Page:The Father Confessor, Stories of Danger and Death.djvu/272

262 them be held equal, men amongst men, and years will return to them that self-respect, power, and intelligence that generations of slavery and oppression have robbed them of."

"They never had such gifts, so did not lose them," Virginia said softly. "I would not sit in the same room with a negro if he had millions and had taken his university degree."

"Virginia!" Lucy cried excitedly, "you are horribly unjust. As for me, all men that God created are the same."

Miss Anderson thought to herself:

"She knows—Lucy knows—but Virginia does not. How fine of the girl to protect her sister. No American woman would stand up for the negroes without some motive of the kind. She protects her sister, fancying we suspect. She must be an adopted child, and Lucy knows."

Mrs. Allison and a young man came into the room at the moment. The group laughingly attacked her.

"We are quarrelling over black and white races," one explained. "We people over here have so little opportunity of seeing anything