PRESERVATION PHOTOCOPY: ORIGINAL MATERIAL RESTRICTED

ly before them, and be an example of goodness, of truth, of beauty. This
long-sought, deeply desired revival of his faith had placed him on a high ty
height of glory and he felt almost as he had felt so long ago in the South when
he had first found the Lord. He began to pray as never before and saw him-
self strong, burning; a man of God.

He formally joined "The Holy Temple of Truth and was received with open arms
and much rejoicing by Father James and his flock. Father James was
a corpulent, shifty-eyed old negro who exuded charm and godliness from each
of his numerous pores. Gabriel was very favorably impressed with him and
described him as "God's right hand" in America. Father James was somewhat
inclined to this view himself, having done many mighty works, such as faith-
healing and the like and was the acknowledged foader and Pastor of some half-
dozen churches. He early befriended Gabriel that "The Holy Temple
of Truth" was his youngest enterprise and that he was hoping the Lord would
send him a young man to take over the job of pastor while he went on to
build new temples for the Lord. Gabriel received this information with
gracious attention, and walked home in a fervent glow of gratitude that
God had seen fit to send him to New York. He did not want earthly glory;
no, but God might have a work for him to do. And it would be wonderful to
be behind a pulpit again.

He prayed that God might have His will in his life and use him for his
glory and honor; and Father James confided to his aide-de-camp, Sister
Rebecca that Young Brother Grimes was a firebrand "fire-brand" for God
and he thought that he would set him to work taking up collection.

9

Roselia stood in the scarlet light reflected from the stained glass window

19

Rugged Cross" and she sang it well and fervently, a handsome and striking figure in her long, white robe.

"So I'll cling to the mix ol', rugged cross
Till my trophies at last I lay down
I will cling to the ol', rugged cross
An' exchange it some day for a crown."

The choir sat down and the smooth, young pastor arose to make announcements and to raise the offering. Benediction would be next and the drowsy congregation would be allowed to go home.

Roselia sat stiff and tortured, looking straight ahead. She knew what they were thinking. Her husband's done left her. Yes! For good. Chile, I don't blame him, I don't blame him a bit. He's left her. He's left her. He's gone.

Let them talk. Let them talk. She didn't care what they said. She was a better woman than any of them and that was why they hated her.

In the vestibule after service was over, and the congregation was gathered in small, vocal, transient groups, Sister Beckett approached her to ask about Frank.

"He's fin," Roselia said stiffly, staring intently at the back of the man in front of her.

"You oughta bring him out to Service sometime," Sister Beckett suggested cheerfully.

"Oh yes," Roselia said eagerly. "But you know how men are. Can't do nothin' with them."

"Can't you?" Sister Beckett asked sweetly. "The Lord wants us to do our duty,"
she added, as Roselia gave her a swift, sharp glance.

"Oh, Frank's alright," Roselia said tolerantly.

"It's just -- you know--

20

"I know," said Sister Beckett, "an' losts of others knows too."

"What do you mean?" Roselia flared.

"Why noth in'. Why nothin' duaghter. Why don't you bring Brother Duncan
out tonigh t? We'd be glad to see him."

"I'll try," Roselia whispered. The vestibule rolled; she was hot and breath-
less, she wanted to scream, Why didn't they leave her alone? She shot
Sister Beckett a venomous glance which one lady accepted with Christian
meekness.

"I' se knows you' s havin a hard time, Sister,"
she said. "if there's
anything I can do......"

"There's nothing needs to be done," Roselia snapped.

"Don't let pride get the best of you sister. "Pride goeth before a fall,"
said Sister Beckett.

"There's nothing wrong," Rose ia said with a spiteful smile, "If certain
people have nothing better to do than talk about things that don't concern
them--"

Sister Beckett refused to be offended. "Lord, chile,"
she said placidly.
"I'm only tryin' to help. I ain't got no time for gossip......"

"When I need your help, I'll ask," Roselia said. She brushed her lips
against the older woman's cheek. "Good-bye."

"You may need it someday," Sister Beckett said, smiling. Roselia started to
walk away; but Sister Julia Johnson, young, pretty and spiteful dashed up.

"Why Sister Duncan!" she shrilled. "I've been looking everywhere for you!

21

"Heard from him?" Sister Beckett asked innocently. "Why, is he left town?"

"Why yes," said Sister Johnson, "He's in St. Louis. Didn't you know? He's been there some time now." She turned to Roselia. "Haven't you heard from him?"

"Why....yes," Roselia said. "Only the other day....He's fine."

"You didn't tell me he was away," said Sister Beckett. "You said you was gonna bring him to church tonight."

Both women stared at Roselia with bright, watchful eyes.

"I....I wasn't thinking," Roselia said. She stared back defiantly, "He
"He is out of town....he寫...he writes me every day...." She could not
face their eyes. "He's coming back," she said.

"Is he?" asked Sister Johnson. "That's nice," she smiled.

"Frank often travels --- on business," said Roselia.

Sister Johnson laughed. "I know how it is," she said. "Ida sent you her
love."

Roselia said blankly: "Ida?"

"My cousin. She's in St. Louis, too."

Ida. Cheap, no-good Ida. She's in St. Louis, too. Ida. Frank and Ida.
Ida. The vestibule whirled sickeningly and she saw Frank's face, his dark
shining face and his black eyes. With Ida in St. Louis. With Ida. Ida.
She strangled a scream/kukk half-way thru' her lips and forced hokkaka her-
self to meet their watch ful faces.

22

She stared, and as she stared, her eyes grew hard and she smiled, carefully
she adjusted ahead, smooth smile over her desperation.

When you write again, give her mine," she said. "And now,"--- she
kissed Sister Johnson,--"I really must run."

The door swung behind her, swung on their mocking faces, rang hollowly in
her heart. She walked briskly down the crowded street, still smiling.
Faces passed her, blank empty faces, which she could not reach. Their
voices stung her nerves with pain, she was one mass of sensitive quivering
pain, the sound of her footsteps rang in her brain until her head seemed one
enormous drum on which a thousand madmen danced in glee.

She got a job three weeks later as a chamber-maid in the White Hotel.
Gabriel was working in the soda factory and seemed to be fairly well
satisfied. She hated her job. Triumphant mockery stared from the walls, she
heard it in every voice, felt it in every face. Her husband's left her.
Her husband's gone.

It was three o'clock. Two more hours to go. She started to the next floor,
fresh linen over her arm.

Here there was some sort of commotion. Three maids were gathered in front
of one of the rooms looking excited and helpless so people are want to do
in an accident. Roselia walked over to them.

"What's the matter?" she asked.

"She just passed out" one of the girls said helplessly, "jazzx "jus' like
that."

"I saw a girl, huddled on the floor, looking incredibly small and

23

sled. She was very pretty.

"My doesn't somebody do something?" Roselia said. She lifted the girl to
our feet and half-dragged her to a chair. "Get some water," she called.

Somebody put a glass of water in her hands. She forced a little of it thru
the girl's lips. There was no reaction. She sprinkled a little on her
face, slapped her, tried again.

The girl moaned, opened her yes, stared. She tried to rise.

"Don't move, honey," Roselia said, feeling a strange release in being tender
with so fragile and helpless a creature.

"I'm sorry," the girl smiled weakly.

"What has happened?" Roselia asked.

"I don't know. I guess it's the heat," the girl said. She tried to rise,
stumbled back against the chair. "I'm alright," she said.

"Maybe you better go home," one of the girls suggested.

"No, I'll be alright," she said. She stood up, smoothed her dress. "Thank you,
she said to Roselia.

They went back to work; Roselia and the girl working in rooms next to each
other. Roselia learned that her name was Bertha Clarke; she was from
North Carolina and was living alone in New York. She was twenty-one.

As they were checking out, Roselia invited her for supper the following Sunday,
out of some dull desire to form a shield against loneliness. Bertha accepted
a bit reluctantly.

24

Girl looked up. "Oh, yes," she said. "Yes, indeed. Thank you very much."
you'll come?"

Thanks so much."

re havin' com pany, Sunday," she hold Gabriel.

roe; appled it. sir; rosed/ "Wh o?"

girl who works with me downtown."

She a Christian?"

Roselia was annoyed. "Probably a better Christian than you are with all your
hoopin' and hollerin'".

"Be careful what you say about the Spriti of the Lord, Roselia."

"You be careful how you ride that high horse, Gabriel Grimes. I know plenty
people s'posed to be sanctified do things I wouldn't do. All that jumpin'
uppin' up and aix an' down's jus' plain ignorance. The Lord max don' want all the
that."

Gabriel rose, mighty in the strength of Jehovah. "God help you, my sister,"
he said. "I'm goin' to the house of God."

"I'd like to know how long you think you can keep runnin' out to that h ole-in-
the-wall every night an' go to work every day. Kapp Keep it up. They'll be
bringin' you home feet first before long."

"The Lord shall renew my strength," Gabriel said. He put on his hat and coat,
opened the door and left.

"Ol' black fool," Roselia muttered, taking the dished to the sink. "Jus' as k

washed and put away the dishes, thinking helplessly of Frank and wishing she could hear his voice. Then she went to her room and pulled out her Bible, true Story Magazine and a motion picture periodical and settled herself for the evening.

Sunday morning Bertha awoke, feeling nauseous and dull and debated whether she should accept Mrs. Duncan's invitation to dinner or go to a movie. Reviewing her finances, she decided finally in favor of the former course. She lay in bed, feeling too weak to move and stared at the ceiling.

She boarded with a Mrs. Redfield in the lower east side of Harlem. The place was a five room apartment, three of which rooms Mrs. Redfield rented furnished to whosoever of her race was able to pay what the sign over her stoop pro-claimed as "moderate rates."

The man who had left most recently had been caused Bertha to be with child.

It had been pretty easy, Bertha reflected, with her. She had been practically a pushover. Bertha Clarke, whom everyone had always referred to as a "good girl" was alone in New York and in trouble. She laughed, scornfully, weakly, and sat up.

She was afraid. She had no friends here, there was no one she could turn to and she couldn't go back home. She'd rather die first, she thought, and shuddered when she reflected that she might.

She sat on the edge of the bed in her shabby bathrobe, her hands between her knees. She could write her sister -- her sister would understand, would help her if she could. But she would be so ashamed to ask and to confess that she had held God's greatest gift to womanhood as lightly as a common whore.

41

She shivered and went to the window. She had never felt more frightened, a more desperately frightened in her life. There was a queer feeling in the pit of her stomach like a heavy lump of cold lead. She was alone, she was com pletely alone. She watched the Sunday morning crowds on th eir way to church. Young men, young girls, brightly dressed, carefree, laughing. Their voices floated up to her, gay, and mocking somehow symbolic of a youth that she felt she had lost forever. She could not imagine herself eve laughing like that again. She had fallen, she had fallen by the wayside, and sinned in the sight of God.

"God forgive me," she muttered, "God help me."

What would become of her child? She hated the small, nauseating flutter beneath her heart. She had heard, valuel y and obscenely, of ways of using preventing a child from being born, but she did not really know anything about it, and there was no one she could ask, and besided, it would be murder, it would be adding sin to sin.

She was h aunted by a spectre from her using adolescen ce in the South; her iron-bound aunt saying: "You's a black girl, Berth a. The world don't like black. If a white girl makes a mistake, it ain't so bad for her, 'cause she's white an' white folks own everything. But a nigger gal" --- she spat -- "Nigger gal ain't got nothin' but her virtue an' her God. If she loses them, she ain't got nothin', ain't nothin' in this world for a nigger but misery. Better stay close to God, honey. Ain't no white an' black with Him."

And it was rue, it was true. White folks owned the whole world, and a black girl didn't have a chance against them. The ways of the world were not for black people. If they ever got anywhere, there were always people who

42

Black girls work in the mills, in the kitchens, in the fields. She remembered the white men's eyes when they watched them, their loose lips, and their coarse jokes and she remembered many a black girl dropping a yellow boy, and never looking daring, except in whispers, to say who the father was. She remembered friends of hers who had crept home at dawn or at midnight, torn and bruised and bleeding, and saying nothing and their parents drooping more and praying more fervently, and the girl silent and stony-eyed and filled with hate.

She had escaped all that and fled to New York -- for this. For this. People had said: In the North you can get ahead. You can go wherever a white man goes and don't nobody stop you. No! Chile, that's the place to go."

She had come and found it true, but found it also a lie. Her skin hadprickled, she had almost fainted the first time a white man had seated himself next to her on a bus. She had been stiff and resentful, and paradoxically eager, when a young white boy with an open, charming face had tried to make conversation with her in a restaurant. She scowled and answered in monosyllables and after a while he left.

It waw all so strange. You didn't know where you stood. She had seen a Negro woman knocked down in a subway station by a young white man, who didn't stop, just hurried on his way. In the big hotels downtown, when she had gone to look for work, she had made the mistake of going in the front entrance and the doorman had stared at her and told her never to come in that way, always to use the service passage downstairs. It was a white man's world alright.

Richard had hated them all. "Get myself a gun and shoot them son of a bitches straight to hell," he would say bitterly. He had

46

Wh never he spoke of it, his lips curled and his eyes filled with tears. "The no-good fucks," he would mutter. "Dirty sons of bitches..." Oh, he was wrong, he was wrong, you couldn't beat it, God was the only answer and now God had turned His face away.

How had it happened? How could he have done this to her? To leave her like this? He was no-good, she reflected, he couldn't have been; he didn't even believe in God. God was a lie, he said, people made Him up out of their own minds because they were afraid, and the more afraid you were, the more real you made Him. How could she ever have thought she loved him?

Oh, but he had been sweet, even if he was bad. Nobody could laugh like him, nobody in the world, and he was such a little boy someti es, you couldn't be mad, your heart almost broke because he was so lovely. She would never forget him, never and she wished he was here now, here to take her in his arms and kiss her, his lips and his body hard against hers, his hands ex- ploring her and making her alive, her hands pressed against his back, and his curly young head against her face.

"Are you a Christian?" Gabriel boomed as Bertha entered the door.

She winced. "I hope I am," she said.

Gabriel smiled. "It's somethin' you gotta know, daughter."

"I'm so glad you were able to come," Roselia said, taking her coat. "Sit down."

Roselia had cooked an excellent dinner of friend chicken, candied yams, rice with gravy and cranberry sauce and hot biscuits. For dessert they had strawberry jello with whipped cream and layer cake.

"Thank you, the Lord an' bless the cook," Gabriel intoned as they rose.

47

"A m ighty fine cook," Bertha smiled.

"A mighty God," said Big Gabriel.

Bertha smiled stiffly; this tall, thin man somehow made her feel guilty and hum ble. He was so strong. She stole a look at his fix face, and he caught her and she turned away, con fused. This was a man of God. God had revealed Hims elf to h im as He never would to her. She felt very small and alone. Before she left, Gabriel invited her to visit his church sometime with him and show a wkwardly she said to him she'd like to sometime; yes, she'd keep in touch with Roselia and yes, yes, of course she'd be back.

"Nice, upright lookin ' girl," Gabriel told his sister, "The Lord can use her."

"She ain't gonna join your holy band," Roselia snapped. "She's got too much sense for that."

"I'll pray for her," Gabriel said, "An' you too, Roselia."

Bertha consented, two weeks later to come to church with him. She sat wide-
eyed and fascinated during the long service, and Gabriel was disappoin ted
that she did not go up to the mourners bench; but on the way home she sudden
and un predictably burst into tears.

"Don't, don 't cry," Gabriel said, distressed and helpless. "What've you go
to cry about?"

But she only wept the more, with a sort of desperate helplessness. She put her handkerchief to her face and cried, hard, chokin g, frighten ed sobs.

"Tell me what's wrong. We'll pray over it, God can h elp you.
Won't you pray to God, sister?"

45

drew her close. "Don't cry," he muttered, "God is a refuge, God will help you, if you call just on Him." She was warm and slender and his body unvoluntarily pressed against her, and his blood grew hot and thick. He pressed his thighs against her and drew her closer. "Pray," he said, "We will pray together....."

She drew away," I'm alright," she said, "I'm sorry." She stared at him as though seeing him for the first time.

"Do you know the Lord, sister?" he asked.

"Yes," she said. She looked away. "I'd like to know Him better."

"Come with me," Gabriel cried "Come with me to the house of God and learn His will. He says "however will may come." He wants to save you, sister. Don't close your heart. Jesus is calling."

"I know," she said. Her voice shook. "You're so good and strong." she said "I wish I was like you."

"I'm a new man in the Lord," G a briel said. "When the Lord saves you, He makes you strong. The things of the world mean nothin'." Satan said Jus' can't catch you".

"Help me," she cried, "to be strong like you! I want to find the Lord!"

"Come to service tomorrow night," Gabriel whispered, "An' pray and an' rassle with the Lord. I'll pray over you. You'll find Him. "He stopped and came closer to her. "Sister Bertha," he said slowly. "The Lord's got somethin' for you to do." He stared at her. "Yes," he said, "You come to church tomorrow night."

She came to church the next night and the next and wept for the sin that

g ratified at the working of the Lord, and the church trium phant

"Prayer changes things!" cried Gabriel.

"Amen! cried the church.

"Lord have mercy, Lord have mercy". Bertha wept.

G abriel spent sleepless nights in a bed of fire, seeing Bertha, Bertha
naked, conjuring up great lustful visions of Bertha and himself.
In agony he groaned and sweated and tossed and prayed and

In agony he groaned and sweated and tossed and prayed and dreamed of Bertha.

And in her room Bertha dreamed of Richard and his clean young body and Hell-
fire and his un born child and a mighty God on a white throne to judge
the nations; and the ght of Gabriel, his stren gth and his burning eyes and
muttered to herself; "It's a name, it's a name for ya my baby, and he's
stron g, oh God forgive me."

They were married by Father James in the Holy Temple of Truthx on the
twenty-third day of September, one-thousand nine hundred and twenty. They
moved to a small apartment on West 131 Stxx; leaving Roselia to live alone.

The Church considered them an ideal young couple and Father James praised them from his pulpit and held them up as examples of what, "Godly life should should be like and Gabriel was made head-deacon. Gabriel waxed strong in the faith and Bertha attended regularly and Roselia, eaten by loneliness and pride, came to see them som etime and complained about how people in her church were always talking about her and trying to hurt her, and xxx occasionally accusing Gabriel of being a fanatic and Bertha of ruining her life.

xxx Bertha was quiet and dutiful and quiescent and mindful of KARL HILL'S
Gabriel's desires and Gabriel's im portance. Everyone said she was a perfect
wife.

50

one she gave birth to an eight month baby in Harlem Hospital. A small, screaming mass of flesh who was named John Grimes after Bertha's father, and occasionally referred to as "Young Richard" after one of her uncles.

The baby was amazingly strong and well-formed for an eight month child and the Chruch said Gabriel had been blessed of God to have such a fine young baby, and Bertha was between tears and laughter when she saw it, and Roselia bought all manner of fantastic presents for her young nephew, and Gabriel fell on his knees before his God, and thanked Him and prayed that God should work mightily through his son.

Fourteen months later they had another boy, whom they named Roy, and two years later a girl names Lou s, and later a girl names Ruth.

God was smiling on Gabriel at last.

Ch apter 3
The Prison - Book II

He was six years old and the sun was shining through the window. There was something special about this day, but he could not remember what it was. Then he remembered and afraid he crept closer to the sleeping Roy.

It was the first day of school.

He was a little afraid to go to school. The other children probably wouldn't like him. He was sure they wouldn't. He was morbidly conscious of his large head ("Chuck head," his father called him) and his wide, startled eyes. He was so ugly, it was a pity he was so ugly. How could anybody like him? His father said he was the ugliest boy in the world.

He lay there, despondently wishing he wouldn't have to get up or go to

51

could hear her in the kitch en now, preparing his father's breakfast, and a
lunch for his father to take to work. He could hear the dishes rattling and the
sound of the frying pan and the voices of his father and his mother, low and
and indistinct. In a little while his father would leave and be gone all day
and come back about six o'clock in the evening with a newspaper under his arm
and his black lunch-box in his hand. He worked all day in a factory on
Long Island. He wondered if a factory was something like school.

His father came into the room and looked in the closet for something and he
closed his eyes quickly, pretending to be asleep. He didn't seem to be able
to find what he was looking for.

"Bertha!" he called, "Where's my jacket?"

"Isn't it in the closet?" his mother inquired, com ing into the room. He wonder
ed if his father thought his mother was pretty. She had big eyes too.

"It must be in the other room," she said.

"You oughta keep thins where they belon g," little la dy," his father said, witl
hint of a smile in his voixex voice.

"Don't worry, dear," his mother smiled. I'll find it."

They went out, closing the door behind them. His mother always called his fe
"dear". She had hardly ever called him "Gabriel which Johnnie knew was his
name.

His father seemed to be in a good mood & this morning. He wish ed he liked
his father more. Sometimes when his father came home in the evenings he pl
with him on his knee, and laughed and Johnnie liked it except the
was always afraid & that his father would somehow

52

would do something to make his father mad. Anyway, most often, his father
played with Roy, or Emilia Lois. He seemed to like them more. Ray was very
good-looking. Evertime they had company, everybody Emilia said so.

He heard the front door slam and knew his father was gone. His mother
began clearing up the kitchen and he could hear her singing.

She was shaking him. He opened his eyes.

"Time to get up," she said.

"I gotta go to school?"

"Yes. Get up, you lazy little boy."

She leaned over to pick him up and he put his arms around her neck and kissed her. She was warm and had a pleasant, motherly smell. He laughed and pulled a hair-pin out of her long black hair. She threw him on the bed, so that he bounced and the bed shook.

"Johnnie, you leave my hair alone."

"It "Whaddya put pins in it for?"

"Ladies always put pins in their hair."

"Why?"

"Sto; askin' so many questions. Sit up an' get dressed."

He wanted to play. "No."

"Johnnie....!"

He rolled to the other side of the bed, out of her reach. She scrambled over
him.

["PRESERVATION PHOTOCOPY: ORIGINAL MATERIAL RESTRICTED", "51", "could hear her in the kitch\\en now, preparing his father's breakfast, and a\nlunch for his father to take to work. He could hear the dishes rattling and the\nsound of the frying pan and the voices of his father and his mother, low xad\nand indistinct. In a little while his father would leave and be gone all day\nand come back about six o'clock in the evening with a newspaper under his arm\nand his black lunch-box in his hand. He worked all day in a factory on\nLong Island. He wondered if a factory was something like school.", "His father came into the room and looked in the closet for something and he\nclosed his eyes quickly, pretending to be asleep. He didn't seem to be able\nto find what he was looking for.", "\"Bertha!\" he called, \"Where's my jacket?\"", "\"Isn't it in the closet?\" his mother inquired, com ing into the room. He wonder-\ned if his father thought his mother was pretty. She had big eyes too.", "\"It must be in the other room,\" she xad, said.", "\"You oughta keep thins where they belon g,\" little lady,\" his father said, with a\nhint of a smile in his v-a-x-x_x_x_x_x_x_x_x_x_x_x_x_x_x_x

52

would do something to make his father mad. Anyway, most often, his father
played with Roy, or Louisa Lois. He seemed to like them more. Ray was very
good-looking. Evertime they had company, everybody xixix said so.

"Time to get up," she said.

"I gotta go to school?"

"Whaddya put pins in it for?"

"Why?"

"Stop askin' so many questions. Sit up and get dressed."

He wanted to play. "No."

"Johnnie......!"

He rolled to the other side of the bed, out of her reach. She scrambled after him.

52

"John nie, you're gonna wake up Roy."

"Why ain't Roy goin' to school?"

"He's not old enou gh,"

"How old am I?"

"Six... come here!"

He let her catch him and make a fuck pretence of spanning him. Mxxi He
un b uttoned his night-clothes and let them fall to his feet and she started
to put on his underwear.

"Let me do it."

"Go a head, little man."

He fumbled into his underwear and began to button it.

"Am I older than Roy?"

"Yes."

"Why is one person older than another person?"

"It just happens."

"Who makes it happen?"

"God"

"Why?"

She gave him his stockings. "If everybody was the same age then there wouldn't be any body to be mothers and fathers to little boys and girls."

He pondered this; it sounded logical. "Why do I have to go to school?" he

53

"So you'll be smart when you grow up and Mother and Daddy will be proud of you."

"What's proud?"

"It means that we're glad you're our little boy."

"Aren't you glad I'm your little boy now?"

She knitted her brows and laughed. "Will you stop asking so many questions,"

she said. "Of course I am."

"Is Daddy glad?"

She frowned again and kissed him. "Certainly, he's glad," she said. She
hugged him, x then knelt down to put on his shoes. He stared at her hair
shining in the morning sun.

"Mama..." he said.

"Yes?"

"Am I the ugliest boy in the world?"

"Of course not! Who said such a thing?"

"Daddy."

"Daddy was just playing with you. If you're a nice boy inside, you'll look
nice outside.""

"Am I a nice boy inside?"

"Certainly, you are. You're Mama's little man." She rose. "Come on, let's
wash your hands and face."

While he was eating breakfast Aunt Roselia came to stay with the children

while his mother took him to school.

"How's my little man?"

54

"You been a good boy?"

"Yes, ma'am."

She put two pennies in his hand. "Now you be a good boy in school today,"
she said. "Don't cause the teacher no trouble."

"No, ma'am."

"Don't get into any fights either, Johnnie," his mother said. "The Lord don't like little boys who fight."

"Yes, ma'am."

"Rember Jesus," his aunt said, "He never fought even when His enemies
nailed Him to a cross. He just said 'Father forgive them for they know
not what they do.' You wanna be like Jesus, don't you?"

He won dered why anybody would want to nail Jesus to a cross.

He shuddered at the thought of nails being driven through his hands and feet

"Yes, ma'am, he said.

His aunt kissed him. "Now you be a good boy," she said. "Goodbye."

Yes, ma'am

he said.

He was walking down the street with his mother. He was on his way to
school.

"Now, remember what I told you," his mother said. "Don't play with any
bad little boys. If someone says do something and you know it's wrong say
"My mother told me not to do it," and no matter what they say, don't
do it."

"Yes, mama... Mama will the other boys like me?"

"If you're a good little boy, everybody will kiax like you."

["PRESERVATION PHOTOCOPY: ORIGINAL MATERIAL RESTRICTED", "\"Join hands,\" the teacher said.", "Johnnie stretched a moist, hot hand out to a small girl in a big\nwho stood beside him.", "\"What's your name?\" she asked him.", "\"Johnnie,\" she mumbled.", "\"Mine's Anne,\" she said shyly.", "He stared ather, pleased and uncomfortable, and awkward.", "\"Hello,\" he said.", "When the long line of children marched double file out of the gated\nJohn nies eyes found his mother standing at the edge of the sidewalk waiting\nwith a few other women. Suddenly his heart felt warm and he was very happy\nand very glad that his mother was there and that she was waiting especially\nfor him. He felt very proud about being in school. He thought about what he\nwould tell Roy when he got home.", "The teacher dismissed them and he ran to her. She caught him in her\narm s laughing, and kissed him.", "\"How was school, little man?\"", "He liked to have his mother call him little man. He smiled and proudly\nshowed her a drawing he had done that day.", "\"O-o-oh! Did you do that?\"", "\"Unh-unh,\" he said proudly.", "\"That's very good, Johnnie,\" she said in x_x_x_x_x_x_x_x_x_x_x

55

This was perplexing; if his mother said so it was probably true but already
he had found it not in fallible. Some boys didn't like him now and som etime
they called him a sissy. But maybe that was because he was ugly. But h is
mother said he wasn't ugly either. It was beyond him.

The school was a dull, grey building with a wide, grey courtyard. It was
very big. Johnnie tightened his grasp on his mothers hand as they entered
the gates. He was suddenly terribly afraid.

"Are you comin' back for me?"

"I'll be waiting right here when you come out."

"Mama, take me back home. I don't wanna go to school."

Don't be foolish, Johnnie. There's nothing to be afraid of."

"Mama, am I ugly?"

"No, Johnnie..!" She knelt beside him, looking earnest and very troubled.

"You're a very nice-looking little boy. Mama loves you very much. "She
stroked his hair and kissed him and looked at him silently for a minute.

"Now be a good boy," she said. She took him to the door of him classroom
squeezed his hand and smiled at him. She opened the door.

The room was filled with other children about Johnnie's age sitting in rows.
There was a tall, white woman with iron-grey hair and glasses standing in
front of the room. She shook his mother's hand.

"Good-morning," his mother said. She smiled down at Johnnie. "Yes," she
said. "This is my little boy."

The woman looked at him. "You think you'll like school?" she asked him.

56

His th roat was hot and dry. "Yes, m a'am," he said.

"Take off your coat, Johnnie," his mother said.

He fum bled at the buttons, and stood helplessly, h olding it in his hand.
The teacher led him to the closet. He hung up his coat. His mother knelt
down and kissed him.

"Good-bye," she said.

He was frighten ed and wanted to cry, but couldn't. "Good-bye," he said.

She left. The teacher sh owed him his seat, and he sat down, uncomfortably
conscious of the eyes of the children on him, and wishing that he hadn't come.

He was in kindergarten. The teacher's name was Mr. Delaney. She was very kind
but old and a little frightening. They were to draw, play with b blocks, learn new games and sing. It sounded a little empty to Johnnie.

He could read a little already, and he had hoped they would have n ew books
for him.

He sat very quietly, because instinctively he knew that that was the best
way to be left alone. He hoped the teacher wouldn't ask him to lead any games
or anything. He felt awkward and wanted to go home.

"Now, children," Mrs. Delaney was saying, "we are going to learn a new game. I want you to stand up when I clap my hands." She paused, then clapped her hands.
They rose.

"I want all of you to come to the center of the room," she said, and make a wide circle. She clapped her hands again. They formed a circle, standing shyley, stiffly apart.

"Join hands," the teacher said.

Johnnie stretched a moist, hot hand out to a small girl in a blue
wh o stood beside h im.

"What's your name?" she asked him.

"Johnnie," she mumbled.

"Mine's Anne," she said shyly.

"Hello," he said.

When the long line of children marshaled doubled fill out of the gate
John nies eyes found his mother stan ding at the edge of the sidewalk waiting
with a few other women. Suddenly his heart felt warm and he was very happy
and very gladthat his mother was there and that she was waiting especially
for him. He felt very proud about being in school. He thought about what he
would tell Roy when he got home.

The teacher dismissed them and he ran to her. She caught him in her
arm s laughing, and kissed him.

"How was school, little man?"

He likedto have his mother call him little man. He smiled and grunted
showed her a newawing he had done that day.

"O-o-oh! Did you do that?"

"Unh- unh," he said proudly.

"That's very good, Johnnie," she said in xixixixiik delight.

"It's for you," he said.

"For me...? Why, Johnnie...!"

She was teasing him, he knew, and he liked it. He put his hand in
hers and they started off.

"Good-bye, Johnnie," a voice called.

He turned, It was An ne, standing beside her mother.

"Good-bye," he called.

G abriel Grimes, Negro, born 1884, deep in the uncivilized wilds of
Georgia, prayed.

He was a very tall man, broad-shouldered, heavy-limbed, and muscular.

His loose, free walk and fluid muscles gave a suggestion of latent strength
and danger; a suggestion somehow akin to the sense of relaxed power one
feels in a locomotive as it stands patient and short winded at some
country railroad station.

He was not a handsome man, but he was able to pass for one. For good
looks he substituted a sexual magnetism which managed to be at once
immoral, spiritual, and depraved; and this is a highly exciting combination
The immoral and the depraved had worked his spiritual downfall more than
once.

He had fallen only last night and he prayed now for forgiveness.

He prayed earnestly and alone, his dark, thin face distorted with con-trite
con trition, the wide nostrils flaring, H is eyes were shut in grief.

"The Lord forgive me," he muttered. "Please, God, forgive this po'
sinner....."

It was a plaint terribly familiar to God and all His angels. He prayed
on his knees in the aged, battered, weatherbeaten church. It was the
summer of 1919.

2

Gabriel was a sinner saved by grace. The Lord had had to ched his h eart
when h e was seventeen, filling him with conviction of sin and inspiring
in his breast a desperate pan ic to achieve salvation. Salvation lay
first in believing; believing that God was, that He had given his only

Gabriel Grimes, Negro, born 1884, deep in the uncivilized wilds of Georgia, prayed.

He was a very tall man, broad-shouldered, heavy-limbed, and muscular. His loose, free walk and fluid muscles gave a suggestion of latent strength and danger; a suggestion somehow akin to the sense of relaxed power on feels in a locomotive as it stands patient and short winded at some country railroad station.

He was not a handsome man, but he was able to pass for one. For good looks he substituted a sexual magnetism which managed to be at once immoral, spiritual, and depraved; and this is a highly exciting combination. The immoral and the depraved had worked his spiritual downfall more than once.

He prayed earnestly and alone, his dark, thin face distorted with concern. The wide nostrils flaring, his eyes were shut in grief. "The Lord forgive me," he muttered. "Please, God, forgive this po' sinner....."

2

Gabriel was a sinner saved by grace. The Lord had hadiouced his hand when he was seventeen, filling him with conviction of sin and inspiring in his breast a desperate PANIC to achieve salvation. Salvation lay first in believing; believing that God was, that He had given his only

2

Him should not perish but have everlasting life. In order to be truly saved one must believe that God kept a gigantic record-book in Heaven and had on the day of Judgment His book would be opened before you to determine where you would spend eternity. Smoking, drinking, dancing and lying were firmly prohibited, as were movie-going, sex (out of wedlock) and the taking of the Lord's name in vain.

Believing this was merely the first step; living this was the second.

Man, it has been said, shall not live by bread alone. The earliest men, once the functions of eating and sleeping had been carried out and after they achieved some sort of shelter and a mate with whom to share the unive se and themselves, looked about for something in the unive se with which they could identify - be identified. They were here, and here was a broad and alien world; dimly the ego of a man refused to accept the possibility of being a mere accident. He made himself at once the best-beloved and the prey of the inanimate heavens. Stones were invested with spirits, the miracle of fire was fraught with terror; alone in his wilderness Man trembled because he could not understand, and with the same lack of understanding crippled his life with arbitrary morals, and unperceptive values of right and wrong. He was happy, having created for himself something of which to be afraid. This was all he had and no one in his wondrous world had more. There were no threats to his well-being, his place in the universe.

But with the passing of time it was discovered and irrevocably that a stove was a stove and fire a chemical reaction and the heavens filled only with planets and space and comets and no one could say with any certainty that Divinity resided there. Lord, when were the cries of "Infidel and Unbeliever! and many were the stones flung in a desperate agony of terror. "Give us back our fears," Man seemed to cry. In more than one sense the history of humanity is the tracing of that cry.

Him should not perish but have everlasting life. In order to be truly saved one must believe that God kept a gigantic record-book in Heaven and had on that day of Judgment His book would be opened before you to determine where you would spend eternity. Smoking, drinking, dancing and lying were firmly prohibited, as were movie-going, sex (out of wedlock) and the taking of the Lord's name in vain.

Man, it has been said, shall not live by bread alone. The earliest men, once the functions of eating and sleeping had been carried out and after they achieved some sort of shelter and a mate with whom to share the universe and themselves, looked about for something in the universe with which they could identify—be identified. They were hear, and here was a broad and alien world, dimly the ego of a man refused to accept the possibility of being a mere accident. He made himself at once the best-beloved and the prey of the inanimate heavens. Stones were invented with spirits, the miracle of fire was fraught with terror; alone in his wilderness Man trembled because he could not understand, and with the same lack of understanding crippled his life with arbitrary morals, and unperceptive values of right and wrong. He was happy, having created for himself something of which to be afraid. This was all he had and no one in his wretchedness, this悲惨世界 had more. There were no threats to his well-being, his place in the universe.

But with the passing of time it was discovered and irrevocably that a stove was a stove and fire a chemical reaction and the heavens filled only with planets and space and comets and no one could say with any certainty that Divinity resided there. Lord, when were the cries of "Infidel and Unbeliever and many were the stones flung in a desperate agony of terror. "Give us back our fears," Man seemed to cry. In more than one sense the history of humanity is the tracing of that cry.

"De fear of de Lord," Gabriel's mother had told him and his sister, Roselia, "is de beginning of wisdom." Gabriel's wisdom began in his seventeen th year early one autumn morning in the middle of a barren field. Roselia's new began properly and came to a late and bitter maturity.

He had been to church the night before and heard a Holy Ghost inspired sermon the subject of which was "The Terrors of Hell." He took Lulu Davis home afterward, and stopped in a dark field on the way. Lulu was a virgin and terrified; she fought him desperately at first, whimpered, wept, protested, finally yielded in an ecstasy of tearful desire.

Gabriel had been going to Church all his life. His mother, all his family, most of his community were good, hard-working, God-fearing Negroes. "Won't find no better niggers down here," Mr. Purvis, their landlord had boasted more than once.) Gabriel had been working since he was very young, his school years, all told, being no more than five. In white men's kitchens, at their backdoors and in their basements, he had waited, he had worked, he had crawled "Yes, suh, Mr. Purvis." "No, sir, Mr. Purvis"......He had never questioned the status-quo particularly. It was something he had been born to, it was a black man's lot. His mother said she pitied most white people. With all their riches, she said, they weren't happy because they didn't have God.

He was thinking these things that morning walking idly along in the autumn sunshine, kicking at the hard ground under his feet. "No, suh, Mr Purvis." Mr. Purvis didn't have God, maybe, but he sure had everything else. All this land belonged to him and they just worked it for him, like dogs they worked on it. Half the crop from the fields was his and whatever else they owed him for the rest of the year; which usually amounted to almost their half or more. They just worked the land year in, year out - was that all? He wanted to get away from here, forged all this, go North maybe.

4

That was a peculiar morning. Never before in all his life had he felt the way he
felt at that moment. Gabriel said later (much later) that if the Lord hadn't
saved him then he'd probably have grown up to be the worst sinner ever born to go
to Hell. He was at the cross-roads he said. On the one hand there was Satan, on
the other there was Christ pleading with him to surrender.

Specifically: he paused to stare at a twig, thinking with unaccustomed bitterness thatt his belonged to Mr. Purvis too when suddenly, in an agony of awareness, there came to his startled brain the realization that n owhere was there anything which he could claim. Not a scrap of earth, nor a stone, not a single moulding brick (unless it had been thrown away) was his. The sky had never seemed so distant as it was that day, nor the world so vast, nor himself so little.

He snapped the twig between powerful thumbs and looked about him. He was all
along, no livin g thing stirred in this desolate place. He wanted to go home,
to run to his mother, but his body seemed rooted and would not move. The
words of an old song flashed into his mind:

Way down yonder
In the valley by myself
I couldn't hear n obody pray

He could hear the voices of his kin-folk singing that song and now it seemed
to him that they were singing it for him. Loud, desolate, sad, infinitely
believing, he heard their voices on the chill,morning air.

"....I couldn't hear nobody pray."

He heard them. They were beging him to come with them and walk in the light
of God; to turn his back on this savage desolation, this wak wasteland of the
Spirit and come to Jesus ere it was too late. Their voices rose, pleading:
"Come on, Gabriel." Let the Lord have your heart, Boy, let the Lord save you
now. The world ain't got nothin' for you."

And himself: hard-hearted, obdurate, sinful, going from one pleasure to another
and grieving the holy Spirit of God. Lulu's agonized face of the hight before
rose before him and suddenly his guilt was more than he could bear. He turned
away, his face in his hands and knelt on the barren ground.

"Oh, Lord....." His voice was thick and jagged with sorrow. "Oh, Lord....."

"Save him, Lord," the voices cried, "Save him!"

"Oh, Lord....." He lay face down on the earth and hid his face from heaven.
His spirit in agony of shame. At that moment the world was grey, the heavens
bleak with grief. His tears ran into the earth, glistened in the light, sank
slowly, and the earth was dull.

"Save him, Lord!" A tambourine crashed, "Save him!"

Other voices took up the cry and after awhile he too cried, "Save me! Save me!"

The cry shuddered on the air, retreated before the wind, almost, not quite,
pierced heaven.

But he must reach heaven and he cried again. This time he rose, and standing
on his feet, his arms outstretched he called on heaven:

"Save me!"

"Save him!" they cried.

"Save me, oh Lord God......!"

He wept, in agon y he pleaded, he moved before heaven. His body seemed on fire.
He could not leave before God heard him.

They heard him in the shacks beyond the field and people came running to

Page 6

touched the heart of this young sinner.

"Ballelujah!" they cried. "Praise Him!"

He was there from that early morning till long past noon and they prayed with him. They prayed and they shouted and danced before the King and Gabriel were led with the angel for his soul's salvation.

"Go get Sister Grimes", somebody said. "Tell her de Lord's done touched her boy."

But as the emissary turned to leave the field, a cloud parted and God sent the sun. The world which had been grey, green bright and Gabriel opened his eyes.

Now his blood leaped and his head seemed bursting. I'm saved," he whispered. "I'm saved." Glad thanksgiving filled his head and tears - sweet tears, tear of joy - flowed down his cheeks. They cried in triumph; they laughed, the of a people with a great secret and a deep peace and someone began to sing:

"I got good news to tell you....
Ain't that good news?"

The song filled the air and met Roselia as she sped across the fields to see what had happened to her brother.

3

The summer of 1919 was Gabriel's last year in the churches of the South. He left at the beginning of 1920 for New York and never returned.

Roselia had been settled in New York for the last five years. She had grown into a beautiful, dark-eyed woman, slender and quick-tempered and proud.

People said she gave herself airs and was dicty." She never got happy at Church and looked on with that seemed to be bored disdain when the others did. She turned down an attractive offer of marriage from a steady, good-tempered

Page 8

Nevertheless, at thirty-four, he was lonely, frustrated and bitter. All his hand had touched had turned to ashes. He lingered out that summer and that fall; working, praying for strength, going to Church occasionally and sitting ill with loneliness on one of the benches. They spoke to him, cordially some of them, but he was a單dx parish, an outcast. They could dx never trust him again and he knew he could not stay.

Finally, in January of 1920, he packed his bags and set out for Koselia's home in New York.

4

"How dare you? How dare you say that to me!"

"For Pete's sake, dry up!"

"Don't talk to me like that! Who the hell do you think you are, the Queen of Sheba?"

"Frank!"

"Well, stop mutting! on so many airs. You ain't talkin' to no rabbit-brained pastor. I'm your husband."

"You might show me a little respect even if you are my husband," she said sarcastically.

"Oh, for Pete's sake," the man said. "Are you sorry you married me? Is that what you're trying to say? she demanded tensely.

"No, that ain't what I'm trying to say. I wouldn't have no trouble saying it if I wanted to."

"You're not the only pebble on the beach, you know. If you want that cheap Georgia nigger go ahead and take her. I won't stop you. I'm only

"Slut up!"

Don't tell me to slut up! Maybe you can say that to some women but you can't say that to me."

"Will you keep quiet before I slap you against that wall?"

"How dare you! How dare you!"

"How dare you!" he mimicked "That's all you know how to say!"

"If you ever lay a hand on me," she said, "I'll walk out of this house so fast -
"Yeah, an' you'll come back just as fast. You walked out before". He spat
into the sink, disgustedly. "Frank," he mimicked, "Frank, I'm sorry. Love
me, Frank? Hol' me tight, Frank. I'll never bother you again, Frank. You
just like all the other righteous tom-cats. All you want is a good ----

"Frank!" She sat down and burst into tears.

"Oh, for Pete's cake!" the man said. He put on his hat. "I'll see you later,"
he said and slammed the door behind him.

The woman jumped up and ran to the door. "Frank!" she screamed. "Frank!"
She heard the downstairs door bang. He was gone. She ran back into the room
and flung up the window. "Frank!" she called, "Frank!" She saw him turn the
corner.

He was gone.

Copper had been ready hours ago. She had warmed it twice through blind and un-
on trollable tears. As a terrible concession to Frank she had even bought two
bottles of beer, which she had placed with desperate fingers in the small ice-
box.

Frank. Black hair, black eyes, white teeth. He was tall and slim and the most handsome man in Harlem. All the women, she taught savagely were jealous because she had such a handsome husband. That cheap no-good Idiot had practically thrown herself at his head.

Well, the Lord would take care of her. If she didn't watch out she'd end up like Jezebel with dogs chewing on her bones.

Why didn't Frank come back? It was nearly eight o'clock. He had to come back. Please, God, send him back.

She wandered to the window and stared into the street. Maybe something had happened. A trolley-car, a horse, some accident somewhere. She wrenched it free from her mind.

Please, Frank. Please, God. Please.

She would die without Frank. Tall, slim, beautiful, with a laugh like an angel's laugh. She had been a good woman and a good wife to him. He was the only man she had ever known.

She remembered: my night, a dark room, and two throbbing figures on the bed. All night. She remembered: the first time she had seen him (on a crowded trolley-car) and the painful catch at her heart when he had taken her arm and said: "Can I help you?"

And she had said, very primly: (he was a stranger) "If you would be so kind."

She remembered: white teeth in the darkness, his groping hands, his heavy breathing, his body and his arms. She remembered: the consumption, the ecstacy of the pain.

Page 11

room until the feet reached the landing and she heard a knock at the door.

"Frank!" she called and flew to the door, and fumbled at the latch, and opened it and stopped with her hand to her throat, for this was a stranger.

"Who are you?" she breathed. And then: "Gabriel!"

5

The city was strange and wonderful. Gabriel walked down the wide streets, staring at the tall brick buildings - taller and stronger than those in the South - admiring the air of swift, jocular friendship among these people, loving even while he told himself he disapproved of them, the swift, light-skinned, tan and dark-skinned women who passed him with lithe, swinging strides occasionally stopping to chat with some friend, waving their heads and their arms, their bright teeth and eyes flashing, and their voices ripe with laughter.

"Ain't him it the truth!"

"Chile, I wouldn't let no man......"

"Chile" they would say would say, with an accent and connotation that almost made the word glint like a new found penny in the sun. "Chile" with curled lips and flashing eyes and scorn. "Chile", with a dangerous rising inflection, with narrowed eyes and pouting lips and a scowl that suggested a suggestion of controlled fury not unmixed with contempt. "Chile" the would say - and the word meant love, fear, anger, hatred, vengeance or whatever they wished it to mean.

Colored people didn't seem to be afraid up here as they were in the South. They walked along briskly, rhythmically, unhurried and calm. He had seen a few white men but they had been very quiet, and no one walked in the gutters to

afraid. Gabriel's heart leaped. That was the way it should be! How would they like to be hung from trees, to have their legs broken or their private parts out away! Unholy, unholy sons of Lucifer cursed by God.

They'd burn. They'd burn. They'd burn in Hell forever if they didn't stop.

There were a lot of churches up here, too. Small, "store-front" churches for the most part, but sometimes larger and more ornate edifices were being used to the glory of God. He savored the titles: "Mt. Hebron Baptist Church, Mt. Lab Lebanon, Mt. Calvary, Bethel A.M. Church, Church of Bethlehem, Star of Bethlehem and (he said afterwards it stuck in his mind, tho it did nothing of the sort) The Holy Temple of Truth, Father James, Pastor.

Roselia attended an enormous church on West 145 Street. "Too big to be holy" Gabriel grumbled after going with her once. He had been in the city a week and had not yet met her husband, Frank. He was away on business, Roselia said and she didn't know exactly when he'd be back. She haunted the mail-box, though and always bought food for three and Gabriel was sure he had heard her crying.

"Then they had gone to church together she had been loath to speak to anybody because she said 'they' were all 'crowing' behind her back. Gabriel had been rather confused but had asked no questions and they had hurried home.

Slowly, he vended his wayback to the apartment now. Roselia was standing by the window with a letter in her hand.

"Beer from Frank?" he asked her.

She coughed and put the letter in her pocket. After a second she said quietly: "Yes."

"How is he?"

She shrugged. "He's fine."

"Say when he's comin' back?"

She walked to the gas stove, carefully lit a burner and pulled a pot over it.

"No," she said, "He doesn't say." She blew out the match and dropped it into the can, and stood with her hands in her pockets leaning against the stove.

He felt a little awkward, he didn't know why. He sat down and poured himself a glass of milk.

"Roselia," he said. "I think I'm gonna stay in New York. I like it fine."

"That's good", she said.

He cleared his throat. "Is somethin' wrong, Roselia?"

"Nothin's wrong, Gabriel. Finish what you were sayin!"

"Well, I was just sayin' that I think I'll stay. You know where I can get a job? I'll have to get a job."

"A job?" she said. "I think" --she frowned and drew her lower lip thoughtfully between her teeth -- "I think that there's probably a job open in that soda-pop factory in Long Island. You might might get a job there."

"How do I get there?" he asked.

"I'll give you all the directions," she said. "I know them by heart." She walked past him into her bed-room and started to close the door.

"Keep an eye on the stove," she called.

Alone in the small bedroom she paced up and down, from the door to the window from the window to the door. She stopped near the bureau with her hands to her

Good Lord! He isn't coming back! He isn't coming back!

After getting a job in the factory on Long Island, Gabriel was obsessed by two hungers to find a church and to find a woman.

It was part of his plan for his new life to marry -- his母公司isofhis
"It is better to marry," St. Paul had said, "than to burn" -- and Gabriel was
burning.

He found most of the larger churches in Harlem unfit for his peculiar psychological and spiritual needs. It was nineteen-twenty and his people seemed to be getting away from the faith that he had known. They were going to bigger churches, but spending less time there. He did not feel that most of them had the right attitude towards God. They were too inclined to take him for granted.

Here he had not found the long, intense, noisy prayer-meeting he had known
in the South. He found the preacher more slick and well-dressed and less
in spired by the word of God than he was by his new altar-cloth - or the new co
llection plate. He missed the primitive force which heretofore had shot him
to such heights of glory. God was personal and very terrible to Gabriel and
he wanted to be "close" to Him. He needed more than hymns. He needed a sense,
however false, of sacrifice and self-righteousness which he was unable to feel
in a church where the minister smoked and two-thirds of the congregation at-
tended movies, dances and avidly devoured the comic section of the Sunday
paper. That was why, in spite of Roselia's hints and pleadings he obdurately
refused to become a member. He found it vaguely unrespectable, too, that
Roselia's husband should be away so long, and that he was not, from what
Roselia had told him, a Church-going man. "Be not unequally yoked with an
unbeliever," he had quoted to her once and Roselia had turned away and had not
considered. He had hardly ever spoken of Frank nor. Gabriel was beginning to

One night, late, he stopped in at "The Holy Temple of Truth," attracted by the loud vocalizing and tambourine playing from within. It was a small, rather bare room, obviously first designed as a store with an enormous and exceedingly distorted picture of the Man, Christ Jesus, over the rickety, home-made pulpit. It was furnished with hard, grey chairs and benches, and an ancient, but remarkably pliable piano from which a slight, dark-eyed woman was pounding out what was perilously close to a jass rendition of "He's Everything To Me." The entire congregation was in a state which the uninitiated might dismiss a frenzied or hysterical. A large woman, dressed completely in white was beating, with infinite gusto, a tambourine. The place resounded with shrills, with screams, with "Hallelujah!" and heavy feet pounding the wooden floor. A young boy was at the front of the Church lost in a musingژjaħx "jubilee shout"---he danced, to wild and incredible rhythm, sweat pouring from his forehead, his face contorted in agonized ecstasy, his arms stiff and jerking as though he were a marionette pulled by unseen strings.
"Oh, God!" the boy cried, "Oh, God, my God!"

"Amen!" cried the congregation. "Bless him, Lord!"

"Amen!" cried the pastor.

"Oh, God, oh, God.......!"

"Hallelujah! Hallelujah!" cried a woman near Gabriel. She jumped, as the assessor struck from behind, and threw up her hands. "Hallelujah!" she screamed. "Bless the Lord!"

"Yes! Praise Him!" Cried the woman in white.

"Amen!" cried the pastor.

"The woman began to dance "The Shout." Her head bobbed, her skirts flash ed,
or heels hit the floor..."

Page 16

her heels hit the floor incredibly. "Jesus," she murmured, "Oh, blessed Jesus!"

And suddenly Gabriel was moved by infinite mystic longing, he could hardly have said for what, and he raised his hands in holy reverence, and his body shook, and tears coursed down his cheeks.

"My God, my God," he murmured, "have mercy, have mercy"--he did not know what he was saying, it did not matter what he was saying. The Spirit of the Lord was here.

And now his heart was moved to power not his own and he could feel and hear
his feet beat upon the floor like drums from a far gone land. He moved and
was at one with God, and all the earth was new. His hands were new; his feet
were new, each atom of his being tingled with cleanness and newness until he
wanted to cry "I'm new! Look at me! I'm new! I'm a new man in the Lord!"

Jericho fell, and the Red Sea rose and the children of Israel were led by day
and by night; th' ru' a weary desert to the Promised Land. And mountains
crashed with an awful vengeance, and thunder rolled over the cringing sea and
the Lord in purple and silver with fire for a crown rose on His throne and
sinners bowed down and cried out "Holy!" And angels ran up the shining way
and stars am sang with them and vied out "Holy! Holy, holy, holy is the Lord
God of Hosts!"

And the Church cried out with a loudtriangle phant voice, for here was a new
soul rejoicing. And the tambourine cried "Blessed!" and the piano answered
"Yes!" and Gabriel danced before his God, and blessed His name and knew he
would not leave this holy place.

5.

"Are you crazy? What'd ya wanna go and join them for?"

17

"If amkin' noise means they're God's people, well they do plenty of that."

"It ain't noise, Roselia. It's the Spirit of the Lord."

"It sounds like some noise to me."

"Well, maybe makin' a little noise wouldn't hurt you non. Better'n that stiff, dried up place you go to, full of dry bones. The Lord ain't pleased with that."

"He ain't said nothin' to me about it. I live a good, clean Christian life. I don't hurt nobody, I don't talk about nobody, can't nobody paint a finger at me."

"You call goin' to the movies a good Christian life? You think the Lord is pleased with the way you cut up with that Mrs. Johnson next door. Ol' sinner woman, half-drunk all the time......"

"I ain't never said I was perfect, Gabriel. An' I've seen you drunk more'n once."

"That's when I was young and didn't know the Lord like I do now. The Lord wants everybody who serves Him to be holy."

"You, holy?"

"Yes, Yes, I'm holy."

He was holy. God had caused the light of His countenance to shine upon him and made him a blessed among men. Henceforth, his way was a way of holiness.

He would marry and be above temptation. He would have children, fine, strong children who would wax great in the service of the Lord. He would live upright

18

He formally joined "The Holy Temple of Truth and was received with open arms
and much rejoicing by Father James and his flock. Brother Father James was
a corpulent, shifty-eyed old negro who exuded charm and godliness from each
of his numerous pores. Gabriel was very favorably impressed with him and
described him as "God's right hand" in America. Father James was somewhat
inclined to this view himself, having done many mighty works, such as faith-
healing and the like and was the acknowledged foster and pastor of some half-
dozen churches. He early befriended donfided to Gabriel that "The Holy Temple
of Truth" was his youngest enterprise and that he was hoping the Lord would
send him a young man to take over the job of pastor while he went on to
build new temples for the Lord. Gabriel received this information with
gracious attention, and walked home in a forvent glow of gratitude that
God had seen fit to send him to New York. He did not want earthly glory;
no, but God might have a work for him to do. And it would be wonderful to
be behind a pulpit again.

9

Roselia stood in the scotlet light reflected from the stained glass window

"So I'll cling to the mix ol', rugged cross
Till my troochies at last I lay down
I will cling to the ol', rugged cross
An' exchange it some day for a crown."

The choir set down and the smooth, young pastor arose to make announcements and to raise the offering. Benediction would be next and the drowsy congregation would be allowed to go home.

Roselia set stiff and tortured, looking straight ahead. She knew what they were thinking. Her husband's done left her. Yes! For good. Chile, I don't blame him, I don't blame him a bit. He's left her. He's left her. He's gone.

"Can't you?" Sister Beckett asked sweetly. "The Lord wants us to do our duty, she added, as Roselia gave her a swift, sharp glance.

20

"I know," said Sister Beckett, "on' losts of others knows too."

"Why noth in'. Why nothin' daughter. Why don't you bring Brother Duncan
out tonigh t? We'd be glad to see him."

"I' se knows you's hvin a hard time, Sister's sister," she said. "If there's
anything I can do........"

"There's nothing wrong," Rose said with a spiteful smile, "If certain
people have nothing better to do than talk about things that don't concern
them--"

Sister Beckt tt refused to be offended. "Lord, chile," she said placidly.

"I'm weak only tryin' to help. I ain't got no time for gospin....."

21

"Why...yes," Roselia said. "Only the other day...He's fine."

"You didn't tell me he was away," said Sister Beckett. "You said you was gonna bring him to church tomorrow."

"I...I wasn't thinking," Roselia said. "She stared back defiantly, still." "He is out of town...he寫...he writes me every day..." She could not face their eyes. "He's coming back," she said.

"Frank often travels on business," said Roselia.

Roselia said blankly: "Ida?"

Ida. The vestibule whirled sickeningly and she saw Frank's face, his dark shining face and his black eyes. With Ida in St. Louis, with Ida. Ida.

She strangled a scream into half-way through her lips and forced herself to meet their watchful faces.

22

The door swung behind her, hung on their mocking faces, rang hollowly in
her heart. She walked briskly down the crowded street, still smiling.
Faces passed her, blank empty faces, which she could not reach. Their
voices stung her nerves with pain, she was one mass of sensitive quivering
pain, the sound of her footsteps rang in her brain until her head seemed one
enormous drum on which a thousand madmen danced in glee.

She got a job three weeks later as a chamber-maid in the White Hotel.
Gabriel was working in the soda factory and seemed to be fairly well
satisfied. She hated her job. Triumphant mockery stered from the walls, she
heard it in every voice, felt it in every face. Her husband's left her.
Her husband's gone.

"She just passed out" one of the girls said helplessly, "just like
that."

Roselia saw a girl, huddled on the floor, looking incredibly smell and

23

tousled. She was very pretty.

"Why doesn't somebody do something?" Roselia said. She lifted the girl to her feet and half-dragged her to a chair. "Get some water," she called.

"What happened?" Roselia asked.

I don't know. I guess it's the heat," the girl said. She tried to rise, tumbled back against the chair. "I'm alright," she said.

They were checking out, Roselia invited her for supper the following Sunday, out of some dull desire to form a shield against loneliness. Bertha accepted it reluctantly.

24

The girl looked up. "Oh, yes," she said. "Yes, indeed. Thank you very much."

"Then you'll come?"

"Yes. Thanks so much."

"We're havin' com pany, Sunday," she hold Gabriel.

Gabroe; appled 1½. sirrosed/ "Wh o?"

"A girl who works with me downtown."

"She a Christian?"

Roselia was annoyed. "Prob'ly a better Christian than you are with all your whoopin' and' hollerin'".

"You be careful how you ride that high horse, Gabriel Grimes. I know plenty people s'posed to be sanctified do things I wouldn't do. All that jumpin' keep up and walk an' down's jus' plain ignorance. The Lord sex don' want all that."

Gabriel rose, mighty in the strength of Jehovah. "God help you, my sister," he siad. "I'm goin' to the house of God."

"I'd like to know how long you think you can keep runnin' out to that h ole-in-the-wall every night an' go to work every day. Keep it up. They'll be bringin' you home feet first before long."

"Ol' black fool," Roselia muttered, taking the dished to the sink. "Jus' as g

She washed and put away the dishes, thinking helplessly of Frank and wishing she could hear his voice. Then she went to her room and pulled out her Bible, True Story Magazine and a motion picture periodical and settled herself for the evening.

It had been pretty easy, Bertha reflected, with her. She had been practically a pushover. Bertha Clarke, whom everyone had always referred to as a "good girl" was alone in New York and in trouble. She laughed, scornfully, weekly, and sat up.

41

She shivered and went to the window. She had never felt more frightened, more desperately frightened in her life. There was a queer feeling in the pit of her stomach like a heavy lump of cold lead. She was alone, she was completely alone. She watched the Sunday morning crowds on their way to church. Young men, young girls, brightly dressed, carefree, laughing. Their voices floated up to her, gay, and mocking somehow symbolic of a youth that she felt she had lost forever. She could not imagine herself ever laughing like that again. She had fallen, she had fallen by the wayside, and sinned in the sight of God.

What would become of her child? She hated the small, nauseating flutter beneath her heart. She had heard, valuelу and obscenely, of ways of preventing a child from being born, but she did not really know anything about it, and there was no one she could ask, and besided, it would be murder, it would be adding sin to sin.

She was h aunted by a spectre from her母's adolescen ce in the South; her iron-bound aunt saying: "You's a black girl, Berth a. The world don't like black. If a white girl makes a mistake, it ain't so bad for her, 'cause she's white an' white folks own everything. But a nigger gal" --- she spat -- "Nigger gal ain't got nothin' but her virtue an' her God. If she loses them, she ain't got nothin', ain't nothin' in this world for a nigger but misery. Better stay close to God, honey. Ain't no white an' black with Him."

And it was true, it was true. White folks owned the whole world, and a black girl didn't have a chance against them. The ways of the world were not for black people. If they ever got anywhere, there were always people who

42

black girls work in the mills, in the kitchens, in the fields. She remembered
the white men's eyes when they watched them, their loose lips, and their
coarse jokes and she remembered many a black girl dropping a yellow boy,
and never making daring, except in whispers, to say who the father was.
She remembered friends of hers who had crept home at dawn or at midnight,
torn and bruised and bleeding, and saying nothing and their parents drooping,
more and praying more fervently, and the girl silent and stonyeyed and filled
with hate.

She had come and found it true, but found it also a lie. Her skin had prickled, she had almost fainted the first time a white man had seated himself next to her on a bus. She had been stiff and resentful, and paradoxically eager, when a young white boy with an open, charming face had tried to make conversation with her in a restaurant. She scowled and answered in monosyllables and after a while he left.

It was all so strange. You didn't know where you stood. She had seen a
Negro woman knocked down in a subway station by a young white man, who didn't
stop, just hurried on his way. In the big hotels downtown, when she
had gone to look for work, she had made the mistake of going in the front
entrance and the doorman had stared at her and told her never to come in
that way, always to use the service passage downstairs. It was a white man's
world alright.

46

Huxley Wh never he spoke of it, his lips curled and his eyes filled with tears. "The no-good.fucks," he would mutter. "Dirty sons of bitches...." Oh, he was wrong, he was wrong, you couldn't beat it, God was the only answer and now God had turned His face away.

How had it happened? How could he have done this to her? To leave her like this? He was no-good, she reflected, he couldn't have been; he didn't even believe in God. God was a lie, he said, people made tk Him up out of their own minds because they were afraid, and the more afraid you were, the more real you made Him. How could she ever have thought she loved him?

Oh, but he had been sweet, even if he was bad. Nobody could laugh like him, nobody in the world, and he was such a little boy sometimes, you couldn't be mad, your heart almost broke because he was so lovely. She would never forget him, never and she wished he was here now, here to take her in his arms and kiss her, his lips and his body hard against hers, his hands exploring her and making her alive, her hands pressed against his back, and his curly young head against her face.

Gabriel smiled. "It's something you gotta know, daughter."

"I'm so glad you were able to come, "Roselia said, taking her coat. "Sit down."

Roselia had cooked an excellent dinner of friend chicken, candied yams, ravioli with gravy and cranberry sauce and hot biscuits. For dessert they had strawberry jello with whipped cream and layer cake.

"Thank you, the Lord above, bless the cook," Gabriel intoned as they rose.

47

"A mighty fine cook," Bertha smiled.

"A mighty God," said Rag Gabriel.

Bertha smiled stiffly; this tall, thin man somehow made her feel so guilty and hum ble. He was so strong. She stole a look at his fix face, and he caught her and she turned away, con fused. This was a man of God. God had revealed Him s elf to him as He never would to her. She felt very small and alone. Before she left, Gabriel invited her to visit his church sometime with him and make a w kwardly she said as she'd like to sometime; yes, she'd k keep in touch with Roselia and yes, yes, of course she'd be back.

Bertha consented, two weeks later to come to church with him. She sat wide-
eyed and fascinated during the long service, and Gabriel was disappoin ted
that she did not go up to the mourners bench; but on the way home she suddenly
and un predictably burst into tears.

"Don't, don 't cry," Gabriel said, distressed and helpless. "What' ve you got to cry about?"

48

drew her close. "Don't cry," he muttered, "God is a refuge, God will help you, if you call just call on Him." She was warm and slender and his body unvoluntarily pressed against her, and his blood grew hot and thick. He pressed his thighs against her and drew her closer. "Pray," he said, "We will pray together...."

She drew away, "I'm alright," she said, "I'm sorry." She stared at him as though seeing him for the first time.

"Come with me," Gabriel cried "Come with me to the house of God and learn His will. He says "however will may come." He wants to save you, sister Don't close your heart. Jesus is calling."

"I'm a new man in the Lord," a briel said. "When the Lord saves you, He makes you strong. The things of the world mean nothing. Satan wins, but can't catch you."

"Come to service tomorrow night," Gabriel whispered, "An' pray and an' rassle with the Lord. I'll pray over you. You'll find Him. He stop and came closer to her. "Sister Bertha," he said slowly. "The Lord's something for you to do." He stared at her. "Yes," he said, "You or church tomorrow night."

She came to church the next night and the next and wept for the sin.

"Amen! cried the church.

"Lrd have mercy, Lord have mercy". Bertha wept.

And in her room Bertha dreamed of Richard and his clean young body and Hell-
fire and his un born child and a mighty God on a white throne to judgment
the nations; and the ght of Gabriel, his stren gth and his burning eyes and
muttered to herself; "It's a name, it's a name for my baby, and he's
stron g, oh God forgive me."

They were married by Father James in the Holy Temple of Truthx on the
twenty-third day of September, one-thousand nine hundred and twenty. They
moved to a small apartment on West 131 Stxy; leaving Roselia to live alone.

The Church considered them an ideal young couple and Father James praise
them from his pulpit and held them up as examples of what, "Godly life a
should be like and Gabriel was made head-deacon. Gabriel waxed strong in
the faith and Bertha attended regularly and Ros lia, eaten by lonelines
pride, came to see them som etime and complained about how people in
her church were always talking about her and trying to hurt her, and an
occasionally accusing Gabriel of being a fanatic and Bertha of ruining
his life.

Bertha was quiet and dutiful and quiescent and mindful of KABEKA
Gabriel's desires and Gabriel's im portance. Everyone said she was a
wife.

50

Fourteen months later they had another boy, whom they names Roy, and two years later a girl names Lou s, and later a girl names Ruth.

He was six years old and the sun was shining through the window. There was something special about this day, but he could not remember what it was. Then he remembered and afraid he creating copy of the sleeping Roy.

He lay there, desperately wishing he wouldn't have to get up or go to

51

could hear her in the kitch on now, preparing his father's breakfast, and a
lunch for his father to take to work. He could hear the dishes rattling and the
sound of the frying pan and the voices of his father and his mother, low zka
and indistinct. In a little while his father would leave and be gone all day
and come back about six o'clock in the evening with a newspaper under his arm
and his black lunch-box in his hand. He worked all day in a factory on
Long Island. He wondered if a factory was something like school.

"Bertha!" he called, "here's my jacket?"

"Isn't it in the closet?" his mother inquired, coming into the room. He wondered if his father thought his mother was pretty. She had big eyes too.

"It must be in the other room," she said, said.

"You oughta keep thins where they belon g," little lady," his father said, with a
hint of a smile in his wakess voice.

They went out, closing the door behind them. His mother always called his father
"dear". She had hardly ever called him "Gabriel which Johnnie knew was his
name.

His father seemed to be in a good mood this morning. He wish ed he liked
his father more. Sometimes when his father came home in the evenings he played
with him on his knee, and Johnnie laughed and Johnnie liked it except that he
was always afraid that his father would somehow

52

would do something to make his father mad. Anyway, most often, his father
played with Roy, or Louis Lois. He seemed to like them more. Ray was very
good-looking. Whenever they had company, everybody said so.

"Time to get up," she said.

"I gotta go to school?"

"Whaddya put pins in it for?"

"Why?"

"Sto; askin' so many questions. Sit up and get dressed."

He wanted to play. "No."

"Johnnie...!"

He rolled to the other side of the bed, out of her reach. She scrambled off
him.