, six years now?”
Tiny asked, “How we goin’ to get to work, if’n we stay down here, Boss?”
Kurt replied, “I’ll try to rent either another bus or a truck. We can pack folks in and—”
Shorty interrupted, “Boss, we’re gonna need guards up there. At least six, maybe eight.” Kurt bit his lip as Shorty continued, counting off on his fingers, “Our tools, the pipeline itself, the tar pot truck,” he shrugged. “And you know Ace Borger is the majority owner of the tank trucks, so he ain’t gonna like anybody cuttin’ in on his bidness.”
(C) 2026 JL Curtis All Rights Reserved
