In fine, can we not, black and white, rich and poor, look forward to a world of Service without Servants?
A miracle! you say? True. And only to be performed by the Immortal Child.
Jesus Christ in Texas
It was in Waco, Texas.
The convict guard laughed. “I don’t know,” he said, “I hadn’t thought of that.” He hesitated and looked at the stranger curiously. In the solemn twilight he got an impression of unusual height and soft, dark eyes. “Curious sort of acquaintance for the colonel,” he thought; then he continued aloud: “But that nigger there is bad, a born thief, and ought to be sent up for life; got ten years last time—”
Here the voice of the promoter, talking within, broke in; he was bending over his figures, sitting by the colonel. He was slight, with a sharp nose.
“The convicts,” he said, “would cost us $96 a year and board. Well, we can squeeze this so that it won’t be over $125 apiece. Now if these fellows are driven, they can build this line within twelve months. It will be running by next April. Freights will fall fifty percent. Why, man, you’ll be a millionaire in less than ten years.”
The colonel started. He was a thick, short man, with a clean-shaven face and a certain air of breeding about the lines of his countenance; the word millionaire sounded well to his ears. He thought—he thought a great deal; he almost heard the puff of the fearfully costly automobile that was coming up the road, and he said:
“I suppose we might as well hire them.”
“Of course,” answered the promoter.
The voice of the tall stranger in the corner broke in here:
“It will be a good thing for them?” he said, half in question.
The colonel moved. “The guard makes strange friends,” he thought to himself. “What’s this man doing here, anyway?” He looked at him, or rather looked at his eyes, and then somehow he felt a warming toward him. He said:
“Well, at least, it can’t harm them; they’re beyond that.”
“It will do them good, then,” said the stranger again.
The promoter shrugged his shoulders. “It will do us good,” he said.
But the colonel shook his head impatiently. He felt a desire to justify himself before those eyes, and he answered: “Yes, it will do them good; or at any rate it won’t make them any worse than they are.” Then he started to say something else, but here sure enough the sound of the automobile breathing at the gate stopped him and they all arose.
“It is settled, then,” said the promoter.
“Yes,” said the colonel, turning toward the stranger again. “Are you going into town?” he asked with the Southern courtesy of white men to white men in a country town. The stranger said he was. “Then come along in my machine. I want to talk with you about this.”
They went out to the car. The stranger as he went turned again to look back at the convict. He was a tall, powerfully built black fellow. His face was sullen, with a low forehead, thick, hanging lips, and bitter eyes. There was revolt written about his mouth despite the hangdog expression. He stood bending over his pile of stones, pounding listlessly. Beside him stood a boy of twelve—yellow, with a hunted, crafty look. The convict raised his eyes and they met the eyes of the stranger. The hammer fell from his hands.
The stranger turned slowly toward the automobile and the colonel introduced him. He had not exactly caught his name, but he mumbled something as he presented him to his wife and little girl, who were waiting.
As they whirled away the colonel started to talk, but the stranger had taken the little girl into his lap and together they conversed in low tones all the way home.
In some way, they did not exactly know how, they got the impression that the man was a teacher and, of course, he must be a foreigner. The long, cloak-like coat told this. They rode in the twilight through the lighted town and at last drew up before the colonel’s mansion, with its ghostlike pillars.
The lady in the back seat was thinking of the guests she had invited to dinner and was wondering if she ought not to ask this man to stay. He seemed cultured and she supposed he was some acquaintance of the colonel’s. It would be rather interesting to have him there, with the judge’s wife and daughter and the rector. She spoke almost before she thought:
“You will enter and rest awhile?”
The colonel and the little girl insisted. For a moment the stranger seemed about to refuse. He said he had some business for his father, about town. Then for the child’s sake he consented.
Up the steps they went and into the dark parlor where they sat and talked a long time. It was a curious conversation. Afterwards they did not remember exactly what was said and yet they all remembered a certain strange satisfaction in that long, low talk.
Finally the nurse came for the reluctant child and the hostess bethought herself:
“We will have a cup of tea; you will be dry and tired.”
She rang and switched on a blaze of light. With one accord they all looked at the stranger, for they had hardly seen him well in the glooming twilight. The woman started in amazement and the colonel half rose in anger. Why, the man was a mulatto, surely; even if he did not own the Negro blood, their practised eyes knew it. He was tall and straight and the coat looked like
