by Don Marquis
CHAPTER XVI
There's a lot of counties in Georgia where the blacks are equal innumber to the whites, and two or three counties where the blacks numberover the whites by two to one. It was fur a little town in one of thelatter that we pinted ourselves, Doctor Kirby and me and Sam--right intothe blackest part of the black belt.
That country is full of big-sized plantations, where they raise cotton,cotton, cotton, and then MORE cotton. Some of 'em raises fruit, too, andother things, of course; but cotton is the main stand-by, and it lookslike it always will be.
Some places there shows that things can't be so awful much changed sinceslavery days, and most of the niggers are sure enough country niggersyet. Some rents their land right out from the owners, and some of 'emcrops it on the shares, and very many of 'em jest works as hands. A lotof 'em don't do nigh so well now as they did when their bosses was theirmasters, they tell me; and then agin, some has done right well on theirown hook. They intrusted me, because I never had been use to looking atso many niggers. Every way you turn there they is niggers and then moreniggers.
Them that thinks they is awful easy to handle out of a natcheral respectfur white folks has got another guess coming. They ain't so bad to getalong with if you keep it most pintedly shoved into their heads theyIS niggers. You got to do that especial in the black belt, jest becausethey IS so many of 'em. They is children all their lives, mebby, tillsome one minute of craziness may strike one of them, and then he is adevil temporary. Mebby, when the crazy fit has passed, some white womanis worse off than if she was dead, or mebby she IS dead, or mebby aloonatic fur life, and that nigger is a candidate fur a lynching bee andginerally elected by an anonymous majority.
Not that ALL niggers is that-a-way, nor HALF of 'em, nor very MANY of'em, even--but you can never tell WHICH nigger is going to be. So in theblack belt the white folks is mighty pertic'ler who comes along foolingwith their niggers. Fur you can never tell what turn a nigger's thoughtswill take, once anything at all stirs 'em up.
We didn't know them things then, Doctor Kirby and me didn't. We didn'tknow we was moving light-hearted right into the middle of the biggestquestion that has ever been ast. Which I disremember exactly how thatnigger question is worded, but they is always asting it in the South,and answering of it different ways. We hadn't no idea how suspicious thewhite people in them awful black spots on the map can get over any onethat comes along talking to their niggers. We didn't know anything aboutniggers much, being both from the North, except what Doctor Kirby hadcounted on when he made his medicine, and THAT he knowed second-handedfrom other people. We didn't take 'em very serious, nor all the talk wehearn about 'em down South.
But even at that we mightn't of got into any trouble if it hadn't ofbeen fur old Bishop Warren. But that is getting ahead of the story.
We got into that little town--I might jest as well call itCottonville--jest about supper time. Cottonville is a little placeof not more'n six hundred people. I guess four hundred of 'em must beniggers.
After supper we got acquainted with purty nigh all the prominentcitizens in town. They was friendly with us, and we was friendly withthem. Georgia had jest went fur prohibition a few months before that,and they hadn't opened up these here near-beer bar-rooms in the littletowns yet, like they had in Atlanta and the big towns. Georgia had wentprohibition so the niggers couldn't get whiskey, some said; but otherssaid they didn't know WHAT its excuse was. Them prominent citizens wasloafing around the hotel and every now and then inviting each other verymysterious into a back room that use to be a pool parlour. They hadbeen several jugs come to town by express that day. We went back severaltimes ourselves, and soon began to get along purty well with themprominent citizens.
Talking about this and that they finally edges around to the onething everybody is sure to get to talking about sooner or later in theSouth--niggers. And then they gets to telling us about this here BishopWarren I has mentioned.
He was a nigger bishop, Bishop Warren was, and had a good deal of whiteblood into him, they say. An ashy-coloured nigger, with bumps on hisface, fat as a possum, and as cunning as a fox. He had plenty of brainsinto his head, too; but his brains had turned sour in his head the lastfew years, and the bishop had crazy streaks running through his sensenow, like fat and lean mixed in a slab of bacon. He used to be friendswith a lot of big white folks, and the whites depended on him at onetime to preach orderliness and obedience and agriculture and beingin their place to the niggers. Fur years they thought he preachedthat-a-way. He always DID preach that-a-way when any whites was around,and he set on platforms sometimes with white preachers, and he got gooddonations fur schemes of different kinds. But gradual the suspicion gotaround that when he was alone with a lot of niggers his nigger bloodwould get the best of him, and what he preached wasn't white supremacyat all, but hopefulness of being equal.
So the whites had fell away from him, and then his graft was gone,and then his brains turned sour in his head and got to working andfermenting in it like cider getting hard, and he made a few bad breaksby not being careful what he said before white people. But the niggersliked him all the better fur that.
They always had been more or less hell in the bishop's heart. He hadbrains and he knowed it, and the white folks had let him see THEY knowedit, too. And he was part white, and his white forefathers had been bigmen in their day, and yet, in spite of all of that, he had to herd withniggers and to pertend he liked it. He was both white and black in hisfeelings about things, so some of his feelings counterdicted others, andone of these here race riots went on all the time in his own insides.But gradual he got to the place where they was spells he hated bothwhites and niggers, but he hated the whites the worst. And now, in thelast two or three years, since his crazy streaks had growed as bigas his sensible streaks, or bigger, they was no telling what he wouldpreach to them niggers. But whatever he preached most of them wouldbelieve. It might be something crazy and harmless, or it might be crazyand harmful.
He had been holding some revival meetings in nigger churches right therein that very county, and was at it not fur away from there right then.The idea had got around he was preaching some most unusual foolishnessto the blacks. Fur the niggers was all acting like they knowed somethingtoo good to mention to the white folks, all about there. But some whitemen had gone to one of the meetings, and the bishop had preached one ofhis old-time sermons whilst they was there, telling the niggers to beorderly and agriculturous--he was considerable of a fox yet. But heand the rest of the niggers was so DERNED anxious to be thoughtagriculturous and servitudinous that the whites smelt a rat, and wishedhe would go, fur they didn't want to chase him without they had to.
Jest when we was getting along fine one of them prominent citizens aststhe doctor was we there figgering on buying some land?
"No," says the doctor, "we wasn't."
They was silence fur quite a little spell. Each prominent citizen hadmebby had his hopes of unloading some. They all looks a little sad, andthen another prominent citizen asts us into the back room agin.
When we returns to the front room another prominent citizen makesa little speech that was quite beautiful to hear, and says mebby werepresents some new concern that ain't never been in them parts and isfiggering on buying cotton.
"No," the doctor says, "we ain't cotton buyers."
Another prominent citizen has the idea mebby we is figgering on one ofthese here inter-Reuben trolley lines, so the Rubes in one village canride over and visit the Rubes in the next. And another one thinks mebbywe is figgering on a telephone line. And each one makes a very eloquentlittle speech about them things, and rings in something about our fairSouthland. And when both of them misses their guess it is time furanother visit to the back room.
Was we selling something?
We was.
Was we selling fruit trees?
We wasn't.
Finally, after every one has a chew of natcheral leaf tobaccer allaround, one prominent citizen makes so bold as to ast us v
ery courteousif he might enquire what it was we was selling.
The doctor says medicine.
Then they was a slow grin went around that there crowd of prominentcitizens. And once agin we has to make a trip to that back room. Furthey are all sure we must be taking orders fur something to beat thatthere prohibition game. When they misses that guess they all gets kindof thoughtful and sad. A couple of 'em don't take no more interest inus, but goes along home sighing-like, as if it wasn't no difference WHATwe sold as long as it wasn't what they was looking fur.
But purty soon one of them asts:
"What KIND of medicine?"
The doctor, he tells about it.
When he finishes you never seen such a change as had come onto the facesof that bunch. I never seen such disgusted prominent citizens in my hulllife. They looked at each other embarrassed, like they had been ketchedat something ornery. And they went out one at a time, saying good nightto the hotel-keeper and in the most pinted way taking no notice of us atall. It certainly was a chill. We sees something is wrong, and we beginsto have a notion of what it is.
The hotel-keeper, he spits out his chew, and goes behind his littlecounter and takes a five-cent cigar out of his little show case andbites the end off careful. Then he leans his elbows onto his counter andreads our names to himself out of the register book, and looks at us,and from us to the names, and from the names to us, like he is trying tofigger out how he come to let us write 'em there. Then he wants to knowwhere we come from before we come to Atlanta, where we had registeredfrom. We tells him we is from the North. He lights his cigar like hedidn't think much of that cigar and sticks it in his mouth and looks atus so long in an absent-minded kind of way it goes out.
Then he says we orter go back North.
"Why?" asts the doctor.
He chewed his cigar purty nigh up to the middle of it before heanswered, and when he spoke it was a soft kind of a drawl--not mad orloud--but like they was sorrowful thoughts working in him.
"Yo' all done struck the wo'st paht o' the South to peddle yo' niggahmedicine in, sah. I reckon yo' must love 'em a heap to be that concernedover the colour of their skins."
And he turned his back on us and went into the back room all by himself.
We seen we was in wrong in that town. The doctor says it will be no usetrying to interduce our stuff there, and we might as well leave therein the morning and go over to Bairdstown, which was a little place aboutten miles off the railroad, and make our start there.
So we got a rig the next morning and drove acrost the country. No onebid us good-bye, neither, and Doctor Kirby says it's a wonder theyrented us the rig.
But before we started that morning we noticed a funny thing. We hadn'tso much as spoke to any nigger, except our own nigger Sam, and hecouldn't of told ALL the niggers in that town about the stuff to turnniggers white, even if he had set up all night to do it. But every lastnigger we saw looked like he knowed something about us. Even after weleft town our nigger driver hailed two or three niggers in the road thatacted that-away. It seemed like they was all awful polite to us. Andyet they was different in their politeness than they was to them Georgiafolks, which is their natcheral-born bosses--acted more familiar,somehow, as if they knowed we must be thinking about the same thing theywas thinking about.
About half-way to Bairdstown we stopped at a place to get a drink ofwater. Seemingly the white folks was away fur the day, and an old niggercome up and talked to our driver while Sam and us was at the well.
I seen them cutting their eyes at us, whilst they was unchecking thehosses to let them drink too, and then I hearn the one that belongedthere say:
"Is yo' SUAH dat hit air dem?"
"SUAH!" says the driver.
"How-come yo' so all-powerful SUAH about hit?"
The driver pertended the harness needed some fixing, and they wentaround to the other side of the team and tinkered with one of thetraces, a-talking to each other. I hearn the old nigger say, kind ofwonderized:
"Is dey a-gwine dar NOW?"
Sam, he was pulling a bucket of water up out of the well fur us with awindlass. The doctor says to him:
"Sam, what does all this mean?"
Sam, he pertends he don't know what the doctor is talking about.But Doctor Kirby he finally pins him down. Sam hemmed and hawedconsiderable, making up his mind whether he better lie to us or not.Then, all of a sudden, he busted out into an awful fit of laughing, andlike to of fell in the well. Seemingly he decided fur to tell us thetruth.
From what Sam says that there bishop has been holding revival meetingsin Big Bethel, which is a nigger church right on the edge of Bairdstown,and niggers fur miles around has been coming night after night, and someof them whooping her up daytimes too. And the bishop has worked himselfup the last three or four nights to where he has been perdicting andprophesying, fur the spirit has hit the meeting hard.
What he has been prophesying, Sam says, is the coming of a Messiah furthe nigger race--a new Elishyah, he says, as will lead them from out'ntheir inequality and bring 'em up to white standards right on the spot.The whites has had their Messiah, the bishop says, but the niggers ain'tnever had none of their SPECIAL OWN yet. And they needs one bad, and oneis sure a-coming.
It seems the whites don't know yet jest what the bishop's beena-preaching. But every nigger fur miles on every side of Big Bethel isa-listening and a-looking fur signs and omens, and has been fur two,three days now. This here half-crazy bishop has got 'em worked up towhere they is ready to believe anything, or do anything.
So the night before when the word got out in Cottonville that we hadsome scheme to make the niggers white, the niggers there took up withthe idea that the doctor was mebby the feller the bishop had beenprophesying about, and for a sign and a omen and a miracle of his graceand powers was going out to Big Bethel to turn 'em white. Poor devils,they didn't see but what being turned white orter be a part of what theywas to get from the coming of that there Messiah.
News spreads among niggers quicker than among whites. No one knows howthey do it. But I've hearn tales about how when war times was there,they would frequent have the news of a big fight before the white folks'papers would. Soldiers has told me that in them there Philippine Islandswe conquered from Spain, where they is so much nigger blood mixed upwith other kinds in the islanders, this mysterious spreading around ofnews is jest the same. And jest since nine o'clock the night before, thenews had spread fur miles around that Bishop Warren's Messiah was on hisway, and was going fur to turn the bishop white to show his power andgrace, and he had with him one he had turned part white, and that wasSam, and one he had turned clear white, and that was me. And they was tobe signs and wonders to behold at Big Bethel, with pillars of cloud andsounds of trumpets and fire squirting down from heaven, like it alwaysuse to be in them old Bible days, and them there niggers to be ledsinging and shouting and rejoicing into a land of milk and honey,forevermore, AMEN!
That's what Sam says they are looking fur, dozens and scores andhundreds of them niggers round about. Sam, he had lived in town fiveor six years, and he looked down on all these here ignoramus countryniggers. So he busts out laughing at first, and he pertends like hedon't take no stock in any of it. Besides, he knowed well enough hewasn't spotted up by no Messiah, but it was the dope in the bottles doneit. But as he told about them goings-on Sam got more and more interestedand warmed up to it, and his voice went into a kind of a sing-song likehe was prophesying himself. And the other two niggers quit pertending tofool around the team and edged a little closeter, and a little closeteryet, with their mouths open and their heads a-nodding and the whites oftheir eyes a-rolling.
Fur my part, I never hearn such a lot of dern foolishness in all mylife. But the doctor, he says nothing at all. He listens to Sam rantingand rolling out big words and raving, and only frowns. He climbs backinto the buggy agin silent, and all the rest of the way to Bairdstownhe set there with that scowl on his face. I guesses he was thinking now,the way things had shaped up,
he wouldn't sell none of his stuff at allwithout he fell right in with the reception chance had planned fur him.But if he did fall in with it, and pertend like he was a Messiah tothem niggers, he could get all they had. He was mebby thinking how muchornerier that would make the hull scheme.
