Four days later, I put on a favourite pink shirtwaist, and skirt. It was an outfit that was very much my style. I looked like the airbrushed perfection of youth. This made me feel wonderful when I departed for the train station. The "Alabama Jubilee Singers" were all lolling about. I couldn't believe my eyes though. They were all people I knew! Not one was from Alabama! My own pianist was even playing for them!
All of the singers just stood around, and didn't even seem to think anything unusual was happening. They acted just kind of anxious to start, but weren't especially thrilled. Of course, they had all been away before. However, I was sure, no matter how many times I'd go away, I'd be excited. When the train finally arrived, we all got in the day coach. I felt like I was in an exciting holiday party. But everybody else, though happy and pleasant, still didn't show any special enthusiasm.
The first stop was Carthage, Missouri, and the white Minister was waiting for us. "Hello there everybody!" He said, as if talking to his flock, who had came in from the wilderness. "I'm glad to see you. The bus is right over here."
We rode through the town, which was even more beautiful than Louisville. Hugh trees with branches overlapping formed perfect arcades down the streets. Everywhere we rode, people stood applauding, and all the town kids ran along beside the bus shouting "Hello! Hello!" The singers bowed most grandly, and I did, too. It was all so wonderful--like being on a mountain of ecstasy!
When we got to the Chateaux, where we were to live and sing, I was totally taken by it all. The large clean-looking white buildings that stood all around, the playgrounds, a lake with boats, and people--young and old-swimming! A large dining room building was pointed out, too. My eyes and nose could scarce take in the colour, the clean smell of the green shrubbery, along with the bright yellow, orange, and gold-coloured flowers everywhere.
"Oh, this is what paradise must be like," exclaimed one of the sopranos, echoing my thoughts exactly.
There were a lot of white people sitting in all this clean beauty. Most of them in white linen dresses, and seersucker suits. As we passed by them, they bowed so friendly saying, "We are very pleased to have you all with us, and know we are all going to have a lovely singing." It made me feel like a Sunday School Bible Queen. I stuck my bosom out, and walked stiff with my nose pert!
The house we were to live in was large, white, framed, and had nine bedrooms, with a sitting room that was furnished beautifully. A piano was in this sitting room--looking very grand. However, we didn't see any dining room. "Where we going to eat?" The piano player asked the Minister.
"In the dining room with the rest of us." He smiled graciously, as his brown eyes twinkled. That was a swell surprise, and an entire new experience. None of us had ever eaten in the same dining room with large groups of white people before. It turned out to be the same as eating with our own people.
That night we rehearsed, and the next afternoon was our first concert. We sang "The Bullfrog On The Bank" and "Little David Play On Your Harp. Then I sang solo. The white people, even the children, sat quiet and deeply attentive. When I finished, they clapped harder than Louisville. But it was their looks, their postures, and their smiles that let me know they thoroughly enjoyed my performance, Then one by one, they said what a deep unusual, beautiful voice I had. How I should be thankful God had given it to me. That settled my future definitely. I was sure I could make a living traveling and singing. That was what I plan to do?
After two weeks of quiet and happiness, we were on our way. Although as the bus carried us to the train station, it dawn on me that there was a jagged crack in all of this bliss. The white people who lived in Carthage, didn't simply ignore the ugly sides of life such as segregation, poverty, or war; they prettied them up. Poverty and segregation was made picturesque; war became a matter of glorious charges and pathetic deaths--but not the agonies or mutilations, I had read about in school.
I took a deep breath, steering my thoughts back to the present, as the bus came to a stop in front of the train station. Gathering my luggage, I rushed to join the others boarding. After we were settled in our seats, the porter saw that we were a company.
"Where you all going?"
"Monette." That was our first one night stand.
"Well, for God's sake," the porter paused to reorganize his thoughts. Finally, he said, "You don't wanna go there! Jus been a lynching! All the Colored've been run out!"
I stiffened, and swallowed hard. "...Run out?"
"Yep..." the porter stopped to stare out the window. Then he looked shakened, "the horror of it all is that there ain't no other station 'fore Monette!"
For a moment, I couldn't speak...I was stunned. I felt a queasiness form in the pit of my stomach. "Well...we'll just have to get off there and see what happens."
"We'll stay close to the train." The piano player said nervously, his hands trembling.
Fear gripped the brown cartoon-looking face of the founder of "The Alabama Jubilee Singers." If there are signs of fury," John cleared his throat, "we'll get right on again.
"Lynching's some bad thing," the porter shook his nappy head, "specially, when them white folks got blood in their heads, no holding 'em!"
We all sat solemn, quiet--thinking of people being burnt alive, stoned, hanged for just being black. We all knew of many such happenings...terrified by the evil nightmares.
My mind drifed back to Granny and her slave friends. The horror stories they used to tell. One slave talked about how as a little bitty fellow--five years old--he watched a slave rushing by, where the boy was playing with some other slave children. The slave's hand had been cut off, and blood was dripping from wrist. The white people were so cruel, they not only cut his hand off, they stuck the bloody thumb of the severed hand in the slave's mouth.
As the train slowly pulled into the Monette station, the steam engine sounded as if it was moaning. We stood bunched together at the door, peering out. Everything looked peaceful, but we still said nothing. We just stayed clustered together, looking around anxiously.
The uncomfortable silence lasted for some time. But at last the Minister, a slim white man, walked forward to greet us. "I suppose you heard about what has happened here, but don't worry. You will be perfectly safe." He smiled warmly, and sounded most cheerful and so confident.
Doubtfully, we looked at one another, around us again, and up. Our attention got glued to one spot. A rough wooden sign, seeming as if it had just been nailed, blazed, "NIGGER DON'T LET THE SUN GO DOWN ON YOU IN THIS TOWN!"
The Minister said tranquilly, "Don't mind that." and led us into town. We all kept close after him. After all, he was a Man of God. No harm would come to him. God wouldn't let it.
We went through the downtown district. Into several large stores, where the white proprietors received us cordially. People in the streets smiled at us, too. It didn't seem like anything unusual had happened. But the hot heavy summer air seemed to drench us. So we eagerly went to the parsonage, where we were to stay until morning. We didn't leave that place for the rest of the day. We knew about lynching, and we weren't trusting nothing.
That night the concert place was packed with white people--not a Colored person present, excepting us. Yet, with all of the pressure about lynching, we were still a success. To this day I don't think any Colored live in Monette--only a place built by the railroad company for the Colored porters.
At the grand dinner, in the church after the concert, the white people ate with us, and were lovely. The Minister embarked on some long Bible story. We had to force ourselves to pay attention to him in between tasty bites. They didn't say one word about the lynching. But we were still very ill at ease. We just wanted to get out of Monette as soon as possible.
We walked across the grounds, eating the strawberries, in silence, that they had given us for dessert. As we got closer to the parsonage, we noticed the Minister's housekeeper at the door. "Which is Mrs. Mickey?"
I stood still, as if paralyzed for a second, then I cleared my throat, "I am."
"A long distance call for you."
"A long distance call? What's the matter?" I'd never had no long distance calls before. I didn't even know what she was talking about.
"Come this way," I followed her into the parsonage, "someone is calling you from St. Louis by the wire."
"Three hundred miles.... And I can talk over it?" I flew to the wire and picked up the receiver. Static crackled over the wire. Then Henry's voice! I couldn't believe my ears. Something must be wrong with Momma!
"Is that you, Georgie?"
"Yes," my heart was in my mouth. Dear God not my Momma! "What's the matter?"
"You've got to come home at once! I'm not going to have you running all over the country. You're married, and your place's at home!" Henry sounded desperate, or had he started drinking, or was he just in one of his jealous rages.
Jealousy or not, the devil jumped in me big as a barrel. "My time isn't out! I have a contract. I can't leap right up and leave, because you say so!" I banged the receiver down! Three hundred miles for that!
Upstairs in bed, thoughts of Henry annoyed me. I truly felt that he was a poor excuse for a man. Although, what was really bothering were my thoughts about lynching. I started to believe that lynching got burned into my brain, along with the sign, "NIGGER! DON'T LET THE SUN GO DOWN ON YOU IN THIS TOWN!"
My restless thoughts settled on the times--life as a blalck entertainer was not easy. In the South we were still being shot at as well as lynched. Lodging on the road was often impossible. The next step for "The Alabama Jubilee Singers" was right across the state line in Arkansas. A terribly prejudiced place, where anything might happen. Racist feelings were running high all down through that part of the country. Wherever we went, we were likely to meet the Colored hate attitude. I knew the next time, it would be all too real. That made up my mind for me.
The next morning after breakfast, I expressed Henry's feelings to John. "My husband won't let me travel with you any longer."
"Does this have something to do with the "Nigger" sign blazing downtown Monette?" John stared at the dirty plates on the table, the crumpled napkins, the sordidness, the disorder, as if he were looking at the racial mess of America.
