Peace Is Better

On they went. A lot of the cars they shared the road with were little Japanese machines: Datsuns and Toyotas, Hondas and Mazdas. Their sales had boomed since gas went through the roof after the first oil embargo. To Bill, they all seemed the size of roller skates. If he hit one with the Mighty Mo, he could bring it home on his fender like a moose — if he noticed the accident at all.

Also on the road heading for Port Orford were smoke-spewing eighteen-wheelers hauling this, that, and the other thing to the harbor for export. More big trucks heading east carried what came into Port Orford, as well as lumber from the nearby mountainsides and fish and crabs pulled out of the Pacific. Gilbert Gable would have been proud had he lived to see it.

Once they came out of the mountains, the land fell swiftly toward the sea. The Mighty Mo’s temperature gauge dropped, too. Bill watched it with relief. The massive car had been working hard. The Gable Memorial Highway joined US 101 a mile or so north of Port Orford. Bill drove south on the 101 almost to the breakwater-protected harbor. He turned left on Seventh and went a couple of blocks to Jackson.

At the corner there, an enormous American flag flew on a tall aluminum pole topped by a gilded eagle. An equally huge flag of Jefferson, pine-green with the gold-pan state seal in the middle, waved beneath it. They fluttered over the land of the free, the home of the brave, and an auto dealership whose sign proclaimed it FUJITA DATSUN OF PORT ORFORD in big red neon letters.

“We’re here,” Bill announced, pulling onto the lot. A local TV news van had already parked there. The cameraman was checking something on his equipment. The reporter, his hair sprayed so the breeze couldn’t get playful, gabbed with a couple of newspapermen Bill recognized. He asked, “What time you got, Barbara?”

His publicist was left-handed, so she wore her watch on her right wrist. She raised it to her face to read the tiny women’s-style dial. “It’s a quarter to twelve, Governor,” she answered.

“Good. Thanks. We aren’t late.” Bill parked two spaces from the news van. Not showing up on time here would have been embarrassing but not unforgivable. He’d really worried when he went to Eureka to meet the Yeti Lama. He’d made it — and the Heiwa Maru, the holy yeti’s ship, came into port an hour late. Well, it let him and Barbara grab lunch.

He got out of the car and stretched. The Mighty Mo was as comfortable for a sasquatch as any car was likely to be, but standing up felt good just the same. He smiled at the shiny new Datsuns on the lot, mileage proudly painted on their windshields. He might have been able to drive some of the bigger ones from the trunk. A sleek little 280ZX? Not even that way — not a chance.

The hairsprayed reporter waved to him. “How’s it going, Governor?”

“Not bad, Stu,” Bill answered easily. “Always good to get out and let the people take a look at me.”

“I guess it is,” Stu said. “And there’s a lot of you to look at.” In a different tone of voice, that would have pissed Bill off. But the TV guy didn’t mean anything by it. He was just talking to hear himself talk. Bill let it slide.

A car salesman walked up. He might have come right from Central Casting. Hair sprayed even stiffer than Stu’s. Porn-actor mustache. Loud wide tie straight out of 1973. Gold Qiana shirt. Plaid jacket made from what looked like the hide of a particularly ugly furnished-apartment sofa. Polyester pants with white belt. White shoes. There he stood, a gladhanding cliché.

“Welcome to Fujita Datsun, Governor Williamson. Welcome to Port Orford. I’m Dave Jenkins.” He stuck out his hand. As Bill carefully shook it, Jenkins went on, “Shall I tell Nobuo you’re here?”

Like many of his kind, he had a gift for the obvious. But Bill had the politician’s gift for putting up with such people. “That would be good,” he said, and left it right there.

Dave Jenkins hurried away. He came back a deferential pace and a half behind the dealership’s founder and owner. Nobuo Fujita was in his late sixties, short and skinny. His close-cropped gray hair receded at the temples. He wore a charcoal-gray suit, a white shirt, and a sober navy tie.

He looked more like a dentist than someone who sold cars. A dentist, though, wasn’t likely to be carrying a sheathed samurai sword. Well, neither were most automobile dealers.

“Thank you for coming, Governor,” he said in fluent but accented English. “You do this simple businessman too much honor.”

Bill paused a moment to make sure the reporters and cameramen were in place. Seeing they were, he answered, “I don’t think so, sir. After all, this is the tenth anniversary of the opening of Fujita Datsun. And you first visited Port Orford a lot longer ago than 1969.”