I will do what I .』
?Yes, I glad to have you. I believe in all Hnfolks stig together—blood kin and marriage kin. I believe in all us struggling along and helping each other out, and some day us will have a reward in the Beyond.』
Pshaw! Doctor Copeland said bitterly. I believe in justiow.』
What that you say you believe in? You speak so hoarse I aint
able to hear you.』
In justice for us. Justice for us Negroes.That right.』
He felt the fire in him and he could not be still. He wao sit up and speak in a loud voice—yet wheried to raise himself he could not find the strength. The words in his heart grew big and they would not be silent But the old man had ceased to listen and there was no oo hear him.
?Git, Lee Ja. Git, Honey. Pick up your feets and quit this here poking. Us got a long way to go.』
AfternoonJ AKE ran at a violent, clumsy pace. He went through Weavers Lane and then cut into a side alley, climbed a fence, and hastened onward. Nausea rose in his belly so that there was the taste of vomit in his throat. A barking dog chased beside him until he stopped long enough to threaten it with a rock.
His eyes were wide with horror and he held his hand clapped to his open mouth.
Christ! So this was the finish. A brawl. A riot. A fight with every man for himself. Bloody heads and eyes cut with broken bottles. Christ! And the wheezy music of the flying-$jinny above the he dropped hamburgers and cotton dy and the screaming younguns. And him in it all. Fighting blind with the dust and sun. The sharp cut of teeth against his knuckles. And laughing. Christ! And the feeling that he had let loose a wild, hard rhythm in him that wouldnt stop. And then looking close into the dead black fad not knowing.
Not even knowing if he had killed or not. But wait. Christ! Nobody could have stopped it.
Jake slowed and jerked his head nervously to look behind him.
The alley was empty. He vomited and wiped his mouth and forehead with the sleeve of his shirt. Afterward he rested for a minute a better. He had run for about eight blocks and with short cuts there was about half a mile to go. The dizziness cleared in his head so that from all the wild feelings he could remember facts. He started off again, this time at a steady jog.
Nobody could have stopped it. All through the summer he had stamped them out like sudden fires. All but this one. And this
fight nobody could have stopped. It seemed to blaze up out of nothing. He had been w on the maery of the swings and had stopped to get a glass of water. As he passed across the grounds he saw a white boy and a Negro walking around each other. They were both drunk. Half the crowd was drunk that afternoon, for it was Saturday and the mills had run full time that week. The heat and the sun were siing and there was a heavy stink in the air.
He saw the two fighters close in on each other. But he khat this was not the beginning. He had felt a big fight ing for a long time. And the funny thing was he found time to think of all this. He stood watg for about five seds before he pushed into the crowd. In that short time he thought of many things. He thought of Singer. He thought of the sullen summer afternoons and the black, hot nights, of all the fights he had broken up and the quarrels he had hushed.
Then he saw the flash of a pocketknife in the sun. He shouldered through a knot of people and jumped on the back of the Negro