«On Monday,» I replied, and her dear eyes grew sombre and her lips quivered. «You'll write?» she asked. «Please do, Frank! No matter what happens, I shall never forget you: you've helped me, encouraged me more than I can say. Did I tell you, I've got a place in Crew's bookstore? When I said I had learned to love books from you, he was glad and said, 'If you get to know them as well as he did, or half as well, you'll be invaluable'; so you see, I am following in your footsteps, as you are following in Smith's.» «If you knew how glad I am that I've really helped and not hurt you, Rose!» I said sadly, for Lily's accusing voice was still in my ears. «You couldn't hurt anyone,» she exclaimed, almost as if she divined my remorse. «You are so gentle and kind and understanding.» Her words were balm to me and she walked with me to the bridge, where I told her she would hear from me on the morrow. I wanted to know what she would think of the books and cape. The last thing I saw of her was her hand raised, as if in benediction. I kept the Sunday morning for Sommerfeld and my friend Will Thomson and the rest of the day for Sophy. Sommerfeld came to the offices before nine and told me the firm owed me three thousand dollars. I didn't wish to take it. Could not believe he had meant to go halves with me, but he insisted and paid me. «I don't agree with your sudden determination,» he said,
«perhaps because it was sudden, but I've no doubt you'll do well at anything you take up. Let me hear from you now and again, and if you ever need a friend, you know where to find me!» As we shook hands I realized that parting could be as painful as the tearing asunder of flesh. Will Thomson, I found, was eager to take over the boardings and my position in Liberty Hall. He had brought his father with him, and after much bargaining I conveyed everything I could over to him for three thousand five hundred dollars; and so after four years' work I had just the money I had had in Chicago four years earlier! I dined in the Eldridge House and then went back to the office to meet Sophy, who was destined to surprise me more even than Lily or Rose; «I'm coming with you,» she announced coolly, «if you're not ashamed to have me along; you goin' Frisco-so far away-» she pleaded, divining my surprise and unwillingness. «Of course, I'll be delighted,» I said, «but-» I simply could not refuse her. She gurgled with joy and drew out her purse. «I've four hundred dollars,» she said proudly, «and that'll take this child a long way.» I made her put her money away and promise me she wouldn't spend a cent of her money while we were together; and then I told her how I wished to dress her when we got to Denver, for I wanted to stop there for a couple of days to see Smith, who had written approving of everything I did and adding, to my heart's joy, that he was much better. On the Monday morning Sophy and I started westwards. She had had the tact to go to the depot first so that no one in Lawrence ever coupled our names. Sommerfeld and Judge Bassett saw me off at the depot and wished me «All luck!» And so the second stage of my life came to an end.
Sophy was a lively sweet companion; after leaving Topeka, she came boldly into my compartment and did not leave me again. May I confess it? I'd rather she had stayed in Lawrence, I wanted the adventure of being alone, and there was a girl in the train whose long eyes held mine as I passed her seat, and I passed it often. I'd have spoken to her if Sophy had not been with me. When we got to Denver, I called on Smith, leaving Sophy in the hotel. I found him better but divined that the cursed disease was only taking breath, so to speak, before the final assault. He came back with me to my hotel, and as soon as he saw Sophy he declared I must go back with him: he had forgotten to give me something I must have. I smiled at Sophy, to whom Smith was very courteous-kind, and accompanied him. As soon as we were in the street, Smith began in horror, «Frank, she's a colored girclass="underline" you must leave her at once or you'll make dreadful trouble for yourself later.» «How did you know she was colored?» I asked.
«Look at her nails,» he cried, «and her eyes: no Southerner would be in doubt for a moment. You must leave her at once, please!»
«We are going to part at Frisco,» I said. And when he pressed me to send her back at once, I refused. I would not put such shame upon her, and even now I'm sure I was right in that resolve. Smith was sorry but kind to me and so we parted forever. He had done more for me than any other man, and now after fifty years I can only confess my incommensurable debt to him, and the hot tears come into my eyes now, as they came when our hands met for the last time. He was the dearest, sweetest, noblest spirit of a man I have met in this earthly pilgrimage. Ave atque vale. As the time drew on to the day when the boat was to start, Sophy grew thoughtful. I got her a pretty corn-colored dress than set off her beauty as golden sunlight a lovely woodland, and when she thanked and hugged me, I wanted to put my hand up her clothes, for she made a mischievous, naughty remark that amused me and reminded me we had driven all the previous day and I had not had her. To my surprise she stopped me. «I've not washed since we came in,» she explained. «Do you wash so often?»
«Shuah,» she replied, fixing me. «Why?» I asked, searching her regard. «Because I'm afraid of nigger-smell,» she flung out passionately. «What nonsense!» I exclaimed. «Tain't either,» she contradicted me angrily. «My mother took me once to Negro-church, and I near choked. I never went again, I just couldn't. When they get hot, they stink-pah!» and she shook her head and made a face in utter disgust and contempt. «That's why you goin' to leave me,» she added after a long pause, with tears in her voice. «If it wasn't for that damned nigger blood in me, I'd never leave you: I'd just go on with you as servant or anything. Ah God, how I love you and how lonely this Topsy'll be,» and the tears ran down her quivering face. «If I were only all white or all black,» she sobbed. «I'm so unhappy!» My heart bled for her. If it had not been for the memory of Smith's disdain, I would have given in and taken her with me. As it was, I could only do my best to console her by saying, «A couple of years, Sophy, and I'll return; they'll pass quickly. I'll write you often, dear!» But Sophy knew better and when the last night came, she surpassed herself. It was warm and we went early to bed. «It's my night dear!» she said. «You just let me show you, you dear! I didn't want you to go after any whitish girl in those islands till you get to China and you won't go with those yellow, slit-eyed girls-that's why I love you so, because you keep yourself for those you like-but you're naughty to like so many, ma man!» -and she kissed me with passion. She let me have her almost without response but, after the first orgasm, she gripped my sex and milked me, and, afterwards, mounting me made me thrill again and again till I was speechless and, like children, we fell asleep in each other's arms, weeping for the parting on the morrow. I said «Good-bye!» at the hotel and went on board the steamer by myself, my eyes set on the Golden Gate into the great Pacific and the hopes and hazards of the new life. At length I was to see the world: what would I find in it? I had no idea then that I should find little or much in exact measure to what I brought, and it is now the saddest part of these confessions that on this first trip round the world I was so untutored, so thoughtless, that I got practically nothing out of my long journeying. Like Odysseus, I saw many cities of men; but scenes seldom enrich the spirit. Yet one or two places made a distinct impression on me, young and hard though I was: Sydney Bay and Heights, Hong Kong, too, but above all, the old Chinese gate leading into the Chinese city of Shanghai so close to the European town and so astonishingly different. Kioto, too, imprinted itself on my memory, and the Japanese men and girls that ran naked out of their hot baths in order to see whether I was really white all over. I learned nothing worth recalling till I came to Table Bay and saw the long line of Table Mountain four thousand feet above me, a cliff cutting the sky with an incomparable effect of dignity and grandeur. I stayed in Cape Town a month or so, and by good luck I got to know Jan Hofmeyr there, who taught me what good fellows the Boers really were and how highly the English Premier Gladstone was esteemed for giving freedom to them after Majuba. «We look on him with reverence,» said my friend Hofmeyr, «as the embodied conscience of England.» But alas! England could not stomach Majuba and had to spend blood and treasure later to demonstrate the manhood of the Boers to the world. But thank God, England then gave freedom and self-government again to South Africa and so atoned for her shameful «concentration camps.» Thanks to Jan Hofmeyr, I got to know and esteem the South African Boer even on this first short acquaintance.