Part One 6 страница

'Then—us'll have these nice collards and some hoecake and

coffee. And I, going to cut me off a few slices of this here

white meat and fry it for myself.'

Doctor Copeland followed Portia with his eyes. She moved

slowly around the room in her stockinged feet, taking down

the scrubbed pans from the wall, building up the fire, washing

the grit from the collards. He opened his mouth to speak once

and then composed his lips again.

'So you and your husband and your brother have your own co-

operative plan,' he said finally.

"That's right.'

Doctor Copeland jerked at his fingers and tried to pop

THE HEAR! IS A LUWHL I rtuiN mis. i»

the joints again. 'Do you intend to plan for children?'

Portia did not look at her father. Angrily she sloshed the water

from the pan of collards. "There be some things,' she said,

'that seem to me to depend entirely upon God.'

They did not say anything else. Portia left the supper to cook

on the stove and sat silently with her long hands dropping

down limp between her knees. Doctor Cope-land's head rested

on his chest as though he slept. But he was not sleeping; now

and then a nervous tremor would pass over his face. Then he

would breathe deeply and compose his face again. Smells of

the supper began to fill the stifling room. In the quietness the

clock on top of the cupboard sounded very loud, and because

of what they had just said to each other the monotonous

ticking was like the word 'chil-dren, chil-dren,' said over and

over.

He was always meeting one of them—crawling naked on a

floor or engaged in a game of marbles or even on a dark street

with his arms around a girl. Benedict Copeland, the boys were

all called. But for the girls there were such names as Benny

Mae or Madyben or Benedine Ma-dine. He had counted one

day, and there were more than a dozen named for him.

But all his life he had told and explained and exhorted. You

cannot do this, he would say. There are all reasons why this

sixth or fifth or ninth child cannot be, he would tell them. It is

not more children we need but more chances for the ones

already on the earth. Eugenic Parenthood for the Negro Race

was what he would exhort them to. He would tell them in

simple words, always the same way, and with the years it

came to be a sort of angry poem which he had always known

by heart.

He studied and knew the development of any new theory. And

from his own pocket he would distribute the devices to his

patients himself. He was by far the first doctor in the town to

even think of such. And he would give and explain and give

and tell them. And then deliver maybe two score times a

week. Madyben and Benny Mae.

That was only one point. Only one.

All of his life he knew that there was a reason for his working.

He always knew that he was meant to teach his people. All

day he would go with his bag from house to house and on all

things he would talk to them. MCUULLEKS

After the long day a heavy tiredness would come in him. But

in the evening when he opened the front gate the tiredness

would go away. There were Hamilton and Karl Marx and

Portia and little William. There was Daisy, too.

Portia took the lid from the pan on the stove and stirred the

collards with a fork. 'Father—' she said after a while.

Doctor Copeland cleared his throat and spat into a

handkerchief. His voice was bitter and rough. 'Yes?'

'Less us quit this here quarreling with each other.'

'We were not quarreling,' said Doctor Copeland.

'It don't take words to make a quarrel,' Portia said. 'It look to

me like us is always arguing even when we sitting perfectly

quiet like this. It just this here feeling I haves. I tell you the

truth—ever time I come to see you it mighty near wears me

out. So less us try not to quarrel in any way no more.'

'It is certainly not my wish to quarrel. I am sorry if you have

that feeling, Daughter.'

She poured out coffee and handed one cup unsweetened to her

father. In her own portion she put several spoons of sugar. 'I

getting hungry and this will taste good to us. Drink your

coffee while I tell you something which happened to us a

piece back. Now that it all over it seem a little bit funny, but

we got plenty reason not to laugh too hard.'

'Go ahead,' said Doctor Copeland.

'Well—sometime back a real fine-looking, dressed-up colored

man come in town here. He called hisself Mr. B. F. Mason

and said he come from Washington, D. C. Ever day he would

walk up and down the street with a walking-cane and a pretty

colored shirt on. Then at night he would go to the Society

Caf6. He eaten finer than any man in this town. Ever night he

would order hisself a bottle of gin and two pork chops for his

supper. He always had a smile for everybody and was always

bowing around to the girls and holding a door open for you to

come in or go out For about a week he made hisself mighty

pleasant wherever he were. Peoples begun to ask questions

and wonder about this rich Mr. B. F. Mason. Then pretty soon,

after he acquaints hisself, he begun to settle down to business.'

Portia spread out her lips and blew into her saucer of

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