The Conquest; the Story of a Negro Pioneer/Chapter 43

by Oscar Devereaux Micheaux

CHAPTER XLIII

"AND SATAN CAME ALSO."

ame a day when the snow had disappeared; my threshing was done; I had money again, and to Chicago I journeyed.

During the winter I had planned a way to get to see my wife, and took the first step toward carrying it out, immediately following my arrival in the city.

I went to a telephone and called up Mrs. Ewis. She recognized my voice and knew what I had come for. She said: "I am so glad I was near the phone when you called up, because your father-in-law is in the house this very minute." On hearing this I was taken aback, for it had not occurred to me that he might be in the city. As the realization that he was, became clear to me, I felt ill at ease, and asked how he came to be in the city at that time.

"Well," and from her tone I could see that she was also disturbed—"you see tomorrow is election and yesterday was Easter, so he came home to vote, and be here Easter, at the same time. Now, let me think a moment," she said nervously. Finally she called: "Oscar, I tell you what I will do, P. H. is sick and the Reverend has been here every day to see him." Here she paused again, then went on: "I will try to get him to go home, but he stays late. However, you call up in about an hour, and if he is still here, I'll say 'this is the wrong number, see?'" "Yes," I said gratefully, and hung up the receiver. I had by this time become so nervous that I trembled, and then went down into Custom House place—I had talked from the Polk Street station—and took a couple of drinks to try to get steady.

In an hour and a half I called up again and it was the "wrong number," so I went out south and called on a young railroad man and his wife, by the name of Lilis, who were friends of Orlean's and mine.

After expressing themselves as being puzzled as to why the Reverend should want to separate us, Mrs. Lilis told me of her. During the conversation Mrs. Lilis said: "After you left last year, I went over to see Orlean, and spoke at length of you, of how broken hearted you appeared to be, and that she should be in Dakota. Mrs. McCraline looked uncomfortable and tried to change the subject, but I said my mind, and watched Orlean. In the meantime I thought she would faint right there, she looked so miserable and unhappy. She has grown so fat, you know she was always so peaked before you married her. Everybody is wondering how her father can be so mean, and continue to keep her from returning home to you, but Mrs. Ewis can and will help you get her because she can do more with that family than anyone else. She and the Elder have been such close friends for the last fifteen years, and she should be able to manage him.

Then her mother said: "Oscar, I have known you all your life; I was raised up with your parents; knew all of your uncles; and know your family to have always been highly respected; but I cannot for my life see, why, if Orlean loves you, she lets her father keep her away from you. Now here is my Millie," she went on, turning her eyes to her daughter, "and Belle too, why, I could no more separate them from their husbands than I could fly—even if I was mean enough to want to."

"But why does he do it, Mama? The Reverend wants to break up the home of Orlean and Oscar," Mrs. Lilis put in, anxiously.

"Bless me, my child," her mother replied, "I have known N. J. McCraline for thirty years and he has been a rascal all the while. I am not surprised at anything that he would do."

"Well," said Mrs. Lilis, with a sigh of resignation, "it puzzles me."

I then told them about calling up Mrs. Ewis and what I had planned on doing. It was then about nine-thirty. As they had a phone, I called Mrs. Ewis again.

While talking, I had forgotten the signal, and remembered it only when I heard Mrs. Ewis calling frantically, from the other end of the wire, "This is the wrong number, Mister, this is the wrong number." With an exclamation, I hung up the receiver with a jerk.

Mrs. Ankin lived about two blocks east, so I went to her house from Mrs. Lilis'. On the street, the effect of what had passed, began to weaken me. I was almost overcome, but finally arrived at Mrs. Ankins'. Just before retiring, at eleven o'clock, I again called up Mrs. Ewis, and it was still the "wrong number." I went to bed and spent a restless night.

I awakened about five-thirty from a troubled sleep, jumped up, dressed, then went out and caught a car for the west side. I felt sure the Elder would go home during the night.

It is always very slow getting from the south to the west side in Chicago, on a surface car, and it was after seven o'clock when I arrived at the address, an apartment building, where Mrs. Ewis' husband held the position as janitor, and where they made their home, in the basement.

She was just coming from the grocery and greeted me with a cheerful "Good Morning," and "Do you know that rascal stayed here until twelve o'clock last night," she laughed. She called him "rascal" as a nickname. She took me into their quarters, invited me to a chair, sat down, and began to talk in a serious tone. "Now Oscar, I understand your circumstances thoroughly, and am going to help you and Orlean in every way I can. You understand Rev. McCraline has always been hard-headed, and the class of ministers he associates with, are more hard-headed still. The Elder has never liked you because of your independence, and from the fact that you would not let him rule your house and submit to his ruling, as Claves does. Now Oscar, let me give you some advice. Maybe you are not acquainted with the circumstances, for if you had been, in the beginning, you might have avoided this trouble. What I am telling you is from experience, and I know it to be true. Don't ever criticize the preachers, to their faces, especially the older ones. They know their views and practices, in many instances, to be out of keeping with good morals, but they are not going to welcome any criticism of their acts. In fact, they will crucify criticism, and persecute those who have criticized them. Furthermore, you are fond of Booker T. Washington, and his ideas, and Rev. McCraline, like many other negro preachers, especially the older ones, hates him and everybody that openly approves of his ideas. His family admire the educator, and so do I, but we don't let on to him. Now I have a plan in mind, which I feel a most plausible one, and which I believe will work out best for you, Orlean, and and myself. Before I mention it, I want to speak concerning the incident of last fall. When you sent him that bunch of letters, with mine in it, he fairly raised cain; as a result, the family quit speaking to me, and Orlean has not been over here for six months, until she and Ethel came a few days before Easter, to get the hats I have always given them. Now, she went on, seeming to become excited, if I should invite Orlean over, the Elder would come along," which I knew to be true. "When you wrote me last summer in regard to taking her to a summer resort, so you could come and get her, I told Mary Arling about it. Now to be candid, Mrs. Arling and I are not the best of friends. You know she drinks a little too much, and I don't like that, but Mary Arling is a friend of yours, and a smart woman."

"Is that so?" I asked, showing interest, for I admired Mrs. Arling and her husband.

"Yes," Mrs. Ewis reassured me, "she is a friend of yours and you know all the McCraline family admire the Arlings, and Orlean goes there often." "Well, as I was saying", she went on, "last summer out at a picnic, Mrs. Arling got tipsy enough to speak her mind and she simply laid the family out about you. She told the Reverend right to his teeth that he was a dirty rascal, and knew it; always had been, and that it was a shame before God and man the way he was treating you. Yes, she said it," she reassured me when I appeared to doubt a little. "And she told me she wished you had asked her to take Orlean away; that she would not only have taken her away from Chicago, but would have carried her on back to Dakota where she wanted to be, instead of worrying her life away in Chicago, in fear of her father's wrath. So now, my plan is that you go over to her house, see? You know the address."

I knew the house. "Well," and she put it down on a piece of paper, "you go over there, and she will help you; and Oscar, for God's sake, she implored, with tears in her eyes, do be careful. I know Orlean loves you and you do her, but the Reverend has it in for you, and if he learned you were in the city, Orlean would not be allowed to leave the house. Now, she added, I will get him over here as soon as I can and you do your part. Good-bye."

I took a roundabout way in getting back to the south side, keeping out of the colored neighborhood as long as possible, by taking a Halsted street car south, got a transfer, and took a Thirty-fifth street car.

I was careful to avoid meeting anyone who might know me, but who might not be aware of my predicament, and who might thoughtlessly inform the McCralines.

I arrived at Mrs. Arlings without meeting anyone who knew me, however. They owned and occupied an elaborate flat at an address in the Thirty-seventh block on Wabash avenue. I rang the bell, which was answered by a young lady unknown to me, but who, I surmised, roomed at the house. She inquired the name, and when I had told her she let out an "O!" and invited me into the parlor. She hurried away to tell Mrs. Arling, who came immediately, and holding both hands out to me, said, "I am so glad you came at last, Oscar, I am so glad."

After we had said a few words concerning the weather, etc., I said in a serious tone, "Mrs. Arling, I am being persecuted on account of my ideas."

"I know it, Oscar, I know it," she repeated, nodding her head vigorously, and appeared eager.

I then related briefly the events of the past year, including the Reverend's trip to Dakota.

Raising her arms in a gesture, she said: "If you remember the day after you were married, when we had the family and you over to dinner, and you and Richard (her husband), talked on race matters, that the Elder never joined. Well, when you had gone Richard said: "Oscar and the Elder are not going to be friends long, for their views are too far apart." When he brought Orlean home last year I said to Richard, 'Rev. McCraline is up to some trick." Continuing, she went on to tell me, "You are aware how bitter most of the colored preachers are in regard to Booker T. Washington." "Yes," I assented. "Mrs. Ewis and I talked the matter over and she said the Reverend had it in for you from the beginning, that is, he wanted to crush your theories, and have you submissive, like Ethel's husband. He was more anxious to have you look up to him because you had something; but after he found out you were not going to, well, this is the result."

"Now, Oscar," whatever you suggest, if it is in my power to do so, I will carry it out, because I am sure Orlean loves you. She always seems so glad when I talk with her about you. She comes over often," she went on, "and we get to talking of you." Now before I tell you more, you must not feel that she does not care for you, because she allows her father to keep her away from you. Orlean is just simple, babylike and is easy to rule. She gets that from her mother, for you know Mary Ann is helpless." I nodded, and she continued. "As for the Reverend, he has raised them to obey him, and they do, to the letter; the family, with Claves thrown in, fear him, but as I was going to say: Orlean told me when I asked her why she did not go on back to you, 'Well,' I don't know.' You know how she drags her speech. 'Oscar loves me, and we never had a quarrel. In fact, there is nothing wrong between us and Oscar would do anything to please me. The only thing I did not like, was, that Oscar thought more of his land and money than he did of me, and I wanted to be first.'"

"Isn't that deplorable," I put in, shaking my head sadly.

"Of course it is," she replied with a shrug, "why, that could be settled in fifteen minutes, if it were not for that old preacher. She always likes to talk of you and it seems to do her good."

"Now, my plan is," I started, with a determined expression, "to have you call her up, see?"

"Yes, yes," she answered anxiously.

 

The cold days and long nights passed slowly by, and I cared for the stock. (Page 296.)

 

"And invite her over on pretense of accompanying you to a matinee."

"Yes, yes," and then, her face seemed to brighten with an idea, and she said: "Why not go to a matinee?"

"Why yes," I assented. "I had not thought of that, then, "Why sure, fine and dandy. We will all go, yes, indeed," I replied, with good cheer.

She went to the phone and called up the number. In a few minutes she returned, wearing a jubilant expression, and cried: "I've fixed it, she is coming over and we will all go to a matinee. Won't it be fine?" she continued, jumping up and down, and clapping her hands joyfully, beside herself with enthusiasm, and I joined her.

Two hours later, Mrs. Hite—the young lady that answered the door when I came that morning—called from the look-out, where she had been watching while Mrs. Arling was dressing, and I, too nervous to sit still, was walking to and fro across the room—that Orlean was coming. We had been uneasy for fear the Elder might hear of my being in the city, before Orlean got away. I rushed to the window and saw my wife coming leisurely along the walk, entirely ignorant of the anxious eyes watching her from the second-story window. I could see, at the first glance, she had grown fleshy; she had begun before she left South Dakota. It was a bay window and we watched her until she had come up the steps and pulled the bell.

Mrs. Arling had told me my wife did not have any gentleman company. I had not felt she had, for, in the first place, she was not that kind of a woman, and if her father, by his ways, discouraged any men in coming to see her while she was single, he was sure to discourage any afterward. But Mrs. Arling had added: "I told her I was going to get her a beau, so you get behind the door, and when she comes in I will tell her that I have found the beau."

I obeyed, and after a little Orlean walked into the room, smiling and catching her breath, from the exertion of coming up the steps. I stepped behind her and covered her eyes with my hands. Mrs. Arling chirped, "That is your beau, so you see I have kept my word, and there he is." I withdrew my hands and my wife turned and exclaimed "Oh!" and sank weakly into a chair.

We had returned from the theatre, where we witnessed a character play with a moral, A Romance of the Under World. We had tickets for an evening performance to see Robert Mantell in Richelieu. Mrs. Arling ushered us into her sitting room, closed the door, and left us to ourselves.

I took my wife by the hand; led her to a rocker; sat down and drew her down on my knee, and began with: "Now, dear, let us talk it over."

I knew about what to expect, and was not mistaken. She began to tell me of the "wrongs" I had done her, and the like. I calculated this would last about an hour, then she would begin to relent, and she did. After I had listened so patiently without interrupting her, but before I felt quite satisfied, she wanted to go to the phone and call up the house to tell the folks that I was in town.

"Don't do that, dear," I implored. "I don't want them to know, that is, just yet." The reason I was uneasy and wanted her to wait awhile was, that I felt her father would go to call on Mrs. Ewis about eight o'clock and it was now only seven. But she seemed restless and ill at ease, and persisted that she should call up mother, and let her know, so I consented, reluctantly. Then as she was on the way to the phone I called her and said: "Now, Orlean there are two things a woman cannot be at the same time, and that is, a wife to her husband and a daughter to her father. She must sacrifice one or the other."

"I know it," she replied, and appeared to be confused and hesitant, but knowing she would never be at ease until she had called up, I said "Go ahead," and she did.

I shall not soon forget the expression on her face, then the look of weak appeal that she turned on me, when her father's deep voice rang through the phone in answer to her "Hello." The next instant she appeared to sway and then leaned against the wall trembling as she answered, "Oh! Pa-pa, ah," and seeming to have no control of her voice. She now appeared frightened, while Mrs. Arling and Mrs. Hite stood near, holding their breath and looked discouraged. She finally managed to get it out, but hardly above a whisper, "Oscar is here."

"Well," he answered, and his voice could be heard distinctly by those standing near. "Well," he seemed to roar in a commanding way, "Why don't you bring him to the house?"

What passed after that I do not clearly remember, but I have read lots of instances of where people lost their heads, where, if they would have had presence of mind, they might have saved their army, won some great victory or done something else as notorious, but in this I may be classed as one of the unfortunates who simply lost his head. That is how it was described later, but speaking for myself, when I heard the voice of the man who had secured my wife by coercion and kept her away from me a year; which had caused me to suffer, and turned my existence into a veritable nightmare, the things that passed through my mind during the few moments thereafter are sad to describe.

I heard his voice say again, "Why don't you bring him to the house?" But I could only seem to see her being torn from me, while he, a massive brute, stood over lecturing me, for what he termed, "my sins," but what were merely the ideas of a free American citizen. How could I listen to a lecture from a person with his reputation. This formed in my mind and added to the increasing but suppressed anger. I could see other years passing with nothing to remember my wife by, but the little songs she had sung so often while we were together in Dakota.

"Roses, roses, roses bring memory of you, dear,
Roses so sweet and endearing,
Roses with dew of the morn;
You were fresh for a day then you faded away.
Red roses bring memories of you."

The next moment I had taken the receiver from her hand, and called, "Hello, Rev. McCraline," "Hello, Rev. McCraline," in a savage tone. When he had answered, I continued in a more savage voice, "You ask my wife why she did not bring me to the house?"

"Yes," he answered. His voice had changed from the commanding tone, and now appeared a little solicitous. "Yes, why don't you come to the house?" I seemed to hear it as an insult. I did not seem to understand what he meant, although I understood the words clearly. They seemed, however, to say; "Come to the house, and I will take your wife, and then kick you into the street."

I answered, with anger burning my voice; "I don't want to come to your house, because the last time I was there, I was kicked out. Do you hear? Kicked out."

"Well, I did not do it." Now, I had looked for him to say that very thing. I felt sure that he had put Ethel up to the evil doing of a year before, and now claimed to know nothing about it, which was like him. It made me, already crazed with anger, more furious, and I screamed over the phone "I know you didn't, and I knew that was what you would say, but I know you left orders for it to be done."

"Where is Orlean?" he put in, his voice returning to authoritative tone.

"She is here with me," I yelled, and hung the receiver up viciously.

It was only then I realized that Mrs. Arling and Mrs. Hite had hold of each arm and had been shouting in my ears all this while," Oscar, Mr. Devereaux, Oscar, don't! don't! don't!" and in the meantime fear seemed to have set my wife in a state of terror. She now turned on me, in tones that did not appear natural. The words I cannot, to this day, believe, but I had become calm and now plead with her, on my knees, and with tears; but her eyes saw me not, and her ears seemed deaf to entreaty. She raved like a crazy woman and declared she hated me. Of a sudden, some one rang the bell viciously, and Mrs. Arling commanded me to go up the stairs. I retreated against my will. She opened the door, and in walked the Reverend.

Orlean ran to him and fell into his arms and cried: "Papa, I do not know what I would do if it were not for you," and kissed him—she had not kissed me. After a pause, I went up to him. As I approached he turned and looked at me, with a dreadful sneer in his face, which seemed to say, "So I have caught you. Tried to steal a march on me, eh?" And the eyes, they were the same, the eyes of a pig, expressionless.

Feeling strange, but composed, I advanced to where he stood, laid my hands upon his shoulder, looked into his face and said slowly, "Rev. McCraline, don't take my wife"—paused, then went on, "why could you not leave us for a day. We were happy, not an hour ago." Here my stare must have burned, my look into his face was so intense, and he looked away, but without emotion. "And now I ask you, for the sake of humanity, and in justice to mankind, don't take my wife."

Not answering me, he said to my wife: "Do you want your papa?"

"Yes, yes," she said and leaned on him. Then she looked into his face and said: "He insulted you."

"Yes yes, dear." he answered. "He has done that right along, but you step outside and Papa will tend to him,"

She still clung to him and said: "He has made you suffer."

He bowed his head, and feigned to suffer. I stood looking on mechanically. He repeated, "Run outside, dear," and he stood holding, the door open, then, realization seemed to come to her, she turned and threw herself into Mrs. Arling's arms, weakly, and broke into mournful sobs. Her father drew her gently from the embrace and with her face in her hands, and still sobbing, she passed out. He followed and through the open door I caught a glimpse of Clavis on the sidewalk below, the man who had written—not a year before, "I am going to be a brother, and help you."

The next moment the door closed softly behind them. That was the last time I saw my wife.

THE END