Page:The Blacker the Berry - Thurman - 1929.djvu/205

 wouldn’t have known about it this time if he hadn’t told her. He often did things like that. Thought it made him more desirable. Despite her simple-mindedness, Anise had spunk. She didn’t like to quarrel, but she wasn’t going to let any one make a fool out of her, so, the next week after the heartbreaking incident, she had moved and left no forwarding address. It was presumed that she had gone downtown to live in the apartment of the woman for whom she worked. Braxton seemed unconcerned about her disappearance, and continued his peacock-like march for some time, with feathers unruffled, even by frequent trips to the pawnshop. But a peacock can hardly preen an unplumaged body, and, though Braxton continued to strut, in a few weeks after the break, he was only a sad semblance of his former self.

Alva nagged at him continually. “Damned if I'm going to carry you.” Braxton would remain silent. “You’re the most no-count nigger I know. If you can’t do anything else, why in the hell don’t you get a job?” “I don’t see you working,” Braxton would answer.

“And you don’t see me starving, either,” would be the come-back.

“Oh, jost ’cause you got that little black wench ”

“That’s all right about the little black wench.