“Once or twice when I was very little, there was an uncle of mine, my mother’s brother, Uncle Benoit Payzold, that used to come calling on us, but only when Daddy was away. I always thought he looked like a light-complected darky. My mother never talked about him. He was a gambler, and he drifted off somewheres and I don’t know if he’s alive today or dead.
“I asked my mother wasn’t Uncle Benoit a colored man, and she slapped me and told me to be still, and I went and forgot it till just now. I guess maybe I made myself forget it, and I think my mother did, too. I think she knows about us, about our being–-You know.
“She had a voodoo lodestone that, she told me one time, came from Martinique, maybe a hundred and fifty years ago, and then long afterwards I couldn’t find it, and I asked her where it was, and she got mad and said there never had been such a stone. I don’t know. Maybe I just imagined it. But you mustn’t punish Neil if he tried to tell the truth.”
Dr. Kenneth was triumphing, “There, you see, Neil? Your mother’s had the sense and the magnificent will-power to simply forget evil and only look upon the good, like the Bible says…. Mother, I want you to simply forbid Neil to go around trying to convince himself and everybody else that this miserable business is true.”
His wife wondered, “I don’t know, Kenny. If it is true–-”
Robert turned hysterical then. “Mother! God is going to curse you for making a nigger out of me, when I’m really white and decent, and I’m getting so successful–-I’m going insane! You and Neil have driven me absolutely dotty, and it’s a dirty fake, and all because of a damn-fool lodestone that could of come from anywheres and you don’t even know for sure it existed!… Alice! Don’t you see I’m white, darling? It’s a lie and I’m white and our kids are white! They are! I’m not going to be ruined by any lunatic like Neil! I’m white, and God help any bastard that comes around trying to prove different. Look at me, Alice!”
She did.
* * * * *
Pat Saxinar’s voice was precise and frigid.
“All of you are assuming that you are superior to the ‘colored people,’ which isn’t obvious to me at all. I’ve been infuriated by discrimination against extremely nice colored sailors, and I’ve wanted to do something about it, and now that I’m colored myself, I shall!”
The chorus, this time, was catastrophic, and it lasted for many minutes, while Neil turned toward Vestal.
She had ardently said nothing at all. When he had a chance to mutter “Well?” she answered, “I must think it over. Naturally, I’m a little surprised.”
After one o’clock, her eyes told Neil that it was time to go home, and, with nothing whatever settled, with even his father determined to stay up all night and exclaim, it was hard for Neil and Vestal to break away.