On Sunday, Sam and Gray Ellen Jenks walked to St. Thomas’s for the ten o’clock mass. But Father Dennen was not there. The place was empty. The Negro janitor watched them warily from the sacristy as they stood, bewildered, in the center aisle of the little frame church. When he was sure they meant him no harm, he emerged into the sanctuary. “Father’s gone north,” he said.

“There’s no mass today?” Gray Ellen asked. This morning, it seemed very important to attend mass, to listen for reassurance in the old Latin prayers, to come away with at least a qualified blessing.

“All the whitefolks over at First Presbyterian. All the ministers, too.”

“How do you know?” Sam asked.

The janitor shrugged. “Man keep his ear to the ground, hear all kind of news.”

By the time they arrived at First Presbyterian Church, the meeting was already well under way. J. Allan Taylor was in the pulpit, addressing the crowd of ministers and white citizens. He was explaining the banishment policy. “And that,” he concluded, “is how we deal with agitators—now and in the future. Colored or white.”

All at once, Sam realized that was what had happened to Father Dennen.

“My God,” Gray Ellen said under her breath, “who do these people think they are?”

A minister Sam did not recognize stood up in the front pew and protested. “That’s illegal! What about a man’s rights under law?”

“Of course it’s not legal!” Taylor said. “Nothing is legal here just now. Where have you been? We’ve been fighting anarchy, and we’re trying to establish orderly government.” He went on to name all the leading citizens who had supported the actions to take back the government, beginning with Waddell, MacRae, and his brother Walker, all of whom were seated on choir chairs in the sanctuary. “Do you want to stand there and tell these men that they are not honorable men? Not the finest men in this city?”

There was a burst of applause, and the minister sat down.

Someone was missing, Sam realized: Captain Kenan.

The white pastor of Brooklyn Baptist Church, now an alderman, stood up and said, “In the riot on Thursday, the Negro was the aggressor.”

“Hear, hear!”

Gray Ellen said loudly, “Riot? It was a massacre.”

“I believe the whites were doing God’s service,” Taylor said. “Just consider all that has been done for the good of business, politics, and the church.”

The Reverend Peyton Hoge, presiding in his own church, ascended the pulpit. “Let us pray and give thanks to God,” he said, raising his eyes to the ceiling, hands upturned as though he were expecting rain. “ ‘He that ruleth his spirit is better than he that taketh a city.’ ” He lowered his eyes and swept a hand toward the men assembled behind him. “We have done both.”

“Amen,” said the congregation.