Twenty-eight: The Annunciation
The new President had been inaugurated. Beneath the creamy pile of the old Capitol, and facing the new library, he had stood aloft and looked down on a waving sea of faces— black-coated, jostling, eager-eyed fellow creatures. They had watched his lips move, had scanned eagerly his dress and the gowned and decorated dignitaries beside him; and then, with blare of band and prancing of horses, he had been whirled down the dip and curve of that long avenue, with its medley of meanness and thrift and hurry and wealth, until, swinging sharply, the dim walls of the White House rose before him. He entered with a sigh.
Then the vast welter of humanity dissolved and streamed hither and thither, gaping and laughing until night, when thousands poured into the red barn of the census shack and entered the artificial fairyland within. The President walked through, smiling; the senators protected their friends in the crush; and Harry Cresswell led his wife to a little oasis of Southern ladies and gentlemen.
"This is democracy for you," said he, wiping his brow.
From a whirling eddy Mrs. Vanderpool waved at them, and they rescued her. "I think I am ready to go," she gasped. "Did you ever!"
"Come," Cresswell invited. But just then the crowd pushed them apart and shot them along, and Mrs. Cresswell found herself clinging to her husband amid two great whirling variegated throngs of driving, white-faced people. The band crashed and blared; the people laughed and pushed; and with rhythmic sound and swing the mighty throng was dancing.
It took much effort, but at last the Cresswell party escaped and rolled off in their carriages. They swept into the avenue and out again, then up 14th Street, where, turning for some street obstruction, they passed a throng of carriages on a cross street.
"It's the other ball," cried Mrs. Vanderpool, and amid laughter she added, "Let's go!"
It was—the other ball. For Washington is itself, and something else besides. Along beside it ever runs that dark and haunting echo; that shadowy world-in-world with its accusing silence, its emphatic self-sufficiency. Mrs. Cresswell at first demurred. She thought of Elspeth's cabin: the dirt, the smell, the squalor: of course, this would be different; but— well, Mrs. Cresswell had little inclination for slumming. She was interested in the under- world, but intellectually, not by personal contact. She did not know that this was a side- world, not an under-world. Yet the imposing building did not look sordid.
"Hired?" asked some one."No, owned."
"Indeed!"
Then there was a hitch. "Tickets?"
"Where can we buy them?"
"Not on sale," was the curt reply.
"Actually exclusive!" sneered Cresswell, for he could not imagine any one unwelcome at a Negro ball. Then he bethought himself of Sam Stillings and sent for him. In a few minutes he had a dozen complimentary tickets in his hand.
They entered the balcony and sat down. Mary Cresswell leaned forward. It was interesting. Beneath her was an ordinary pretty ball—flowered, silked, and ribboned; with swaying whirling figures, music, and laughter, and all the human fun of gayety and converse.
And then she was impressed with the fact that this was no ordinary scene; it was, on the contrary, most extraordinary.
There was a black man waltzing with a white woman—no, she was not white, for Mary caught the cream and curl of the girl as she swept past: but there was a white man (was he white?) and a black woman. The color of the scene was wonderful. The hard human white seemed to glow and live and run a mad gamut of the spectrum, from morn till night, from white to black; through red and sombre browns, pale and brilliant yellows, dead and living blacks. Through her opera-glasses Mary scanned their hair; she noted everything from the infinitely twisted, crackled, dead, and grayish-black to the piled mass of red golden sunlight. Her eyes went dreaming; there below was the gathering of the worlds. She saw types of all nations and all lands swirling beneath her in human brotherhood, and a great wonder shook her. They seemed so happy. Surely, this was no nether world; it was upper earth, and—her husband beckoned; he had been laughing incontinently. He saw nothing but a crowd of queer looking people doing things they were not made to do and appearing absurdly happy over it. It irritated him unreasonably.
"See the washer-woman in red," he whispered. "Look at the monkey. Come, let's go." They trooped noisily down-stairs, and Cresswell walked unceremoniously between a black man and his partner. Mrs. Vanderpool recognized and greeted the girl as Miss Wynn. Mrs. Cresswell did not notice her, but she paused with a start of recognition at the sight of the man."Why, Bles!" she exclaimed impetuously, starting to hold out her hand. She was sincerely pleased at seeing him. Then she remembered. She bowed and smiled, looking at him with interest and surprise. He was correctly dressed, and the white shirt set off the comeliness of his black face in compelling contrast. He carried himself like a man, and bowed with gravity and dignity. She passed on and heard her husband's petulant voice in her ear.
"Mary—Mary! for Heaven's sake, come on; don't shake hands with niggers."
It was recurring flashes of temper like this, together with evidences of dubious company and a growing fondness for liquor, that drove Mary Cresswell more and more to find solace in the work of Congressman Todd's Civic Club. She collected statistics for several of the Committee, wrote letters, interviewed a few persons, and felt herself growing in usefulness and importance. She did not mention these things to her husband; she knew he would not object, but she shrank from his ridicule.
The various causes advocated by the Civic Club felt the impetus of the aggressive work of the organization. This was especially the case with the National Education Bill and the amendment to the Child Labor Bill. The movement became strong enough to call Mr. Easterly down from New York. He and the inner circle went over matters carefully.
"We need the political strength of the South," said Easterly; "not only in framing national legislation in our own