The patrons liked him and often kidded him about his sandy hair. “Boy, you’s too dark to have hair like that. Ain’t nobody but white folks s’posed to have sandy-colored hair. An’ your’n’s nappy at that!” Then Sandy would blush with embarrassment—if the change from a dry chocolate to a damp chocolate can be called a blush, as he grew warm and perspired—because he didn’t like to be kidded about his hair. And he hadn’t been around uncouth fellows long enough to learn the protective art of turning back a joke. He had discovered already, though, that so-called jokes are often not really jokes at all, but rather unpleasant realities that hurt unless you can think of something equally funny and unpleasant to say in return. But the men who patronized Pete Scott’s barber-shop seldom grew angry at the hard pleasantries that passed for humor, and they could play the dozens for hours without anger, unless the parties concerned became serious, when they were invited to take it on the outside. And even at that a fight was fun, too.

After a winter of Saturday nights at Pete’s shop Sandy himself became pretty adept at “kidding”; but at first he was timid about it and afraid to joke with grown-up people, or to give smart answers to strangers when they teased him about his crinkly, sand-colored head. One day, however, one of the barbers gave him a tin of Madam Walker’s and told him: “Lay that hair down an’ stop these niggers from laughin’ at you.” Sandy took his advice.

Madam Walker’s—a thick yellow pomade—and a good wetting with water proved most efficacious to the boy’s hair, when aided with a stocking cap—the top of a woman’s stocking cut off and tied in a knot at one end so as to fit tightly over one’s head, pressing the hair smooth. Thereafter Sandy appeared with his hair slick and shiny. And the salve and water together made it seem a dark brown, just the color of his skin, instead of the peculiar sandy tint it possessed in its natural state. Besides he soon advanced far enough in the art of “kidding” to say: “So’s your pa’s,” to people who informed him that his head was nappy.

During the autumn Harriett had been home once to see her mother and had said that she was working as chambermaid with Maudel at the hotel. But in the barber-shop that winter Sandy often heard his aunt’s name mentioned in less proper connections. Sometimes the boy pretended not to hear, and if Pete Scott was there, he always stopped the men from talking.

“Tired o’ all this nasty talk ’bout women in ma shop,” he said one Saturday night. “Some o’ you men better look after your own womenfolks if you got any.”

“Aw, all de womens in de world ain’t worth two cents to me,” said a waiter sitting in the middle chair, his face covered with lather. “I don’t respect no woman but my mother.”