The languor of a Southern May was in the air. It was a season dear to
the heart of a negro. Work on the wharves was slowing down, and the men
were putting in only two or three days a week. There were always some of
them lying about the court, basking in the sun, laughing, and telling
stories while they waited for their women to come from the “white
folks’” kitchens, with their full dinner pails.
Near the entrance, the stevedores usually lounged, their great size
differentiating them from most of the other men. They had bright
bandanas about their thick necks, and under their blue cotton shirts
moved broad, flat backs that could heft a five hundred pound cotton
bale. Earning more money than the others, and possessing vast physical
strength in a world of brute force, they lorded it swaggeringly about
the court; taking the women that they wanted, and dressing them
gorgeously in the clashing crimsons and purples that they loved.
Grief over the loss of Robbins had stormed itself out at the funeral.
Peter’s ill fortune still occasioned general comment, but slight
concern to the individual. There was an air of gaiety about. The scarlet
of the geraniums was commencing to flicker in a run of windy flame on
each window sill; and from the bay came the smell of salt air blown
across young marsh-grass.
At the wharf, across the narrow street, the fishermen were discharging
strings of gleaming whiting and porgy. Vegetable sloops, blowing up from
the Sea Islands, with patched and tawny sails, broke the flat cobalt of
the inner harbor with the cross-wash of their creamy wakes.
Through the back door of the cook-shop Maria, the huge proprietress,
could be seen cutting shark-steaks from a four-foot hammerhead that one
of the fishermen had given her. All in all, it was a season for the good
things of life, to be had now for scarcely more than the asking.
Only Porgy sat lonely and disconsolate in his doorway and watched the
sunlight creep up the eastern wall until it faded to a faint red at the
top, then the blue dusk grew under the wharf, and swirled through the
street and court. He had not been able to get to his stand since Peter’s
departure; and the small store of coins, which he kept under a loose
brick in his hearth, was nearing exhaustion. Also, he missed his old
friend keenly and could not enter into the light-hearted life about him.
Presently two women entered. Porgy saw that they were Robbins’ widow,
and her sister, who now shared her room. He had been awaiting their
coming eagerly, as they had left in the early afternoon to carry
bed-clothing and food to the jail for Peter.
“How yuh fin’ um, Sister?” he hailed.
The younger woman paused, standing in the shadow, and the widow lowered
herself to a seat beside Porgy. She had put her grief aside, and gone
resolutely about her task of earning a living for the three children.
“I can’t puzzle dis t’ing out,” she said after a while. “De old man
ain’t done nuttin’, an’ dey done gots um lock up like a chicken t’ief.
Dey say dey gots tuh keep um till dat nigger Crown get ketch; an, Gawd
knows when dat debble ob a t’ing goin’ tuh happen.”
“It sho pay nigger tuh go blin’ in dis world,” contributed the young
woman. “Porgy ain’t gots much leg, but he sho got sense.”
After a moment of reflection, Porgy replied: “Sense do berry well; but
he can’t lift no weight.”
A big stevedore was crossing the court, his body moving easily with the
panther-like flow of enormous muscular power under absolute control.
The beggar’s eyes became wistful.
“Sense gots power tuh take a t’ing atter yuh gits dere,” he said. “But
he nebber puts bittle in a belly what can’t leabe he restin’ place. What
I goin’ do now sence Peter gone, an’ I can’t git on de street?”
“Pray, Brudder, pray,” said the widow devoutly. “Ain’t yuh see Gawd done
soffen de haht of dat yalluh buryin’ ondehtakuh attuh I done pray tuh
him fuh a whole day an’ night? Gawd gots leg fuh de cripple.”
“Bless de Lord!” ejaculated the young woman.
“An’ he gots comfort fuh de widder.”
“Oh, my Jedus!” crooned Porgy, beginning to sway.
“An’ food fuh de fadderless.”
“Yes, Lord!”
“An’ he goin’ raise dis poor nigger out de dus’.”
“Allelujah!”
“An’ set um in de seat ob de righteous.”
“Amen, my Sister!”
For a little while the three figures, showing now only as denser shadows
in a world of shade, swayed slowly from side to side. Then, without
saying a word, Porgy drew himself across his threshold, and closed the
door very softly.
§
It was not yet day when Porgy awakened suddenly. His eyes were wide, and
his face was working with unwonted emotion. In the faint light that
penetrated his bleared window from a street lamp, he made his way to the
hearth, and removed the brick from his secret depository. With feverish
haste he counted his little store, placing the coins in a row before
him. Then with the utmost care he recounted them, placing them in little
piles, one for the coppers, one for the nickels, and one for the dimes.
When he had fully satisfied himself as to the extent of his wealth, his
tension relaxed, and, tying the money in a rag which he tore from his
bed-clothing, he closed his hand firmly upon it, crawled back into bed,
and immediately fell asleep.
§
Two days later, Porgy drove his chariot out through the wide entrance
into a land of romance and adventure. He was seated with the utmost
gravity in an inverted packing-case that proclaimed with unconscious
irony the virtues of a well-known toilet soap. Beneath the box two solid
lop-sided wheels turned heavily. Before him, between a pair of
improvised shafts, a patriarchal goat tugged with the dogged persistence
of age which has been placed upon its mettle, and flaunted an
intolerable stench in the face of the complaisant and virtuous soap box.
As oblivious of the mirth-provoking quality of his appearance, as he was
of a smell to which custom had inured him, Porgy turned his equipage
daringly into a new thoroughfare, and drove through a street where high,
bright buildings stood between wide gardens, and where many ladies
passed and re-passed on the sidewalks, or in glittering carriages.
But the magic that had come to pass, even in the triumph of that first
morning, stirred vague doubts and misgivings within him. He noticed that
while he occasioned slight comment in the negro quarter, no sooner had
he entered the white zone, than people commenced to pass him with
averted faces, and expressions that struggled between pity and laughter.
When he finally reached his old stand before the apothecary shop, these
misgivings crystallized into a definite fear.
Several of his clients happened to be passing the shop together. One of
them was clerk to an apothecary further down the street. He seized his
nose with one hand, while he pointed at Porgy with the other. Then all
seized their noses, shaking with laughter, and waited to see what would
happen.
Porgy looked his outfit over carefully. Certainly it was working with
the utmost satisfaction. Somewhat mystified, he tied the ancient animal
to a post and, with great gravity, swung himself out of his wagon,
across the pavement, and to his old stand.
The boys who had laughed stood nearby, and were joined by others, until
soon there was quite a group.
Presently here issued from the shop the loud voice of the proprietor:
“Oh, Mary, come quick, and bring the broom. Something has died again.”
Then followed the sound of boxes being overturned, while dust from a
prodigious sweeping bellied in clouds from the door. Then the
apothecary, very red in the face, came out for air, and found the goat.
The burst of laughter that greeted him increased his irritation.
Brandishing the broom, and in no uncertain language, he drove Porgy from
his door.
But the bystanders had so enjoyed the joke at the apothecary’s expense,
and were feeling in such high good humor, that when Porgy had an
opportunity to appraise his collections, he found that they amounted to
more than he frequently got from a whole day of patient waiting.
§
It is impossible to conceive of a more radical change than that brought
about in Porgy’s life by his new emancipation. From his old
circumstances which had conspired to anchor him always to one spot, he
was now in the grip of new forces that as inevitably resulted in
constant change of scene. Soon he became quite a metropolitan, and might
have been seen in any part of the city, either sitting in his wagon at
the curb, or, if the residents of the locality seemed lenient in their
attitude toward goats, disembarking, and trying his luck in the strip of
shade along the wall.
In those days, everyone tolerated Porgy--for a while. He had become “a
character.” The other beggars gnashed their teeth, but were powerless.
On certain days he would turn to the south when he left the court, and
soon would emerge into a land of such beauty that he never lost the
illusion that it was unreal. No one seemed to work in that country,
except the happy, well-clothed negroes who frequently came to back gates
when he passed, and gave him tender morsels from the white folks’
kitchens. The great, gleaming houses looked out at him with kindly eyes
that peered between solid walls of climbing roses. Ladies on the deep
piazzas would frequently send a servant running out to give him a coin
and speed him on his way.
Before the houses and the rose-trellises stretched a broad drive, and
beyond its dazzling belt of crushed shell the harbor lay between its
tawny islands, like a sapphire upon a sailor’s weathered hand. Sometimes
Porgy would steal an hour from the daily rounds, pause there, and watch
a great, blunt-nosed steamer heave slowly out of the unknown, to come to
rest with a sigh of spent steam, and a dusty thundering of released
anchor chains.
“Gawd sho gots a long arm,” he would murmur; or, “Porgy, yo’ sho is a
little somethin’ aftuh all.”
Then there would be other days when he would repair to the narrow retail
street, with its unbelievable windows, and drawing near to the curb,
between the tall carriages of the shoppers would fall heir to the
pennies which they got with their change, and which were of no value to
such as they.
Always kind hands dropped coins in his cup, and sped him on. They were
great days for Porgy. And great were the nights when he would tell of
his adventures to the envious circle that gathered in the dusk of the
court.
But Porgy was by nature a dreamer, and there were times even in those
days, when his mind returned with wistful longing to the old
uninterrupted hours when he used to sit, lost in meditation, under the
unmarked drift of time. Some day, he would tell himself, there would
come one with a compassion so great that he would give both Porgy and
the goat place by his doorstep. Then life would be perfect indeed.
§
June, and the cotton season was over. The last tramp steamer had faded
into the horizon. Great sheds that linked land and sea lay empty and
dark, and through their cavernous depths echoed the thud and suck of
waves against the bulkheads. The last of the stevedores had departed,
some to the plantations, others to the phosphate mines, and still others
to the river barges.
The long, hot days, so conducive to indolence, brought a new phase of
life to Catfish Row. The loud talk and noisy comings and goings
diminished. Men came in earlier in the evenings, and spent more time
with their women.
Porgy sat alone in his doorway. In a room overhead a man and his wife
were engaged in a friendly quarrel that ended in laughter. From an open
window nearby came the sound of drowsy child voices. In the crowded dark
about him, Life, with cruel preoccupation, was engrossed with its
eternal business.
A large, matronly woman who lived near him, passed, carrying a pail of
water. She stopped, set down her burden, and dropped a hand on Porgy’s
shoulder.
“What de matter wid dis man, he ain’t gots nuttin’ tuh say?” she asked
him kindly.
Porgy’s face contracted with emotion. He caught her hand and hurled it
from him. “Lemme be,” he rasped, in a tight, husky voice. “Yuh done gots
yuh own man. Ain’t yuh?”
“Oh, Lawd!” she laughed, as she turned away. “Yuh ain’t t’ink I wantin’
_yuh_, is yuh? Do listen tuh de man.”
§
Through the early night a woman had lain in the dust against the outer
wall of Maria’s cook-shop. She was extremely drunk and unpleasant to
look upon. Exactly when she had dropped, or been dropped there, no one
knew. Porgy had not seen her when he had driven in at sunset. But he had
heard some talk of her among those who had entered later. One of the men
had come in laughing.
“I seen Crown’s Bess outside,” he said. “Must be she come aroun’ tuh
look fur um.”
“She sho goin’ tuh hab one long res’, ef she goin’ wait dere fur um. Dat
nigger gone f’om hyuh fas’ and far!” another had averred.
It was ten o’clock: and Maria was closing her shop. The great negress
was in the act of fastening the window, when the tall, gaunt form of the
woman lurched through the door into the faint illumination of the
smoking lamp. The visitor measured the distance to the nearest bench
with wandering and vacant eyes, plunged for it, and collapsed, with head
and arms thrown across a table.
Maria was exasperated, but equal to the emergency. Catching the woman
around the middle, she swung her easily to the door, dropped her into
outer darkness, and returned to the window.
A crash caused her to turn suddenly. There was the woman again, sprawled
across the table as before.
“I swear tuh Gawd!” exclaimed the provoked negress. “Ef yuh ain’t de
persistentes’ nigger I ebber seen.” She went over, lifted the woman’s
head, and looked into eyes in the far depths of which a human soul was
flickering feebly.
“Somethin’ tuh eat,” the woman whispered. “Lemme hab somethin’ tuh eat,
an’ I’ll go.”
Growling like an approaching equinoctial gale, Maria brought bread and
fish; and emptying the dregs of the coffeepot into a cup, placed it
before her.
“Now, eat an’ trabble, Sister,” she advised laconically.
The woman raised her head. An ugly scar marked her left cheek, and the
acid of utter degradation had etched hard lines about her mouth; but
eyes into which human consciousness was returning looked fearlessly into
the determined face of the big negress. For a moment she ate wolfishly;
then asked suddenly:
“Who lib in dat room ’cross de way?”
“Porgy,” she was informed, “but such as yuh ain’t gots no use fuh he.
He a cripple, an’ a beggar.”
“He de man wid goat?”
“Yes, he gots goat.”
The woman’s eyes narrowed to dark, unfathomable slits.
“I hyuh say he gits good money fum de w’ite folks,” she said slowly.
In silence the meal was finished. Then the woman steadied herself a
moment with hands against a table, and, without a word to Maria, walked
quickly, with an almost haughty carriage, from the room.
She crossed the narrow drive with a decisive tread, opened the door of
Porgy’s room, entered, and closed the door behind her.
§
It was late afternoon. Serena Robbins entered the court, paused at
Porgy’s door, and gave a sharp rap on the weathered panel. The door was
opened by a woman. The visitor looked through her, and spoke directly to
Porgy, who sat within.
“I gots good news,” she announced. “I done tuh see my w’ite folks ’bout
Peter; an’ dey say dey gots a frien’ who is a lawyer, an’ he kin git um
out. I tell um tuh sen’ um tuh see you ’bout um, ’cause yuh gots so
much sense when yuh talks tuh w’ite folks.”
Having delivered her message, Serena turned a broad back upon the woman
who stood silently in the doorway, and with the bearing of an arbiter of
social destinies, strode to her corner of the court.
Across the drive, Maria, vast and moist, hung over her stove in a far
corner of her cook-shop. Several negroes sat at the little tables,
eating their early suppers, laughing and chaffing.
“Yuh sho got good-lookin’ white gals in dis town,” drawled a slender
young octoroon. He was attired in sky-blue, peg-top trousers, yellow
spats, and in the center of a scarlet bow-tie gleamed an immense paste
horseshoe.
“Do listen tuh Sportin’ Life!” said a black, loutish buck admiringly.
“Ef he ain’t lookin’ at de rollin’ bones, he always gots he eye on de
women.”
Maria’s heavy tread shook the room as she crossed and stood, with arms
akimbo, scowling down at her iridescent guest. The man looked up,
lowered his eyes quickly, and shifted uneasily in his chair.
“Nigger!” she finally shot at him, and the impact almost jarred him from
his chair. “I jus’ tryin’ ter figger out wedder I bettuh kill yuh
decent now, wid yuh frien’s about yuh; or leabe you fuh de w’ite
gentlemens tuh hang attuh a while.”
“Come now, old lady, don’t talk like dese old-fashioned lamp-oil niggers
what have had no adwantage. Why, up in New York, where I been waitin’ in
a hotel--”
But he got no further.
“Noo Yo’k,” she shouted. “Don’t yuh try any Noo Yo’kin’ aroun’ dis town.
Ef I had my way, I’d go down tuh dat Noo Yo’k boat, an’ take ebbery
Gawd’s nigger what come up de gang plank wid er Joseph coat on he back
an’ a glass headlight on he buzzom and drap um tuh de catfish befo’ he
foot hit decent groun’! Yas; my belly fair ache wid dis Noo Yo’k talk.
De fus t’ing dat dem nigger fuhgit is dat dem is nigger. Den dem comes
tuh dese decent country mens, and fills um full ob talk wut put money in
de funeral ondehtakuh pocket.” Breathless, she closed her arraignment by
bringing a fist the size of a ham down upon the table with such force
that her victim leapt from his chair and extended an ingratiating hand
toward her.
“Dat’ all right, Auntie. Le’s you an’ me be frien’.”
“Frien’ wid yuh?” and her tone dripped scorn. “One ob dese days I might
lie down wid er rattlesnake, and when dat time come, yuh kin come right
along an’ git intuh de bed. But till den, keep yuh shiny carcase in Noo
Yo’k till de debbil ready tuh take chaage ob um!”
Suddenly the anger left her eyes, and her face became grave. She leaned
over, and spoke very quietly into his face.
“Fuh Gawd’s sake, don’t talk dat kind ob talk tuh dese hyuh boys. Dis
county ain’t nebber yit see a black man git lynch. Dese nigger knows
folks, an’ dey knows nigger. Fer Gawd’ sake keep yuh mout’ off w’ite
lady. Yuh gots plenty ob yuh own color fuh talk ’bout. Stick tuh dem,
an’ yuh ain’t git inter no trouble.”
During Maria’s attack upon her guest, the court had been full of the
many-colored sounds that accompanied its evening life. Now, gradually
the noise shrunk, seeming to withdraw into itself. All knew what it
meant. A white man had entered. The protective curtain of silence which
the negro draws about his life when the Caucasian intrudes hung almost
tangibly in the air. No one appeared to notice the visitor. Each was
busily preoccupied with his task. Yet the newcomer made no move that was
not noted by fifty pairs of inscrutable eyes.
The man wore a soft hat drawn well down over his face. He was slender
and tall, and walked with his body carried slightly forward, like one
who is used to meeting and overcoming difficulties.
A young woman passed him. He reached out and touched her on the arm. She
stopped, and turned immediately toward him, her eyes lowered, her manner
submissive, but utterly negative.
“I am looking for a man by the name of Porgy,” he said in a clear
pleasant voice. “Can you direct me to his room?”
“Porgy?” she repeated slowly, as though trying to remember. Then she
called aloud: “Anybody hyuh know a man by de name ob Porgy?”
Several of the silent bystanders looked up. “Porgy?” they repeated, one
after another, with shakes of the head.
The white man laughed reassuringly, as though quite used to the
proceeding. “Come,” he urged, “I am his friend, Mr. Alan Archdale; I
know that he lives here, and I want to help him.”
From behind her tubs, Serena advanced, knocking the ashes from her clay
pipe as she came. When she was quite close, she stopped, and peered up
into the face above her. Then she turned upon the girl.
“Go ’long an’ call Porgy,” she commanded. “Can’t yuh tell _folks_ when
yuh see um?”
A light broke over the young woman’s face.
“Oh, yuh means _Porgy_?” she cried, as though she had just heard the
name for the first time; “I ain’t understan’ wut name yuh say, Boss,”
and echoes arose from different parts of the court. “Oh, yes, de
gentleman mean _Porgy_. How come we ain’t understan’.” Then the tension
in the air broke, and life resumed its interrupted flow.
The young woman stepped to Porgy’s door, and called. Presently the door
opened, and a woman helped the beggar out to his seat upon the sill,
then seated herself behind him in the deep gloom of the room.
Archdale crossed the short distance, and seated himself on the sill
beside the negro.
“Tell me about your friend who got locked up on account of the Robbins
murder,” he asked, without preamble.
In the dim light, Porgy leaned forward and looked long into the keen,
kindly face of his questioner.
Archdale gave a surprised exclamation: “Why, you’re the old man who used
to beg in front of the apothecary shop on King Charles Street!” he said.
Then, after a moment of scrutiny: “But you are not old, after all, are
you?” and he studied the face intently. There was a touch of grey in the
wool above the ears, and strong character lines flared downward from the
nose to corners of a mouth that was, at once, full-lipped and sensuous,
yet set in a resolute line most unusual in a negro. With the first
indications of age upon it, the face seemed still alive with a youth
that had been neither spent nor wasted.
“But, tell me about your friend,” said the visitor, breaking a silence
that was commencing to become tense.
Porgy’s face still wore its mask. “How come yuh tuh care, Boss?” he
queried.
“Why, I am the Rutledge’s lawyer; and I look after their colored folks
for them. I think they must have owned half the slaves in the county. A
woman here, Serena Robbins, is the daughter of their old coachman, or
something; and she asked them to help her friend out.”
“Peter ain’t gots no money, yuh know, Boss. An’ I jes begs from do’ to
do’.” There was still a shade of suspicion in Porgy’s voice.
Archdale laughed reassuringly. “It will not take any money. At least,
not much; and I am sure that Mrs. Rutledge will take care of that. So
you can go right ahead and tell me all about it.”
Fully satisfied at last, Porgy told the tale of the killing and the
subsequent arrest of Peter.
When he had finished the recital, Archdale sat silent for a while. “The
dirty hounds!” he said under his breath. Finally he turned wearily to
Porgy, and explained slowly:
“Of course we can go to law about this; but it will take no end of time.
There is an easier way. He must have someone, who is acceptable to the
magistrate, to go his bond. Do you know a man by the name of Huysenberg,
who keeps a corner-shop down by the West-end wharf?”
Porgy, listening intently, nodded.
Archdale handed him a bill. “Take this ten dollars to him, and tell him
that you want him to go Peter’s bond. He hasn’t any money of his own,
and his shop is in his wife’s name; but he has an arrangement with the
magistrate that makes him entirely satisfactory.”
He handed Porgy a card with an address pencilled under a printed name.
“You will find me here,” he said. “If Peter is not out in two days after
you hand over the ten, let me know.” Then, with a brisk, but friendly
“Good night,” he left the court.
§
There was great rejoicing in Catfish Row. Peter had returned. The ten
dollar bill which Archdale had given Porgy had worked the miracle.
Except for the fact that the old negro’s shoulders drooped, and his grip
on actualities seemed weakened by his confinement, there was no evidence
to show that he had been absent. He had gone to the horse-dealer, and
had found his ancient beast still awaiting a purchaser. Another contract
had been signed which had started him off again on the eternal weekly
payment. The German had driven back with the furniture, which Peter had
docilely purchased for the second time. Again “The Great Emancipator”
had been hung in his accustomed place above the mantel. Now, each
morning, the old wagon rattled out over the cobbles, with the usual
number of small, ecstatic, black bodies pendant from its dilapidated
superstructure.
“De buckra sho pots nigger figgered out tuh a cent!” said Peter
philosophically, and even with a note of admiration in his voice. “Dem
knows how much money wagon make in er week; an’ de horse man, de
furniture man, an’ de lan’lo’d mek dey ’rangement’ accordin’. But I done
lib long ’nough now tuh beat ’em all, ’cause money ain’t no use tuh a
man attuh he done pass he prime, nohow.”
When the old man had settled firmly back into his nook, and had an
opportunity to look about him, he noticed a change in Porgy.
“I tell yuh dat nigger happy,” he said to Serena, one evening while they
were smoking their pipes together on her washing bench.
“Go ’long wid yuh!” she retorted. “Dat ’oman ain’t de kin’ tuh mek man
happy. It tek a killer like Crown tuh hol’ she down.”
“Dat may be so,” agreed the old man sagely. “But Porgy don’ know dat
yit. An’ ’side, ef a man is de kin’ wut needs er ’oman, he goin’ be
happy regahdless. Him dress she up in he own eye till she look lak de
Queen of Sheba tuh um. Porgy t’ink right now dat he gots a she-gawd in
he room.”
“He sho’ gots de kin’ wut goin’ gib um hell,” Serena commented
cynically. “Dat ’oman ain’t fit tuh ’sociate wid. Much as I like Porgy,
I wouldn’t swap t’ree wo’d wid she.”
“Dat’s all so, Sister,” conceded Peter. “But yuh keep yo’ eye on Porgy.
He usen tuh hate all dese chillen. Ain’t he? Now watch um. Ebery day
w’en he come home he gots candy-ball fuh de crowd. An’ wut mo’,
yistuhday I hyuh he an’ she singin’ tuhgedduh in dey room.”
Serena motioned to him to be quiet. Porgy’s woman crossed the court to
draw a bucket of water from the common tap near Serena’s corner. She was
neatly dressed, and passed them as though they did not exist. Filling
her pail, she swung it easily to her head, and, steadying it lightly
with one hand, returned close to them with an air of cool scorn that
produced entirely different effects upon her two observers. Serena
watched her departure in silence.
“Dat de t’ing!” said Peter, a note of admiration in his voice. “She sho
ain’t axin’ no visit offen none of she neighbor.” And he emitted an
indiscreet chuckle, which was too much for his friend.
“Yuh po’, ole, wall-eyed, sof’-headed gran’daddy! Ain’t yuh ’shame’ tuh
set dey befo’ me, an’ talk sweet-mout’ ’bout dat murderin’ Crown’s Bess?
Ef I wuz yo’ age, an’ er man, I’d sabe my sof’ wo’d fer de Gawd-farin’
ladies.”
“Ef yuh wuz my age, an’ a man--” commenced Peter. He hesitated, and
looked long at her with his dim, kindly eyes; then he shook his head.
“No; it ain’t no use. Yuh wouldn’t onderstan’. Dat somet’ing shemale
sense ain’t goin’ tuh help yuh none wid.” And, still shaking his head,
he knocked out his pipe, and departed in the direction of the stable,
where he was presently greeted by a soft, comprehending whinny.
Bess entered Porgy’s room and swung her pail of water to its place
beside the new wood stove that had superseded the old, open hearth, and
busied herself with preparations for supper.
Porgy was seated in a low chair near the door. He was smoking
contentedly, and the odd tension that had characterized him, even in his
moments of silent thought, had given place to a laxed attitude of body
and an expression of well-being.
An infinitesimal negro passed with a whistle and a double shuffle.
“Look hyuh, sonny!” called Porgy.
The boy paused, hesitated, and advanced slowly. Porgy held out a large
round ball, striped red and white. “How ’bout er sweet?” he said a
little self-consciously. The boy took the candy, and shuffled uneasily
from foot to foot.
“Dat’s right,” said Porgy, with a burst of sudden, warm laughter, that
somehow startled the child. “Now yuh come again an’ see Porgy an’
Bess.”
III
[Illustration]