Not Without Laughter

by Langston Hughes

“One by one you leaves me—Tempy, then Harriett, then you,” she said. “But Sandy’s gonna stick by me, ain’t you, son? He ain’t gwine leave his grandma.”

He wondered sometimes whether if he washed and washed his face and hands, he would ever be white.

Someone had told him once that blackness was only skin-deep.... And would he ever have a big house with electric lights in it, like his Aunt Tempy—but it was mostly white people who had such fine things, and they were mean to colored....

And when he got big, he wanted to travel like Jimboy. He wanted to be a railroad engineer, but Harriett had said there weren’t any colored engineers on trains.... What would he be, then? Maybe a doctor; but it was more fun being an engineer and travelling far away.

He wondered if there were any colored people in New York.... How ugly African colored folks looked in the geography—with bushy heads and wild eyes! Aunt Hager said her mother was an African, but she wasn’t ugly and wild; neither was Aunt Hager; neither was little dark Willie-Mae, and they were all black like Africans....

“One by one they leaves you,” Hager said slowly. “One by one yo’ chillen goes.”

Hager had turned to Sandy in these lonely days for comfort and companionship. Through the long summer evenings they sat together on the front porch and she told her grandchild stories.

I ain’t never had no room in ma heart to hate neither white nor colored. When you starts hatin’ people, you gets uglier than they is—an’ I ain’t never had no time for ugliness, ’cause that’s where de devil comes in—in ugliness!

“They talks ’bout slavery time an’ they makes out now like it were de most awfullest time what ever was, but don’t you believe it, chile, ’cause it weren’t all that bad. Some o’ de white folks was just as nice to their niggers as they could be, nicer than many of ’em is now, what makes ’em work for less than they needs to eat. An’ in those days they had to feed ’em. An’ they ain’t every white man beat his slaves neither! Course I ain’t sayin’ ’twas no paradise, but I ain’t going to say it were no hell

ei...

An’ Miss Jeanne taught me to read what little I knowed. An’ when she growed up an’ I growed up, she kept me with her like her friend all de time. I loved her an’ she loved me. Miss Jeanne were de mistress’ daughter, but warn’t no difference ’tween us ’ceptin’ she called me Hager an’ I called her Miss Jeanne.

De words don’t make no difference if de love’s there.

Ain’t left nothin’ but womens an’ niggers on de plantation.

“O, de white folks needed niggers then mo’n they ever did befo’, an’ they ain’t a colored person what didn’t stick by ’em when all they men-folks were gone an’ de white womens was a-cryin’ an’ a-faintin’ like they did in them days.

“Well, de freedom come, an’ all de niggers scatter like buckshot, goin’ to live in town. An’ de yard niggers say I’s a ole fool! I’s free now—why don’t I come with them? But I say no, I’s gwine stay with Miss Jeanne—an’ I stayed. I ’lowed ain’t nary one o’ them colored folks needed me like Miss Jeanne did, so I ain’t went with ’em.

‘Hager, I ain’t got nobody in de world but you.’ An’ I say: ‘Miss Jeanne, I ain’t got nobody in de world but you neither.’

An’ ’fore I think what she’s doin’, Miss Jeanne done stepped over de little rail o’ de balcony like she were walkin’ on moonlight. An’ she say: ‘I’m comin’, Bob!’ “She ain’t left no will, so de house an’ all went to de State, an’ I been left with nothin’. But I ain’t care ’bout that. I followed her to de grave, an’ I been with her all de time, ’cause she’s ma friend.

an’ some of ’em’s been kind to me an’ some of ’em ain’t; some of ’em’s cussed me an’ wouldn’t pay me fo’ ma work; an’ some of ’em’s hurted me awful. But I’s been sorry fo’ white folks, fo’ I knows something inside must be aggravatin’ de po’ souls. An’ I’s kept a room in ma heart fo’ ’em, ’cause white folks needs us, honey, even if they don’t know it. They’s like spoilt chillens what’s got too much o’ ever’thing—an’ they needs us niggers, what ain’t got nothin’.

“White peoples maybe mistreats you an’ hates you, but when you hates ’em back, you’s de one what’s hurted, ’cause hate makes yo’ heart ugly—that’s all it does. It closes up de sweet door to life an’ makes ever’thing small an’ mean an’ dirty. Honey, there ain’t no room in de world fo’ hate, white folks hatin’ niggers, an’ niggers hatin’ white folks. There ain’t no room in this world fo’ nothin’ but love, Sandy chile. That’s all they’s room fo’—nothin’ but love.”

“Stay here, sir, with Hager. I needs you to pump ma water fo’ me an’ fill up these tubs,” she would say. Or else she would yell: “Ain’t I told you you might get hurt down there with them old rough white boys? Stay here in yo’ own yard, where you can keep out o’ mischief.”

“I don’t know what I’s gwine do all day without you, Sandy. You sho been company to me, with all my own chillens gone.”

So Sandy went to see Mr. Peter Scott at the colored barber-shop on Pearl Street that evening and was given his first regular job. Every Saturday, which was the barber-shop’s only busy day, when the working-men got paid off, Sandy went on the job at noon and worked until eight or nine in the evening.

“Boy, you’s too dark to have hair like that. Ain’t nobody but white folks s’posed to have sandy-colored hair. An’ your’n’s nappy at that!” Then Sandy would blush with embarrassment—if

During the autumn Harriett had been home once to see her mother and had said that she was working as chambermaid with Maudel at the hotel. But in the barber-shop that winter Sandy often heard his aunt’s name mentioned in less proper connections. Sometimes the boy pretended not to hear, and if Pete Scott was there, he always stopped the men from talking.

“An’ neither do I,” answered Greensbury Jones. “All of em’s evil, specially if they’s black an’ got blue gums.”

I ain’t talkin’ ’bout what she is! I’m talkin’ ’bout how she looks. An’ a songster out o’ this world. Don’t care if she is a—!”

but I ain’t goin’ anear there myself to be Jim-Crowed,

Gwine make a smart man even if yo’ daddy warn’t nothin’. Gwine get ahead an’ do good fo’ yo’self an’ de race, yes, sir!”

The boy did not miss his mother. When she had been home, Annjee had worked out all day, and she was quiet at night because she was always tired. Harriett had been the one to keep the fun and laughter going—Harriett and Jimboy, whenever he was in town.

“I wants you to stay nice an’ make something out o’ yo’self. If Hager lives, she ain’t gonna see you go down. She’s gonna make a fine man out o’ you fo’ de glory o’ God an’ de black race. You gwine to ’mount to something in this world.

“I told you little darkies this wasn’t your party.... Come on—next little girl.” And the line of white children pushed past Willie-Mae and Sandy,

Free Admittance to Every Child in Stanton.’ Can’t you read it, Sandy?” “Sure, I can read it, but I guess they didn’t mean colored,” he answered, as the boy watched the white children going in the gate. “They wouldn’t let us in.”

“God damn old sons of biscuit-eaters, that what they are! I wish I was a big man, dog-gone, I’d shoot ’em all, that’s what I’d do!”

the laughter of happy children following them, the group of dark-skinned ones started down the dusty road together—and to all the colored boys and girls they met on the way they called out, “Ain’t no use, jigaboos! That party’s for white folks!”

Hager said to the little black girl, who was still crying. “You’s colored, honey, an’ you’s liable to have a hard time in this life—but don’t cry.

He was glad to get a letter from his mother, and word in it about Jimboy. And he was sorry his father had broken his guitar. But not even watermelon and the long letter could drive away his sick feeling about the park.

“I ain’t never wanted none o’ my chillens to work in no ole hotels,” she said. “They’s evil, full o’ nastiness, an’ you don’t learn nothin’ good in ’em. I don’t want you to go there, chile.” “But grandma,” Sandy argued, “I want to send mama a Christmas present. And just look at my shoes, all worn out! I don’t make much money any more since that new colored barber-shop opened up. It’s all white inside and folks don’t have to wait so long ’cause there’s five barbers.

But don’t forget, honey, no matter where you works—you be good an’ do right.... I reckon you’ll get along.”

Pete got mad and told him to go to hell, quitting when business was bad after all he had done for Sandy, besides letting him shine shoes and keep all his earnings. At other shops he couldn’t have done that; besides he had intended to teach Sandy to be a barber when he got big enough.

NEGRESSES ARRESTED Harrietta Williams and Maudel Smothers, two young negresses, were arrested last night on Pearl Street for street-walking. They were brought before Judge Brinton and fined ten dollars and costs.

“What does that mean, ma—street-walking?” the child asked, but his grandmother raised her apron to her eyes and stumbled into the house. Sandy stopped, perplexed at the meaning of the article, at his aunt’s arrest, at his grandmother’s horror.

“Let’s we pray, son, fo’ yo’ po’ lost Aunt Harriett—fo’ ma own baby chile, what’s done turned from de light an’ is walkin’ in darkness.”

He liked to clean things, to make them beautiful, to make them shine. Aunt Hager did, too. When she wasn’t washing clothes, she was always cleaning something about the house, dusting, polishing the range, or scrubbing the kitchen-floor until it was white enough to eat from. To Hager a clean thing was beautiful—also to Sandy, proud every evening of his six unblemished brass spittoons.

He it was who found some fault with Sandy’s work every day until he learned to like the child because Sandy never answered back or tried to be fly, as George said most young niggers were.

Christmas came and Sandy sent his mother in Detroit a big box of drugstore candy. For Aunt Hager he started to buy a long pair of green ear-rings for fifty cents, but he was afraid she might not like them, so he bought her white handkerchiefs instead. And he sent a pretty card to Harriett, for one snowy December day his aunt had seen him through the windows sweeping out the lobby of the hotel and she had called him to the door to talk to her. She thrust a little piece

Then she went on through the snow, looking very pretty in a cheap fur coat and black, high-heeled slippers, with grey silk stockings. Sandy saw her pass the hotel often with different men. Sometimes she went by with Cudge Windsor, the owner of the pool hall, or Billy Sanderlee. Almost always she was with sporty-looking fellows who wore derbies and had gold teeth.

Sandy scampered away, and when he found Charlie, he told him about Miss McKay. The child was scared because he had often heard of colored boys’ being lynched for looking at white women, even with their clothes on—but the bell-boy only laughed.

“Say, little coon, let’s see you hit a step for the boys! . . . Down where I live, folks, all our niggers can dance! . . . Come on, boy, snap it up!” “I can’t,” Sandy said, frowning instead of smiling, and growing warm as he stood there in the smoky circle of grinning white men. “I don’t know how to dance.”

“Now, a nigger his size down South would no more think o’ not dancin’ if a white man asked him than he would think o’ flyin’. This boy’s jest tryin’ to be smart, that’s all. Up here you-all’ve got darkies spoilt, believin’ they’re somebody. Now, in my home we keep ’em in their places.” He again turned his attention to Sandy. “Boy! I want to see you dance!”

Everyone in the lobby turned to see what had happened, but before Joe Willis got out from behind the clerk’s desk, the boy, wriggling free, had reached the street-door. There Sandy turned, raised his boot-black box furiously above his head, and flung it with all his strength at the group of laughing white men in which the drunken southerner was standing. From one end of the whizzing box a stream of polish-bottles, brushes, and cans fell clattering across the lobby while Sandy disappeared through the door, running as fast as his legs could carry him in the falling snow.