The Conquest: The Story of a Negro Pioneer

by Oscar Micheaux

  CHAPTER XXV

  THE SCOTCH GIRL

  It had been just four years since I bought the relinquishment and sevensince leaving southern Illinois. I had been very successful in farmingalthough I had made some very poor deals in the beginning, and when mycrops were sold that season I found I had made three thousand, fivehundred dollars. Futhermore, I had in the beginning sought to secure thebest land in the best location and had succeeded. I had put two hundredeighty acres under cultivation, with eight head of horses--I had done alittle better in my later horse deals--and had machinery, seed and feedsufficient to farm it. My efforts in the seven years had resulted in theownership of land and stock to the value of twenty thousand dollars andwas only two thousand dollars in debt and still under twenty-five yearsof age.

  During the years I had spent on the Little Crow I had "kept batch" allthe while until that summer. A Scotch family had moved from Indiana thatspring consisting of the father, a widower, two sons and two daughters.One of the boys worked for me and as it was much handier, I boarded withthem.

  The older of the two girls was a beautiful blonde maiden of twentysummers, who attended to the household duties, and considering the smallopportunities she had to secure an education, was an unusuallyintelligent girl. She had composed some verses and songs but not knowingwhere to send them, had never submitted them to a publisher. I securedthe name of a company that accepted some of her writings and paid herfifty dollars for them. She was so anxious to improve her mind that Itook an interest in her and as I received much literature in the way ofnewspapers and magazines and read lots of copy-right books, I gave themto her. She seemed delighted and appreciated the gifts.

  Before long, however, and without any intention of being other thankind, I found myself being drawn to her in a way that threatened tobecome serious. While custom frowns on even the discussion of theamalgamation of races, it is only human to be kind, and it was only myintention to encourage the desire to improve, which I could see in her,but I found myself on the verge of falling in love with her. To makematters more awkward, that love was being returned by the object of mykindness. She, however, like myself, had no thought of being other thankind and grateful. It placed me as well as her in an awkwardposition--for before we realized it, we had learned to understand eachother to such an extent, that it became visible in every look andaction.

  It reached a stage of embarrassment one day when we were reading avolume of Shakespeare. She was sitting at the table and I was standingover her. The volume was "Othello" and when we came to the climax whereOthello has murdered his wife, driven to it by the evil machinations ofIago, as if by instinct she looked up and caught my eyes and when I cameto myself I had kissed her twice on the lips she held up.

  After that, being near her caused me to feel awkwardly uncomfortable. Wecould not even look into each other's eyes, without showing the feelingthat existed in the heart.

  Now during the time I had lived among the white people, I had kept myplace as regards custom, and had been treated with every courtesy andrespect; had been referred to in the local papers in the mostcomplimentary terms, and was regarded as one of the Little Crow's bestcitizens.

  But when the reality of the situation dawned upon me, I became in a wayfrightened, for I did not by any means want to fall in love with a whitegirl. I had always disapproved of intermarriage, considering it as beingabove all things, the very thing that a colored man could not even thinkof. That we would become desperately in love, however, seemedinevitable.

  * * * * *

  Lived a man--the history of the American Negro shows--who had been theforemost member of his race. He had acquitted himself of many honorabledeeds for more than a score of years, in the interest of his race. Hehad filled a federal office but at the zenith of his career had broughtdisappointment to his race and criticism from the white people who hadhonored him, by marrying a white woman, a stenographer in his office.

  They were no doubt in love with each other, which in all likelihoodovercame the fear of social ostracism, they must have known would followthe marriage. I speak of love and presume that she loved him for in myopinion a white woman, intelligent and respectable and knowing what itmeans, who would marry a colored man, must love him and love him dearly.To make that love stronger is the feeling that haunts the mind; theknowledge that custom, tradition, and the dignity of both races areagainst it. Like anything forbidden, however, it arouses the spirit ofopposition, causing the mind to battle with what is felt to beoppression. The sole claim is the right to love.

  These thoughts fell upon me like a clap of thunder and frightened me themore. It was then too, that I realized how pleasant the summer justpassed had been, and that I had not been in the least lonesome, butperfectly contented, aye, happy. And that was the reason.

  During the summer when I had read a good story or had on mind to discussmy hopes, she had listened attentively and I had found companionship. IfI was melancholy, I had been cheered in the same demure manner. Yet, onthe whole, I had been unaware of the affection growing silently; drawingtwo lonesome hearts together. With the reality of it upon us, we wereunable to extricate ourselves from our own weak predicament. We triedavoiding each other; tried everything to crush the weakness. God hasthus endowed. We found it hard.

  I have felt, if a person could only order his mind as he does his limbsand have it respond or submit to the will, how much easier life wouldbe. For it is that relentless thinking all the time until one's mindbecomes a slave to its own imaginations, that brings eternal misery,where happiness might be had.

  To love is life--love lives to seek reply--but I would contend withmyself as to whether or not it was right to fall in love with this poorlittle white girl. I contended with myself that there were good girls inmy race and coincident with this I quit boarding with them and went tobatching again, to try to successfully combat my emotions. I continuedto send her papers and books to read--I could hardly restrain theinclinations to be kind. Then one day I went to the house to settle withher father for the boy's work and found her alone. I could see she hadbeen crying, and her very expression was one of unhappiness. Well, whatis a fellow going to do. What I did was to take her into my arms and inspite of all the custom, loyalty, or the dignity of either Ethiopian orthe Caucasian race, loved her like a lover.

  * * * * *

  It was during a street carnival at Megory sometime before the Tippcounty opening, when one afternoon in company with three or four whitemen, I saw a nice looking colored man coming along the street. It wasvery seldom any colored people came to those parts and when they did, itwas with a show troupe or a concert of some kind. Whenever any coloredpeople were in town, I had usually made myself acquainted and welcomedthem--if it was acceptable, and it usually was--so when I saw this youngman approaching I called the attention of my companions, saying, "Thereis a nice-looking colored man." He was about five feet, eleven, of alight brown complexion, and chestnut-like hair, neatly trimmed. He woreglasses and was dressed in a well-fitting suit that matched hiscomplexion. He had the appearance of being intelligent and amiable.

  I was in the act of starting to speak, when one of the fellows nudged meand whispered in my ear, that it was one of the Woodrings from a town ashort distance away in Nebraska, who was known to be of mixed blood butnever admitted it.

  According to what I had been told, the father of the three boys wasabout half negro but had married a white woman, and this one was theyoungest son. Needless to say I did not speak but kept clear of him.

  There is a difference in races that can be distinguished in thefeatures, in the eyes, and even if carefully noted, in the sound of thevoice.

  It seemed the family claimed to be part Mexican, which would account forthe darkness of their complexion. But I had seen too many differentraces, however, to mistake a streak of Ethiopian. Having been in Mexico,I knew them to be almost entirely straight-haired (being a cross betweenan Indian and a Spaniard). When I observed
this young man, I readilydistinguished the negro features; the brown eyes, the curly hair, andthe set of the nose.

  The father had come into the sand hills of Nebraska some thirty-fiveyears before, taken a homestead, but from where he came from no oneseemed to know. It was there he married his white wife, and to the unionwas born the three sons, Frank, the eldest, Will, and Len, the youngest.

  The father sold the homestead some twenty years before and moved toanother county, and had run a hotel since in the town of Pencer, wherethey now live.

  Unlike his younger brother, Frank, the eldest son, could easily havepassed for a white, that is, so long as no one looked for the streak.But when the fellow whose timely information had kept me fromembarrassing myself, and perhaps from insulting the young man, a fewminutes later called out, "Hello, Frank!" to a tall man, one lookdisclosed to my scrutiny the negro in his features. I was not mistaken.It was Frank Woodring.

  In view of the fact, that in some chapters of this story I dwell on thenegro, and on account of the insistence of many of them who declare theyare deprived of opportunities on account of their color, I take theprivilege of putting down here a sketch of this Frank Woodring's life.And although these people deny a relation to the negro race, it was wellknown by the public in that part of the country, that they were mixed,for it had been told to me by every one who knew them, therefore theinstance cannot be regarded altogether as an exception.

  Shortly after coming to Pencer, he went to work for an Iowa man on aranch near by, and later a prosperous squaw-man, who owned a bank, tookhim in, where in time he became book-keeper and all round handy man,later assistant cashier. The ranchman whom Woodring had worked forprevious to entering the bank, bought the squaw-man out, made Woodringcashier, and sold to him a block of stock and took his note for theamount. In time Woodring proved a good banker and his efficientmanagement of the institution, which had been a State bank with acapital stock of twenty-five thousand dollars, had been incorporatedinto a National bank and the capital increased to fifty thousanddollars, and later on to one hundred thousand dollars. He dealt inbuying and selling land as well as feeding cattle, on the side, and hadprospered until he was soon well-to-do. Coincident with this prosperityhe had been made president of not only that bank--whose footing was neara half-million dollars--but of some other three or four local banks inNebraska, also a Megory county bank at Fairview--which is the countydepository--and a large bank and trust company at the town of Megory,with a capital stock of sixty thousand dollars. Today Frank Woodring isone of the wealthiest men in northwest Nebraska.

  The local ball team of their town was playing Megory that day, and a fewhours later out at the ball park, I was shouting for the home team withall my breath, the batter struck a foul, and when I turned to look wherethe ball went, there, standing on the bench above me, between two whitegirls, and looking down at me with a look that betrayed his mind, wasLen Woodring. Our eyes met for only the fraction of a minute but I readhis thoughts. He looked away quickly, but I shall not soon forget thatmoment of racial recognition.

  Everything grew so rank, thick and green.]

  And now when I found my affections in jeopardy regarding the love of theScotch girl, I thought long and seriously over the matter, and picturedmyself in the place of the Woodring family, successful, respected,and efficient business men, but still members of the down-trodden race.I pondered as to whether I could make the sacrifice. Maybe they werehappy, the boys had never known or associated with the race they denied,and maybe were not so conscientious as myself, although the look ofLen's had betrayed what was on his mind.

  I had learned that throughout these Dakotas and Nebraska, that otherlone colored men who had drifted from the haunts and homes of the race,as I had--maybe discontented, as I had been--and had with time andnatural development, through the increase in the valuation of theirhomesteads or other lands they had acquired, grown prosperous and hadfinally, with hardly an exception, married into the white race. Even thedaughter of the only colored farmer between the Little Crow and Omahawas only prevented from marrying a white man, at the altar, when it wasfound the law of the state forbids it.

  I could diagnose their condition by my own. Life in a new country isalways rough in the beginning. In the past it had taken ten and fifteenyears for a newly opened country to develop into a state of cultivationand prosperity, that the Little Crow had in the four years.

  At the time it had been opened to settlement, the reaction from theeffects of the dry years and hard times of 93-4 and 5 had set in and atthat time, with plenty of available capital, the early extension of therailroad, and other advantages too numerous to mention, life had beenquite different for the settlers. Such advantages had not been the lotof the homesteader twenty and thirty years before.

  These people had no doubt been honorable and had intended to remainloyal to their race, but long, hard years, lean crops, and the long,lonesome days had changed them. It is easier to control the thoughtsthan the emotions. The craving for love and understanding pervades thevery core of a human, and makes the mind reckless to even such a gravematter as race loyalty. In most cases it had been years before thesepeople had the means and time to get away for a visit to their oldhomes, while around them were the neighbors and friends of pioneer days,and maybe, too, some girl had come into their lives--like this one hadinto mine--who understood them and was kind and sympathetic. Whatworried me most, however, even frightened me, was, that after marriageand when their children had grown to manhood and womanhood, they, likethe Woodring family, had a terror of their race; disowning and denyingthe blood that coursed through their veins; claiming to be of someforeign descent; in fact, anything to hide or conceal the mixture ofEthiopian. They looked on me with fear, sometimes contempt. Even themixed-blood Indians and negroes seemed to crave a marriage with thewhites.

  The question uppermost in my mind became, "Would not I become like that,would I too, deny my race?" The thought was a desperate one. I did notfeel that I could become that way, but what about those to come afterme, would they have to submit to the indignities I had seen some ofthese referred to, do, in order that they may marry whites and try tobanish from memory the relation of a race that is hated, in manyinstances, for no other reason than the coloring matter in theirpigment. Would my life, and the thought involved and occupied my minddaily, innocent as my life now appeared, lead into such straits if Imarried the Scotch girl. It became harder for me, for at that time, Ihad not even a correspondence with a girl of my race. As I look backupon it the condition was a complicated affair. I confess at the time,however, that I was on the verge of making the sacrifice. This was dueto the sights that had met my gaze when I would go on trips to Chicago,and such times I would return home feeling disgusted.