The Banner was only one of a kind. It stood to the stranger and the man and woman without connections for the whole social life. It was a substitute—poor, it must be confessed—to many youths for the home life which is so lacking among certain classes in New York.
Here the rounders congregated, or came and spent the hours until it was time to go forth to bout or assignation. Here too came sometimes the curious who wanted to see something of the other side of life. Among these, white visitors were not infrequent—those who were young enough to be fascinated by the bizarre, and those who were old enough to know that it was all in the game. Mr. Skaggs, of the New York Universe, was one of the former class and a constant visitor—he and a “lady friend” called “Maudie,” who had a penchant for dancing to ragtime melodies as only the “puffessor” of such a club can play them. Of course, the place was a social cesspool, generating a poisonous miasma and reeking with the stench of decayed and rotten moralities. There is no defence to be made for it. But what do you expect when false idealism and fevered ambition come face to face with catering cupidity?
It was into this atmosphere that Thomas had introduced the boy Joe, and he sat there now by his side, firing his mind by pointing out the different celebrities who came in and telling highly flavoured stories of their lives or doings. Joe heard things that had never come within the range of his mind before.
“Aw, there’s Skaggsy an’ Maudie—Maudie’s his girl, y’know, an’ he’s a reporter on the N’Yawk Universe. Fine fellow, Skaggsy.”
Maudie—a portly, voluptuous-looking brunette—left her escort and went directly to the space by the piano. Here she was soon dancing with one of the coloured girls who had come in.
Skaggs started to sit down alone at a table, but Thomas called him, “Come over here, Skaggsy.”
In the moment that it took the young man to reach them, Joe wondered if he would ever reach that state when he could call that white man Skaggsy and the girl Maudie. The newcomer soon set all of that at ease.
“I want you to know my friend, Mr. Hamilton, Mr. Skaggs.”
“Why, how d’ye do, Hamilton? I’m glad to meet you. Now, look a here; don’t you let old Thomas here string you about me bein’ any old ‘Mr.!’ Skaggs. I’m Skaggsy to all of my friends. I hope to count you among ’em.”
It was such a supreme moment that Joe could not find words to answer, so he called for another drink.
“Not a bit of it,” said Skaggsy, “not a bit of it. When I meet my friends I always reserve to myself the right of ordering the first drink. Waiter, this is on me. What’ll you have, gentlemen?”
They got their drinks, and then Skaggsy leaned over confidentially and began talking.
“I tell you, Hamilton, there ain’t an ounce of prejudice in my body. Do you believe it?”
Joe said that he did. Indeed Skaggsy struck one as being aggressively unprejudiced.
He went on: “You see, a lot o’ fellows say to me, ‘What do you want to go down to that nigger club for?’ That’s what they call it—‘nigger club.’ But I say to ’em, ‘Gentlemen, at that nigger club, as you choose to call it, I get more inspiration than I could get at any of the greater clubs in New York.’ I’ve often been invited to join some of the swell clubs here, but I never do it. By Jove! I’d rather come down here and fellowship right in with you fellows. I like coloured people, anyway. It’s natural. You see, my father had a big plantation and owned lots of slaves—no offence, of course, but it was the custom of that time—and I’ve played with little darkies ever since I could remember.”
It was the same old story that the white who associates with negroes from volition usually tells to explain his taste.
The truth about the young reporter was that he was born and reared on a Vermont farm, where his early life was passed in fighting for his very subsistence. But this never troubled Skaggsy. He was a monumental liar, and the saving quality about him was that he calmly believed his own lies while he was telling them, so no one was hurt, for the deceiver was as much a victim as the deceived. The boys who knew him best used to say that when Skaggs got started on one of his debauches of lying, the Recording Angel always put on an extra clerical force.
“Now look at Maudie,” he went on; “would you believe it that she was of a fine, rich family, and that the coloured girl she’s dancing with now used to be her servant? She’s just like me about that. Absolutely no prejudice.”
Joe was wide-eyed with wonder and admiration, and he couldn’t understand the amused expression on Thomas’s face, nor why he surreptitiously kicked him under the table.
Finally the reporter went his way, and Joe’s sponsor explained to him that he was not to take in what Skaggsy said, and that there hadn’t been a word of truth in it. He ended with, “Everybody knows Maudie, and that coloured girl is Mamie Lacey, and never worked for anybody in her life. Skaggsy’s a good fellah,
