* * * * *

Neil said, “He knows.”

Vestal said, “Of course he does, my good man. Maybe everybody does, by now…. Do all the high-toned darkies live on Canoe Heights? Like this Dr. Melody?”

“I have no idea.”

“Don’t any of your—don’t you know any Negroes on Canoe Heights?”

“I didn’t say that! I didn’t say anything of the kind! I didn’t say I didn’t know any Negroes on Canoe Heights! I just said—all I said was that I didn’t know where Dr. Melody lives, and I don’t!”

“Oh, Neil, you never used to talk to me like that!”

“I know, and–-I’m sorry. Yes, let’s not squabble.” (He realized that superhumanly she was refraining from saying, “I wasn’t squabbling,” and that encouraged him.) “Let’s not let Them beat us by dividing us.”

“We won’t!… I don’t think we will.”

They wondered, then and every evening, how many of Them knew and what They were saying. It was a gasping relief to Vestal that as yet the neighborhood children were not taking it out on Biddy but continuing to see her only as the charming and ingenious imp who had always led them in producing incredible amounts of noise. All but Peggy Havock, next door. She had been Biddy’s acolyte, but now she rarely came out when Biddy clamored, and Vestal was sick as she watched Biddy, after yelling for Peggy, stand puzzled, slowly tracing a circle with her small red boot in the snow, staring at the Havock house, vainly waiting.

Most of the neighbors were extra cordial, and extra brief, on the Street. From their look it was evident that they were finding something new and objectionable in Neil, even in Vestal. The frankest was their gentle neighbor, Mr. Topman, who at over fifty was still a teller in the Merchants & Miners Bank.

He stopped Neil, to say humbly, “I am told that you have Negro blood, Neil. I must say I was surprised. I always thought that all Negroes were big and black and did a lot of thieving. Could I have been wrong?”

He spoke as to a tremendous authority, and authoritatively Neil put it, “You could be.”

“Now isn’t that interesting! Tell me, do the Negroes like it, when they go back to Africa?”

“I don’t suppose they go back.”

“They don’t? I never realized that. But I know a Swedish fellow that went back to the Old Country.”

“I think that’s different.”

“Is it? I just wanted to know. Tell me, Neil, do you know a Negro preacher down in Atlanta, Georgia—I read about him—his name was—well, I don’t recall it exactly, but it was something like George Brown—do you know who I mean?”

“I’m afraid I don’t.”

“Or it might have been Thomas. I thought you might know about him. Say, tell me—here’s something I’ve always been curious about. How much do these top-notch colored orchestra-leaders, say like Duke Ellington—how much do they make a year, net?”