“What are you trying to do, get smart, nigger?” he asked me. “No, sir,” I said. I was baffled. Perhaps he just did not want to help me. I went to Pease, reminding him that the boss had said that I was to be given a chance to learn the trade. “Nigger, you think you’re white, don’t you?” “No, sir.” “You’re acting mighty like it,” he said. “I was only doing what the boss told me to do,” I said. Pease shook his fist in my face. “This is a white man’s work around here,” he said. From then on they changed toward me; they said good morning no more. When I was just a bit slow in performing some duty,
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