Page:Nigger Heaven (1926).pdf/59

 Pushkin was a genius, that Dumas was a genius, but it was because they had white blood! Apparently miscegenation is a very fine thing indeed after it has happened, but for God's sake don't let it happen!

You know very well, Mary inserted, as she set down her empty cup, that the best people of our race object to mixed marriages more strenuously than the whites do. I believe if the social barriers were let down there would be fewer of them than there are now.

And if the barriers were let down, another great factor would be eliminated, Howard asserted, the present advantage of being as near white as possible. Why, the white Negro—you, Dick, or Olive—can go anywhere, to any hotel or theatre, without being challenged. You know the number of us that have gone even farther than that.

Buda Green is passing, Olive put in. I met her on Fifth Avenue last Sunday. She was with a white man and she tipped me a wink. Later, she called me up and told me all about it. You can't blame her. I couldn't do it, though. No matter what happens, I stick to my race.

Mary noted that a more intense expression had come into Dick Sill's face.

You say that, he said, but I wonder how much you mean. Think how much easier it is to get jobs if you don't acknowledge your race. Why, even in the Negro theatre they won't engage dark girls. In their world, the white world, they won't even give