The Fire in the Flint

revolted against dining in the same room, however large, with a “nigger.” So indignant had he been that he had taken it up with the president. Benign, kindly, clearheaded, and patriarchal, the older man calmly and dispassionately and without rancour had shown Gordon the injustice of his position⁠—how unfair it was to deny an education to a man for the sole offence of having been born with a black skin. Before he quite knew how it had happened, Gordon found himself ashamed of what now was seen to be petty nastiness on his part. So interested had he become after his eyes were thus opened that he had made a special study of the Negro problem. After finishing both his college and law courses, he had returned to Atlanta to practise law with his father. His interest in the race question had increased since his return. He was now one of that liberal and intelligent few who are most free from prejudice an emancipated Southerner. Some inner voice told Kenneth instantly that greatest hope of the three lay in David Gordon⁠—and men like him.⁠ ⁠…

The introductions completed, Dr. Scott opened the conversation.

“Doctor, we’ve heard of the society you’ve started in Central City. Tell us how you’re getting along.”

“You have heard of it?” asked Kenneth in surprise. He did not know his fame had preceded him.

“Oh, yes,” answered Dr. Scott. “You see, I know a man in the Klan headquarters here. They’ve got, so I understand, a pretty full account of your movements.”

“They honour me,” laughed Kenneth, a note of irony in his voice. He was not a physical coward⁠—threats bothered him little. He had paid little attention to the report of the Klan meeting at Central City, though it had worried his mother and Bob considerably. No more would he be perturbed by any reports of his activities the Klan might have in their files.

“Then, too, Judge Stevenson’s been writing me about you,” continued Dr. Scott. “We are all interested in what you’re doing, Doctor, and we want you to talk frankly. You can to us,” he added.

The three men were genuinely interested in the plan on which Kenneth was working. They were too intelligent to fail to see that something would have to be done towards adjustment of race relations in the South to avert an inevitable clash. What that something was they did not know. They felt the time was not ripe for a challenge to the existing order, and they would not, in all probability, have been willing to issue such a fiat had the time been propitious. Yet they were anxious to examine the plans of this coloured man, hoping against hope that therein might lie an easy solution of the problem.

Frankly and clearly Kenneth told of the simple scheme. Occasionally one of his hearers would interrupt him with a question, but for the most part they heard him through in silence. The story ended, the three men sat in silence as each revolved in his mind the possibilities of the plan. John Anthony was the first to speak, and then he approached the whole race problem instead of Kenneth’s plan for attacking one phase of it.

“Doctor,” asked Mr. Anthony, “do you believe there is any solution to the race problem? Just what is the immediate way out, as you see it?”

“It would take a wiser man than I to answer that,” laughed Kenneth. “You see, we’re in the habit of thinking that we can find a simple A-B-C solution for any given problem, and the trouble is there are mighty few that are simple enough for that.”

“Yes⁠—yes⁠—I know all that,” interjected Mr. Anthony, rather testily. “What I want to hear is what you, as an intelligent Negro, think. I want you to tell us exactly what men like you are saying among yourselves.”

“Well, we’re talking about lynching⁠—poor schools⁠—the way Negroes are denied the ballot in the South” began Kenneth.

“Er⁠—that’s a thing we can’t discuss,” hastily interrupted Dr. Scott. “Conditions in the South are too unsettled to talk about giving the Negro the vote as yet.”

“As yet,” echoed Kenneth. “If we can’t discuss it now, when can we talk about it?”

“It’ll be a long time,” answered Dr. Scott frankly. “There are a lot of white people in the South who know disfranchisement is wrong. We know that we can’t keep the ballot from the Negro always. But,” he ended with a shrug of his shoulders and a thrusting-out of his hands, palms upward, in a gesture of perplexity and despair Kenneth was learning to know so well that he was associating it instinctively with the Southern white man, “we’d stir up more trouble than we could cope with.”

“And while you’re waiting for the opportune time, conditions are getting steadily worse, the problem is getting more complicated, and it’ll be harder to solve the longer you put off trying to solve it,” urged Kenneth. It was with an effort that he kept out of his voice the impatience he felt. “Why don’t men like you three band together with those who think as you do, so you can speak out?” he asked.

“That’s just what we are trying to do, but we have to go very cautiously,” answered Dr. Scott. “We must use discretion. How much are Negroes thinking about voting?”

“They think about it all the time,” replied Kenneth. “We know the mere casting of a ballot isn’t going to solve all our problems, but we also know we’ll never be able to do much until we do vote.”

“You must be patient⁠—wait until the time is ripe⁠—” cautioned Dr. Scott.

“Patience can be a vice as well as a virtue.” It was David Gordon who spoke.

Kenneth looked at him gratefully.

“Your race’s greatest asset,” continued Dr. Scott, addressing his remark to Kenneth, yet seeking to impart a gentle rebuke to Gordon, “has been its wonderful gentleness under oppression. You must continue to be sweet-tempered and patient⁠—”

“That’s all very well to advise, but how would you or any other white man act