One of the group of five had sighted Emma Lou as soon as she had sighted them:
“Who’s this?” queried Helen Wheaton, a senior in the College of Law.
“Some new ‘pick,’ I guess,” answered Bob Armstrong, who was Helen’s fiancé and a senior in the School of Architecture.
“I bet she’s going to take Pharmacy,” whispered Amos Blaine.
“She’s hottentot enough to take something,” mumbled Tommy Brown. “Thank God, she won’t be in any of our classes, eh Amos?”
Emma Lou was almost abreast of them now. They lowered their voices, and made a pretense of mumbled conversation among themselves. Only Verne Davis looked directly at her and it was she alone who returned Emma Lou’s smile.
“Whatcha grinnin’ at?” Bob chided Verne as Emma Lou passed out of earshot.
“At the little frosh, of course. She grinned at me. I couldn’t stare at her without returning it.”
“I don’t see how anybody could even look at her without grinning.”
“Oh, she’s not so bad,” said Verne.
“Well, she’s bad enough.”
“That makes two of them.”
“Two of what, Amos?”
“Hottentots, Bob.”
“Good grief,” exclaimed Tommy, “why don’t you recruit some good-looking co-eds out here?”
“We don’t choose them,” Helen returned.
“I’m going out to the Southern Branch where the sight of my fellow female students won’t give me dyspepsia.”
“Ta-ta, Amos,” said Verne, “and you needn’t bother to sit in my car any more if you think us so terrible.” She and Helen walked away, leaving the boys to discuss the sad days which had fallen upon the campus.
Emma Lou, of course, knew nothing of all this. She had gone her way rejoicing. One of the students had noticed her, had returned her smile. This getting acquainted was going to be an easy matter after all. It was just necessary that she exercise a little patience. One couldn’t expect people to fall all over one without some preliminary advances. True, she was a stranger, but she would show them in good time that she was worthy of their attention, that she was a good fellow and a well-bred individual quite prepared to be accepted by the best people.
She strolled out on to the campus again trying to find more prospective acquaintances. The sun was warm now, the grass dry, and the campus overcrowded. There was an infectious germ of youth and gladness abroad to which Emma Lou could not remain immune. Already she was certain that she felt the presence of that vague something known as “college spirit.” It seemed to enter into her, to make her jubilant and set her every nerve tingling. This was no time for sobriety. It was the time for youth’s blood to run hot, the time for love and sport and wholesome fun.
Then Emma Lou saw a solitary Negro girl seated on a stone bench. It did not take her a second to decide what to do. Here was her chance. She would make friends with this girl and should she happen to be a new student, they could become friends and together find their way into the inner circle of those colored students who really mattered.
Emma Lou was essentially a snob. She had absorbed this trait from the very people who had sought to exclude her from their presence. All of her life she had heard talk of “right sort of people,” and of “the people who really mattered,” and from these phrases she had formed a mental image of those to whom they applied. Hazel Mason most certainly could not be included in either of these categories. Hazel was just a vulgar little nigger from down South. It was her kind, who, when they came North, made it hard for the colored people already resident there. It was her kind who knew nothing of the social niceties or the polite conventions. In their own home they had been used only to coarse work and coarser manners. And they had been forbidden the chance to have intimate contact in schools and in public with white people from whom they might absorb some semblance of culture. When they did come North and get a chance to go to white schools, white theaters, and white libraries, they were too unused to them to appreciate what they were getting, and could be expected to continue their old way of life in an environment where such a way was decidedly out of place.
Emma Lou was determined to become associated only with those people who really mattered, northerners like herself or superior southerners, if there were any, who were different from whites only in so far as skin color was concerned. This girl, to whom she was now about to introduce herself, was the type she had in mind, genteel, well and tastily dressed, and not ugly.
“Good morning.”
Alma Martin looked up from the book she was reading, gulped in surprise, then answered, “Good morning.”
Emma Lou sat down on the bench. She was congeniality itself. “Are you a new student?” she inquired of the astonished Alma, who wasn’t used to this sort of thing.
“No, I’m a ‘soph,’ ” then realizing she was expected to say more, “you’re new, aren’t you?”
“Oh yes,” replied Emma Lou, her voice buoyant and glad. “This will be my first year.”
“Do you think you will like it?”
“I’m just crazy about it already. You know,” she advanced confidentially, “I’ve never gone to school with any colored people before.”
“No?”
“No, and I am just dying to get acquainted with the colored students. Oh, my name’s Emma Lou Morgan.”
“And mine is Alma Martin.”
They both laughed. There was a moment of silence. Alma looked at her wristwatch, then got up from the bench.
“I’m glad to have met you. I’ve got to see my advisor at ten-thirty. Goodbye.” And she moved away gracefully.
Emma Lou was having difficulty in keeping from clapping her hands. At last she had made some headway. She had met a second-year student, one who, from all appearances, was in the know,
