“Angèle, don’t think for one moment that I do not thank you for Sunday. … My heart is at your feet for what you revealed to me then. But you and I have nothing in common, have never had, and now can never have. More than race divides us. I think I shall go away. Meanwhile you are to forget me; amuse yourself, beautiful, charming, magnetic Angel with the men of your own race and leave me to my own.
It was such a strange letter; its coldness and finality struck a chill to her heart. She looked at the lonely signature, “Anthony”—just that, no word of love or affection. And the phrase: “More than race divides us.” Its hidden significance held a menace.
The letter was awaiting her return from work. She had come in all glowing with the promise of the future as she conceived it. And then here were these cold words killing her high hopes as an icy blast kills the too trusting blossoms of early spring. … Holding the letter she let her supper go untasted, unregarded, while she evolved some plan whereby she could see Anthony, talk to him. The tone of his letter did not sound as though he would yield to ordinary persuasion. And again in the midst of her bewilderment and suffering she was struck afresh with the difficulties inherent in womanhood in conducting the most ordinary and most vital affairs of life. She was still a little bruised in spirit that she had taken it upon herself to go to Anthony’s rooms Sunday; it was a step she felt conventionally, whose justification lay only in its success. As long as she had considered it successful, she had been able to relegate it to the uttermost limbo of her self-consciousness. But now that it seemed to avail nothing it loomed up before her in all its social significance. She was that creature whom men, in their selfish fear, have contrived to paint as the least attractive of human kind—“a girl who runs after men.” It seemed to her that she could not stand the application of the phrase, no matter how unjustly, how inaptly used in her own case.
Looking for a word of encouragement she reread the note. The expression “My heart is at your feet” brought some reassurance; she remembered, too, his very real emotion of Sunday, only a few days before. Men, real men, men like Anthony, do not change. No, she could not let him go without one last effort. She would go to Harlem once more to his house, she would see him, reassure him, allay his fears, quench his silly apprehensions of non-compatability. As soon as he knew that they were both coloured, he’d succumb. Now he was overwrought. It had never occurred to her before that she might be glad to be coloured. … She put on her hat, walked slowly out the door, said to herself with a strange foreboding: “When I see this room again, I’ll either be very happy, or very, very sad. …” Her courage rose, braced her, but she was sick of being courageous, she wanted to be a beloved woman, dependent, fragile, sought for, feminine; after this last ordeal she would be “womanly” to the point of ineptitude. …
During the long ride her spirits rose a little. After all, his attitude was almost inevitable. He thought she belonged to a race which to him stood for treachery and cruelty; he had seen her with Roger, Roger, the rich, the gay; he saw her as caring only for wealth and pleasure. Of course in his eyes she was separated from him by race and by more than race.
For long years she was unable to reconstruct that scene; her mind was always too tired, too sore to reenact it.
As in a dream she saw Anthony’s set, stern face, heard his firm, stern voice: “Angel-girl—Angèle I told you not to come back. I told you it was all impossible.”
She found herself clutching at his arm, blurting out the truth, forgetting all her elaborate plans, her carefully preconcerted drama. “But, Anthony, Anthony, listen, everything’s all right. I’m coloured; I’ve suffered too; nothing has to come between us.”
For a moment off his guard he wavered. “Angèle, I didn’t think you’d lie to me.”
She was in tears, desperate. “I’m not lying, Anthony. It’s perfectly true.”
“I saw that picture of your mother, a white woman if I ever saw one—”
“Yes, but a white coloured woman. My father was black, perfectly black and I have a sister, she’s brown. My mother and I used to ‘pass’ sometimes just for the fun of it; she didn’t mind being coloured. But I minded it terribly—until very recently. So I left my home—in Philadelphia—and came here to live—oh, going for white makes life so much easier. You know it, Anthony.” His face wan and terrible frightened her. “It doesn’t make you angry, does it? You’ve passed yourself, you told me you had. Oh Anthony, Anthony, don’t look at me like that! What is it?”
She caught at his hand, following him as he withdrew to the shiny couch where they both sat breathless for a moment. “God!” he said suddenly; he raised his arms, beating the void like a madman. “You in your foolishness, I in my carelessness, ‘passing, passing’ and life sitting back laughing, splitting her sides at the joke of it. Oh, it was all right for you—but I didn’t care whether people thought I was white or coloured—if we’d only known—”
“What on earth are you talking about? It’s all right now.”
“It isn’t all right; it’s worse than ever.” He caught her wrist. “Angel, you’re sure you’re not fooling me?”
“Of course I’m not. I have proof, I’ve a sister right here in New York; she’s away just now. But when she comes back, I’ll have you meet her. She is brown and lovely—you’ll want to paint her—don’t you
