Chapter Twenty-Three

Margaret rounded a corner and went from walking along an empty, darkly-shadowed side street to standing on a crowded, neon-emblazoned avenue.

She instantly recognized her location was the heart of Five Points. The same bustling village of restaurants, shops, offices, and clubs she saw the day she learned that she was part Negro.

She was a stranger here, yet she no longer felt unwelcome, as now she knew that these were her people too. She enjoyed the way so many of them lavishly greeted one another, as if they were reunited relatives.

She overheard unfamiliar words that she wished she could ask the meaning of copasetic and gams, but she’d have to do that another day. Right now she had to get to Amy’s. She was looking for the market that was a few doors from the cross street she needed.

She realized people were staring at her, their mouths agape as she walked by. She had hoped not to draw attention, but suddenly realized that she was still wearing her Klan robe.

She overheard a passerby exclaim, “Hey Bub, check out the crazy ofay,” and knew by the man’s tone of voice that he meant it. She must be crazy. He just didn’t know, and had no way of knowing, how wrong he was about the ofay part.

Her father’s blood, the Negro part of her, meant that she was as colored as if she was pure African. More importantly, this was the clearest-minded she’d been in all of her thirty-four years.

She was walking so fast that faces were mostly a blur, except, once again, she couldn’t help noticing the extraordinary array of the Negro peoples’ skin colors. They ranged from lightest light to darkest dark and every hue in between, like Amy’s, which was similar to coffee generously diluted with cream.

She envisioned a cup of coffee, particularly the type Mother Browne preferred, with so much cream added that the unaware might believe it to be a cup of milk. So, did that mean it was milk or was it still coffee? Mother Browne called it coffee.

She crossed an intersection behind a quartet of apparent friends, two men in tuxedos and two women in long silk evening gowns. One of the women kept turning to look at her.

“Honey,” the woman said, “are you lost or something? We can give you a ride if you need.”

The woman’s eyes conveyed sincerity and concern. Margaret was grateful for her kindness. “No, but thank you,” she said. “I just have to get to my daughter. She only lives a few blocks from here,”

“Okay, if you’re sure,” the woman said, ignoring her companion’s urging to, “Come the hell on.”

The woman had dropped back and was walking beside Margaret.

“Yes, I’m sure,” said Margaret. “In fact, here’s the little grocery store I was looking for to remind me of which street to turn on. I take a right at the corner, go two blocks, and then left, then I’m there. I can’t miss the house. It’s the biggest house on the block.”

Margaret started to thank the woman again, but stopped short when the two men halted and cocked their heads as if listening for something.

Margaret heard it too … a faint, yet distinguishable sound. The still-distant cacophony of a multitude of honking horns sent chills down her spine. Unmistakably, it was the Karavan on its way to Five Points. She couldn’t determine how many miles away it was, but the two men and the two women were clearly distraught.

One man seized the kind woman by her arm exhorting, “Let’s be smart and get the hell out of here.”

The woman nodded reluctantly, yet maintained another brief moment of eye contact with Margaret, as she moved onward. Then the four elegantly dressed companions were gone.

Aloneness engulfed Margaret. She was so near to where her daughter lived, yet the Karavan was definitely on its way.

“Oh, no, Lord. I beg you, don’t ask this of me,” she cried aloud, but within an instant, realized this wasn’t the Lord’s doing. It was ignorance’s doing and self-hate. Because anyone who loved truly loved himself or herself didn’t have the capacity to hate others. If she didn’t resist evil, how could she expect anyone else to? And she was the only one who could sound a warning.

The scale was so unmercifully unbalanced — one life versus an entire community. Margaret blinked back her tears. She needed to act fast.

If she ran up to people, one by one, they would only think what the earlier group probably thought, that she was simply out of her mind and just ignore her. Frantic, she prayed for a solution.

A banner across the front of the church on the adjacent corner caught her eye. The public was invited to a revival. Tonight.

“Dear God, please let them still be there.”

She ran across the street without watching for traffic and was grazed by a motorist unable to stop in time. She pitched forward and fell across the curb. The driver of the car swore and shook his fist at Margaret, but didn’t stop to help her.

Dazed, she stood back up on her own. She just needed a few seconds to regain her equilibrium. She was dirtied, bruised, but not bloodied.

She limped to the church steps and ignored the pain in her thigh as she climbed the steps. Perhaps a bone had been broken, but a minor injury wasn’t going to stop her.

When she reached the church door, her stomach knotted. She denied that feeling too. This wasn’t a time for uncertainty and especially not for fear.

She pulled the door open by its wrought iron handle and hobbled through the narthex into the church, and started up the center aisle. Most of the congregation gasped and some even screamed.

She cried out to them, “You have to get out of here, now. The Klan is on its way in a Karavan. They could arrive in a half-hour or in minutes. Either way, if you want to avoid trouble, there’s no time to delay.”

She reached the edge of the altar and looked up into the pastor’s eyes, pleading, “You’ve got to believe me. There’s no time for explanations. The warning must be sounded as quickly as possible.”

The congregation was whispering comments back and forth. The initial shock of a white woman dressed in a Ku Klux Klan robe running into their service gave way to instinct.

The women hugged the children close and the men pushed the women and children closer together. The sense of alarm was palpable. Some people moved into the aisle as if to block Margaret in.

Pastor Carlisle raised his hands and demanded, “Everyone quiet! Hear her out. As you know, thousands of Klansmen met tonight on Table Mountain and burned crosses. Perhaps this woman’s conscience spoke to her and she truly is here as a Good Samaritan.”

The congregation’s respect for Reverend Carlisle’s leadership was evident. Suddenly, there was complete silence. Margaret continued.

“Those men have been drinking bootleg whiskey since practically sunup. Most of them just to get the nerve to cause something bad to happen.”

A woman shouted, “But Pastor, what if she is just some crazy old…?”

“Sister,” Pastor Carlisle, interrupted, sternly, “I don’t think a good Christian woman like yourself wants to say anything she’ll be ashamed of later. Furthermore, whoever this woman is, she made it clear there isn’t time for debate.”

No one could have been more stunned to see Margaret enter the church than Walter. An elder in the church, he was sitting in his assigned chair next to the pastor’s.

As he maneuvered past the individuals obstructing the aisle on his way to Margaret, he loudly declared, “She’s telling the truth. And, she’s not white, she’s colored just like the rest of us. If she says those murdering bast …, I mean, the Klan, is on its way. We’d want to be ready.”

Walter reached Margaret and pulled her close. As usual, she felt comforted by his presence and grateful for his support.

She looked into the face of the woman who had voiced her suspicion of Margaret. The woman’s expression softened.

Margaret appealed to the pastor, again. “Everyone needs to get off the streets and stay in their houses. There’s no way to know what those men have planned or what they’re capable of. It’ll be harder for them to succeed if we pull their bluff.”

“All right,” declared Pastor Carlisle, “all of you know what to do.”

As if rehearsed a hundred times, the women and children exited the pews by the side aisles and hurried down the rear hallway. The men, including the pastor, filed quickly into the center aisle, then rushed out the front doors.

Walter remained with Margaret, holding her to him. She was sobbing. He held her at arms-length and looked into her face. “Is something else wrong?”

They were now alone in the church, but she couldn’t breathe. “I need to get to my daughter. That’s why I was nearby. I almost made it. Then I heard the Karavan and I had no choice but to …”

Walter put his fingers to her lips. “What you’ve done was very brave, Margaret. And, there still might be a way for us to find your daughter. I think there’s a connection between her and another incident that happened here just a short while ago.”

“I don’t understand. What do you mean?”

Walter seemed to be weighing what he wanted to say. Margaret gave him a look that begged him to speak plainly.

“Dwight Hudson’s son blew in here during the middle of the service looking for your Aunt Euphrates. The word is that he’s been spending time with your daughter. Did you know that she is pregnant?”

Margaret was, all at once, alarmed and perplexed. Alarmed to learn that Amy was pregnant and perplexed that Walter knew about her aunt and Amy.

As if reading her mind, Walter added, “Look, Five Points, just like Harlem, the south side of Chicago, Central Avenue in Los Angeles, or any other Negro side of town in an American city, is a world within a world. Under such circumstances, not too much escapes the grapevine.”

“The grapevine?” Margaret asked.

“The gossip mill,” Walter answered, “the staple of all colored beauty shops and barber shops. For instance, a fair number of folks around here had known for years that your father was passing. That sort of thing is a popular topic, especially among old-timers. He also helped a lot of them get through tough times with loans, and so forth. The unspoken agreement was that they’d never go into his store or call him out on the street. He seemed to visit Five Points whenever he was, in a manner of speaking, homesick, which, actually was quite often.”

Margaret was incredulous at what else she was learning about her father. It was occurring to her that she might never have truly known him; however, her only concern now was Amy. “You said you might be able to help me find my daughter?”

Walter hesitated answering. He was listening to the sound of the approaching chaos outside. Innumerable car horns were blaring and racial epithets were shouted.

Something glass shattered against the outside of the church door.

“It’s them!” Margaret said, trembling.

“Then, we’d better get out of here.”

“But what about Amy?”

Walter took hold of Margaret’s hand. “It’s just a hunch, nothing I know for sure. I think your aunt may be able to help. She left the service early with Dwight’s son.”

Walter started to brush the smudge from Margaret’s temple, only to see that it was caked with blood from a bad scrape.

“Come on,” he said, tenderly, “let’s go out the back through the fellowship hall.”

⟞ • ⟝

Other than the Karavan madness a few blocks away, all was dark and quiet as Walter and Margaret waited in hope of Euphrates coming to the door. They knocked and knocked, but no one had answered. Perhaps the family thought it wiser to stay elsewhere for the night.

A car turned onto the block, shut off its headlights and continued slowly down the street.

A young boy not even ten years old leaned out of the car’s passenger side, yelling, through a bullhorn, with the skill of a sideshow huckster, “Come out, come out, niggers, wherever you are. You can’t hide forever. The mighty White Knights of the Imperial Invisible Realm will find you, and you’ll wish you’d run tail when you had the chance. Come out, come out, niggers …”

And so the refrain went on as the car drove by. Walter again pulled Margaret close.

Something — a rock, baseball, or bottle — broke a window in the house next door, and the car sped away.

A dim yellowish-orange light started to flicker in the living room of the house, then, noticeably brightened. Licks of flame quickly climbed the curtains.

Margaret looked on, petrified. The mindless destruction of businesses and homes and the deadly assaults of faultless and vulnerable individuals was happening again.

Within moments, acrid smoke was billowing out of the broken window. Walter looked anxiously at Margaret. “I’ve got to go for the fire department,” he said. “The old man who lives in that house doesn’t have a telephone. Will you be all right until I get back?”

“Of course I will, Walter. Just please be careful.”

“I promise,” he said, and lightly kissed the tip of Margaret’s nose.

Then they heard the screams from the upstairs of Euphrates’ house.

“That’s Amy,” Margaret cried, “I’m sure of it. It sounds like she might be in labor. We have to break down the door. My child needs me!”

Walter examined the door, then gently pushed Margaret aside. He kicked the door again and again until it finally splintered. After that, he used his fist to open a hole in the door and reached through the hole to turn the lock.

The fire was eating through an outside wall of the neighbor’s house and hot embers freckled the air.

Some ashes landed on their skin and some in Margaret’s hair, which Walter quickly brushed away.

She was trying not to grimace as she didn’t want to reveal the pain shooting down her leg or that an ember had burned her cheek.

“Walter,” she said, “if Amy is in labor, she shouldn’t be moved. It could jeopardize her and the baby. I’ll stay with her until you come back from alerting the fire department and finding a doctor. And don’t worry, I’ll find my way around inside the house. I’ve been here before.”

“All right,” Walter said. “I’ll be back as soon as humanly possible. By the way, Margaret,” he yelled back to her from the sidewalk, “you should know I love you.”

⟞ • ⟝

Margaret decided it was best not to turn on any lamps. Instead, she extended her arms and hands to help her avoid the furniture, then worked her way across to the stairs.

As she struggled to overcome the excruciating pain extending the length of her leg, and to climb the stairs, she heard Amy cry out again.

She called up to her, “I’m coming, precious.”

A young man holding a lighted lantern appeared on the landing. “Euphrates hid Kyle and Amy in the attic,” he said, “But the baby is coming and Euphrates hasn’t come back with the doctor.”