(from The Great Midland by A. Saxton)
Pledger gave part of his pay for a ticket to Chicago. Through the long night he lay asleep, with his head against the arm of his seat, thinking how it would be when he stepped down from the train and Sarah came towards him along the platform. The cold of the winter night came through the windows. Pledger wrapped himself up in his coat.
Towards morning the train stopped in an Indian town. He woke up and got down to the platform, where he began to walk up and down. He felt cold. He walked fast across the street from the station for a cup of coffee. A few people were in the restaurant eating breakfast and Pledger felt the American smell of coffee and toast and bacon. Smiling happily, he sat down at the counter and took the menu.
The counterman was standing over him, young, white and self-important.
“What do you want here?”
“Coffee and fried eggs”, Pledger said calmly.
“We do not serve coloured here”.
Pledger looked at the man attentively for a moment before he understood. Getting up from the chair, Pledger lifted his brown hands in the air. Then he let them fall. He was making an effort to control himself. He saw the other people in the restaurant watching him with expressionless faces. The door closed behind him. He was no longer hungry and now he did not even feel angry. He crossed the street and walked down to the end of the train.
He felt empty and bitter and hurt because of what had been done to him. For a moment he remembered that a Marshal of France had pinned to the flag of his regiment the Cross of War, he remembered the French girls who had kissed the Negro soldiers and cried over them, and the Mayor of New York standing with his hat in his hands. But now he was waking up; it seemed that the people who had been his friends had gone. He found himself alone in the winter daylight, among the snow-covered fields.
He got on the train and took his set. He sat deep in thought through the long hours as the train ran towards Chicago.
Дата добавления: 2015-08-17; просмотров: 122 | Нарушение авторских прав
| <== предыдущая страница | | | следующая страница ==> |
| Card # 13 | | | Card # 11 |