22

I didn’t expect a young girl. Not sure what I had expected—but not suits and ties, not a teenager in a yellow sundress. She had a washed-out complexion, pale eyes, orangey-blonde hair hanging shapeless to her shoulders—nothing that a trip to Adele’s Hair and Nails couldn’t brighten up. But mostly she looked . . . scared. Like me. For a moment, I felt confused, then angry. How dare this hate group suck youth and innocence into their toxic clutches?

Cover the rally in prayer, Jodi. Pray for the people you see.

I decided to pray for that girl. Jesus, I don’t know anything about that girl, don’t even know her name, but You do—

The bullhorn swung up. “Glad to see some people on this campus believe in free speech!” The metallic bellow of the bullhorn had everyone’s immediate attention. “Today’s university campus is a far cry from the free exchange of ideas our European forefathers intended. Today the liberal elite talk about tolerance, but only certain ideas are tolerated—”

The sound of the bullhorn must’ve carried a good distance, because the edges of the crowd grew amoebalike and filled up the feeder sidewalks. A good two or three hundred by now. An undercurrent bubbled through the crowd. A few heads nodded. Whites and minorities made up the crowd in about equal numbers. I glanced uneasily around me. I had steeled myself for the kind of venom Josh had found on the White Pride Web site, the hate-filled rhetoric in the books riding on his back. Not something that actually made sense.

The man on the “soapbox” held up a purple and gold handbook. “You all recognize this. The university catalog. Padded with African-American Studies, Asian and Middle East Studies, even Jewish Studies! And student services galore—African-American Student Affairs, Latino Student Services . . .” He nailed the crowd with dark, serious eyes. “But where are the White American Studies? The White Only fraternities? The White Pride festival? Oh, no. Everybody would cry racist!”

A voice somewhere in the crowd shouted, “Tell it like it is!” A couple of the sentries ringing the Rock yelled, “Bigot!” and “Whaddya think all those Greek frat houses are, anyway?”

A hand touched my arm. I jerked it away and whirled, coming face to face with a familiar mug under a brown hat. “Ben Garfield! Don’t scare me like that!” I gave the older man a big hug, nearly knocking off the hat. “Do you really want to be here?”

He settled the hat back over his yarmulke. Strange. Ben didn’t usually wear a yarmulke. “Good question, missy,” he grunted. “Bad for my blood pressure, but what else could I do? My brother called for the troops.” He stuck out his hand to Denny. “Are we having fun yet?”

Denny chuckled. “Just getting started.”

The man with the bullhorn drowned out the yelled comments. “What do they teach you at university these days? Only what the government wants you to know! A government perverted by Judeo-Christian propaganda and held captive by Jewish money!”

“Here we go,” muttered Ben.

“The glorious accomplishments of the White Race in pushing back inferior races and building a great nation are now being taught to our children as mistakes and blunders! Think about it, people! Haven’t you learned anything in your science classes about the survival of the fittest? Do you think this university would be standing here if we’d left this country in the hands of the so-called natives?”

Catcalls and angry comments flew fast and furious now. The same big voice on the wall yelled, “Bigot!” which soon became a chant picked up by others: “Big-ot! Big-ot! Big-ot!” The girl in the yellow dress looked frightened. She took a step closer to the slim young man in the red tie, but he seemed oblivious to her presence.

I focused on her face. If I looked around at the crowd, my heart would fail me like Simon Peter when he tried to walk on the water but let the waves sink him. Jesus, I prayed silently, she’s caught in a trap. Set her free, Lord.

“You white men and white women!” yelled the man on the soapbox. “Wake up! While you party and fraternize and whine, ‘Can’t we all just get along?’ the Jews and the mud races are taking over our country! What do you think is going to happen to your rights when the glorious white race is no longer a majority in this nation? Do you think your rights will be—”

“Big-ot! Big-ot! Big-ot!” The chanting drowned out whatever the man said next. A few of the sentries surrounding the Rock, including the big guy with dreadlocks, stepped off the wall and started pushing their way through the crowd. I caught sight of Peter Douglass and Carl Hickman standing off to the side of the crowd, as if they’d arrived late. Smart. Wished we were standing off to the side instead of smack-dab in the middle with Mark—

I clutched Denny’s arm. “Denny! Where’s Mark?”

Mark had disappeared, but a moment later he reappeared next to the White Pride guy, waving his arms for attention. “Let the man speak!” he yelled over the crowd. “People have died for the right of a person to speak freely in this country, no matter how much we disagree. Let him speak!”

The crowd, startled into submission by seeing one of NU’s African-American professors defending the speaker, quieted to a restless mutter.

The young man glared at Mark. His voice still carried through the bullhorn. “I don’t need your permission to speak. This is a free country.”

“That’s right,” Mark tossed back. “I was only offering you the courtesy of my attention. If you’re done, I have a few things to say in reply.”

Someone yelled, “Dr. Smith! We want Dr. Smith!” Now the crowd took up the new chant, and it became obvious that Mr. Guy-in-the-Tie had lost his platform. He glanced around in frustration and then lowered his bullhorn.

A student still standing on the wall yelled, “Over here, Dr. Smith!” A path opened through the crowd like the parting of the Red Sea, and Mark stepped up onto the wall. Spontaneous clapping erupted.

But not everyone was clapping. I noticed several people clustered around the White Pride speaker as if asking him questions, even shaking hands with him. Were they White Pride supporters who’d been planted in the crowd? Or listeners who suddenly found someone who dared to speak their private prejudices and fears?

Oh God, I groaned. Don’t let the seeds of hatred settle into new hearts today—white or black.

“Fellow professors and students! Friends and neighbors!” Mark raised an arm for attention. “Some of what you heard today has a kernel of truth. Tolerance as a virtue has been co-opted in today’s society to mean, ‘You have to agree with me.’ But frankly, tolerance is particularly necessary when we don’t agree. The real virtue is the freedom to disagree while respecting each other’s humanity.” Mark grinned. “Admittedly, a good deal of tolerance is needed today to listen to this man speak—”

Laugher erupted in the crowd.

“But the man has a point. Every ethnic and racial group should be able to celebrate its heritage and its contributions to our society, including our white brothers and sisters. But don’t be fooled by the half-truths you heard a few minutes ago. The group this man represents, the Coalition for White Pride and Preservation, is not interested in whites celebrating their heritage along with blacks and other minorities. They believe in white superiority; they want to return to white domination. Their creed goes even further! They want to eliminate other races and ethnic groups—and they are prepared to go to any lengths to achieve it!”

I squirmed, keenly aware at that moment of my own whiteness. I knew Mark wasn’t speaking about whites in general, but did everyone know that?

“Do your homework, men and women! Don’t let this group fly under the radar until they launch their own version of a racial war. Visit their Web site! Read their books! Learn what this group really—”

The crowd seemed to be pressing forward, separating me from Denny. A large figure loomed behind Josh, who was standing a few feet in front of me. “So, skinhead,” a deep voice taunted. “You white folks think you gonna eliminate us, do you?”

I stared in astonishment at the big black guy in dreadlocks, leering behind his shades at Josh’s shaved head. No, no . . .

Josh turned; his eyes traveled up to the student’s face. “I’m not a skinhead.” The muscles beside his mouth twitched. “Just shaved my head, like Michael Jordan.”

The big guy belched. “Don’t ‘Michael Jordan’ me, white boy. You look like a skinhead—what’s this?” He yanked at the backpack slung over Josh’s shoulder. The jerk nearly pulled Josh off his feet. The backpack thudded to the ground and spilled its contents out of the broken zipper.

The White Pride books.

It happened so fast, the moment seemed frozen in time. Fear flickered in Josh’s eyes. My own stomach lurched into my throat. Oh God! Not those books! A sour frown creased the face beneath the shades, even as Mark Smith’s voice rose and fell from the wall near the Rock.

“What’s this?” The bully snatched up one of the books with its blood-red title. A string of profanity scorched the air around us. “Got your own racist library, huh, white boy?” He pushed Josh, who stumbled into me, and we both went down. I landed hard; Josh landed on top of me. Grit bit into my palms and knees. The weight of Josh’s body held me down.

The big voice somewhere over my head yelled, “Get a load of this crap!” I twisted my head and caught a glimpse of books being held aloft.

“Hey!” I heard Ben Garfield shouting. “Stop it! . . . Denny! Denny! Help me here!”

Josh was struggling to get up. I felt hands under my shoulders and saw Denny’s grease-stained pant leg bending down near my head. “Jodi! Josh! What happened? Are you OK?” With Denny’s help, I somehow got my feet beneath me, and the three of us struggled upward.

Voices shouted and bodies jostled all around us, making it hard to keep our footing. Denny held onto my arm like a vise. Suddenly the bullhorn’s metallic voice rose over the din. “You! Nigger! Get your polluted hands off our sacred books!”

The atmosphere seemed to suck in its breath. Then a roar of rage swept through the crowd, as if someone had opened a dam. Josh got shoved again—but another hand grabbed him, held him upright, and Peter Douglass’s voice hissed, “You guys gotta get out—now!”