do stylistic analysis

One afternoon, a Sunday, a new model TFord2
slowly came up
the hill and went past the house. The boy, who happened to see it
from the porch, ran down the steps and stood on the sidewalk. The
driver was looking right and left as if trying to find a particular ad
dress; he turned the car around at the corner and came back. Pulling
up before the boy, he idled his throttle and beckoned with a gloved
hand. He was a Negro. His car shone. The brightwork gleamed… I
am looking for a young woman of color whose name is Sarah, be said.
She is said to reside in one of these houses.
The boy realized he meant the woman in the attic. She’s here. The
man switched off the motor, set the brake and jumped down.
When Mother came to the door the colored man was respectful,
but there was something disturbingly resolute and selfimportant
in the way he asked her if he could please speak with Sarah. Mother
could not judge his age. He was a stocky man with a redcomplect
ed shining brown face, high cheekbones and large dark eyes so in
tense as to suggest they were about to cross. He had a neat mous
tache. He was dressed in the affection of wealth to which colored
people lent themselves.
She told him to wait and closed the door. She climbed to the
third floor. She found the girl Sarah not sitting at the window as
she usually did but standing rigidly, hands folded in front of her,
and facing the door. Sarah, Mother said, you have a caller. The girl
said nothing. Will you come to the kitchen? The girl shook her head.
You don’t want to see him? No, ma’am, the girl finally said softly,
while she looked at the floor. Send him away, please. This was the
most she had said in all the months she had lived in the house. Moth
er went back downstairs and found the fellow not at the back door
but in the kitchen where, in the warmth of the comer near the cook
stove, Sarah’s baby lay sleeping in his carriage. The black man was
kneeling beside the carriage and staring at the child. Mother, not
thinking clearly, was suddenly outraged that he had presumed to
come in the door. Sarah is unable to see you, she said and she held
the door open. The colored man took another glance at the child,
rose, thanked her and departed.
Such was the coming of the colored man in the car to Broad
view Avenue. His name was Coalhouse Walker Jr. Beginning with
that Sunday he appeared every week, always knocking at the back
door. Always turning away without complaint upon Sarah’s re
fusal to see him. Father considered the visits a nuisance and want
ed to discourage them. I’ll call the police, he said. Mother laid her
hand on his arm. One Sunday the colored man left a bouquet of
yellow chrysanthemums which in this season had to have cost him
a pretty penny.
The black girl would say nothing about her visitor. They had no
idea where she had met him, or how. As far as they knew she had no
family nor any friends from the black community in the downtown
section of the city. Apparently she had come by herself from New
York to work as a servant. Mother was exhilarated by the situation.
She began to regret Sarah’s intransigence. She thought of the drive
from Harlem, where Coalhouse Walker Jr. lived, and the drive back,
and she decided the next time to give him more of a visit. She would
serve tea in the parlor. Father questioned the propriety of this.
Mother said, he is wellspoken and conducts himself as a gentle
man. I see nothing wrong with it. When Mr Roosevelt3
was in the
White House he gave dinner to Booker T. Washington. Surely we
can serve tea to Coalhouse Walker Jr.
And so it happened on the next Sunday that the Negro took tea.
Father noted that he suffered no embarrassment by being in the parlor with a cup and saucer in his hand. On the contrary, he acted as if it
was the most natural thing in the world. The surroundings did not
awe him nor was his manner deferential. He was courteous and cor
rect. He told them about himself. He was a professional pianist and
was now more or less permanently located in New York, having se
cured a job with the Jim Europe Clef Club Orchestra, a wellknown
ensemble that gave regular concerts at the Manhattan4
Casino on 155th Street and Eighth Avenue. It was important, he said, for a musician to find a place that was permanent, a job that required no travelling… I am through travelling, he said. I am through going on the
road. He spoke so fervently that Father realized the message was in
tended for the woman upstairs. This irritated him. What can you play?
he said abruptly. Why don’t you play something for us?
The black man placed tea on the tray. He rose, patted his lips with
the napkin, placed the napkin beside his cup and went to the piano.
He sat on the piano stool and immediately rose and twirled it till the
height was to his satisfaction. He sat down again, played a chord and
turned to them. This piano is badly in need of a tuning, he said. Fa
ther’s face reddened. Oh, yes. Mother said, we are terrible about that.
The musician turned again to the keyboard. “Wall Street5
Rag,” he
said. Composed by the great Scott Joplin.6
He began to play. Illtunedor not the Aeolian had never made such sounds. Small clear chords
hung in the air like flowers. The melodies were like bouquets. There
seemed to be no other possibilities for life than those delineated by
the music. When the piece was over Coalhouse Walker turned on the
stool and found in his audience the entire family: Mother, Father, the
boy, Grandfather and Mother’s Younger Brother, who had come down
from his room in shirt and suspenders to see who was playing. Of all
of them he was the only one who knew ragtime. He had heard it in his
nightlife period in New York. He had never expected to hear it in his
sister’s home.
Coalhouse Walker Jr. turned back to the piano and said “The
Maple Leaf”. Composed by the great Scott Joplin. The most famous
rag of all rang through the air. The pianist sat stiffly at the key
board, his long dark hands with their pink nails seemingly with no
effort producing the clusters of syncopating chords and the thump
ing octaves. This was a most robust composition, a vigorous music
that roused the senses and never stood still a moment. The boy per
ceived it as light touching various places in space, accumulating in
intricate patterns until the entire room was made to glow with its
own being. The music filled the stairwell to the third floor where the mute and unforgiving Sarah sat with her hands folded and lis
tened with the door open.
The piece was brought to a conclusion. Everyone applauded. Moth
er then introduced Mr Walker to Grandfather and to Younger Brother,
who shook the black man’s hand and said I am pleased to meet you.
Coalhouse Walker was solemn. Everyone was standing. There was a
silence. Father cleared his throat. Father was not knowledgeable in
music. His taste ran to Carrie Jacobs Bond.7
He thought Negro music
had to have smiling and cakewalkmg. Do you know any coon songs?8
he said. He did not intend to be rude — coon songs was what they
were called. But the pianist responded with a tense shake of the head.
Coon songs are made for minstrel shows,9
he said. White men sing
them in blackface. There was another silence. The black man looked
at the ceiling. Well, he said, it appears as if Miss Sarah will not be able
to receive me. He turned abruptly and walked through the hall to the
kitchen. The family followed him. He had left his coat on a chair. He
put it on and ignoring them all, he knelt and gazed at the baby asleep
in its carriage. After several moments he stood up, said good day and
walked out of the door.