' And then he offered to set
me up in some business at once, and urged hard when I declined."
"Say it all over again, sonny; what was it you told him?"
"I said that would do well enough for a white man; that he could help,
and the white man be helped, just as people were being and doing all the
time, and no one would think a thought about it. But, sir," I said,
"everybody says we can do nothing alone; that we're a poor, shiftless
set; and it will be just one of the master race helping a nigger to
climb and to stand where he couldn't climb or stand alone, and I'd
rather fight my battle alone."
"Yes, yes! well, go on, go on. I like to hear what followed."
"Well, there was just a word or two more, and then he put out his hand
and shook mine, and said good by. It was the first time I ever shook
hands with a white _gentleman_. Some white hands have shaken mine, but
they always made me feel that they _were_ white and that mine was black,
and that it was a condescension. I felt that, when they didn't mean I
should. But there was nothing between us. I didn't think of his skin,
and, for once in my life, I quite forgot I was black, and didn't
remember it again till I got out on the street and heard a dirty little
ragamuffin cry, 'Hi! hi! don't that nagur think himself foine?' I
suspect, in spite of my lameness, I had been holding up my head and
walking like a man.
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