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 you're engaged to a man with Negro blood in him. He is a Negro. Do you hear me? He's a Negro."

Lida waited for no more. She bolted from the room and left the girl screaming the words that burned into her ears and into her heart. She knew not what to do. She rushed to her room and locked the door, cast herself on her bed, feeling as if the world was strangling her, smothering her and stifling her. She gasped, clutched at her throat and tossed. She wanted to cry—wanted to think, wanted to scream but was powerless in the grip of what Louise Comstock had said. One moment she thought the girl must be mad, stark mad and the next doubt and the possibility of her words being true sent panic into her soul.

She turned and faced the ceiling, staring wild-eyed, on through the top of the room into space. As never before she was wishing she had a mother to whom she could turn and talk. There was nothing but despair for her. Helpless black despair. What if the words of Louise Comstock were true? What if there was blood of that despised race in his veins. He surely did not look like one with a trace of Negro blood in him. True he did look like a foreigner. As she began to analyze the face and features of Bennet she could detect no trace of Negro blood in him. His swarthiness, however, gave her some cause for doubt. She seemed to be caught in a tangling net of circumstances that was gripping her more and more strongly as she became weaker and weaker. She could not cry. The situation was too appalling for tears. What could she do? As she pondered she pictured, almost for the first time since