From Place to Place

masters who had been kindly and gracious and whose memories thereby were affectionately perpetuated; these were mainly of a generation now growing into middle age. Others-I am spe

worth Junius Courtney Jones, of colour, would be his janitor and sweep out his office for him. Yet others had been named after white children-and s

nstances amounting in the

by way of a bedroom in a large white house on Tilghman Avenue and was at the b

Hildegarde a

ffluent quarters of our thriving little city four more Rowena Hildegardes, of tender years

th deliberate intent, the name of a person of undoubted African descent. However, at this stage to reveal the circumstances governing this phenomenon would be t

and music-growing steadily louder as the unseen singer drew nearer. The music was a lusty, deep-

lovin'

n' up de hi

n' git to hea

heaben d

assionate entreaty, then rising in the

at lion dow

n dat li

pl

one chained

d dat deadl

r-e

lean. Her under lip was shoved forward as though permanently twisted into a spout-shape by the task of holding something against the gums of her lower front teeth, and from one side of her mouth protruded a bit of wood with the slivered bark on it. One versed in the science of forest

awn at an angle. In all things about her-in her gait, despite its limp, in her pose, her figure-there was something masterful, something dominating, someth

hine of the late afternoon. But before she was out of hearing she had made it plain that not only a loving mother and a loving father, but likewise a loving brother and a loving

heard in the oak trees upon the lawn, where they were holding one of their excited powwows, served to destroy the illusion that a dead quiet had descended upon a spot lately racked by loud sounds. The well-dressed young ma

pirits to-day," he said with a wry smile. "I don't know that I ever

girl who sat alongside hi

ot to carry on like that here at the front of the house we've asked her a hundred times. It's bad

d of her altogether as a reme

, Aunt Sharley has always been in our family! Why, she's just like one of us-just like

mancipation?" Then catching the hurt look on her flushed face he dropped his raillery and hastened to make amends. "Well, never mind. You're the sweetest slave girl I ever met-I guess you're the sweetest one that ever lived. Besides, she's gone-probably won

seemed no more than a minute, seeing that he was in love and time always speeds fast for a lover with his sweetheart, the old black woman came hurrying back up the side stre

ief. Hastily and guiltily the young man released his hold upon a slim white hand which somehow had found its way inside his own. The sharp eyes of the old negress snapped. She gave a grunt as she withdrew her head. It was speed

go away, won't you?

in slightly strained, somewhat artificial voice, which to the understanding of the anno

t you, Aun

s little more

hadn't you better be

supper. Ise bound de supper'll be ready 'f

ir continued to

her hands with a ges

lained under her breath. "Au

sper was a suggestion of the proprietorial tone. Also for the first time in his life he addressed her without the prefix of Miss be

door. She makes me nervous. Don't be afraid of the old nuisance. This is your house, isn't it-yours and your sister's? Well, then, I

rs to hear the dialogue. His sweetheart's voice came to him only in a series of murmurs, but for him there was no difficulty about distinguishing the replies, for the replies were pitched in a strident, belliger

an' by dat I realise' I'd done lef' you 'lone in dis house wid a young man dat's a stranger yere, an' so I come right back. And yere I is, honey, and yere I stays. . . . Whut's dat you sayin'? De gen'l'man objec's? He do, do he?" The far-carrying voice rose shrilly and scornfully. "Well, let him! Dat's his privilege. Jes' let him keep on objectin' long ez he's a mind to. 'Tain't gwine 'fluence me none. . . . I don't keer none ef he do heah me. Mebbe it mout do him some good ef he do heah me. Hit'll do him good, too, ef he heed me, I lay to dat.

o a burning cheek, Emmy Lou returned to he

at she said?" she as

I imagine the people next door heard it, too,

screetly down. "There's no use trying to do anything with her. We've tried and tried and tried, but she just will have her way. She doesn't seem to understand

d with a great and burning sympathy for the down-trodden

in her instinct to come to t

ere sick. Why, Harvey, she couldn't have been more loyal or more devoted or more self-sacrificing than she has been through all these years while we were growing up. I know she loves us with every drop of blood in her veins. I kn

she's terribly aggravating at times. It's almost unbearable to have her playing

n Street the to

tantly he stirred and sat up in t

supper," he hinted. For one Northern born, young Mr. Harvey Winslow was

ee, she regards you as a person of great importance. That's why she's putting on so many airs now. If it was one of the home boys that I've known always that was here with me she wouldn't mind it a bit. But with you it's different, and she's on her

good deal to learn about the quaint and interesting tribal customs of this co

hall and returned to her special domain at the back of the house. Left alone, the girl sat on the porch with her troubled face cupped in her hands and a furrow of perplexity spoiling her smooth white brow. Presently the gate latch click

ddy blouse and fanning her flushed face with the broad ends of her sailor tie. Then observing her sister's despon

Emmy Lou's simmering indignat

nuff stick of hers stuck in the corner of her mouth, and singing that terrible song of hers at the very top of her lungs and wearing that scandalous old straw hat

absent offender. Before Emmy Lou was done baring the burden of

one she picks on. Why, don't you remember, Em, how just here only the other day she jumped on me because I went on the moonlight excursion aboard the Sophie K. Foster with Sidney Baumann?-told me right to my face I ought to be spanked and put to bed for daring to run round with 'codfish aristocracy'-the very words she used

es by going with anybody who isn't quality folks until I'm sick and tired of the words. She has quality folks on the brain! Does she

sound of a limping

arley briefly. "You chillen come ri

ted upon them. She was glumly silent herself, but occasionally she broke, or rather she punctuated, the silence with little sniffs

ell, 'tain't no use fur nobody to be poutin' an' sullin'. 'Tain't gwine do 'em no good. 'Tain't gwine budge me nary hair's brea'th frum whut I

e marched with her hea

belles. Once, when they had first returned from finishing school the year before, a neighbouring lady, meeting Aunt Sharley on the street, had been moved to ask whether the girls had

stiferously noisy. Abroad her worshipful pride in, and her affection for, the pair she had reared shone through her old black face as though a lamp of many candle power burned within her. She might chide them at will, and she did, holding this to be her prerogative and her right, but whoso

he debit page. The last caller had gone. Aunt Sharley, after making the rounds of the house to see to door boltings and window latchings, had hobbled upstairs to her own sleeping quarters over the kitchen wing, and in the elder sister's room, with the lights turned low, the two of them sat in their ni

ther who had been just and a mother who had been mercifully kind and gentle. First one would play the part of devil's advocate, the while the other de

ess sacrifices on behalf of them. The average Northerner, of whatsoever social status, would have been hard put to it either to comprehend the true inwardness of the relationship that existed between these girls of one race and this old woman of another or to

is faithful, loving, cantankerous, crotchety old soul. Aunt Charlotte had been born in servitude, the possession of their mother's mother. She had been their mother's handmaiden before their mother's marriage. Afterward she had been their own

fied his affectionate regard for the black woman by leaving her a little cottage with its two acres of domain near the railroad tracks. Regardless though of the fact that she was now a landed proprietor and thereby exalted before the eyes of her own race, Aunt Sharley had elected to go right on living beneath the Dabney roof. In the latter years of Mrs. Dabney's lif

altogether shrewd and competent negress had not figured after some fashion or other: as foster parent, as unofficial but none the less capable guardian, as confidante, as overseer,

fterward turned out to be good ones, had chiseled a good half off their income from the estate. It was Aunt Sharley who, when the question of going away to boarding school rose, had joined by invitation in the conference on ways and means with the girls' guardians, Judge Priest and Doctor Lake, and had cast her vote and her voice in favour of the same old-fashioned seminary that their mother in her girlhood had attended. The sisters themselves had rather

l she herself was satisfied that her chillen's clothes would be as ample and as ornate as the clothes which any two girls at the boarding school possibly could be expected to have. It was Aunt Sharley who packed their trunks for them, who kissed them good-by at the station, all three of them being in tears, and who, when the train had vanished down the tracks to the southward, had gone back to the empty house, t

King James' Son just as the child was about to be kissed by a knickerbockered admirer who failed to measure up to Aunt Sharley's jealous requirements touching on quality folks; and, following this, had engaged in a fight with the disappointed little boy's coloured attendant, who resented this slur upon the social standing of her small char

nd apron when serving meals. She was forever quarrelling with the neighbours' servants, with delivery boys, with marketmen and storekeepers. By sheer obstinacy she defeated all their plans for hiring a second servant, declaring that if they dared bring another darky on the place she would take pleasure in scalding the interloper with a kettle of boiling water. She sat in self-imposed judgment upon their admirers, ruthlessly rejecting those courtiers who did not measure up to her arbitrary standards for appraising the local aristocracy; and toward such of the young squires as fell under the ban of her disfavour she deported herself in such fash

tude. But it is the small things that are most annoying usually, and, besides, the faults of the old woman were things now of daily occurrence and recurrence, w

vernight, as it were, and she could not be made to comprehend the fact. In their case the eternal conflict between yo

and they agreed that never had there been such a paradox of part saint and part sinner, part black ogre and part black angel, as their Auntie was, created into a troubled world, and that something should be done to re

ay exactly similar in its pett

nslow, the hero or villain of the hammock episode previously described in this narrative. He did not venture, though, to suggest a definite

was no one whose consent had actually to be obtained. Both the girls were of age; as their own master they enjoyed the use and control of their cosy little inheritance. Except for an aunt who lived in New Orleans and some cousins scattered over the West, they were without kindred. Th

ill there was nothing begrudged or forced about the vocal jubilations with which she made the house ring during the succeeding week. At prayer meeting on Wednesday night at Zion Coloured Baptist Church and at lodge meeting on Friday n

es from being domineering. Along with divers other qualities it had taken masterfulness for him at twenty-nine to be superintendent of our street-railway system, now owned and operated by Northern capitalists. Likewise it had taken masterfulness for him to distance the field of Emmy Lou's local admirers within the space of

to Aunt Sharley. The girls came upon the old woman in one of her busiest moments. She was elbows deep in a white mass which in due time would become a batc

hile," stated the

n we're afraid that you're getting alo

Aunt Sharley, and she jerked her han

mean we all think so

e of one sister to the face of the other, reading their looks. "Uh-huh!" she snorted. "I mout 'a' knowed he'd be de ver' one to come

should make a change in the running of the house. So-so--" She hesitated, then broke off altogether, anxious though she was to make an end to what she foresaw must be a painful scene for all

Go on, chile-quit mumblin' up yore words an' please go on an' tell me whut you got to say! But ef you's fixin' to bring up de subjec' of my lettin' ary one of dese yere young flighty-haided, flibbertigibbeted,

We couldn't leave Mildred alone, and until she gets married this is going to be home for us all. And so we're afraid-with one more coming into the household and e

; say it, whu

here altogether and went to live in that nice

she hid the look behind the fit of rage that instantly possessed her. Perhaps they mistook the

of me-tryin' to t'row me aside lak an' ole worn-out broom? Well, I ain't

will have your own little home and your own little garden. You can come to see us-come every day if you want to. We'll come to see you. Things between us

t isn't as if you were going clear out of our lives

on mill! Think Ise gwine be corntent to wuk in a gyarden whilst I knows Ise needed right yere to run dis place de way which it should be run! Think Ise gwine set quiet whilst Ise pulled up by de roots an' transported 'way frum de house whar Ise spend purty nigh de whole of my endurin' life! Well,

y own chillens wants to drive me away frum

mfort her, tried to put their arms about her, both of them crying too. At the touch of their arms stealing about her hunched shoulders she straightened, showing a spark of the spirit with

pain, though their owner strove to keep them firm. With their own faces tear-streaked and with lumps in their throats the girls kept their heads averted, as though they had been caught doing something very wrong, and made poor pr

ured by hours and almost by minut

ying something, but she, too, held her tongue until they had risen up from their places. From within the passage

gwine leave de premises. Ise gwine camp right dere on de sidewalk an' dere I means to stay twell de policemens teks me up fur a vagrom. De shame of i

ple who trooped in to say the things which people always say on such occasions-such things, for example, as that young Mr. Winslow should count himself a lucky man and that Emmy Lou would make a lovely bride; that he should be the proudest young man in the Union and she the happiest girl in the state, and all

olerable. Then, in despair, seeing no way out at all, she went to a certain old white house out on Clay Street to confide in one to whom many another had turned, seeking

uch at home beneath its roof as beneath her own, Emmy Lou, without knocking, walked into the hall and turning to the right entered the big sitting room. Its lone occupant sat up with a jerk,

comin' a-tall." He took her small hands in his broad pudgy ones, holding her off at arm's length. "And don't you look purty! Mighty nigh any woman looks cool and sweet when she's got on white fixin's, but when a girl like you puts 'em on-well, child, there

ou, sir, on the sofa, if

ourself

of her hands into his. Her free hand played with one of the big buttons on the front of her

s you 'way out here to my h

nd he saw the brooding in her eyes and g

dred's when we were still minors that I hate to come now worrying you wit

e when he named us two as the guardians of his children, and it was a pleasure to both of us to help look to your interests after he was took from us. Why, when your mother went too, I'd a' liked the best in the world to have adopted you two children outrigh

ey that I came to see yo

visit from her h

day?" she as

gittin' hisself engaged to a member of the Dabney family, and she wanted to know ef his folks were the real quality folks and not this here codfish aristocracy: That was the very term she used-'codfish aristocracy.' Well, I was able to reasshore her. You see, honey, I'd took it on myself to do a little inquirin' round about Mr. Winslow on my own responsibility-not that I wanted to be pryin' into your business and not because I aimed to be try

"We weren't even engaged then. Who coul

e private investigation. So you see I was qualified to reasshore Aunt Sharley. I told her all the available information on the subject proved the young gentleman in question was not only a mighty clever, up-standin', manly young feller, but that where he hailed from he belonged to the quality folks, which really was the p'int she seemed most anxious about. That's whut I to

to see you. And you didn't tell me, either, when

ned Judge Priest. "So I respected whut I took to be her wishes in the m

d because I know now better than ever before how much she really loves me, those things make it all the harder to tell you wh

us we oughter be able to find a way out of the difficulty, whutever it is. S'pose, honey,

mes, she kept on until she came to the end of her tragi

d neither will Harvey budge an inch. He says she must go; she tells me every day she won't go. This has been going on for a week now and I'm almost distracted. At what should be the happiest time in a

to begin now by disobeying him-by going counter to his wishes. And I can understand his position too. To him she's just an unreasonable,

r all these years she must have a nice little sum saved up. I can't remember when she spent anything on herself-she was always so thrifty about money. At least she was careful about our expenditures, and of course she must have been about her own. So it can't be that. Harvey puts it down to plain stubbornness. He says after the first wrench of the separation is over she ought to be happier, when she's

unt Sharley say?

makes a different excuse or she gives a different reason every morning; she seems to spend her nights thinking them up. Sometimes I think she is keeping something back fro

knows more about me-my habits, my likes and my dislikes, my private business and my private thoughts and all-than I know myself. And I know jest egsactly ez much about his real self-whut he thinks and whut he does behind my back

adfastly at h

's mighty nigh extinct, ez you might say. Us Southern people are powerfully given, some of us, to tellin' whut we've done fur the black race-and we have done a lot, I'll admit-but sometimes I think we're prone to furgit some of the things they've done fur us. Hold on, honey," he add

raight at her he

affair that's makin' you unhappy. It seems like to me I heared somewheres that you first met this young man of you

rst went to Knollwood, Harvey had just been sent South to t

in me, I suppose, and afterward, when he had worked his way up and had been promoted to the superintendency, his company bought

owed you here-or rather it jest so happened by a coincidence that he was sent here. Well, I don't know ez I blame him-for being interested, I mean. It strikes me that in addition to

d out of his voice. Hi

fur old Aunt Sharley this great thing that's come into your life probably never would have come into it? What ef I was to tell you that if it

that be?" Her widened eyes b

, it was worse snarled up than you two children had any idea of. Two or three of the heaviest investments your father made in the later years of his life weren't turnin' out very well. The taxes on 'em amounted to mighty nigh ez much ez whut the income frum 'em did. We didn't aim to pester you two girls with all the details, so we sort of kept 'em to ourse

ying nothing,

s, and that you were beginnin' to talk about goin' and that it was high time fur you to be gittin' ready to go, and, in brief, she wanted to know whut about it? We told her jest how things stood-that under the terms of your father's will practically everything you owned was entailed-held in trust by us-until both of the heirs had come of age. We told her that, with your consent or without it, we didn't have the power to sell off any

st-born ones never had the advantages of a college education, but she said she didn't keer whut people somewheres else might do-that the daughters of her kind of quality folks went to college and that you two were goin', so that all through your lives you could hold up your heads with the finest in the land. You never seen anybody so set and determined about a thing ez that old woman was. We tried explainin' to her and we tried arguin' with her, and Lew Lake tried losin' his temper with her, him bein

me out strong in favour of Knollwood and that after a while we seemed to give in? Well, child, I've got a little confession to make to you now along with a bigger one later on: That was all a little piece of by-play that had been planned out in advance

y fixin's to wear whilst you was away and why you had ez much pin money to spend ez any other two girls there was because that old woman lived on less'n i

nt out the words in the letters we wrote her so that she could read them. I don't understand how the poor good old ign

ut she's got laid by kin only represent the savin's of four or five years, not of a whole lifetime. And when she said to you that she couldn't leave you to go to live in that little house that your father left her in his will she wasn't speakin' a lie. She can't go there to live because it ain't hers-she don't own it any more. Over

nning to run down her cheeks. They ran faster and faster. She gave a great sob and th

I've been so cruel to her, so heartless! Oh, Judge Priest, why did you and

her should

e impulses in this world too noble to be interfered with or hampered or thwarted, and some sacrifices so fine that none of us should try to spoil 'em by settin' up ourselves and our own wills in the road. That's how I felt. That

have been spared the cruel thing I've done? Why didn't she come out and tell us when we went to her and I told he

ty an' entitled to hole up they haids wid de fines' in de land. I don't want never to have dem demeaned by lettin' dem know or by lettin' ary other pusson know dat an old black nigger woman furnished de money to help mek fine young ladies of 'em. So long ez I live,' s

rdin' was never made public. Whut's the good of my bein' the circuit judge of this district without I've got influence enough with the county clerk to see that a small real-estate transaction kin be kept frum pryin' eyes? So you see only five people knowed anything a-tall about that sale, and only three of them knowed the true facts, and now I've told you, and s

ough the brimming tears her

to know, because I'm going to tell them. I'll be a prouder and a happier girl when they do know, all of them, than I've ever been in my whole life. And I w

n'," said Judge Priest. "Anyhow, I expect to be kept busy durin' the next few days keepin

nd thing I do. But the first thing I am going to do is to go straight back home as fast as I can walk a

yin' bee with her that'll answer every purpose. Jest put your young arms round her old neck and cry a spell with her. It

her smile was like sunshine in the midst of a shower. "I'll begin by kissing he

surprise. Do you know who's going to be the matron of honour a

up at her q

ung man is goin' to have t

can find some other girl

min' frum you," said Judge Priest. "He will ef he's the kin

ext in importance to that of the contracting pair and the maid of honour, but apparently in active and undisputed charge of the principal details. However, being well-bred persons, they did not betray their astonishment by word,

town who bore the names of white friends and white patrons, but to my knowledge there was never but one white child named for a black person. The child thus distinguished was a girl child, the first-born of