I was awakened at six the following morning. A strange, singsong voice
called into the room:
"Marnin', missee! Heah's your coffee."
I found Miss Foster up and dressed. She was sitting at a table drinking
coffee. She put up the shade and let the light in. Then she came over
to the bed, where the maid had set the tray. I was looking at what I
supposed to be my breakfast. It consisted of a cup of black coffee and
a single piece of dry toast.
"You'd better drink your coffee," said Miss Foster, wearily. "It will
sustain you for a while."
I got a good look at her, standing by my bed. The yellowness of her
skin startled me, and I wondered whether it could be possible that
she, too, was "colored." Then I remembered that she was from my home.
Moreover, her eyes were a pale blue, and her hair a light, nondescript
brown. She had a peevish expression, even now while she made an effort
at friendliness. She sat down on the side of my bed, and while I drank
my coffee and nibbled my piece of toast she told me a few things about
the country.
Jamaica, she said, was the beastliest country on the face of the
earth. Though for a few months its climate was tolerable, the rest
of the year it was almost unbearable. What with the crushing heat and
the dirty, drizzling rain that followed, and fell without ceasing for
months at a time, all ambition, all strength, all hope were slowly
knocked out of one. There were a score of fevers, each one as bad as
the others. She was suffering from one now. That was why she was going
home. She was young, so she said, but she felt like an old woman. She
pitied me, she declared, for what was before me, and said Campbell had
no right to bring healthy young girls from Canada without first telling
them what they were coming up against.