The Black Lizard Big Book of Black Mask Stories

II

Ten white men sat around the long mahogany table in the library of Cater Courtnay’s house, and from their faces and their manner it was clear that business of a most serious nature had brought them together. They were men whose faces had long known the sun, prosperous-appearing men, who among them owned most of the good farming land in the county.

Sam Hull, big-faced, untidy, in a wrinkled suit, was speaking.

“Yes, sirs,” he was saying, an overtone of hate in his voice, “right now is the time to call a halt. Learn ’em a lesson they won’t forget in a hurry; they got one coming to them. I reckon you all have noticed how they been getting out of hand of late.”

The men about the table nodded and growled. Cater Courtnay at the head of the table said: “Yes, yes, I guess we all have. Go on, Sam.”

“But this last thing — that’s the limit with me.”

“You mean that voting business, Sam?” asked one of the men.

The big-faced planter nodded.

“What were the facts, Sam? I was down to Mobile when it happened.”

“Well,” said Hull, “last week on registration day over at Live Oak Corners, little Ned Harris, the election clerk, was dozing in the polling place, when in come two niggers, that big boy Ike, that works for Cassius Pryor, and Courtnay’s boy Matt. Ned Harris sings out, ‘What in hell do you want here?’ and do you know what Matt says?”

The narrator paused before he answered his own question.

“Matt says, ‘Mr. Harris, please, sir, we all would like to vote, if you please.’ At first Ned Harris thought they was fooling, and he says, ‘You want to what?’ ‘We want to vote,’ says Ike and Matt, together, like they had rehearsed. Well, you know what a hair-trigger temper Ned Harris has. ‘You get out of here and get damn quick,’ he says. And do you know what Ike says?”

The listeners did not know but expressed a keen interest in knowing.

“Ike says, ‘Mr. Harris, sir, in the Constitution of the United States it says we all can vote and — and — we want our constitutional rights.’ Well, with that Ned Harris jumps up to knock him down; but Ned ain’t very strong and the blow only staggers Ike, and then do you know what Ike does?”

The speaker looked round the ring of attentive eyes before continuing: “He pushes Ned Harris back into his seat, and says, ‘Mr. Harris, sir, you don’t respect the Constitution,’ and then he and Matt walks out.”

“Where are those two niggers now?” demanded one of the men, sharply.

“Matt’s lit out,” Cater Courtnay informed him.

“What about the other one — Ike?”

“Oh, after what Cassius Pryor did to him I guess he won’t be overanxious about his constitutional rights again.”

They all laughed. The man who had been in Mobile threw out a question.

“How come these niggers are so glib about their constitutional rights? Those boys can’t read, can they?”

Courtnay stood up.

“Gentlemen,” he said, “Telfair, here, has put his finger on the sore spot of the whole business. Who put these niggers up to acting this way? Ike and Matt and the rest of them haven’t the brains or the nerve; someone is behind them, telling them what to say. I reckon all of us know who I mean.”

There were growls of, “Greel. That skunk Greel.”

“I always figure, gentlemen,” went on Courtnay, “that the way to stop a thing is to stop it at its source—”

“In other words,” interjected Sam Hull, “get Greel.”

“Precisely.”

They looked at each other; there was no dissension.

“I had Greel come to see me last week,” said Courtnay. “He’s a smart, educated nigger, not at all like the hands down here. He’s full of a lot of wind about racial equality—”

He saw that his words were goading them; he went on:

“No. I didn’t hit him. That’s not the way to handle his kind. I just gave him a strong hint that if he valued his skin he’d better take his school up North, where it would be appreciated.”