UVERSITY
BRARIES








THE WHITE BAND





THE
WHITE
BAND
a novel by Carter Brooke Jones
FUNK & WAGNALLS COMPANY, NEW YORK


828
J7623 wh
Copyright © 1959 by Carter Brooke Jones
The White Band
Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 59-12384
Printed in the United States of America


grad
32199430
engl
10/25199
To the memory of my father,
Carter Helm Jones





THE WHITE B A N D





DUT WHAT WAS the lowdown? people asked. Why, really,
underneath all the bunk, was Joe Duffield retiring from poli-
tics?
Here he was, at the age of forty-eight, in his very prime,
you could say, leaving the United States Senate after one
term.
Most people who gave much thought to such things prob-
ably felt that the Honorable Joseph Duffield's announcement
was a cover-up for something else. He was a figure in politics,
and not just in the state; no doubt of that. Before going to the
Senate, he had served three terms in the House of Representa-
tives. He had achieved a certain prominence as a congress-
man, but the Senate had given him a much greater opportunity
for displaying his particular gifts: a flair for old-time oratory
rare these days even in the most oracular of legislative bodies;
a native shrewdness which could cut into the heart of an issue
and expose it in harmony with his own peculiar logic; sharp-


THE WHITE BAND
ness at repartee, at give-and-take on the floor. Most people
liked him, regardless of whether they always agreed with him.
He had a youthful face, good-looking enough for most pur-
poses, a well-knit figure, an affable personality. Why should
he step out, or at least sidetrack himself at the threshold, you
might say, of a notable career?
The Senator had issued a statement explaining that he had
served in Congress twelve years and that he felt he had con-
tributed what little he could to the welfare of his state and
the country. His private affairs required his attention; he
could give them little time when he had to be in Washington
most of the year. He didn't feel he could settle down to a
lifetime of office-holding, or until somebody beat him at the
polls. It was, contrary to what most people thought, a finan-
cial sacrifice to serve in Congress. The salary might sound
large, but when the constant claims against it were considered
it actually was small. A man had his children to educate, his
future to think of. He would always be humbly grateful to
the people of his district and of the entire state for so honor-
ing him, for trusting him to represent them in the Nation's
Capital. He was sure that in someone like John Byroad-Mr.
Duffield's favored candidate among several who had expressed
a willingness to succeed him—the people would find a senator
who not only would carry on his, Mr. Duffield's, work, but
would advance it.
Some of his more cynical constituents asked what Joe Duf-
field was up to. A few even suggested that maybe he'd got
himself into some sort of jam in Washington.
It was typical of Senator Duffield that his statement had
been both truthful and disingenuous. It was private business
that was depriving the Senate of his services (beyond any
question he could have been reelected), but the particular
business would be a well-guarded secret for some time—until


THE WHITE BAND
he and his new associates thought the moment propitious to
make it known.
On a day in late summer, while Riverport waited somno-
lently for cooler weather, Joseph Duffield and three of these
associates were having another in the series of conferences
which had occupied them from time to time since late spring.
This time they were meeting in an upper suite at the Bradley
Hotel. The rooms were air-conditioned, and the men relaxed
comfortably from the heat of the street as the afternoon
dragged on.
Senator Duffield looked from one to another, not staring
but, with casual glances, studying them as they talked. At the
moment he was listening; beyond a nod or a noncommittal “I
see” he had little to say.
“The way I look at it,” Henry Caldwell was saying, “we
can't let any grass grow under us. There are other outfits
horning in on this fight. I hear the Klan's starting up again.”
Dave Beckett said, “I agree with you entirely. We have to
push off in a big way.”
Duffield lit a fresh cigar, pulled down his tie, opened his
soft collar, and settled back in the big soft chair. He con-
trasted the two young men, both of pleasant appearance, well-
groomed, adequately educated, but differing, naturally, in
temperament and taste, in capacity. He'd known both since
they were small boys, watched them grow up, for Riverport,
until just a few years ago, had been a much smaller city; you
knew almost everyone when he was a youth. Now that it
was a leading metropolis of the Deep South, a distribution
center for trade, if still not too important industrially, every-
thing was different; you passed crowds of strangers on the


THE WHITE BAND
downtown streets instead of spotting somebody you knew
every few steps.
He had the feeling that Hank Caldwell, blond and chubby
at thirty-four, still a junior executive in his father's construc-
tion firm, though probably drawing a good salary, was
incurably lazy. The way he talked, the way he sat, more espe-
cially the way he moved, denoted almost a horror of energy.
The Senator wondered how Hank had ever managed to be-
come a lieutenant-commander in the late war. He must have
found somewhere the power to show a burst of activity now
and then. But Hank had his points: he was affable, disarm-
ingly easygoing, made friends, and came from a family that
packed plenty of influence in the state.
Hank picked up the phone. “What'll you fellows have?”
The Senator wanted bourbon and water, the others Tom
Collinses.
Dave Beckett proffered his cigarettes around and lit one
“I think Joe should announce his new position-at once. How
do you feel about it, Joe?”
Duffield delayed his answer. Not that he hadn't reflected
on it often in recent weeks; not that he was in much doubt.
But he had a trick of waiting a moment or two before reply-
ing to a cogent question. He had found that in political give-
-and-take it confused opponents or hecklers, whether out in
the hustings or on the floor of Congress. The device was
hardly applicable here with these men he had known for
years, but it had grown into a habit, and sometimes he found
himself pausing similarly when Sarah, his wife, asked some
simple question.
Dave Beckett, only three or four years older than Hank,
was much the stronger character. He was a tall, dark young
man, well put together. He was junior member of a good law
firm and already had something of a reputation as a trial law-


THE WHITE BAND
yer. He was quiet, didn't as a rule have a lot to say unless
something that concerned him came up, but you felt strength
in his firm handshake, a reserve capacity in the way he looked
at you over his slow smile. But Duffield wondered what Dave
was like underneath his polished manners and his detached,
even aloof, outward personality. It was hard to say. There
was no reason to question his integrity, to doubt his candor,
and yet there was something about him, some elusive impres-
sion ... well, no matter. Years in politics made a man too
cynical, too ready to doubt everybody.
“I've given it prayerful consideration," said the Senator.
The others laughed. “My inclination is to announce it at
once. As you know, the only thing that held me back was
that I was still in the Senate, and while Congress was in session
I felt it would give my enemies—and I've got some good ones
-another chance to blast me and perhaps impair my useful-
ness during the short time that remained till the end of my
term. Now ... well, it's true that I haven't resigned, just
announced I won't run again, and that my term doesn't run
out until the end of the year, but the session's over, and it's
extremely doubtful that we'll be called into special session. I
don't see that it matters, so far as I'm concerned, whether I
announce my new connection now or at the end of the year."
The fourth man, who had kept an attentive silence, spoke.
"It makes a hell of a lot of difference to us, Joe. We've got
to get going. The Klan's being revived, in some form or
other, and these Citizens' Councils, whatever they are. ...
We've got to get going big before they beat us to it.”
“I can see that,” Duffield agreed.
The fourth man was considerably older than the others.
He was one of those men whose age is hard to guess. He
might be anywhere from the beginning to the far side of
middle age. Actually he was fifty-six. Damon Quiller was a


THE WHITE BAND
small, desiccated-looking man, with a voice that somehow
suggested attics and brittle, dusty mementos.
The drinks came. They waited while the bellboy distrib-
uted them. Hank paid him, and he left.
Joe Duffield leaned toward the small man. “We'll announce
any way you want to do it.”
"Splendid,” said Damon Quiller. He laughed. He had a
way of laughing dryly, when there was nothing funny, and
keeping a straight face, or perhaps smiling just a little, when
somebody told a joke.
The Senator had known Quiller almost as long as he could
remember. Joe had no doubt of his attitude toward this adroit
lawyer, whose reputation was mixed, to put it charitably; who
preferred to work behind the scenes, to settle rather than go
to trial, to ... "fix" was probably the word. You couldn't
trust him. Yet he was a successful man in his field: criminal
cases and the shabbier types of lawsuits, such as certain di-
vorces which other lawyers wouldn't touch. There was no
question of his value to this organization. He had been an of-
ficer of the old White Band when it flourished in the middle
twenties; he knew how such an outfit should be run. You
couldn't always pick your associates. Joe reflected that he'd
had to work closely in Washington and at home, for party
harmony or other cogent reasons, with men he wouldn't be-
lieve on oath. You simply accepted such contacts as inevitable
in politics. You went ahead and worked with such men; you
watched them too, saw that they didn't slip over fast ones on
you.
“Swell,” said Hank Caldwell, “now we can go to town.”
"I'll be around,” Duffield explained, “most of the time. Of
course I'll still have to fly up to Washington now and then,
for two or three days maybe. Loose ends to tie up, things to
handle, even when we're not in session. I suppose I could


THE WHITE BAND
have stepped out entirely, resigned as of a day certain, as we
lawyers say, and let the Governor appoint somebody to serve
ad interim. But it didn't seem the best thing to do. I had
some things on the fire; I wanted to round out my term. I
delayed announcing my retirement as long as possible. It was
only fair to give my would-be successors time to qualify and
fight it out."
“We haven't wasted much time,” Dave Beckett observed.
“Reactivated the White Band the middle of May, almost as
soon as the Supreme Court's decision came down. Since then
we've been busy organizing. And we're really moving, let
me tell you."
Duffield laughed. “Reactivated. Sounds like something out
of the Pentagon.”
“I was at the Pentagon a while,” Dave recalled. “Too
long.” He had been a lieutenant-colonel in something, Joe
remembered, probably air intelligence.
They were quiet a moment, and the sound of traffic floated
up thinly to the closed windows of their eighth-floor suite.
Joe sipped his highball. He remembered hearing of the White
Band in the twenties, along with the Klan, the Silver Shirts,
and other such groups. The White Band had quietly faded
during the depression, like a lot of other things, though, he
learned from Quiller, it had never been officially disbanded.
Well, he wouldn't have had anything to do with it in the
twenties, when demagogues were conjuring up phony issues.
Now there was a real issue. Moreover, if they got the jump
on the other outfits, there'd be a pile of money in it, more
than you could ever make as a senator.
“We were hot stuff back in the Coolidge-Hoover era,”
Damon Quiller added. “We had them joining so fast we
could hardly keep up with them with an adding machine.”
Tere


10
• THE WHITE BAND
“What did you do?” the Senator asked. “I mean you per-
sonally.”
“I was known as Grand Counsellor. Which meant I was
general counsel. We'd have kept right on if the bottom
hadn't dropped out of everything. The slump, Roosevelt the
Lesser, all those New Deal subsidies to cotton- and tobacco-
growers, the government promising everybody the world.
Naturally our members were confused, and lots of them
dropped out. Others didn't even have the five bucks a year
for dues.”
“We'd figured,” Beckett put in, that Damon would func-
tion in the same capacity in the new-I should say revived-
Band.”
"Sure,” said Duffield. He wondered whether Damon
would do. The man's reputation among lawyers was not too
savory, and yet no one had ever gotten enough on him to
start disbarment proceedings; he was clever enough to avoid
such an extremity.
“I don't care much what I do,” Damon said. “I have enough
law practice to keep me fairly busy, but I want to do what I
can to get this thing whirling again.”
“I think you should be-Counsellor, or whatever we'll call
it,” Joe said casually.
“You see,” Damon added, "it'll be different this time. In-
stead of ... well, demonstrating and asserting our strength
in-er-other ways, we'll probably be going into court a lot in
an effort to stop this insanity. Injunctions, writs of manda-
mus, what have you. In the old days we avoided courts as
much as we could. Times do change.”
“Will we,” Hank Caldwell asked, “be able to intervene as
an organization in these various moves to thwart what our
Yankee friends call the law of the land? I don't know too
much law."
“I don't see why not,” Damon replied. “That Red outfit


THE WHITE BAND
II
in the North, the American Civil Liberties Union, is always
doing it. An organization can intervene in such a proceeding,
as amicus curiae, or what have you. Or it can initiate.”
Hank finished his drink. “I see.”
“We've been enrolling at a great rate,” Dave added.
“We've got chapters in five states already. So far we've de-
ferred doing much, other than putting out a few pamphlets
and issuing a few statements. It was obvious nothing much
would happen until fall, until the schools opened. We needed
a big name on top. Now we've got that.”
Joe laughed.
“Nothing can stop us now.”
Joe looked at his wrist watch. “Fine. I've got an appoint-
ment. I'll see you fellows soon, any time. We'll go into
details as they come up. By the way, I want to see whatever
announcement you cook up.”
“Naturally,” Dave said. “We thought you'd want to write
a statement and put it out over your signature.”
“That's a good idea.” Joe stood up, putting on his jacket.
“We thought if you were ready we'd release the news in
the two Sunday papers in Riverport and for Sunday papers
elsewhere, because there'll be interest in it a lot of other
places.”
"I'll write out a statement tomorrow,” Joe promised, “and
get it over to you.”
“That's the stuff.”
Joe paused in the doorway. “What's my title to be?”.
“My thought,” said Damon Quiller, “is that we'd keep the
old titles. You'll be Grand Protector. Can you think of a
better name?”
“Not at the moment. It sounds okay.”
Senator Duffield waved his hand to the three men and
stepped into the corridor, closing the door quietly behind him.
CI


11 HE NEXT SATURDAY MORNING, in Dave Beckett's private
office, they went over the brief announcement they had pre-
pared for the papers-Dave, Joe Duffield, Hank Caldwell, and
Damon Quiller. Joe had written the part quoting him, and
the four men had collaborated on the rest.
They'd put out a teaser the previous day in the form of a
story which the two local papers had carried: The revived
White Band was to hold a rally at Memorial Hall Saturday
night at which an important announcement would be made.
This was the announcement, which the chairman of the meet-
ing would read and Joe would amplify in an address. “The
kickoff,” Hank commented.
Joe wondered if they'd get a crowd. “You needn't worry,"
said Dave, pulling some dodgers out of a drawer. “These have
been scattered all over town and into surrounding towns like
Millrace. There'll be a mob, unless I'm all wet.”
12


THE WHITE BAND
13
Joe picked up one of the dodgers. It was headlined:
DO YOU WANT DESEGREGATION FORCED ON YOU?
SHOULD COLORED AND WHITE CHILDREN GO TO SCHOOL TOGETHER?
WHERE IS THIS FEDERAL INTERFERENCE LEADING?
WHAT CAN WE DO ABOUT IT?
These questions will be squarely faced at a mass
meeting at Memorial Hall at 8:30 Saturday night, August 28.
Notable speakers and an important announcement.
Don't miss this timely meeting. Admission free.
Everybody invited.
Auspices: The White Band.
Joe laughed. “This ought to fetch 'em.”
Damon chuckled in a way that suggested the rustling of dry
leaves. “If I know Riverport.”
“It'll get us a lot of new members,” Hank Caldwell sug-
gested.
“I'm having Doc Whimsett set up a table in back to take
applications,” Damon disclosed.
“Who's Doc Whimsett?” Joe asked.
"A friend of mine. A good guy. He'll be useful in the
organization."
Joe stuffed a dodger and a copy of the statement into his
pocket. "Be seeing you fellows around.” He got up.
“We deliberately left your name out of the dodger and
the preliminary story,” Dave explained. “Have to leave some
element of surprise for the meeting and the story in the Sun-
day papers.”
“I think it was good timing,” Joe reflected. “I've always
found in politics that you've got to space out your publicity,
me


14
THE WHITE BAND
not tell everything at once. You shoot your wad, and the rest
is anticlimax.”
“We might have drawn a bigger crowd if we'd announced
you were to speak,” Dave conceded, “but the papers would
have guessed you were affiliating yourself with the White
Band and that would have dampened the Sunday story pretty
well. As it is, I think we'll have a crowd, and if I'm not
mistaken, the papers, maybe even the press associations, will
have reporters at the meeting. The issue is red-hot right now
-national news.”
"By the way,” Damon Quiller added, “we'll need a press
agent."
“You mean full time?” Hank asked.
"Sure. It's important.”
Dave said they'd take that up in due course. Joe said sure,
good idea, adding, “We can complete our organization in the
next week or two. We'll need lots of help if memberships
pour in at the rate they should. I'll be running along. Unless
there's something else to take up at the moment. See you
around eight tonight.”
It was a stifling night. Memorial Hall, a civic enterprise
dedicated to the memory of Riverport soldiers lost in World
War I, dated back to the days when air conditioning was a
new marvel, and the city had never gotten around to putting
in a cooling system. The auditorium, a handsome structure
of Yankee limestone (Indiana), selected over the protests of
those who wanted marble from neighboring Georgia, rarely
was rented in summer. The singers, pianists, orchestras, and
ballets always came in winter. But there were fans, and the
outer and side doors had been propped open, so it was, as
somebody remarked audibly while the audience quieted for


16
THE WHITE BAND
auditorium.” There was scattering laughter and some ap-
plause. The chairman grinned. “Well, I take it most of you
have heard what the Supreme Court did back in May.” There
were derisive murmurs. “I thought you had. Our grand-
daddies had hoped back in eighteen sixty-five that the War
Between the States was over. But we see we was wrong.
They're invadin' the poor old South again. Trying to dictate
to us how we'll live our daily lives. Now they want us to
send our children to school with the nigger children.”
He paused for the hooting to subside. “Now we can be
driven just so far. And no farther. The same spirit that
characterized our grandfathers at Manassas, and Fredericks-
burg, and Chancellorsville, and Chickamauga is not dead. At
least I don't think it is. What can we do? Hell and plenty!"
Laughter, applause. “As a great American once said, we've
just begun to fight.”
He paused. “Now this mass meeting," he went on more
slowly, “is under the auspices of an organization called the
White Band. It is not a new organization. Some of you older
Riverportians remember it back in the twenties and early
thirties. It was dedicated, not to causing trouble, as its enemies
always charged, but to serving the interests of the white race.
It sort of died out, because it didn't seem to be needed so
much. Some of its aims at least had been accomplished. Now,
as it turns out, it's needed more than ever, and it's come to
life. Like Lazarus, it's been raised from the dead.” There was
laughter. “And it's a-gonta try its utmost to solve-in a legal
and peaceful way, we hope-this new problem our friends up
North have thrust upon us. ... Now I want to read you a
brief announcement which you're hearing for the first time.
You'll find it in your morning paper. I quote:
“ 'The White Band is pleased to announce that pursuant to
reorganization plans which have been under way for several


THE WHITE BAND
might have passed for white, so light was his skin-might
have been what is called in Harlem a “passee”—but, as a matter
of fact, he rarely impersonated the ruling race, and then only
when it was expedient to accomplish something. He preferred
to stay with his own people. He was dressed quietly but well,
in dark tropicals. He was a well-built man on the youngish
side of middle age, his thick, dark hair graying at the edges.
His features were nearly Caucasian, his nose almost classical
in its symmetry. He leaned over the balcony railing.
He saw a handsome man who looked younger than his
forty-eight years-a slim, athletic figure, perhaps five-eleven,
with a winning smile and a deceptive air of candor. He had
a way of pausing for rhetorical effect, his smile sometimes
expanding into a grin. He also had a few gestures, never
overdone, which conveyed emphasis here and there.
But the man and his oratorical tricks were an old story to
Ned Tarver. Not only had he seen Joe Duffield many times
during his years in Congress, but he had talked to him often.
They had, in fact, been friends, of a sort, ever since they were
classmates at the Georgetown Law School in Washington.
So this was it. Ned Tarver had wondered, like a lot of other
people, why the Senator was quitting-in full career, you
might say. He had met Joe Duffield on F Street, in Washing-
ton's downtown shopping district, only the other day, and
asked him what it was all about. Joe had only smiled mysteri-
ously and said he didn't want to stay in Congress the rest of
his life; he wanted to make some money, provide for his
family, his future. A phrase from the announcement flashed
back: “... serving without salary.” What the hell? But Ned
Tarver laughed inaudibly to himself. He thought he knew.
Joe, standing before the mike with long-practiced poise,
delivering his speech with his customary suavity, was saying:
0
LO


THE WHITE BAND
19
han
“I feel that at this momentous point in her history I can better
serve the South out of Congress than in it.”
The boys in the gallery, in their late teens or early twenties,
whistled through their teeth or shouted. One called down,
“Atta boy, Joe!” They did not notice the quiet, attentive man
in the corner.
"I believe,” Senator Duffield added, "that this fine organi-
zation, the White Band, will be able to help you and others
like you all over the South. Help you with the legal, moral,
and social problems inherent in the Supreme Court's unfor-
tunate decision. Mind you—and I emphasize this point,” he
paused with a characteristic side-thrust of his right arm, “we
will never encourage or condone lawlessness or violence in
any form. The South is a God-fearing, law-abiding section of
the country. Oh, some of our more exuberant citizens may
get a little out of hand now and then, perhaps rough up some-
body, but in this we're no different from any other section of
the country. And I may say our highest judicial tribunal is
encouraging lawlessness when it undertakes to dictate to us,
to overthrow some of our long-standing customs, to tell us
with whom we and our children shall associate on an intimate
basis.”
He stopped for the applause to subside. “Friends, we've
had our problems cut out for us, ever since some of our
ancestors were misguided enough to bring in slaves. And did
you know, by the way, that New England was the first to
run slave ships? It's a fact, though they've always looked
down their noses at us. But never mind that. I started to say
we've had our difficulties, and we've tried to cope with them
sanely. I don't say we always succeeded, but we've tried, and
on the whole I think we've done pretty well.”
High above him Ned Tarver grinned. Nice going, Joe.
I knew you when ... but never mind.


D AT
20
TH
H.
WHITE BA
no
THE WHITE BAND
“We had, living side by side, two races—races superficially
much alike, but actually differing in many ways, in different
stages of development. Our nigras have done exceedingly well
considering that a few generations ago they were slaves and,
before that, African tribesmen. Nobody deplores slavery
more than I. It was wrong morally and a bad thing in every
way. But you and I had nothing to do with it. We inherited
freed nigras, many thousands of them. Now I'm no Afro-
phobiac.” The speaker laughed. “That's a six-bit word I
picked up at Princeton or Georgetown or somewhere. I mean
I'm not obsessed with a fear of colored blood, of a dark pig-
mentation. I'm no professional nigra-baiter. My close friends
know I've always been friendly with them, tried to help them
all I could.
"But I realize that although certain individuals have soared
into prominence in the arts and sciences, in the professions,
the race as a whole still has a long way to go. Educationally,
morally, in manners, in general culture, the average still is
pretty primitive.”
I don't grant it, mused Ned Tarver, but assuming it's true,
whose fault is it?
“But that's to be expected, and nigras deserve great credit
for doing as well as they did.”
Considering their white friends, Tarver added.
“Now, friends and neighbors, this is obvious to you, but I
repeat it-for the record, as lawyers say. We have found,
through years of bitter experiences, that our two races get
along better, live in greater peace and prosperity, living their
separate lives. Each has, on the whole, its own way of life,
and it's much better for them to be apart. Segregation has
become a dirty word to Northern radicals, but we've found
that it works pretty well. I'm not saying it's an ideal arrange-
ment. Few things are ideal in this imperfect world. And yet


THE WHITE BAND
21
it's the best solution to a practical problem, a duality of races
which has been with us for nearly a century. We've found
that segregation in most places-schools, restaurants, theaters,
playgrounds-works best. And we intend to continue that
policy!”
Applause swelled into cheers. Ned Tarver, peering down
from his perch below the rafters, clapped his hands in mock
approval. A boy near him, his voice lost in the raucous demon-
stration, shouted: “Tell 'em to go screw theirselves!”
When the audience had quieted, Joe Duffield asked: “Does
that mean we're going to tell the Supreme Court-well, in
effect, to go to hell?”.
"Sure, tell 'em,” somebody yelled.
Joe laughed. “Well, we may feel like it, but, after all, it's
the supreme law of the land, and we're good, law-abiding
Americans. No, we're not defying the Supreme Court. But
we have many remedies left, legal and otherwise, and by the
‘otherwise' I don't mean violence. Even the Court, which is
so stacked against us, said we should be given time to work
this out.” He had emphasized the last three words, and he
added: “Well, we'll work it out.” Laughter and applause.
“How? you may ask. The Supreme Court has spoken, and
it's supposed to be the last word. Well, I can tell you the
states have not entirely surrendered their sovereignty despite
the New Deal Supreme Court with which we're afflicted. I
don't think the founding fathers of this republic intended for
any branch of the government to oppress any substantial
number of the people, whether that branch is executive, legis-
lative, or judicial. You can be sure this state and our sister
states will solve this problem and solve it without surrendering
to the anti-South clique which seems to be in the saddle in
Washington. Our best legal minds are at work on the prob-
lem, and you can offer odds to anyone who wants to wager
U
C


22
THE WHITE BAND
that they'll come up with a solution-or several solutions-
which will add up to maintaining our sovereignty and our
way of life.”
He paused and glanced up at the top gallery, but saw only
a blur of faces on the front row. “Our state legislators are
not asleep, and I can assure you this: you can send your
children to school week after next without any fear that
they'll be required to share their classrooms, perhaps even
their desks, with colored children.”
Spirited applause swelled as it traveled over the hall, like a
wave gathering size and force. “But where does organization,
the White Band, come in? I'll tell you, neighbors, where it
comes in. It plans to help the state legislatures and the people
to solve this pressing problem, to help wherever it can. We
stand ready to offer legal aid where it is needed-and it will
be needed-and to hold meetings and discuss measures; in
short, to do what we can—and I think we can do a great deal
-to protect you folks, who are busy with your jobs and your
homes and can't be expected to have the necessary time to
devote to this urgent matter. The White Band is an old
fraternal order, started in nineteen twenty-two. It has always
been devoted to the best ideals, the finest aims of Southerners
and those from other sections who are interested in protecting
the purity of the white race, in preserving pure Americans
from the encroachments of alien cultures.
“This issue, thrust at our vitals by a judicial whim, a doc-
trinaire constitutional conception, has revived the White Band
overnight. It has become again a vital force throughout the
South. You'll see. We invite men of good moral character,
citizens of standing and repute—and we don't want any other
kind-to join this fine fraternal order. We charge a reasonable
initiation fee and moderate dues. We have to. The fight we
face will involve heavy expenses, and we have to meet them


THE WHITE BAND
23
some way. We invite the men in this audience who are in-
terested to sign application blanks which you'll find at a desk
in the rear of this auditorium. The application will not commit
you in any way, but you'll receive an invitation to a meeting
in your area, at which the order will be explained in more
detail. If then you want to join, we'll be delighted to have
you—if you measure up to the sort of man we want. And we
won't take just anybody. For you good ladies there may be
an auxiliary or something of the sort. I hope so.
“Now a personal word, and I close. I felt that I should get
into this fight, do what I could to help preserve our South as
it has been, as our fathers and grandfathers knew it. I've done
what I could for you in the Senate.”
"You've done it, Joe!” a voice shouted.
“Thank you, friend. Well, I've always tried. But there's
not much the Senate or the House of Representatives can do
about a decision of the Supreme Court. Oh, we could amend
the Constitution, but, as you know, that's a slow process. I
felt I should get out on the firing line. I felt my state was
menaced as clearly as it was the day my grandfather enlisted
in eighteen sixty-one and went off to join Joe Wheeler's
cavalry. It seemed to me the White Band was the answer to
a prayer. The gentlemen who were leading the movement to
revive it invited me to join them, in fact to take the top post.
I couldn't do that and stay in the Senate-it wouldn't have
been right. So I'm relinquishing my seat in the Senate at the
end of my term to give full time to this movement, at least
for a while, after the first of the year. I'm serving without
salary as a civic and patriotic duty.
“This will be a long, hard fight. It won't be won even
three years from now, but it can be lost in the first skirmish
if we're not courageous and vigilant. I know we can count
on every one of you and thousands like you in a dozen states.


24
THE WHITE BAND
I'm grateful to all of you for coming out this sultry night.
Thank you each and every one.”
The Senator sat down to a noisy outburst of adulation. Ned
Tarver made his way down the two long flights of steps unno-
ticed. In an eddy of the surging crowd in the lobby a line
of men waited to be signed up at the table where a thickset
man presided. Tarver resisted a vagrant impulse to line up
with them, hand in his name, sign up. It wouldn't do. Some-
body, sooner or later, might recognize him, and his usefulness
on this mission would be ended.
As he left the auditorium, the heat of the streets, cooked in
the sun all day, steamed on, as a dish removed from the stove
continues to exude steam. At a side street he turned out of the
laughing, chattering crowd and walked down a lonely stretch
of mean shops for two blocks. He paused at a three-story
brick building. There was an electric sign, “Hotel,” and
below it in smaller letters, “For Colored."


OE DUFFIELD took off the coat of his tropical suit, a green-
ish weave, and unknotted a tie of matching green stripes. His
dacron shirt was plastered against him with sweat. With an
exclamation of discomfort and weariness, he started taking
off the limp shirt. His wife, Sarah, stood in the doorway of
his room.
"Hot work, wasn't it,” she said.
“You can say that again. When'll our progressive city air
condition that gaudy hall?”
“Some vagrant January,” she said.
Sarah loved to use unusual adjectives, and phrases which
might sound strained or inapplicable came to her readily. This
quaint practice had charmed him in their early years together;
now it merely annoyed him. He used to tell her she was a
poet, and she did write verses then, not very good ones. Now
he said nothing, or turned away impatiently when she came
25


26
THE WHITE BAND
out with what she imagined to be an original way of putting
things.
A faded beauty still clung to her, and she was far too young
to be losing her looks, yet she no longer had that breath-
taking loveliness compounded of a rare touch of natural color
on her cheeks, the symmetry of a wide mouth, an unobtrusive
nose, and big dark eyes. Her cheeks were puffed with too
many drinks, and her trim figure had been lost; she bulged in
the middle. Her dark brown hair was graying, not unbe-
comingly.
“The Rednecks were in good form,” she commented. “I've
heard you do better."
“My speech,” he explained, annoyed, "was on the informa-
tive side. I wasn't trying to be eloquent. And they were not
all Rednecks. There were some pretty high-grade people in
that audience."
She had gone, to his surprise; out of curiosity. He had
offered her a seat on the platform-there were other women
there—but she had preferred to sit in the audience.
“But one thing I don't understand,” she added. “That part
of the statement in which you affirmed that you'd serve with-
out salary. I thought you said ..."
“I thought you understood,” he said wearily. “But I guess
I didn't explain too clearly. There'll be profits, big ones.”
“And you'll share in them.”
“Naturally.”
“You didn't tell them that."
“And why should I have?”
“Oh. Well, I didn't think you were going into this as an
idealistic gesture.”
“Maybe in a way I am.”
She laughed. “Maybe. Well, good night.”
“Good night.”


THE WHITE BAND
27
He was aware of her clinging reddish dressing gown as
she went to her room across the hall. Once he would have
found it and her alluring. No more. They were friendly,
most of the time, but their separate rooms attested a changed
relationship. They had, as the Victorian novelists said, drifted
apart.
He wondered whether Ted, his sixteen-year-old son, was
home, but he was too tired to find out. Probably not. And it
was doubtful that he had bothered to go to the meeting. Their
daughter, Sally, whose formal name, of course, was Sarah, was
a more stable sort; she'd given them very little worry. And
she was prettier, he reflected, as he got into the shower, than
her mother ever was. At the moment Sally was visiting a girl
friend up in North Carolina. In a few weeks she'd be going
back for her junior year at Bryn Mawr.
Cooled and tingling pleasantly from the lightly applied
towel, he got into his silk summer pajamas and stepped back
into his bedroom. He went to an open window. A nice breeze
was stirring through the tall pines of their place on the edge
of town. Duffields, a colonial house standing on a hill over
Dogwood Road, was charming, if old-fashioned. They'd
moved here eight years ago, at a cost beyond his means, and
it would take him another ten years to pay for the place,
unless the White Band. ... Well, there were possibilities.
He started, gratefully, for bed.
Joe Duffield was at the law office he had kept in Riverport
throughout his years in Congress. He had maintained what he
called a lukewarm practice, which he left largely to his color-
less but learned partner, Will Belforth. Then, too, it was
desirable for a member of Congress to have an office in
his home town, a place to meet his constituents and the state's
CM


28
THE WHITE BAND
more important politicians when Congress was not in session.
The new Professional Tower, in which they had a corner
suite just below the top floor, the twentieth, was air-con-
ditioned, a triumph of modernistic architecture, with setbacks
every five stories, soaring (for Riverport) into a graceful
spire. He was settled back in his swivel chair, the morning
after the meeting, with nothing special to do. He had gone
through the mail and dictated answers to the few letters that
required them.
His secretary, a tall girl with cornsilk hair, opened the door.
“There's a gentleman to see you. A Mr.-Carver, I believe.
He says he's an old friend of yours, and just dropped in.”
“Carver? I don't remember him. Probably I know him,
though. God, a man can't remember the names of all his
constituents, though he must always pretend to. Show him
in.”
A moment later Ned Tarver walked in, cool-looking in a
fancy brown weave of seersucker.
Joe stood. “Why, Ned Tarver! I'll be good and god-
damned. My girl said 'Carver.'”
“They usually get it wrong.”
They shook hands. “How are you, Joe? You're looking
fine.”
“Never felt better. Sit down.”
They talked a moment of Riverport and the weather, which
can be taken for granted in the Deep South and needs no
comment. Then Tarver said: “I was at your meeting last
night.”
Joe smiled. “Well ..." He hardly knew what to say.
Ned laughed. “That was your white-collar speech, Joe.
You didn't say a word about nigger rapists or our smelly
neighbors.”
"Now, Ned..."


THE WHITE BAND
29
“But I will say, Joe, there was always more class to you
than your Stone-Age ideas would indicate. You used to be
able to argue against the federal lynching bill in Congress
cending to the vituperative levels of a Bilbo or a
Huey Long.”
“Thank you, Ned, my old college pal.”
“We had a lot of fun in those days, Joe.”
“We sure did. Cigarette?”
"I don't mind. Thanks. But in those days, Senator, you
didn't have the ... shall I say 'extreme' views about the inter-
racial situation you now entertain.”
“Well, Ned, I don't know that I've changed so much. But
when you get into politics in the South ..."
“I know, I understand, and I won't try to embarrass you.”
Joe looked out the window over the skyline. Quite a me-
tropolis Riverport was becoming. The Cherokee River cut
gleaming through the city, twisting in the sun like molten
metal. “What brings you here, Ned? If you care to tell me.”
"I do—that's why I came in, one reason-I'm always glad
to see an old friend. I'm general counsel for this new organi-
zation, the League for Racial Justice.”
“I've heard of it,” Joe mused. “What is it?”
“Just what it purports to be.”
"I see. I suppose the segregation issue-or should I call it
the desegregation issue-brings you down here."
“Naturally.” Ned tapped his cigarette reflectively on the
big brass ashtray on Joe's desk. “I suppose, Joe, this thing
will get into the courts in various ways. I'm just hoping we
can avoid hysteria and violence, on both sides."
“I'm with you there, Ned.”
"I'm sure you are. But what about this White Band?".
"Well, it's agin you, naturally. You know the attitude of
Southerners-of perhaps ninety percent of them. They don't


30
THE WHITE BAND
want desegregation-integration-whatever you want to call
it. They're determined not to have it.”
Ned raised his hands and dropped them. “But what can
they do? The Supreme Court has spoken.”
“And how! Well, you know as a lawyer there are many
lines of legal attack, even when your last remedy seems ex-
hausted.”
"I suppose so. I got a new trial for a boy in Washington
who was about to go to the hot seat. I got it after the Supreme
Court had refused to review his case.”
“There you are. And the various state legislatures are dis-
cussing plans to, to ..."
"Nullify."
Joe laughed. “If you want to call it that.”
“I don't want to pry into your business, Joe, but is this
White Band a secret society?”
“Yes, to an extent. I think we'll carry on the formalities it
used back in the twenties: white masks when appearing in
public, if there should be parades or demonstration, and
they'd be to attract recruits, raise money maybe-it costs a lot
to fight through the courts."
“A sort of Ku Klux?”
"No, that's not my understanding. We don't plan to in-
timidate anybody or to make threats.”
"I see.” Ned wondered if Joe was sincere in saying that.
You couldn't be sure. He was too enmeshed in Southern poli-
tics to be trusted any longer. There had been a time, when
they were both very young ...
“How," Joe asked, “did your outfit happen to spring up?
I thought the N.A.A.C.P. was looking after the interests of
the nigras.”
“It's doing its share and more, but we were set up particu-
larly to handle the legal end, to advise our people, to try to


THE WHITE BAND
31
smooth out situations where there is serious tension, as I'm
afraid there will be in a lot of places. We're a small organi-
zation, financed by subscriptions and by some substantial gifts
from Northern liberals.”
"I hope,” said Joe, “the Commies don't horn in on this
thing.”
Ned's face tensed, but he controlled an instinctive wave of
anger. “They always do. But our outfit is pro-American and
anti-Red. They'll call us Reds, they have already. Everything
that is against the status quo is called Red sooner or later."
"I know. I'm not accusing you of reddishness. I was simply
thinking. The Reds always show up in times of stress and
cause trouble if they can.”
“That's perfectly true, and it's something we both have to
guard against.”
They were silent a moment, then Ned said, “I thought
since you and I were heads of two organizations in the middle
of this thing, naturally on opposite sides, we might sort of
ease things where we could. For instance, if we get into court,
we could stipulate facts here and there and maybe save drag-
ging in a lot of witnesses and perhaps engendering local hatred
or fanning it.”
"I'm with you there. I'll do what I can. I won't be going
into court personally. But I'll introduce you to our general
counsel, and I'm sure he'll cooperate wherever it seems feasi-
ble.”
"Fine."
Joe thought of something else. “Look, Ned, are you going
to advise colored parents to send their children to white
schools.”
“It's what the Supreme Court said they were to do.” Ned
laughed. “But, no, we won't advise any such thing as a mass
movement-it would simply cause trouble. In some individual


32
THE WHITE BAND
instances we may have to. After all, we too may decide to
make a test case or two, in the interest of enforcing the law.”
“I see.” Joe's serious expression relaxed into a grin. “Look,
Ned, why don't we go out and have a drink? It's a little
early in the day, but we can have coffee, coke, anything you
like.”
“That's nice of you, Joe. But somebody might recognize
me, and that would ruin your career.”
Joe laughed. “That I doubt. Anyway, it would be a hell
of a note if I couldn't have a cup of coffee or a mug of beer
with an old friend.”
Ned leaned over the desk reflectively. “There was a time
when you and I more or less agreed this was all a lot of non-
sense."
"I know.” Joe looked around and lowered his voice, as if
afraid someone was eavesdropping. “Entre nous, Ned, I
haven't changed so much. I think, down deep, interracial
contacts are a matter of congeniality, not color or blood.
God, they'd shoot me if they heard me say this. ..."
"I'll never tell.”
“You want to know the truth? I wouldn't really mind if
my children went to school with colored children. Didn't I
sit right beside you as we heard Professor Blaisdell expound
the law of contracts?”
"Sure, and didn't we trot down the half block to the courts
together to listen in and get practical knowledge of pro-
cedure?”
"We did, often."
“And didn't you and I and Rafferty and that tall Swede-
Larsen?-go to that speak nights and settle the problems of
the universe?”
"Sure."
"Well,” Joe added, “as you know, I've been in the middle


THE WHITE BAND
33
ass
of Southern politics for some years. You can't be elected
constable if you entertain such views. Then, too, Ned, you
Yankees oversimplify the whole problem.”
“We Yankees. Merciful God! You forget I was brought
up in Alabama?"
“So you were. But you've been away a long time. It's one
thing for two people or four people of common interests but
different races and perhaps different colors to associate so-
cially. It's another thing to force a mass integration of two
races when their average levels of culture are so different,
their divergence so pronounced, their prejudices against each
other so bitter. It's bound to come. But it can't be forced all
at once by edict.”
Ned turned away thoughtfully. “I realize the difficulties,
Joe. But just the same we've got to try, and hope it will work
out.” He stood up. “Well, it's nice to talk to you, Joe, and
I'll be seeing you around.”
“Good.”
They shook hands and the visitor left.
V
Ned Tarver pushed through the revolving doors and turned
down Dogwood Street, the main thoroughfare, and it re-
minded him of entering the steamroom in the turkish bath in
Harlem he patronized occasionally. Well, New York could
be hot too, very much like this some days.
Suddenly aware of intense thirst, he spotted a tavern, and
impulsively went in. He twisted himself into a high chair at
the bar. No one challenged him. He ordered a beer, and
glanced at himself in the mirror back of the bottles. His fea-
tures were as Caucasian as the bartender's or those of any of
the half-dozen men at the bar. There were one or two with
complexions as dark as his.


34
THE WHITE BAND
He drained the beer without pause and ordered another.
The intense humidity had given him a terrific thirst.
Poor old Joe. A successful man, to be sure, and no doubt
happy. Or was he happy, or even content? That was hard
to say. A lot of men would consider a seat in the Senate the
apex of their ambition. But Joe. . . . And now he'd gone
into this-well, it couldn't be, in the final analysis, anything
but a hate society, however Joe and his associates gilded it.
Ned thought of Joe as he had been twenty-five years ago. A
brilliant youth, crackling with potentialities. He'd gone to
law school with a university degree, an education more on
the classical than the more popular practical side ... liberal
arts: languages, philosophy. Afterward his law degree, and
postgraduate courses in London and Paris. A young man
equipped to lead the South instead of following it, and yet he
was ending, like so many others, nowhere.
Down the bar two men in slacks and sport shirts, middle-
aged men who probably were artisans of some sort, were dis-
cussing the big issue.
"... but what the hell can they do?”
“They can send federal troops down if they wanta.”
“They ain't a-gonta do that?"
“I'd like to know why the hell not? What's to stop 'em?"
“Think they want another war, like back in 'sixty-four
when Sherman come down here?”
“They wouldn't care a damn."
“They ain't soldiers enough to force us to send our kids to
school with niggers.”
“I think you're right. They'd hafta de-tail a corporal's
guard to every family. I know I'd a damned sight druther my
kids grew up not knowin' how to read and write and add a
column of figures than have 'em go to school with a lot of
were
me
niggers.”


THE WHITE BAND
35
W
“Me too.”
The other laughed. “Next they'll be saying I gotta have
niggers in to dinner once a week.”
“I wouldn't be surprised none at what they'd do.”
Ned drained his second beer and left.
He walked two blocks and waited for a bus. He knew
Riverport. He had been here often, the first time when he
was eleven, or maybe barely twelve, and he had worked for
a grocer in an interim between schools.
Boarding the bus, he instinctively started to the back, where
Negro patrons were supposed to sit. They could, if there
were enough of them, fill the seats toward the front, half-way
at least, though the drivers always saw that there were seats
reserved for white passengers who might get on. But he took
a vacant seat near the front, and no one bothered him. When
in the South he usually followed the routine devised for his
race; it was best not to tempt providence or whatever it was
that controlled fate. He was in a perverse mood today, no
doubt about it. There was always the chance that somebody
would recognize him. Last year he had delivered the com-
mencement address at Carwell College, to which he was on
his way at this moment, and recently a weekly news maga-
zine had written him up rather extensively, with a picture.
Oh, well.
The campus, quite pretty with its rows of poplars and the
taller pines in back, the ivy-subdued brick buildings, was
quiet. A few students of the summer school were passing, but
the big rush wouldn't be on for three weeks, when the regu-
lar session started.
In the outer office of the president's suite the secretary, a
dark, pretty girl, recognized him. “How are you, Mr. Tar-
ver? Dr. Jameson will be right with you. Sit down, won't
you."


36
THE WHITE BAND
“Thank you.”
In a few minutes he was ushered into the inner office, where
a tall, thin, black man greeted him with a warm handshake.
“Good to see you, Ned. You're looking well.”
“Bearing up quite nicely, thanks. And you?”
"I do very well considering my age and burdens.” Dr.
Jameson laughed. He was a Ph.D. from Cornell, who had
specialized in soil chemistry, and he had devised some im-
proved fertilizing formulas and some new crop-rotating pro-
cedures. “Sit down, Ned. Lunch'll be ready in a little while.”
"Thank you. I hope I'm not putting you to any trouble.”
“On the contrary, it's only a pleasure. How's your fam-
ily?”
“Quite well. Nell's giving a one-man-I should say, one-
woman-show soon at some little gallery down in the
Village.”
“Your wife's really got it, hasn't she?”
“They say she has. I'm no judge of painting, and I suppose
I'd be a prejudiced critic. My oldest boy's in the army. He's
in Germany at the moment. He got a commission.”
“Good for him.”
“As long as he doesn't come South.”
They both laughed. “He got through Columbia before the
Army took him," Ned added. “Your family well?”
“All quite well. Jim, that's my youngest boy, is doing re-
search in physics for the government. Nuclear. All quite
hush.”
“Fine."
“I believe it's in the peaceful use of nuclear energy, though
he can't say too much about it. I hope so. How's your mis-
sion going?”
“Just starting, so I don't know. I had a talk with Joe Duf-
field this morning.”
vernm


THE WHITE BAND
37
"Joe Duffield? Oh, I believe you told me once you and he
were more or less friends.”
“We are. We went to Georgetown Law together."
"You did? Well, I'll be damned. I see he's taking over that
White Band. It was revived recently. One of the most vicious
of those secret societies that flourished in the twenties. Well,
it's too bad. I once had hopes of Joe Duffield.”
“We all had.”
“They all end up the same way down here. What did he
have to say?"
"The usual thing. Of course he denied the White Band
would be used for intimidation or violence."
“That has a familiar ring,” said the educator. “They always
deny it. When the Ku Klux was reborn nearly forty years
ago, they said it was merely a fraternal order-of course for
white, gentile Protestants. But what are your plans? What
about the League for Racial Justice?”
“We're moving along, doctor, sort of feeling our way. But
the schools open in two weeks, and we hope to make a few
test cases, get the ball to rolling, you might say.'
“The Supreme Court,” Dr. Jameson reflected, “agreed to
allow a reasonable time to put its ruling into effect. I suppose
some of our Southern white friends will construe that as any-
where from twenty-five years to a century.”
Ned laughed. “I don't doubt it. And I don't want to pre-
cipitate trouble. There's enough of it on the horizon already.
But we felt, our board of directors, that we ought to test the
thing in some way, at least make a formal showing of com-
plying with the court's order, and let the federal courts con-
strue the meaning of “reasonable.' We can't let it lapse by
default.”
"I think you're on the right track, Ned. It shouldn't cause
trouble-though you never know. Let some Negro children
TIPS
O


38
THE WHITE BAND
apply for admission to a public school. Of course they'll be
turned down, with one excuse or another, and then you can
apply for mandamus or certiorari or whatever you always call
it."
“Exactly."
“What you wrote me about Baynesville ..."
“Yes?”
"It might do very well. It's a typical mill town, and the
Negro grade school there is particularly bad. The building
is unsanitary and about to fall apart, and the school is pitifully
understaffed. The old gag about separate but comparable fa-
cilities is ludicrous at Baynesville, as it is in many places. The
white schools there are new and quite good.”
“We heard the situation was pretty bad there."
Baynesville was only twenty miles from Riverport. Ned
recalled it vaguely as a little county seat, with the usual brick
courthouse presiding over the usual square. Since then some
big textile mills had moved down from New England. He
picked up a glass paperweight from the educator's uncluttered
desk. It was a pretty thing, with marine fossils seeming to
grow in depths at its bottom.
Dr. Jameson glanced at a ship's chronometer on the wall.
“I'm sure lunch is ready. Suppose we start.”


OE DUFFIELD tossed the morning paper on the dining-room
table indignantly. “Harry Holmes,” he said, “you might
know."
Sarah took a sip of her cooled-off coffee. “He's always
been against you, hasn't he?”
“He's against everything,” Joe said, “except his own brand
of enlightenment-what he regards as the liberal attitude to-
ward the South. Look at this editorial!”
“Let's see it.” Sarah, cool-looking in a thin, blue lounging
robe, picked up the paper and read:
,
Apparently the White Band, one of the better hate socie-
ties of the lamented '20's, is being revived in a big way to
combat this dreadful scourge of integration in the schools.
The announced head of it is none other than our retiring
(although that's not quite the word) junior Senator, the
Hon. Joseph Duffield. Between pious platitudes at a meeting
39


40
THE WHITE BAND
at which he ended the breathless public suspense over his im-
mediate future, he explained that he was serving this fine
secret society without salary. We have no reason to doubt
the word of a man who is still a Senator of the United States.
Probably he is serving without salary. But then ... let us
express the hope that he is not sacrificing too much for the
welfare of his beloved South.
“Personally he's not a bad guy," Joe commented. “But he's
obsessed with the idea that he and a few other editors-God
knows they are few enough-can change the South's think-
ing. He'll hurt the Dispatch, cause subscriptions to be can-
celed; worse, the paper'll lose advertising. But Harry's the
kind who would rather be right than make a living. He's
nuts."
“Wasn't such a trait once considered rather noble?” Sarah
asked.
Joe put down his coffee cup. “No doubt. Still is, perhaps.
But this is a practical world. And if you're in public life-
and editors as well as politicians are-you can get only so far
ahead of public opinion. You've got to consider what people,
most people, think, even if you regard them as a lot of dolts.”
“Tra-la-la,” said Sarah, “but why is the South worked up
into such a zither?”
“Dither.”
“As you like. But why? This thing'll be worked out no
doubt. Most things are, I've found. A way out's usually
found, sooner or later.”
"No doubt,” Joe said indifferently. “But you're from the
North, Sarah, and, though you've been down here a long
time, you can't yet see through Southern eyes.”
"I'm afraid I don't want to," she retorted. “The South's


42
THE WHITE BAND
The dark young man was in a good humor. “We've
jumped into this thing at just the right time, Joe. It's going
like fury. Hank and I have had to hire a dozen clerks to take
care of the mail-the checks, the membership certificates.
We've got thousands of new members in five states."
“Great.” Joe, leaning over Dave's desk, flicked the ashes
from his cigarette. “I guess the ten bucks initiation hasn't
scared many off.”
"No. My God, it's what the White Band charged back in
the twenties, and prices have gone up about three hundred
percent since.”
“I know, but it still sounds like a spot of money to many
men. And the dues. We fixed them at twenty dollars a year,
didn't we?”
“Yeah, payable quarterly. Five bucks every three months
won't hurt anybody. Only the poorest whites-sharecroppers
and migratory workers-will stay out.”
"We don't want them anyway,” said Joe. “What good
would they be? We'll have their support anyway, for what-
ever it's worth.”
"Sure.”
“There's something," Joe reflected, "called the Citizens'
Councils started over in Mississippi and reported spreading.
It has our aim-well, the aim of almost everybody in the
South-to preserve the white race, if you want to simplify,
although at the moment the issue is only schools.”
"I know about them,” Dave Beckett said. “Fats Gilliam
was over on the Ole Miss campus last week, and he told me
all about them.”
“Who's Fats Gilliam?”
“Why, Joe, you mean to say you don't remember the
coach at Baynesville State Teachers, the onetime All-Amer-
ican guard at State U?”


THE WHITE BAND
43
"Of course! Sometimes I can't remember my mother's
maiden name.” A picture of an enormous man with a loud
chuckle took shape. There were many Gilliams around this
country. They pronounced it Gill-um. “What did he say?”.
"Simply that it's no competitor of ours, except we're all
working for the same end. It's not a fraternal or secret order
like ours. It's composed of Rotarians, Kiwanians, what have
you; leading citizens in most towns. They simply meet and
pass resolutions and petition the legislatures and so on. The
White Band will be much more-effective."
“Fats Gilliam is with us?”
“Decidedly. I think he was the first man to join at Baynes-
ville. Hank and I were thinking of bringing him into the in-
ner council, making him an officer. That is, if you approve.”
"Sure, anything you want.”
“He has a lot of friends, a lot of influence, especially in the
younger crowd, the men we particularly want. But what I
wanted to tell you today was something else. One of my
spies,” Dave Beckett laughed, "brought me word that the
nigras are fixing to make the first test of this new ruling, if
you want to call it a ruling-I call it a piece of legislation by
the Supreme Court-anyway that they're planning to test it
over at Baynesville.”
“Is that so?”
“Yeah. They claim Baynesville has one of the worst col-
ored schools in the state and a high school that's substandard.”
“Certainly they're not up to what we've given them in Riv-
erport.”
"No. And I hear an Afro lawyer named Ned Tarver is in
Riverport and is going down there to make trouble when
the schools open.”
“I'm not surprised. I know Ned. In fact, I saw him yes-
terday.”


44
THE WHITE BAND
"You saw him?”
“Sure, he came up to my office. We talked over the situ-
ation a little.”
“You knew him before?”
"I knew him around Washington,” Joe said vaguely. “Not
a bad guy. Quite brilliant."
“Oh, they have them,” Dave conceded. “I've known them.
Remember, I went to school up North, like you did. Sure,
their leaders are as well-educated as we are, some better than
most of us, and they should know better. But they come
down here and stir up the poor morons on the farms and in
the towns and only cause them trouble.”
“That's true. But what can you do?”
"Nothing,” said Dave significantly, “but meet each situa-
tion as it happens.”
“I suppose they'll go into Federal Court and ask certiorari,
and we'll have Damon Quiller there to oppose them, and if
the judge grants them relief, we'll appeal on one ground or
another, although the basic question appears to have been
settled.”
Dave looked up with a small, sardonic smile. “That's about
how the legal end of it will shape up."
Joe changed the subject. “How are plans for headquarters
coming?”
“Oh, I'm glad you asked. We've got a chance to lease the
whole top floor of the Darby Building at Dogwood and
Henry. A very nice building."
“I know.”
"We want you to meet there with us within the next few
days to go over the deal. We feel we can't do much better,
but you must be satisfied, Joe.”
“I'll be glad to meet with you. Call me. If I'm not in,


THE WHITE BAND
45
leave word with my secretary. I'll be running along. Every-
thing looks fine-super, in fact.”
“I'll say."
Joe, trying to ignore the discomfort of the steamy street,
reflecting how much like Washington Riverport could be,
found vague but impressive figures flashing through his mind.
Why, if this thing went as it should, as it promised to, he'd
be a rich man in a year; they'd all be-Dave, and Hank, and
Damon, and perhaps one or two others who would be cut in.
With thousands coming in, week after week, the money
would pile up. Their overhead wouldn't be much, as such
things went. Maybe he'd have enough in six months to pull
out. This was nothing he wanted for a permanent connec-
tion. He needed money. And he'd have it. More than he
could make as a senator in thirty years. In Washington you
never had enough: you had to maintain a decent home, if
you were a senator, entertain a certain amount. It took a
wealthy man to get by.
He returned the greetings of two men who called, "Hello,
Senator.” He hadn't the slightest idea who they were. When
he, his family-of course he included them in everything, even
if Sarah was strange and distant these days, more interested
in the next drink than in him-when they accumulated
enough, and it shouldn't be long, he could think about re-
suming his political career ... if he still wanted it. They'd
be electing a new governor in two years, and that might be
a better stepping-stone even than senator: you were closer to
your own state. Then, too, he wouldn't be at all surprised if
a new party was organized in the South, better, more effective
than the Dixiecrats of 'fifty-two, a split-off from the liberal
Democrats of the North. And who was better fitted to lead
them? Oh, he had no political illusions. He knew such a
candidate couldn't be elected, any more than Strom Thur-
N


46
THE WHITE BAND
mond could, and yet, if the movement were South-wide, more
cohesive, more determined, more intelligent, the presidential
candidate would come out of the campaign with a prestige
the leaders, the manipulators, North and South, would have
to reckon with. A man had to plan ahead.
He turned into a side street and soon came to the old brown
mansion that housed the Cherokee Club. He pushed into its
spacious, cool, hushed rooms, sat down in the main lounge,
and rang for a drink before lunch.


LARRY HOLMES was bent over his battered desk reading
the editorial-page galley proofs. He was sixty-seven and
looked older-a veteran who had started on the Dispatch as a
copy boy in the days when the first Roosevelt was president,
and the automobile was a stared-at novelty, and you could
buy a substantial lunch for fifteen cents. This rickety three-
story building, which you entered down a little street that
was no more than an alley off Forrest Square, actually was
the paper's third home, though it looked as if it might have
been the original building. The Dispatch dated back to
eighteen seventy-one, when Sherman's march was still a fresh
memory and a Federal provost guard prowled the streets at
night. But now the owners had drawn plans for a resplendent
new building. The editor wondered if he'd live or his job
would last long enough to work in the new place. He didn't
own any of the paper; he was still only a salaried employee.
He was aware of a figure looming in the doorway, though


48
THE WHITE BAND
it had approached noiselessly. John Braden always loomed;
he was that sort of well-filled-out, bulgy-jawed man, whose
age must be around fifty, though he never mentioned it. John
Braden was the principal owner of the chain of papers which
had bought the Dispatch five years ago. Everything, Harry
Holmes reflected, tended to chains these days: newspapers,
hotels, groceries, even drugstores.
"Don't let me interrupt you, Harry,” said John Braden.
“Oh, that's all right, John, I was just going over these
proofs. No hurry. There's time for them. Have a seat.”
"Thanks." The owner pulled up an uncomfortable straight
chair and lit his half-smoked cigar. His cigars were always
going out. He'd forget them, then suddenly remember them.
He had been in town several days, so that Harry Holmes was
not surprised to see him again. This, he sensed, was to be a
conference; the other meetings had been merely to pass the
time of day.
“How are things going, Harry?” John, who looked vocif-
erous and blustery, was surprisingly soft-spoken, and yet he
never failed to make his points.
"All right, I guess, John. No particular complaints. This
segregation thing has got us all worried.”
“That's one thing I wanted to speak to you about.”
“Yes?”
John Braden puffed on his revived cigar. “Your editorial
about Joe Duffield was clever. I had to laugh.” Harry knew
that his employer had not brought up the editorial to compli-
ment him, and he waited. “But don't you think," the owner
added, with an obvious striving after tact, “that you went a
little far?”
“Maybe.” Harry, a small man who seemed to shrink as the
years piled on him, ran a hand through his thinning gray hair.
“After all, Joe is a very popular man.”


THE WHITE BAND
"No doubt of that.”
“I think you were entirely right in everything you-im-
plied,” Braden went on. “But an editorial like that might hurt
us, cost us subscribers, even advertisers. I hear this White
Band is going great, really taking on proportions.”
"I don't doubt it.”
“And the segregation thing is a red-hot issue, as you know.
When the Court's decision was announced, this paper sup-
ported it, although you were tactful in what you said: they
couldn't expect too much from the South all at once, but it
had to come. We were right of course. Remember, Harry,
I'm a Yankee, and I don't see much wrong with desegregating
the schools, but I realize most Southerners do, and we've got
to get along with them. We've got that paper in Florida too,
though Jack Beamer is not as liberal as you are, Harry, and
he hopped all over the Court, and I let him alone, just as I let
you alone. And I'm not trying to tell you what to do now.
You're the editor, and I believe strongly in local management
of our papers. And yet ... well, we can't go too far in an-
tagonizing the people who are our bread and butter. I don't
need to labor that point, Harry. You've been a newspaper-
man a damned sight longer than I have, and you're one of the
best editors we have.”
“Thank you.” There was no sarcasm in the editor's tone,
though a measure of it in what he felt. Twenty years ago he'd
have said get somebody else, I can't be a half-way editor. But
now-where could he get another job at his age? And how
could he and his wife get along on the pension they'd prob-
ably dole out to him, though the children were grown, mar-
ried, scattered, making their own way? But how could you
compromise with principle, with what you felt to be right?
"I just thought,” John Braden went on, “that you might
sort of tone things down, at least until things simmer down.
1


50
THE WHITE BAND
I suppose there'll be some sort of compromise—there generally
is in situations like this."
"I wonder.” Harry smoothed back what was left of his
hair.
"I've heard some pretty harsh things said about the Dispatch
the last few days,” Braden added. “Of course I'm not for
spineless, do-nothing papers. Nobody has any respect for
them. Just the same, I've wondered, Harry, what made you so
-so liberal. You were born down in this country and grew
up, I suppose, with the prejudices of the region.”
"I did. My father was a kid soldier in the Confederacy.
He was at Chickamauga and Atlanta and in some other bat-
tles. I absorbed most of his feelings when I was young. It
was only later that I began to think for myself. I'm not sure
what it was. I remember we were desperately poor. My
brothers and sisters, five of them, and my father trying to
make a go of a country store. The boys had to drop out of
school when they were in their teens. Then my father died,
and my mother tried to run the store, but there wasn't much
in it, and she had to sell out for what she could get. We had
a small farm, but everything brought so little it was hardly
worth holding out. I went up to Riverport-I was around
seventeen-and got on here as a copy boy. I stayed. I became
a reporter. But you don't want a biography of me. You're
wondering how a Southerner who grew up just after Recon-
struction got the ideas I seem to have.”
Harry Holmes paused and filled his caked old pipe, a
straight briar. He lighted it carefully and took a few puffs.
“I used to see the nigras, especially in the country, trying to
scrab a living in those days, and they were worse off than we
were, though some of them were more efficient farmers. They
were still held in a sort of economic slavery. Very few of
them could afford much of an education, and their schools in


THE WHITE BAND
those days, where there were any at all, were one-room
shacks. I'd know boys who tried desperately to better them-
selves. There are some good nigra colleges in the South-
Tuskegee, Morehouse in Atlanta, Carwell right here in River-
port-but it was hard for boys to qualify for these colleges,
and harder to work their way through when they could make
the grade. And even when they did, what was there for them
afterward? I've seen young men with B.A.'s, even M.A.'s,
become waiters or janitors because there was nothing else for
them. There were not enough teaching jobs. Oh, they could
go North. But there wasn't much for them there, unless they
became lawyers or doctors, and they couldn't all go into those
professions.”
“Harry,” John Braden interposed, “every kid has that prob-
lem, white, black, or green, whatever his color or anteced-
ents.”
“To an extent, John, but the Negroes”-suddenly he pro-
nounced the name as Northerners and Westerners do—“have a
tougher time. Down here they can't vote except at general
elections. You know how much a general election counts in
the South. They can't vote at Democratic primaries, which
decide who will rule them. They have no voice in their gov-
ernment. They are segregated in every way: at theaters, res-
taurants, station waiting-rooms, drinking fountains, toilets.
Either they're citizens or they're not. Let's be honest and call
them a servile class without rights or else give them full citi-
zenship. I can't see making somebody half a citizen.”
John held his half-smoked cigar, which had gone out, and
looked away at the scrounged-up plaster on the far wall. He
said nothing.
“Another thing,” Harry added. “I'm against segregation
because of its effect on the white people.”
"The white people?”


THE WHITE BAND
53
the boy who was twenty-five before he knew white girls did
it. Well, they bring to their marriages a sense of guilt and an
appalling lack of understanding. But I didn't mean to make
a speech. Sorry, John.”
"It's all been very interesting.” John Braden got up. “And
instructive. You've got logic on your side. But these people
-you could never persuade them.”
"I don't expect to.”
"Well, don't worry too much about what I said. Just give
it some thought.”
“I will, John.”
“Will you lunch with me tomorrow, Harry? There'll be a
couple of other men there, men you know-Will Hardin and
Jefferson Smith.”
“I'll be glad to. Thank you.”
“We'll meet at the Cherokee Club. At one. I'm leaving
tomorrow night.”
They shook hands. Braden left, and Harry went back to
his galleys.


DAYNESVILLE WAS IN process of turning from a country
town into a city. On courthouse square, a fine new steel-and-
brick office building of eight stories was flanked on one side
by a seventy-year-old livery stable, converted with a mini-
mum of effort into an auto repair shop; on the other side by
Wallen's market, a rickety old frame building. Across the
square, the new city library, of limestone, stood next to the
old Travellers' Hotel, a rambling frame structure which had
decayed into a cheap rooming house. The new stone-and-
brick Baynesville Hotel, a block off the square, towered ten
stories. There was a new residential suburb, where executives
of the textile mills transplanted from New England (because
of cheap labor and accessibility to raw cotton) had built their
expensive homes. The Baynesville Country Club had one of
the state's sportiest golf courses.
But there was one section of the fast-growing httle city
which had changed hardly at all-the area, roughly eight
square blocks, known as Niggertown. It was a haphazard col-
lection of wooden houses, some in fair preservation, others
mere hovels, with sagging roofs and crumpling joints. There
were, on the fringes, some brick houses which had been solid
54


56
THE WHITE BAND
“I understand, but you don't know these white folks around
here. Where was you brought up, Mr. Ned?”
“Over in Alabama.”
“Golly, you ought to know. I bet you didn't talk outa turn
over there. But you've lived up North a long time.”
“I went North when I was seventeen.”
“Maybe you've forgotten how it was when you was a little
shaver.”
“No, Jack, I haven't forgotten.”
“Well, you can't get away with nothing out of the way.
You best go along in the regular way, and keep your mouf
shut and speak when you're spoken to. I wouldn't have my
job three days iffen I was to mess in this school thing." He
drove a truck for one of the mills.
Tarver stood up. “I don't want to cause you any trouble,
Jack. But the only way we'll get anywhere in this fight, even
if the Supreme Court has decided it, is to keep putting the
pressure on them.”
Jack Dornin laughed. “Well, let somebody else put the
pressure on. Not me. I knows when I'm well off.”
“Think it over. And thanks just the same.”
Ned started down the street, with a backward wave. It was
a mild day, with a haze on the pine hills that surrounded the
town and a hint of autumn in the air.
It was hard to break through the shell which fear, compli-
ance, and indifference had formed in these people. He didn't
blame them for not wanting to stick their necks out. The
whites would retaliate, undoubtedly. But what could you
do? You couldn't let the decision languish by default. Well,
the lawyer, Goodwin, had offered to take his two children
over to the white school and ask to have them enrolled. And
Smith, the colored undertaker, was willing to proffer his eight-
year-old girl any time. Probably he could get others. One


THE WHITE BAND
57
was enough to make a test case, but he had wanted a score: a
large number would make a more impressive petition. Or
would it matter? The books were full of important decisions
in which a single citizen had been upheld in some plea. Be-
sides, the Court had acted. This would merely constitute
defiance, contempt of court.
It was time to act. The schools had opened two weeks ago,
and nothing had yet happened. He had planned to make a
test the opening day, but there was so much confusion and so
much delay in obtaining volunteers that he hadn't yet been
able to prepare the papers and go into court. He didn't feel
that the delay greatly mattered; perhaps it would strengthen
their cause to have allowed the white schools more time to
prepare for integration ... which not one was doing, none
south of a border state.
Well, he'd stop in at one more house, just for luck. He
selected one of the least inviting places, a sagging old house
which was little more than a shack. Integration, disintegra-
tion, he thought as he knocked. After some time a nervous
little woman opened the door a crack. “What is it, please?”
“Could I speak to you a minute?”
She looked at him suspiciously. It was the old story. He
looked too much like a white man; it was hard to get them to
believe he was one of them. Sometimes he wished for a skin
like coal. “Is your husband around?”
She opened the door a little wider. “I haven't got a hus-
band. I'm a widow.”
“Oh, do you have children?”
“Yassah, three.”
“Could we sit here on the porch a minute and talk? It's
about the children.”
She came out then. "Well, sit down, mister.” She remained
standing. One pillar of the porch was gone, and a corner of


58
THE WHITE BAND
the roof which it had supported had lurched forward until
it looked as if it might tumble over any time. He sat on a
broken kitchen chair. “What ages are your children?”
“Nine, eleven, twelve. . . . If you're the truant officer,
they're all in school, up at Spread Creek, and they goes regu-
lar–I sees to that.”
He laughed. “I'm nothing like that. I represent the League
for Racial Justice.”
She stared at him. “What mought that be?”
“Well, it's an organization to try to get full citizenship
rights for the colored people. I'm colored, just like you.”
She studied him. “You don't much look it."
“I know, but I am. Wouldn't you like to have your chil-
dren go to a better school?”
The little woman's eyes flashed. “I shore would. It ain't
that the teacher's not okay at Spread Creek. But last year
seven, maybe eight chillun come down with the typhoid fever,
and I was scared sick my chillun would get it. So was the
other mothers. We figured it come from the well they gets
drinkin' water. The health officer tested it, says it warn't
that. I don't know. He said it mought be the milk. He raised
hell-closed up one dairy till it got rid of some cows. I don't
think he'd've bothered much except he was afraid t'would
spread to white folks. They got it stopped, though, wherever
it was a-comin' from.”
“That was a worry all right. You've got outdoor toilets at
the Spread Creek school?”
“Oh, shore.”
“You've heard about the Supreme Court, how it's held
Negro children were entitled to go to white schools?”
“I heard about it; so did the white people. I heard plenty
talk, too. I'm a charwoman at the new ho-tel. I heard 'em


THE WHITE BAND
59
sayin' ain't none of their chillun gonta go to school with nig-
ger chillun.”
“That's what they say, but the courts feel differently, and
what the courts say goes."
“Maybe. I ain't sayin' one way or the other.”
“If you'd be willing to cooperate with us, to help us to the
extent of just taking your children to the white school and
offering to enroll them ...” He explained how they had to
test the issue.
To his surprise she said, “Shore. I ain't got nothin' to lose.”
But suddenly she eyed him suspiciously. “How do I know
you're not a white man tryin' git me into a jam?”.
He laughed softly. “I guess you'll just have to take my
word for it. Of course I've got papers to prove who I am, if
you'd like to ..."
He reached into his inside pocket, but she held up a re-
straining hand. “Never mind. Somehow or other I believe
you. And I'll do what you say."
He took down her name and the names of her children.
The next night Ned Tarver had dinner at the home of Tom
Goodwin, the lawyer.
The Goodwins lived in one of the new houses on the Bel-
ton Street edge of Niggertown. Tom, who had a good prac-
tice, as much as he could handle, had built this bungalow. It
had a carefully tended, sloping lawn, on the fringes of which
ran the flower garden that was Tom's particular pride. Tom,
an open-faced brown man with an infectious grin, had studied
law at a state university in the North. His wife, youthful and
pretty, with a complexion like cream, had gone to Howard
University in Washington. She had under-furnished rather
than over-furnished the house, with a taste that ran to spare,


60
THE WHITE BAND
blond, modern furniture. There were a few prints of Cézanne
and Gauguin.
Ned and Tom were at the flat desk in a corner of the living
room going over the petition they had drawn up earlier in
the day in Tom's office. Ella Goodwin sat at the small piano
playing a Chopin nocturne in a pianissimo that was a mere
breath of sound.
"If I'm disturbing you two ...” She paused.
“Not at all,” Ned assured her. "I love it. You can really
play, Ella.”
"Thank you, Ned. I had a good teacher, but I don't prac-
tice the way I used to, and I can't play much any more.”
“I must,” Ned retorted, “ask the court to rule out that
statement as obviously untrue.”
They all laughed. The two children, the girl twelve and
the boy nine, were in another corner going over their school
books.
The two lawyers bent over their papers. “Of course," Ned
observed, “if our clients are admitted to the white school, we
won't need this.”
Tom Goodwin laughed hard. “You can be funny. Know
any more good ones? Well, we'll have the evidence for a
prima facie case by tomorrow night.”
Ella began playing again, very softly. It was a mild eve-
ning, half summer, half autumn, and through the screen door
a faint background chorus of crickets drifted in.
Suddenly there was another sound, vague at first, then
definite ... the music of a band. It was swelling, approaching.
They all went out on the porch. The band was coming up
Belton Street, through the middle of Niggertown.
“What could that be?" Tom wondered. "The colored
Elks maybe. They hang on a parade every now and then.”
e-


THE WHITE BAND
61
"It's 'The Stars and Stripes Forever they're playing,” Ned
remarked, “though their tempo is a little ragged.”
“It certainly is,” Ella agreed.
The band finished the number, and the drums rolled a beat
for hundreds of marching men. As the procession neared the
"nice” part of Belton Street the drums beat a flourish, and the
band launched into “Year of Jubilo.” Ella shuddered and
laughed. “Did you hear that trumpet? Brother! Was it ever
flat.”
The van of the parade approached. The short autumnal
twilight was fading into darkness, but the marchers carried
flares—a relic of the torchlight political parades of two gen-
erations ago—and the watchers could see them well and read
their banners. The color-bearers in front carried an American
flag, and beside it an enormous white placard which flared
out in the wind, flaunting its words:
THE FRATERNAL AND BENEVOLENT ORDER OF
THE WHITE BAND
The bandsmen and all the men who marched behind them
wore white masks across their faces, from their foreheads to
the tips of their noses, with holes for their eyes. There were
placards along the line. The first one said:
COLORED FRIENDS, STAY IN YOUR PLACE
AND ALL WILL BE WELL
“Well, I'll be damned,” Ned remarked softly.
“I know that fat guy,” said Tom Goodwin, pointing. “He's
Duffendorf, the grocer. You couldn't mistake that bulge.”
“They don't really disguise themselves much,” said Ella.


62
THE WHITE BAND
“It's not like the Klan,” said Ned. “Those hoods and night-
gowns really hid them.”
The second banner said:
WHITE SCHOOLS FOR WHITE CHILDREN!
A third proclaimed:
COLORED CITIZENS, YOU'VE GOT YOUR SCHOOLS
STAY IN THEM . . . . . . OR ELSE!
Another paraphrased Kipling:
WHITE IS WHITE AND BLACK IS BLACK
AND NEVER THE TWAIN SHALL MEET
"I don't know what Duffendorf would do without the
Negro trade," Tom said. "He's right in the middle of Nigger-
town. I wonder where the great Joe Duffield is. Suppose he's
marching there somewhere?”
"Oh, he wouldn't take part in a thing like that,” Ned was
sure.
"He's too exalted?”
“Yes.”
There were other placards.
THE WHITE BAND
AN ASSOCIATION FOR THE ADVANCEMENT OF WHITE PEOPLE
And:
SUPREMI
AKE
VOTICE
SUPREME COURT, TAKE NOTICE!
A MONGREL SOUTH-NEVER!


THE WHITE BAND
Later:
COLORED BROTHERS, IF YOU DON'T
LIKE THE WHITE SOUTH, GO NORTH
OR GO BACK TO AFRICA
A marcher called up to the group on the porch, “Can you
boys read them signs?”
They laughed and nodded.
“Be goddam sure you read 'em, then.”
“Maybe," Tom murmured, “I'd have been happier if I
hadn't learned to read.”
"That could well be," Ned conceded.
The last marchers passed, and the music faded into the dis-
tance. The gathering night quieted again, and the small, stri-
dent nocturne of insects floated back on the mild air.
"I get the impression,” said Tom Goodwin, lighting a cigar,
"that they're trying to intimidate us niggers.”
"You get the damnedest ideas.” Ned gestured down the
ill-lit street. “I'm just afraid that the few I lined up will back
out now.”
Tom blew a smoke ring. “I know two that won't.”
“I'm sure of that. But the others ..."
“We'll see."
Belton Street and the other streets of Niggertown were
strangely deserted. There were no raucous groups of chil-
dren; even the porches and stoops, where families habitually
lounged about, were empty. Doors were closed, shades
drawn, and dim streaks of light came from the silent houses.
OWN
WO
ere


Qor
SO
ea
OE DUFFIELD looked over the luxurious corner suite re-
served for the Grand Protector of the White Band. It looked
too pretty to be used, he remarked to Dave Beckett and Hank
Caldwell as they conducted him on a tour of the headquarters,
the entire sixteenth floor of the Darby Building.
Joe's desk was long, low, glass-topped, and the furniture
was on the modernistic side, though the large chairs, uphol-
stered in some sort of cream-colored material, looked com-
fortable, which was more than you could say for most of this
neo stuff. The other offices looked equally sharp, and Joe
remarked that the furnishings must have cost a pretty penny.
Well, yes, the young men agreed, but Dave pointed out that
you had to make an appearance with an organization that al-
most overnight had attained South-wide scope.
They looked out one of Joe's large windows. The view
was magnificent. The skyline of Riverport stretched about
them, quite metropolitan these days; the Cherokee River
64


THE WHITE BAND
65
wound lazily through outer sections of the city; in the dis-
tance, steep little pine-thick hills formed the horizon. The
day was warm, though it was late September, but air condi-
tioning made the offices a temperate sixty-eight degrees.
The morning Dispatch was spread over Joe's desk; other-
wise the desk was empty. His secretary, who would occupy
the outer office, had yet to be installed. At the end of the
year, when he ceased to be a senator, he would close his
other office.
“Quite a ride they gave the parade in Baynesville,” said
Hank, glancing at the front page of the Dispatch.
Joe nodded. “Yeah.”
“The Gazette'll play it down,” Hank predicted.
The afternoon paper, the only other daily in Riverport, was
owned by Henry Calhoun Gaines, the aging newspaper mag-
nate. It was a comparatively new paper, and for years it had
been trying, with little success, to win advertising away from
the eighty-year-old Dispatch.
“Gaines is in for gains,” Hank punned. “Harry Holmes
will cost the Dispatch plenty if he's allowed to continue his
fight on segregation.”
Gaines encouraged his papers to go along with local senti-
ment, whatever it appeared to be. The Gazette was careful
never to offend what it took to be the prevailing opinion on
any issue. It had avoided editorial discussion of the Supreme
Court edict, and confined itself to reporting the news growing
out of it, doing this colorlessly enough to annoy no one.
"Harry,” Joe remarked, "is a dedicated liberal. But I can't
see Braden letting him get away with this. Braden is a busi-
nessman. He doesn't care a single damn about issues.”
The Dispatch had an inside page of pictures of the parade,
the work of a staff photographer. Several of the placards
were shown. The three men studied the pictures.
e


66
THE WHITE BAND
а
Joe turned to his two younger colleagues. “What effect do
you think such a parade has? To cause more trouble?”
“On the contrary,” Dave said quickly. “I think it may pre-
vent trouble. It'll show the niggers we mean business, and by
'we' I don't mean merely the White Band but the whole white
community. I wouldn't be surprised if the nigra families who
had decided to petition the court dropped out."
“Intimidated?”
“If you want to call it that. But maybe it's actually a move
toward peace. If the coloreds get to running into court and
agitating this thing in other ways maybe, you know there'll
be trouble sooner or later, and the White Band won't start it."
“If the issue isn't tested there, it'll be tested somewhere
else,” Joe observed.
“Sure,” Hank agreed, “but Baynesville is shaping up as a
battleground.”
Dave wondered why.
"Several factors,” Hank explained. “The mills. A concen-
tration of nigra and white wage-earners, rivals in a way, and
the fact that the colored schools are pretty bad. Ned Tarver
has gone there to file the first test case. There's a lawyer
there named Tom Goodwin who is district representative of
the N.A.A.C.P. He's in on the fight. I've heard a couple of
organizers from the International Friends of Labor are due
there any minute.”
“What in the hell's the International Friends of Labor?”
Dave demanded.
"I know that outfit,” Joe explained. “A Commie front if
there ever was one. It's on the Attorney General's list. Our
Subversive Control Committee found out ..."
He was interrupted by the phone. He picked it up. “Yes?
This is Duffield. Yes, yes. Just a moment."


THE WHITE BAND
67
Joe held his hand over the speaker. “It's somebody named
Blanship. Says he's head of the chapter in Baynesville."
“That's right,” Dave said.
“Wants me to address a mass meeting Saturday night.
What do you fellows think?”
“Okay, I'd say,” Dave replied.
"Fine,” Hank added.
Joe returned to the phone. “Yes, Mr. Blanship. I'd be glad
to do it. Sure, I'll be down, some time late in the afternoon.
Thanks, I'll be glad to. Dinner at six-thirty, meeting at eight-
thirty. Fine. Thanks a lot. Good-by.”
“This is Wednesday,” Dave mused. “Things'll pick up
fast down there."
“They'll actually have to file their proceeding in Federal
Court here," Joe reflected.
“Yes,” said Dave, “but, as it happens, Judge Hurben will
be sitting at Baynesville next week-you know, he has a cir-
cuit-and if he cares to he may hear the case there."
"Well, it does look like Baynesville will be the center of the
hurricane for a while,” Joe commented. “Of course, other
towns will be in the picture. Other tests will be brought. But
Baynesville may set a precedent at that.”
Hank Caldwell, who was Grand Recorder and so recipient
of all membership lists and of national headquarters' share of
initiation fees and dues, poked Dave's arm. “There are a lot
of angles to this thing and a lot of organizations horning in
on it, on one side or the other, but the White Band'll hold its
own. We have nine thousand new members in the last week.
By the way, one of our largest chapters is at Baynesville.
Joe laughed softly in a way he had when he was pleased.
"Good, good. Everything looks fine.”
“For the white race,” Dave added, with a cynical laugh,
"and for us.”


THE COACH, puffing into his office under the gym, took off
his sweater, slacks, and cleated shoes, and put on a tweed suit.
He was a huge man, but not merely fat; he bulged with mus-
cles; even his ample stomach could have withstood a powerful
blow. His face was symmetrically broad, so that he was not
bad-looking, but his eyes were disproportionately small, with
a piggish look when he narrowed them to glare at someone
The tall young man who edged in apologetically was Tim
O'Hearn, star halfback and team captain, a senior whose
grades never caused anyone the slightest worry; he'd made
Phi Beta Kappa in his junior year.
"Mind if I come in a minute, Mr. Gill-um?”
“Come right in, Tim. Sit down, if you can find a seat.
There. This place is a mess. Anything bothering you?”
"Nothing about the team, sir.” He looked at the framed
football pictures on the wall, some dating back to Fats
Gilliam's undergraduate days at State U. “It's just that ...
68


THE WHITE BAND
69
well, Coach, do you know anything about the White Band?”
“Something, sure. Why do you ask? You interested in it?”
“I don't know. A man on the campus asked me to join. He
couldn't tell me a lot about it except it's against integration.”
Gilliam tapped a cigarette on his desk. “Well, Tim, it's a
good outfit. I don't mind telling you I'm in it, though its
rolls are supposed to be more or less secret.”
“I don't think integration can possibly work, at least not in
the South, Coach, but I'm opposed to force and intimidation.
I hope we don't have any trouble.”
"The White Band's not for force, Tim. We're trying to
prevent it by convincing the niggers and everybody else con-
cerned that integration won't work, and they'd better forget
the whole thing. After all, if the niggers don't try to enroll
in our schools, the thing'll be a dead letter after a while.”
“That's right.” The young man paused and studied a tro-
phy in a glass case over the coach's desk. “I heard a nigra is
going to try to enroll here.”
"You mean in some Baynesville school or at State Teach-
se
o
ers?”
“At Teachers."
“That's interesting. Where'd you hear that?”
“It's just a ... well, a sort of rumor around the campus.
Maybe nothing to it. There was talk around the Phi-O
house.”
“I'm not surprised,” said Fats Gilliam. “There's hell being
cooked up right here in town. Some radicals are down from
the North agitating the niggers. All hell's liable to pop. Well,
one thing I am confident of. Doc Davison won't let a nigger
in. Doc's a good old conservative. He thinks the New Deal
went too far, made the federal government too powerful, in
fact changed our whole form of government. I agree.”
Tim O'Hearn was silent, and the coach went on, “If you're


70
THE WHITE BAND
interested in the White Band, why not come to our meeting
Saturday night? We're having a mass meeting that's not se-
cret, open to everybody. Joe Duffield will be the principal
speaker.”
“He's a smart guy," Tim conceded.
"I'll say. I'd like to get you and some more of our campus
leaders in the White Band. You have to be twenty-one, but
the seniors ..."
“I'm twenty-three.”
“Yeah. Well, come out Saturday night. Odd Fellows' hall.
Be an overflow, I expect; probably have to put loudspeakers
outside. Come early and get a seat.”
"I think I will,” Tim said, "and thanks for the information,
Coach.”
“Don't mention it.”
At that moment, in the office of the president of the State
Teachers College, Dr. Davison was talking to the dean of the
faculty, Dr. Rowen. Both men were turning gray, and their
hair had thinned considerably. Dr. Rowen was a spare, as-
cetic-looking man, with a quiet voice. The president, robustly
built, more hearty in manner, was talking.
"So if he applies, I'll admit him, and let nature take its
course.”
Dr. Rowen laughed. His laugh too was thin. “The trou-
ble is, Bill, nature won't take its course; the demagogues will
take theirs, and we'll be in for turmoil, I'm afraid.”
Dr. Davison put down the paperweight he'd been playing
with. “So be it. I can't help it."
“It's not that you're not right,” the dean went on. “You
are.”
"It's a simple matter of justice,” the president added. "I'm


THE WHITE BAND
71
ever
against a lot of this leftist stuff. You know that. I don't be-
lieve in taxing wealth out of existence. I didn't believe in
expanding the federal government until it became the mon-
strosity it is today. There's a lot of this liberal junk I don't
believe in. I've never tried to conceal that. But I still believe
in justice. If this fellow comes here and is qualified-and I
understand he has the very best grades from the colored high
at Riverport, which is the best colored high school in the state,
and one of our best, white or colored-why, I intend to admit
him, that's all. And I hope the board of trustees will back
me up.”
“I think they will.”
“Mind you, Jim, I'm not sure integration in general will
ever work. It'll be tough in some of those Mississippi towns,
for instance, where the nigras outnumber the whites three or
four to one. But on this level of education it's different, as
I see it. And, after all, what harm can one colored student
do among three thousand white students?"
“They'll argue,” said the dean, “that once you open the
door they'll pour in.”
“But that's not true. Not many are qualified, and not many
will want to come here. Most of our nigras who want to go
to college prefer to go North, where they can get into almost
any school if they have the grades.”
“I've no doubt this fellow is being put up to it by the radi-
cals.”
“Probably. But still, I have no right to assume anything if
he's qualified. Look at it this way. He's a citizen, he has the
requisite grades, he's entitled to enter State Teachers if he
wants to. Right is right.”
“Naturally, but still ..." The dean rose. “I've got to be
going.”


72
THE WHITE BAND
“See you tomorrow, Jim. I intend to put this before the
trustees. If it happens, as I'm reliably informed it will.”
“Good. And I hope we get by with it.”
“We will.”
“Maybe,” said Dr. Rowen dubiously, waving a small,
veined hand in parting.
ven
wav
a
ST
Joe Duffield returned home quite early that afternoon,
around three o'clock, partly because he had nothing more to
do downtown, and partly because the day was cool and pleas-
ant, and he thought he might take Sarah, Ted too if he were
around, out to the Country Club for supper. He could get in
nine holes, cool off, have a couple of drinks, maybe, and, if
Sarah stayed reasonably sober, a pleasant evening.
Ted, as it happened, was in the back yard playing with Har-
rigan, the Irish setter. At sixteen, Ted was at a stage where
he was too tall for the rest of his body. He had, as Aunt
Martha, their ancient servitor said, shot up like a ol' beanpole.
His thin frame was approaching six feet, but it would fill out;
he would be, in a year or two, a well-proportioned boy.
Meanwhile he seemed all legs and arms. He ran the dashes
for the high school track team, and he was stronger than he
looked.
Joe Duffield stood in the kitchen doorway. It was Martha's
evening off, and the big kitchen was scrubbed and ordered.
“ 'Lo, Ted. Where's your mother?”.
Ted looked up, his arm still around the panting red dog.
“Taking a nap, I guess, Dad.” The limber-jointed boy ac-
companied his words with a half-smile and what might be a
wink. His father was annoyed, but said nothing. Ted had
known his mother's hardly secret failing for a long time.


THE WHITE BAND
73
How could you fool a child of even average intelligence?
And Ted had never been lacking in perception.
"I thought,” Joe Duffield added, "we might all go out to
the Country Club for supper."
“Swell,” said Ted. “I'd like a swim. I guess Mommy'll be
stirring in a little while. Say, Dad...” The boy paused as if
undecided whether to say what had reached his tongue.
“Well?” His father smiled encouragingly
“Ben Peterson-he's a senior and pretty smug-well, at
school today he was sneering around about the White Band.”
“What did he say?”
“He said it was a lynching, whipping outfit, like the old
Ku Klux Klan. I said you wouldn't be connected with it if
it was anything like that. He said he wasn't so sure. I told
him I was, and asked him did he want to make something of
it. It seemed like he did, but Johnny Weston-he's president
of the Student Council-stepped up and made us break it up.”
Joe Duffield grinned. “Thanks for coming to my defense,
but I don't want you getting into fights about the White
Band.”
Ted stood up. He was wearing slacks and a T-shirt. “I hear
Ben's father's a radical. He's high up in some union, and he's
going around telling people integration is coming and we
might as well accept it.”
“That so? Well, there are people who think so.”
“Gosh, Sis is bad enough; she got a lot of funny ideas off at
school.”
Ted's father laughed. Sally was going through a slightly
radical stage. A lot of young people did; it didn't, as he saw
it, matter. Perhaps it was a good indication: that she did her
own thinking, and didn't echo the clichés of others. Though
the liberals too had their clichés.
“I bet I never go to school with niggers,” Ted Duffield said.


74
THE WHITE BAND
"You probably won't have to, Ted, unless you go North to
college; then you'll probably encounter them.”
“I'm going to Princeton,” Ted proclaimed.
“You won't run into many there, a few.”
“It's different anyway in college,” Ted pondered. “There
wouldn't be many. I don't suppose they'd bother you any.
But if they came into Riverport High they'd be all over the
place and ..."
"Joe!” The voice came from upstairs. Joe Duffield re-
treated into the kitchen. “Yes, Sarah?”
She floated downstairs in a blue duster, fresh from a cold
shower, and she seemed all right. Good. “Got any plans for
tonight, Joe?” On Thursdays they often went out to dinner,
though sometimes Sarah, if she were in the mood, fixed them
a supper.
"Hello, dear. I thought we might go out to the Country
Club. How do you feel about that?”
“Suits me fine," she said. She swallowed as if she had a bad
taste in her mouth, and her eyes were reddened, but she was
certainly sober.
He went upstairs to change into white linens. He had a
cold shower, and shaved lightly again, though he didn't par-
ticularly need it.
What, he wondered, had happened to Sarah ... perhaps he
should say, to Sarah and him? There had been a time, nearly
twenty years ago, when they had both been delighted with
life and with each other. Was it his fault? Was it anyone's,
least of all Sarah's? No woman in her right senses, no man,
would deliberately choose to become an alcoholic. Some peo-
ple were constitutionally unfit to drink at all. They couldn't,
as the saying went, hold it, and yet it was almost impossible
for them to leave it alone. Liquor had never been a problem
in his life. He could stay away from it, days at a time, and


THE WHITE BAND
75
not miss it particularly, unless others around him were drink-
ing and it became a social thing. Who was it said, I drink to
make my friends bearable. Was it Huneker? Worthy of him,
anyway. Or Mencken.
Twenty years ago, when he was serving his first term in
the state legislature and had gone to Washington on a legal
mission, he had met Mencken at a party. They had got to
talking in a corner behind some palms, drinks in their hands.
He couldn't remember what they'd talked about at first, the
South perhaps, but Mencken had said, “You don't sound much
like a rising young statesman from the Bible Belt.” He, Joe,
had been outspoken-well, within reason. He was politically
ambitious, but in those days he hadn't altogether submerged
his cynical doubt of popular ideas, his opinion of the prevail-
ing political parties. Their talk had ended with an invitation
to attend a soirée a few nights later at a German restaurant in
Baltimore. He remembered Mencken's saying, “The music
will be bad, but the food will be good.”
What a time he'd had with Mencken and a few of his
friends, getting pleasantly drunk, eating sauerbraten and apple
strudel, listening to an ensemble including two fiddles and a
flute, with Mencken at the piano. What he'd give for such
an evening now! There was no one like that around, no one
he knew, here or in Washington.
His evening with Mencken had been followed by corre-
spondence. At Mencken's suggestion, he had written an arti-
cle on the state of politics in the South for the American
Mercury-necessarily under a pseudonym, and it had caused
quite a stir, since the author obviously was a Southerner. Two
or three editorials had made reference to fouling one's nest.
Whose nest had you a better right to foul?
That time in Washington he'd looked up an old friend.
One Ned Tarver. They'd dined at a downtown restaurant.


76
THE WHITE BAND
Ned had offered to take him to what he called a black-and-tan
joint, but had explained, “You'd be embarrassed there, a white
man among so many niggers. Me, I won't be embarrassed at
all at the Occidental.”
Well, you'd never know to look at Ned ... the tar brush.
What was it? What did it matter? They'd had a grand time
that night talking over the sad state of the world. What had
happened, among other things, to their friendship? Now,
with this thing, what the papers called an explosive issue,
ding, they were enemies, in a way, though he'd always
liked and admired Ned.
Sarah's voice floated up. “Joe! You about ready?”
“In two shakes,” he called back.


78
THE WHITE BAND
Ivy had spread across the front wall, giving the old build-
ing a certain academic charm and hiding the signs of decay.
The interior more clearly revealed the struggle against ob-
solescence. The floors sagged in places, and there were holes
in corridor corners through which rats had emerged on certain
terrifying occasions. The desks were carved up and colorless.
The plumbing in the toilets was always getting out of order.
Teachers considered it a sort of assignment to Siberia to be
sent to the Taylor School.
And yet, to some of the Negro families living on adjacent
streets this old school seemed luxurious. Compared to the
school their children had to attend, Spread Creek up on the
hill, Taylor was the latest in design and equipment. If segre-
gation were removed, there was every logical reason why their
children, at least those living on the near side of Niggertown,
should go to Taylor, though there were few mothers and
fathers who dared believe this revolutionary measure would
ever come about. Most of them had heard of the Supreme
Court decision, but it meant little to them. It was something
said up North to which nobody living down South would pay
any mind.
On this Wednesday morning in September, hazy and cool,
with even a touch of chill in the air that blew in from the pine
hills, a small, strange procession approached Taylor School.
There were six children and five adults. All were Negroes.
There were three mothers and two men unrelated to the
children. These were lawyers, namely Ned Tarver and Tom
Goodwin. The children ranged in age from seven to eleven;
four were boys.
The children, comprehending little of what was at issue,
skipped along, restrained from too much exuberance by their
mothers. The adults were serious, talking, when they did,
quietly.


THE WHITE BAND
79
wer
rs C
At the time the little parade reached the school, the pupils
were ranged about the yard awaiting the starting bell. The
white children paid no attention to the Negroes at first, think-
ing they were merely passing, but when they started up the
walk toward the building the pupils stared, struck suddenly
silent in their amazement. They could not believe what they
were seeing. The Negro children, aware now of intense
curiosity and growing hostility, hesitated as they started up
the walk, but their mothers caught their arms and urged them
on gently.
"It's all right, Mamie Lou, ain't nobody goin' hurt you...
Come on, Joe. White chillun ain't studyin' you. ..."
One of the older boys in the yard whistled shrilly through
his teeth. Some big boys beside him, eighth-graders, began to
laugh jeeringly. One shouted, “Nigger, nigger, never die!
Please tell us the reason why!” Another remembered an old
song his mother used to sing: “Nigger child bowlegged; he
walk too soon."
At that moment the school bell clanged, and the pupils
instinctively began lining up. But some of the older boys
continued to laugh raucously and call insults. Then the prin-
cipal, a thin young man who always looked harassed, even
when things were tranquil, appeared on the steps. “Quiet,
quiet!” he ordered. “Line up as usual. What's the matter with
you boys? I don't want to hear any more noise. What's this
all about anyway?”
Then he saw the small procession of Negroes and paused.
His children lined up obediently and marched into the school-
house. The principal waited on the steps to receive the dele-
gation. He did not ask them in, but stood on the third step,
with a stubborn expression, as if ready to defend the school
single-handed.
"What is it?” he asked.


80
THE WHITE BAND
an
Ned Tarver spoke. “My name's Tarver. I represent the
League for Racial Justice. This is Tom Goodwin, a member
of the bar, and these are the mothers of these schoolchildren.
They all live nearby, within this area, and these children want
to enroll in Taylor School.”
The principal, after pausing to find words, said, “But aren't
they already enrolled in the Spread Creek School probably?”
“Yes,” Ned explained, “but they want to transfer here. It's
nearer their homes. The Supreme Court ..."
“I know,” said the principal. “But there's nothing I can
do. No arrangements have been made ... yet. The Board
told me not to accept any–any nigras at present. There's
nothing I can do."
"Could I ask your name?” Ned inquired.
“Deever-James Deever.” The young man pulled out an
immaculate handkerchief and swished it around his face. He
looked away.
"Just for the record,” said Ned Tarver, “I hand you a list
of the names of these proffered pupils. They are all residents
of the state and county and live within the school district.
I understand you refuse to enroll them.”
James Deever took the paper from Ned and held it gingerly
but did not look at it. “There's nothing else I can do. I can't
enroll them, as of the moment, anyway. I haven't the author-
ity.”
“I see. Well, that's all. Thank you, Mr. Deever."
“Don't mention it.” The principal laughed nervously and
turned back up the steps.
Ned paused. “Unless you think of anything else we should
do, Tom?"
But the lawyer smiled and said, “No, Ned, you handled it
admirably. And I'd rather you had. After all, I live here,
however much I want to do.”


THE WHITE BAND
81
Ned signaled to the others, and they followed him out to
the street.
William Davison, Ph.D. (Harvard), never called himself
doctor. The title, he felt, was honorary and should be re-
served for doctors of medicine. But virtually everybody else
called him doctor except his intimates, who called him Bill.
He was a plain man, hearty, with a good appetite, who liked
a highball before dinner, who put on few airs. Students in-
stinctively liked him; they could come to him with their
problems. He was easy to talk to, and his secretary, who had
her instructions, rarely shunted them to someone else when
the curricular or extra-curricular perplexity was substantial.
He was talking at this moment to a prospective student, one
who was about to enroll. The student was a Negro, quite
dark, tall, with fine, regular features. His name, he had ex-
plained, was Jack Taylor. He was eighteen, and had gradu-
ated from Dunbar High School in Riverport. Dr. Davison had
asked him to sit down, and called him Jack, not that he would
have gagged at mister, but he customarily called his students
by their first names—he found it put them more at their ease.
Jack sat on the edge of the chair, a little nervous but deter-
mined.
“I've got all my credits here,” he explained, touching a thin
briefcase. “I–I got all A's my senior year.”
"I've heard of your record, Jack.” The president of Baynes-
ville State Teachers College swung about in his chair, a
mannerism of his. “It's a very commendable record. I'm sure
you're fully qualified.”
Jack Taylor waited for the president to go on, and Dr.
Davison asked, “So you want to be a teacher?”
“Yes, sir, I do."


82
THE WHITE BAND
The president looked at the youth quizzically. “Why do
you want to be a teacher, Jack?"
Jack did not hesitate more than a moment. “Because, Dr.
Davison, it appeals to me as a career. I feel-this may sound
like I'm taking myself pretty seriously, but I don't mean it
that way-I feel I can do a lot of good among my own peo-
ple if I'm properly prepared to teach. I'm sure that I can get
what I need here."
Dr. Davison swung back toward his desk. “A most com-
mendable attitude, Jack. I'm sure it's no whim, that you've
thought about it a long time.”
"Yes, sir, I have.”
Dr. Davison was reviewing in his mind the meeting of the
board of trustees the previous afternoon. He had hardly
known what to expect. He knew the trustees fairly well,
though there were three new ones he knew only by reputa-
tion. They were a fairly progressive, open-minded little group,
for this state, and yet a break in the old, moss-covered wall
of segregation was something only an occasional Southerner
could contemplate without a shudder. Yet they had voted,
four to three, to take no action. This meant a victory for
him. The idea was, as those who backed him pointed out,
that this was an administrative matter which it was his re-
sponsibility to decide, not theirs. True, it was also a matter of
policy, a new, trail-breaking racial policy, and yet if they
chose to view it as an administrative matter, that was all right
with him. He hadn't sought support so much as a definition
of where he stood. He hadn't wanted to defy the board of
trustees; he could hardly do that, he'd better have resigned
first.
The president swung back to face his visitor. “Well, Jack,
I'm going to let you enroll.”
S
er


THE WHITE BAND
83
S
"I'm most grateful, Dr. Davison, and I'll try to be worthy
of your trust in me.”
“I'm sure you will. ... I suppose you've thought about-
well, the difficulties of your position here, at least at first.”
Jack Taylor smiled. “Indeed I have, doctor. Naturally. I
suppose I'm the first Negro ever to enroll here."
“I believe you are.”
"Well, Dr. Davison, if they'll just give me a chance, I'm
sure I'll show them it's not so bad having a Negro in some of
their classes. I won't-I won't try to mess in any of their
social activities. If they'll just let me alone, I'll be as-as ..."
“Unobtrusive?” Dr. Davison suggested.
“That's the word, doctor. As unobtrusive as possible.”
"Well, we'll see how it works out. And I'm thinking only
of your happiness. I don't care whether they like it or not,
the others. But if they'll just give us a chance, I'm sure it'll
work out beautifully. It's mostly an idea they've grown up
with, this color bar, nothing based on anything substantial.”
He swung back to his desk, pulled a pen out of its holder
and wrote on a memorandum pad. “Now if you'll just take
this to the registrar's office, room 318.”
Jack Taylor got up and took the memorandum. “Dr.
Davison, I don't know how to thank you.”
“You don't need to, Jack; it's something I'm glad to do.
And I wish you every success, here and later in life.”
They shook hands.


ED TARVER opened the letter which the bellboy had just
handed him. Who knew that he was stopping at Baynesville's
only "colored” hotel? Tom Goodwin, but Tom would phone.
He had told his family to write him general delivery; he had
not known where he would stay. Tom had a guest room and
had wanted him, but he had decided he'd be better off at the
hotel, bad as it was; he'd be more independent. Nice as the
Goodwins were, he'd have to shape his hours to suit their
habits. It was not that he was temperamental about such
things, but he preferred to be free to come and go as the
moment indicated. He couldn't be bound by any routine.
The envelope had been typewritten, addressed, “Ned Tar-
ver, Cotton Hotel.” The letter too was typewritten-even the
signature. He read:
IS
Listen, nigger, you better get going. Go back to Harlem
and mind your own business, don't mess in ours. This is
84


THE WHITE BAND
85
fair warning. Next time it won't be a warning. It will be
something much worse.
The White Men of Baynesville.
He had a good laugh at the signature. He seemed to see
all the white men of the busy textile town grouped as in a
gigantic football huddle, all pressing forward to help dictate
this letter. Probably two or three men, the worse for several
drinks, had contrived it. He thought of taking it to the police
but dismissed this idea as useless. They'd tell him sure, they'u
investigate, but after he left they'd enjoy a laugh with the
desk sergeant: somebody had scared that nigger, but good.
They'd agree with whoever sent the note. No, there was no
point in even keeping it; there was nothing by which to iden-
tify anybody. As he lit a cigarette, he held the match to an
edge of the letter and to a corner of the envelope. He dropped
the burning paper in the ashtray and watched it blaze into a
charred heap.
He went into the dark bathroom and pulled on the light
by its dangling string. A big cockroach looked up at him
from the rim of the tinny old tub. He got a slipper and dis-
patched the repulsive crawler. Maybe it too was entitled to
live, but he couldn't stomach the thing; it suggested filth,
squalor. In New York this place would have rated somewhere
between a fourth-rate hotel and a flophouse. They did make
an effort to keep it clean, but the rooms had needed doing over
for so long the plaster was flaking off. The plumbing was
uncertain, or perhaps you should say it was certain not to
work as it should; you had to coax it, and you were lucky
if it did not break down entirely. Oh, well. What did you
expect for your color?
He stretched out on the bed, with its frayed blue spread.
He picked up a magazine, but quickly put it down. He closed


88
THE WHITE BAND
opened his eyes to the clawed-out, color-drained plaster of the
room. He had dozed.
Jack Taylor sat in the president's private office. Seated
around him were the president, Dr. Davison, the dean, Dr.
Rowen, and Roger Clay, registrar of the State Teachers Col-
lege. Jack was trembling, not altogether from fear, but from
a mixture of terror, rage, and sheer astonishment. He had the
normal boy's fear of violence, and yet mingled with this
emotion was a stubborn quality-you could call it courage-
which had enabled him to go through many situations he
would have preferred to avoid. Somehow the other reactions
outweighed the fear. It is the sort of emotional formula that
allows a youth to push on into battle, though terrified by
awareness that at any moment he may lose his life.
A window over the campus was half open to the mild
September afternoon. From the campus came the heavy,
throbbing sound that can be either a turbulent stream or a
throng of people in scattered talk.
“Of course there are some students,” said the registrar, “but
I saw a lot of young men I've never seen on the campus,
they're from town, young men and older men.” Roger Clay
was a short, portly man, on the young side of middle age,
who looked as if he should always have a pipe stuck in his
teeth, and, in fact, he often had.
"I know,” Dr. Davison agreed, “I think the town fellows
are the ringleaders. They've stirred up the students.”
“Some students,” Dr. Rowen added, his thin voice almost
a whisper, “are all too ready to be stirred up.”
Jack Taylor felt he should say something. “I–I just went
to classes, like I was supposed to.”
was


THE WHITE BAND
89
C
“Nobody blames you,” said the president. “You went about
the campus minding your own business.”
“When I left chemistry,” the dark-skinned young man re-
called, “I was going to English, and all of a sudden there was
a crowd around me, sort of escorting me along and making
jeering remarks, some worse than that.”
“I know,” Dr. Davison said soothingly. “I know. We've
got to figure out what to do. I've sent for the police.'
“I don't want to cause trouble,” Jack Taylor said.
The president made a gesture intended to convey: Never
mind, it's not your fault.
They were all silent for a moment while the sinister murmur
of angry male voices throbbed on the perfectly trimmed lawn
below the open window. Then a rock cracked against the
window, splintering a section of it, sending a little shower
of glass into the room. The four men dodged instinctively,
though none of the particles of glass fell near them. The
dean said something that might have been, “God damn it!”
President Davison got up. He walked resolutely through
the door of his office, into the wide front corridor and through
the spacious front door, followed, a little reluctantly, by the
dean and the registrar.
Dr. Davison stood on the front steps, facing the murmurous
crowd. “Those of you who are students are to disperse at
once. Go to your classes or wherever you are due at this
hour. Go! This is an order to the students. If you don't
obey, you risk expulsion from the school.”
There was a slow, half-defiant movement away from the
thick cluster of men in front of the administration building.
Students began drifting away, sluggishly at first, then a little
faster as they disengaged themselves from the mob. But a
core of men, most of them older, though some were high-
school students, stood where they were.
school studenta ost of them older the won the mob. But


90
THE WHITE BAND
“As for you others,” said the president, "you have no busi-
ness on the campus. I'm asking you to leave. I've sent for
the police, and they'll know how to deal with you if you
persist in staying.”
"Nigger-lover!" shouted a man in coveralls.
Another called, “Send the nigger out! We'll take care of
him. We'll end all this. We know he's in there.”
Dr. Davison did not reply. He stood his ground, looking
anxiously over the heads of the scores of men who stood
laughing jeeringly and shouting unintelligible comments.
Finally there was a noise of sirens, and two prowl cars
crowded with police sped up the road to the administration
building. The cars swung dizzily to a stop below the porch,
and the police jumped out. A captain, one of the two on the
Baynesville force, was in charge. He talked to Dr. Davison.
The captain gave the men their orders, and fourteen police-
men began closing in on the crowd. The officer, a trim,
youngish man who wore war decorations, kept calling, “All
right, fellows, break it up, break it up! Let's get going.”
With a sullen sluggishness the men allowed themselves to be
pressed backward. Slowly their close formation broke, melted
into segments, and the segments began drifting back across
the long lawn and so, in thin trickles of muttering men, out of
the college grounds.
The three officials returned to the president's room, where
Jack Taylor waited fidgeting in his chair.
“Those town fellows,” said Dr. Davison, “are the trouble-
makers. They've gone now, thanks to the police, and maybe
we won't have any more trouble.”
"I hope not,” Dean Rowen said dubiously.
The president turned to Jack Taylor. “I think you can go
back to classes now."


THE WHITE BAND
91
or VOU
Jack Taylor got up with a harassed smile. “Whatever you
say, sir.”
Dr. Davison touched the youth's arm reassuringly. “But
if you have any more trouble, come right back here and let
me know.”
“Yes, sir.”
Jack Taylor left the administration building, walking as
one might walk into battle.
That Friday afternoon, when the class in Methods 5 was
over, Tim O'Hearn left the Education building and started
across the campus.
Tim was a good-looking fellow, tall and slim, with a face
that seemed always clean and fresh. He was football captain
and a campus leader, a young man whom faculty members
pointed out to illustrate their contention that a man could be
both an athlete and a first-rate student. The excitement of the
late morning had faded; the campus was normal, with clusters
of boys and girls standing about and lone students going their
separate ways.
He had come to college with a vague idea that he might
become a teacher. Anyway, he had been offered an athletic
scholarship, and this was an unexpected bonanza. His family,
farmers in one of the most sparsely settled counties in the state,
never had much money. True, he had been a football star in
high school, but Gale County High was so obscure in scho-
lastic athletics, had so little material, that its teams lost most
of their games, and rarely rated more than a line in the big
papers. It was just a lucky break that caused him to be noticed
at all by scouts from the colleges. In his senior year they had
the best team they'd had in maybe twenty years, and they got
a chance to play Riverport High in Riverport in one of the


92
THE WHITE BAND
play-off games for the state championship. Of course they
lost, but the score was fairly close, and he managed to make
two touchdowns, one on a spectacular open-field run of
seventy yards, and none other than Fats Gilliam went to see
him afterward in the locker room under the grandstand and
told him they'd like to have him at Baynesville Teachers. It
was the only offer he had, and he accepted eagerly.
Now, he reflected as he left class, he doubted that he would
ever teach. Two pro clubs were after him, and he'd had two
offers to coach at high schools and one to become an assistant
coach at a college in North Carolina. He hadn't accepted any
of them yet; he hadn't decided whether he wanted to devote
the next few years or more to football. But even if he quit
football, he didn't have to teach; there were many oppor-
tunities in business, and he thought occasionally that he might
study law. If he did he could perhaps make his way putting
in part time on some coaching staff.
Tim O'Hearn turned a corner of the Baynes Building, and
almost collided with the new Negro student. There was no
one else around, and Jack Taylor paused with a diffident smile.
"Hello,” he said.
Tim, brought up among sequestered farmers, one of whose
social axioms was “a nigger stays in his place or else,” was
about to pass with a cold look, a disdainful shrug. Why had
this fellow insisted on enrolling and causing a lot of trouble?
But something about Jack Taylor's appearance and his shy
effort to be friendly melted the campus hero, who, after all,
was never inclined to feel, as his father would have said,
bigger than his britches.
“Hello,” Tim said, stopping.
“Gee, it's a big place,” Jack Taylor added. “Kind of hard
to find your way around at first.”
"I guess so,” Tim agreed.


THE WHITE BAND
93
Jack laughed. “Right now I'm lost. Where's the Science
Building?”
Tim pointed. “See that long building jutting out at the
edge of those pines?”
"Sure.”
"Well, turn left around that building, and you'll see a big
stone building in front of it. That's Science.”
“Thanks a lot.”
“Okay.”
Jack Taylor walked on. Tim watched the Negro student's
receding figure. Not a bad guy. A hell of a fuss over one
dark-skinned student. What difference did it make? How
would it hurt anyone? Still you had to be careful. If this
segregation thing really went through, became widespread,
the South wouldn't be the South any more. In some towns,
not in his little county seat certainly, the Negro students
would outnumber the whites. His father used to say, "Give
a nigger an inch, and he'll take an ell.” Whatever an ell was.
Maybe this White Band would figure a way out of a very
tough situation. Anyway he'd go to the public meeting to-
morrow night, see what they had to say. He didn't want to
see violence. It was bad all around, bad for the white people
too. He thought of his church. It didn't think much of seg-
regation. But what did they know in Rome about the prob-
lems of the southern United States? Maybe they knew more
than you'd think; there was a lot of wisdom in the Vatican.
His father could never agree with the church in its attitude
that all souls were alike, whatever the color of their bodies.
His father and his mother were good Catholics too. The
family used to drive twenty miles in the old Ford pickup
every Sunday to go to Mass at the nearest church, St. Ve-
ronica's in Hillsdale. And sometimes there would be a few
W


94
THE WHITE BAND
Negroes worshiping with them, perhaps a few seats away.
Negro Protestants had their own churches; they were not
welcome in white Protestant churches.
Tim O'Hearn, swinging his briefcase, trudged on. It was
a muddled, messy thing, this racial question.


IHAT SAME FRIDAY AFTERNOON Federal Judge James Darcy
had been listening to arguments in the trim little courtroom
on the second floor of the Baynesville Post Office Building.
A judge sat here three or four times a year, or as often as
might be necessary, on his rounds of the judicial circuit. The
rest of the time the courtroom, with its dark mahogany
furnishings and the gilt eagle over the bench, seldom was
used. Usually it was David Hurben, the regular district judge,
who presided, but he was tied up in Riverport on an in-
terminable water-rights case, and Judge Darcy had been sent
from Florida to hear this and other cases which otherwise
would have been delayed indefinitely.
Judge Darcy was a small but somehow impressive man, and,
with this thick black hair, unsprinkled with gray, looked
younger than his fifty-two years. The black robes of a fed-
eral judge the people saw only when this court was in session,
for in this state, as through most of the South, judges of
95


96
THE WHITE BAND
state courts wore business suits, attesting to the distrust of
Southerners for ritual and vestments, whether ecclesiastical
or juridical.
These arguments were concerned with the legal and com-
mon-sense aspects of the new desegregation ruling. The facts
had been stipulated: that Negro pupils had tried to enroll in
the Taylor School and had been refused. The Supreme
Court, in a supplementary finding, had held that segregation
in the public schools should be ended “with all deliberate
speed.” Well, what was deliberate speed? This was the crux
of the present discussion, though no doubt the state and its
friends, including the White Band, would think of other ob-
jections when this defense, a mere delaying tactic, was paid
out.
Ned Tarver and Tom Goodwin, each speaking briefly, had
contended that deliberate speed meant a reasonable time to
prepare for such a change. Surely, there had been time
enough since the Supreme Court handed down its decision in
May. Were not four months long enough to move with
deliberate speed to comply with the law? They'd had the
spring and summer to prepare the people for this change, to
make the necessary adjustment in physical equipment. Wasn't
it time now to carry out the law? Would the community,
the state, the South be better prepared four months or a year
hence?
Damon Quiller, appearing for the White Band as amicus
curiae, argued that deliberate speed could mean something
else entirely. It could mean enforcing the edict when a com-
munity was ready for it.
“If the Supreme Court had wanted this done at once,” said
Damon Quiller, a bent, wizened figure with a rasping voice,
“it surely would have said so. The term “deliberate' placed it
within the discretion of the judge, who has a right to consider
11.


THE WHITE BAND
97
whether a particular community is ready for such a stupen-
dous change in the historic customs of the South.”
Even a year would not be too long to come within the
meaning of all deliberate speed, the White Band's counsel
insisted.
The state's Attorney General already had argued at some
length along somewhat similar lines. He cited a case in which
obedience to a court mandate had been delayed for more than
a year because of uncontrollable physical barriers, and an
appellate court had held there was no deliberate evasion and
the respondent was unable to prevent the conditions which
thwarted compliance. The Attorney General represented the
Baynesville superintendent of schools, and offered to present
evidence in support of his contention that there were cogent
reasons, among them lack of physical equipment to expand
the white schools and no funds for the purpose, why the
decision could not be carried out at this time. Judge Darcy
said no evidence would be necessary at present.
As Damon Quiller sat down Ned Tarver rose. “Does Your
Honor care to hear further from us?”
“I don't think so," Judge Darcy said. “I'm ready to rule.”
He leaned forward over the bench. “There can be no doubt,
I think, that in the specific question raised here, the refusal of
the school authorities to allow Negro pupils to enroll in the
Taylor school, mandamus should issue. It is strictly in ac-
cordance with the ruling of the Supreme Court. However,
the court set no time for the ruling to apply; in fact, it implied
a certain latitude in stating that the schools should proceed
with all deliberate speed. And what, as counsel have asked,
is deliberate speed? It could be interpreted in more than one
way. It is, it seems to me, a matter for the discretion of the
court. The phrase is not one that may be weighed on scales
or measured according to some formula.


98
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“I realize the difficulties involved, here and in most places
in the South. And yet I must take notice that four months
have elapsed since the decision-four months in which those
in charge of our public schools had time to prepare. I am
also aware, as the Attorney General reminded us, that this
state has a law requiring segregation of the races in the public
schools. And yet I must hold that the constitutional inter-
pretation of the Supreme Court supersedes any state law.
“Coming to the immediate question before us, I doubt that
Baynesville will be any more ready for desegregation a year
hence than it is today. However, I do not wish to be ar-
bitrary in a situation which is admittedly difficult.”
The judge picked up a pen from a silver penholder and put
it down. The crowd that filled the benches and stood close-
pressed against the back wall waited tensely.
"I shall hold that within two months of this date, or on the
nearest school day appropriate, the Baynesville School Board
must begin putting this measure into effect.”
The Attorney General, a tall young man, was on his feet.
“We ask an exception to this ruling and announce our in-
tention to appeal it.”
“Exception noted,” said Judge Darcy. “This court will
adjourn until ten o'clock tomorrow morning.”
A deputy marshal repeated that court was adjourned, and
the crowd began pushing out through the double doors. In
the vanguard was the bulky figure of Jake (Fats) Gilliam.
He plucked at a friend as they reached the corridor. “The
son of a bitch. But what can you expect?”
“They'll all rule the same way," the friend said.
“We'll have the last word,” Fats Gilliam retorted. “You
wait and see.”


THE WHITE BAND
99
V
When the football coach got back to his office under the
gym he found a stranger waiting for him. Since it was a
white man, who said his name was Graham, Fats Gilliam
shook hands and pulled out a chair. The visitor sat down.
Graham was dressed sloppily, his sport shirt open at the
collar, but his clothes, worsteds which needed pressing, were
of good quality. He was a large, slouchy man. His nose had
been broken, and this gave him a tough look. Fats wondered
if he was an old Teachers athlete. But he was not, it turned
out; he was from New York and a stranger in these parts,
he said.
He lit a cigarette that the coach proffered, spilled ashes on
his trousers, and half brushed them off with a flick of a heavy
hand. He spoke with what Fats Gilliam imagined was a
Brooklyn accent. “I represent the International Friends of
Labor."
“Yeah?” the massive coach reflected. “Whatever that is.”
"What its name implies,” said Graham. “We try to help
the laboring man everywhere, and we're in a number of
countries.”
“What are you doing here?” Gilliam asked. “This desegre-
gation thing?”
"Not altogether.” Graham grinned, exposing broken and
missing teeth. “Naturally we don't agree with you folks on
the issue.”
"I reckon not,” Gilliam conceded. “If you people would
stay home and leave us alone, we'd be better off.”
Graham pulled at his cigarette, leaving it in his mouth, so
that the long ash began falling on him. He did not answer
directly. “We're interested in organizing and protecting the
workers all we can. We want them to go into the regular,
established unions, not in any special one of ours.”
“What's all that got to do with me?" the coach demanded.


100
THE WHITE BAND
Again the visitor replied indirectly. "Above all, we want
to prevent trouble over this segregation thing, because trouble
always makes it tough for the working man, black or white."
“Who's not a working man?” Fats countered. “Even I
work, though some folks don't believe it.” He pointed to a
blackboard, where he had been drafting some intricate plays.
"I don't doubt it.” Graham laughed. “Maybe there should
be a union for football coaches."
“Not a bad idea.”
“You may wonder why I came to you.”
“I've just wondered that,” Fats Gilliam said.
“Well, Mr. Gilliam, I heard you were high up in the White
Band.”
The coach leaned forward. “Maybe. So what?”
“The White Band, so it says at least, wants to keep things
in hand and prevent trouble. Well, I'm sorry to say there's
trouble impending, and it doesn't all come, as you might ex-
pect, from you people who are trying to prevent integration.”
“That so?” Fats' small eyes narrowed skeptically.
“Yeah. In fact, some of your tougher colored citizens are
sore and looking for trouble.”
“Then they'll sure-God get it,” the coach said.
“I know.” Graham made a pretense of flicking the ashes
off his shirt and trousers. “But I can tell you this. Some of
them have bought guns and switch-blade knives.”
Gilliam looked his visitor up and down with a thin smile.
“Maybe. But you'll pardon me if I'm a bit skeptical. We've
had very little trouble with our niggers. They've stayed
pretty well in their place, gone their own way while we went
ours. Of course this school thing has upset everybody, and
some of you birds from the North have come down and
stirred the niggers up and made things worse."
"On the contrary, I'm trying to prevent trouble,” Graham
as are


THE WHITE BAND
101
insisted. “I felt that a little prevention would be a lot better
than a more drastic cure.”
“I still don't see why you came to me.”
“You will. Do you know Bearcat Turner, the ex-prize
fighter?”
"Just to speak to,” the coach said. "He was damned good
in his day. Fought champions, though he never held a title,
and I thought he was robbed of one fight for the welter title.”
"Yeah. Well, he's a ringleader of this group that's arming.”
“Well,” said Fats Gilliam, "he's punch-drunk, hardly re-
sponsible. He goes around talking to himself. Anybody
could lead him into anything."
“That's just it,” Graham explained. “And he still has a lot
of influence in what you call Niggertown. Many of them
still think he's a hero. But do you know who's stirring up
the more irresponsible element among the Negroes? Well,
I'll tell you. It's a guy named Ned Tarver, a lawyer from
Harlem, who represents something called the League for
Racial Justice."
“I just heard him spouting off in Federal Court, telling us
all what to do, minding our business.” The coach looked
away with an angry tightening of his lips. “I'm not surprised
at what you say.”
"He's the one,” Graham went on. “He told some of those
fellows the White Band was planning to tar and feather the
families of those that tried to put kids in the white school.”
“First I heard of that.” Gilliam laughed. “Might be a good
idea.”
“This guy Tarver worked on Bearcat Turner, knowing he
still has a following even though he's a goof-ball, just like a
bale of marijuana. Tarver told Bearcat a white man was fix-
ing to beat him up. Bearcat thinks he can still fight, and he
has his pride. He told his friend that if them chalk-faced
14cd,


102
THE WHITE BAND
bastards was looking for trouble they'd sure as hell find it.
My point is, though, that if you fellows could-well, persuade
Ned Tarver to beat it, go away and mind his own business,
those fellows would probably bury their guns and knives and
forget their plans to fight somebody. He keeps stirring them
up.”
Fats Gilliam looked at the floor reflectively, then straight
into the eyes of Graham. “Sounds reasonable. I believe
you've got a point. I'll see what I can do. I knew all along
that guy Tarver was not down here for any good. A nigger
that looks like a white man, or almost, and goes into court
and tries to bully us with writs-well, you can expect most
anything."
Graham put his burned-down cigarette in an ashtray on
the coach's desk, looking at it as if it were his first glimpse
of such a contraption. “You might have heard of me too?”
He laughed, exposing his wolfish assortment of irregular teeth.
“Yeah? In what connection?”
“Ever hear of Patsy Grogan?”
“I remember him, sure. Fought Mickey Walker for the
middleweight championship, damned near beat him too.”
“That was me.”
“No kidding?” Gilliam studied his caller's limber, slouchy
frame. He did look the part. "Grogan. Well, I'm damned.”
“My real name was a long Polish name. Never mind it. I
fought under the name of Grogan. People thought I was
Irish. That was a good one. I had sense enough to quit while
I had all my buttons, or most of them. Now I go under the
name of Graham. As Shakespeare said, what's in a name?”
“Quite a lot sometimes. But it makes no never mind to me
what you call yourself. Grogan. Well. He was a first-rate
fighter. I saw him-you-fight once. Somebody named Brick


THE WHITE BAND
103
Teven, something like that. At Newark. A long time ago.
I was a kid.”
“Brick Blevin. That was an easy one. Ended in the fifth.”
“I remember. I'll never forget how fast you feinted with
your left and crossed your right to that guy's jaw. He hadn't
stirred when the count was over.”
“I was good then. But a man's a sucker to go into that
racket. He generally ends up broke and punch-drunk too."
“When I was a lot younger," Gilliam recalled, “and
weighed a lot less”-he slapped at his paunch-“a manager
wanted to add me to his stable, but I couldn't see it.”
“You were wise. Well, to go back to this difficulty, you
know I wouldn't be surprised, from what I've heard around
New York, if this League for Racial Justice wasn't a Com-
mie front.”
“I don't doubt it for a minute.”
Graham stood, and Fats Gilliam said, “Thanks for coming
in-Patsy.”
They both laughed. “Don't mention it,” said Graham, “I
wouldn't like to see rioting and people hurt, maybe killed.
Do what you can.”
"Don't worry-I will.”
“And keep me out of it. I mean let your informant remain
confidential.”
"Sure, I understand.”
The men shook hands, and Graham slouched out.
An hour later Ned Tarver was leaving his hotel when a
white man stepped up to him. “My name's Graham,” he ex-
plained. “Could I speak to you a minute?”
“Of course," Ned said, “right here?”
“Maybe we could walk a little,” Graham suggested.


104
THE WHITE BAND
“Okay.”
They started down a side street toward the center of Nig-
gertown. Graham said, “I represent the International Friends
of Labor. I'm down here on the same mission you are, to
try to see that the law's enforced.”
Ned Tarver waited for Graham to go on, and he said, “Of
course, Mr. Tarver, your organization and the N.A.A.C.P. are
taking care of the legal end. Our role would be superfluous
in that direction. But we're interested in working through
the unions, what few they have in the South. You know how
badly they're organized down here, how many workers be-
long to no union at all.”
“Yes, I know," Ned said.
“Naturally we'll all depend on the courts to see that the
edict of the Supreme Court is obeyed. However, it's going to
be tough to enforce even a court order-we all know that. In
the I.F.L, we've felt that the strike also would be a powerful
weapon against defiance of the law-that is, if we could ever
get it organized.”
“I suppose it would be," Ned said.
“I wanted to give you my background,” Graham explained.
“But what I came to you about right now-of course I'm
ready to help you in any way you say—but what I asked you
to take this little walk for was to give you a friendly warning.
There's trouble coming-plenty, I'm afraid.”
“Yes?”
“You bet. I have some confidential sources through the
I.F.L. I'm told on good authority that this White Band's get-
ting ready to get even with the families that tried to put their
kids in the white school.”
“That so?”
“You can take it from me. I know what I'm saying. I've


THE WHITE BAND
105
heard, and it's not just gossip, that they're going to burn their
houses.”
Ned Tarver blew out his breath in a half-whistle. “It
doesn't seem possible. All the parents did was try to carry
out the law, as laid down by our highest court."
“I know all that. But what Southerner gives a good god-
dam for that. Not many."
“I'm afraid you're right. But anything that barbarous ..."
“Prejudice, hatred ..."
“But if your information is correct, what can we do? Go
to the police? A waste of time.”
"Sure. I don't say all the cops are for lynch law or are
corrupt. But I doubt they'd spend much time guarding Nig-
gertown.” Graham added, with deliberation, “My advice, for
whatever it's worth—and I guess I'm presumptuous to offer
advice to a good lawyer like you-what I'd do is to warn
those families, even advise them to arm themselves.”
“I'd never do that,” said Ned. “That would mean terrible
trouble; it could anyway."
“You know best,” Graham replied. “They've got it in for
certain Negroes besides, I mean besides the ones that tried to
integrate their children. One is Bearcat Turner.”
Ned laughed. “I've known Bearcat for years. He's harm-
less. He's not all there-he's punch-drunk. Nobody pays
much attention to anything he says.”
"Just the same, they're threatening to get him and some of
his pals. It seems Bearcat's been doing a lot of talking, threat-
ening to beat up some of those white men that come along
these streets waving their banners and threatening Negroes."
“He does a lot of talking. It means absolutely nothing. I
don't think he'd hurt a bumblebee.”
“Some of those fellows don't know or don't make any
distinction. I know Bearcat's off the beam. I know him. I've


106
THE WHITE BAND
se
lze
seen him fight.” Graham laughed. “I used to be a prize
fighter myself.”
"You don't talk much like those I've known.”
They turned a corner and paused while some Negroes
passed. The afternoon was waning in sparkling sunlight, brac-
ingly cool; unusual for a September day in the Deep South.
Graham laughed. “Look at Gene Tunney. Seriously, I got
hold of myself when I quit the racket. And I was only
twenty-two. I went to night school and studied English and
economics and even some philosophy. I didn't want to be a
half-illiterate goof all my life. I qualified for white-collar
jobs. I was a shipping clerk, later a bookkeeper; I even be-
came an office manager.”
“Good for you.”
“Better than staying in the fight racket and becoming ...
well, like poor Bearcat Turner.”
"Sure.”
Ned stopped and looked around. There was no one in
sight. The quiet street, with its decayed houses, seemed to
slumber under the benign, fading sun.
"Well, I'm grateful to you, Mr. ...".
“Graham.”
“Mr. Graham. Sorry. I've heard of the International
Friends of Labor. What does it do mostly?”
"Well, we try to organize the workers, encourage them to
join their appropriate unions. We also sometimes provide
counsel for oppressed people, like Negroes in the South, who
are charged with crimes of which they may be entirely inno-
cent, and who have no means of employing counsel and have
to take whatever green young lawyers the court may appoint.
We see that evidence in their behalf is collected-all that.”
"I see.” Ned smiled. “I believe you're on the Attorney
General's list.”


THE WHITE BAND
107
Graham laughed. “Sure, what outfit isn't that tries to help
those without money or influence.”
"Is it that bad?”
“I honestly think so, Mr. Tarver. McCarthyism in action.”
“Anyway, thanks for your warning.”
“Don't mention it. And if there's anything I can do, I hope
you'll let me know. I can be reached through Sam Brady.
He's secretary of the International Textile Workers. They
have an office in the Benton Building. You know, right off
the square.”
"I know where it is."
"A pitifully small union-here. But it's growing. All this
takes time and patience. The workers down here, white and
colored, have been so thoroughly intimidated that most of
them are afraid to join a union. But that situation'll pass.”
"Sure. Well, thank you, Mr. Graham.”
“Yours truly, Mr. Tarver. So long."
They shook hands.
Graham, turning away from Ned Tarver, started back to-
ward the center of town. He paused at a Negro pool hall and
looked through one of the plate-glass windows. He caught
the eyes of an undersized Negro, who sat at a table in the
front bar draining a glass of beer. Graham made a beckoning
gesture, and the Negro finished his beer and slowly rose and
shuffled out. Graham walked ahead for a way, then waited
for the man to catch up.
“Hello, Johnson, how're things?”
“Okay, Graham. Some of those guys are getting stirred
up plenty.”
Johnson was a slender, five-foot-six mulatto, who was apt
to walk with his head bent forward, as if constantly ponder-
ing something. He was rather flashy in a corduroy sport coat
and neat gray slacks, with the collar of his sport shirt tucked


108
THE WHITE BAND
outside his coat collar. His yellow shoes were glistening. His
hands were not rough, like those of the Negroes around, but
immaculate, with neatly trimmed nails.
“Of course three-fourths of 'em are chicken,” he told Gra-
ham. “But some of the rest are plenty tough. They've got
switch-blades, and I know of at least a dozen who are toting
guns.”
“Good, comrade,” said Graham, giving the term a derisive
inflection. “The more trouble there is, the better they'll like
it.”
“That I know.” Johnson added, “Last night I won twelve
bucks in a crap game."
“Don't take all their money, or they'll start working on
you.”
“Of that also I'm aware, Mr. Graham.”
"Well, look, Johnson, keep up the good work. Tell 'em
the White Band's out to get them, organizing a raiding party,
all that. And I want you to work specifically on Bearcat
Turner. They've already heard he's talking his head off.”
Johnson gestured as if swatting a fly. “Why pick on poor
old Bearcat? Everybody know he's bugs.”
“Never mind that. He'll stir up some of the other morons.
Remember, he's still something of a hero in Niggertown.
Some of them haven't sense enough to know he's a psycho.”
“Niggertown! I'm surprised at you, sir,” said Johnson with
mock-injured dignity. “Can you mean Negrotown?”
"No, Baynesville wouldn't know what you meant. Act
your age, Johnson, and get busy."
“That I'll do, exalted sir.”


12
e
1
ENATOR DUFFIELD was guest at a dinner which leaders of the
Baynesville chapter of the White Band had proffered at the
resplendent new ten-story Baynesville Hotel. There were
thirty at the long table in the banquet room, among them
some surprisingly substantial men, including a banker, a de-
partment-store manager, two lawyers, and the principal of a
school. There were to be no speeches, for within two hours
the big public meeting advertised for this Saturday night
would be under way, and there would be plenty of speaking.
This was an informal get-together, as Jay Blanship, Protector
of the chapter, pointed out.
Jay Blanship sat at the Senator's right. He was a big,
paunchy man with a genial grin. He owned the city's leading
hardware store. At this moment, as Negro waiters took away
the hors d'oeuvres and brought in the soup, he was leaning
forward and talking to Joe Duffield in a confidential tone that
even the man on his right could not hear.
109


IIO
THE WHITE BAND
"Some of those niggers,” Jay Blanship was saying, “tried to
buy guns in my store. You know, I have a fine line of guns.
Of course my clerks wouldn't sell them to niggers. Told
'em they'd have to have permits. I believe they did sell a
couple of shotguns. They use them hunting, and we can
hardly refuse them, but if there's any rush on shotguns I'll
clamp down on them, too—at least until the tension eases.”
“Quite right,” Joe said.
“Not many of them could afford to buy revolvers and
especially shotguns,” the merchant added. “Shotguns are
costly these days, and nigger families that hunt keep them
for generations. What I wondered about was, how could ten
or fifteen of them all at once have the money to buy guns?
In other words, who's advancing them money? Not any of
our loan sharks, you can bet.”
“I could hazard a guess,” said Joe.
“So could I, Senator. Some of these Yankee Red outfits.
But you can't prove a thing.”
“No, you can't,” Joe conceded. “They're slick. But I don't
doubt they're down here, in one form or another.”
Jay Blanship sipped his wine. “Doubt! I know it, Senator.
That Ned Tarver, a nigger lawyer from Harlem, represents
something called the League for Racial Justice, and he had the
gall to bring this court action that just came up.”
“Yes, Tarver.” Joe picked up a fork and put it down. “Of
course I'm against him on this, and I wish he hadn't come
down here, but I doubt he's a Red.”
Blanship looked a little shocked. “But how can you know,
Senator? They'll deny it with their last breath.”
“Naturally I can't know," said Joe Duffield, “but as it
happens I've known the fellow for years, and, as misguided
as he may be on this issue, I doubt that he's a Commie.”


THE WHITE BAND
III
SenCO
“I suppose,” Jay Blanship hazarded, “a man in national
politics encounters all sorts."
"Sure.”
"And this Tarver might as well be a Red for all practical
purposes.” Again Blanship lowered his voice and talked into
the Senator's right ear."“You know, it's getting to be a
dangerous situation in our Niggertown. A small minority, of
course—the few niggers who think they're tough guys-and
I've been told Tarver is stirring them up.”
“That so?”
“Yes, and there's a local character who's leading the dinges
astray. A former prize fighter called Bearcat Turner.”
"I've heard of him,” Joe said. “I believe he was quite a
fighter in his day.”
"Topnotch, Senator. But he's punch-drunk, pretty well
off his nut, and the sad part of it is he still has influence in
Niggertown. The more intelligent pay no attention to any-
thing he says, but some of the others, the scum around nigger
taverns and pool halls, hang on every crazy word he says.
And a bird like Tarver stirs him up, and he stirs up others.
At least that's the way the story comes to me.”
"I see.” Joe pondered this. He could not believe that Ned
Tarver would fan violence. He'd never been that sort. He
was primarily a lawyer, an advocate, and the courts were his
arena for settling disputes, always had been, but it was in-
evitable that he'd be blamed for any trouble that broke out
in Baynesville.
Blanship turned back to his food, and a man down the
table asked, “What did you think of Judge Darcy's decision,
Senator?”
"About what I expected,” Joe said.
A man across the table observed, “We're lucky it wasn't
the regular judge, Hurben. He was tied up with a long-


112
THE WHITE BAND
winded water-rights case at Riverport, and they sent Darcy
from Florida. Hurben's from Michigan, and he'd probably
have held desegregation must go into effect tomorrow. He
thinks we're not half nice enough to our Nee-groes.”
There was laughter. Someone else asked, “How's Teachers
College coming out with that nigger?”
“There'll be more trouble, you wait and see,” said the man
seated next down the table.
“It's unfortunate,” Joe Duffield commented, "that it should
have happened right at this time. There's trouble enough
over the primary schools.”
“That nigger Jack Taylor was planted,” Blanship was posi-
tive, "you can offer odds on that. More Commie manipula-
tions.”
There were murmurs of assent. Someone far down the table
said, “I'm surprised at Doc Davison and the trustees too. If
you can't rely on your own people ..."
A loud-voiced man in the center of the long table said,
“We'll get Davison. He'll be looking for a job. Up North,
too.”
Laughter and approbative comments answered. Again
Blanship leaned over to Joe. “I've heard a little group of those
tough niggers have planned to beat up any white man who
ventures into Niggertown at night. I've even heard they
plotted to burn down Taylor School.”
“We can only hope there'll be no trouble,” Joe said. “And
avoid precipitating it ourselves.”
“Oh, sure.”
“The police ..."
“They've been alerted, Senator. They've been told what
I just told you. They're watchful. But it's damned near im-
possible to get any information out of Niggertown. Even
the more intelligent niggers, those that don't want trouble,


THE WHITE BAND
113
are afraid to talk to white men, and the stool-pigeons the cops
always have planted are deathly afraid of Bearcat and his
crowd.”
“That's the way it's always been,” Joe reflected.
Tim O'Hearn had come early, as Coach Gilliam had sug-
gested, and edged into an aisle seat near the front. It was
well he had followed this advice, for the city auditorium, a
fine, commodious hall located in the new limestone city
library, soon filled, and others began pressing in and lining
the walls. Long before the meeting began the hall was
jammed and the police would allow no more to enter, and a
mobile truck with a loudspeaker was testing outside, where
a sizable crowd was gathering.
A drum-and-bugle corps from the White Veterans' League,
something which had been organized in the wake of the
Supreme Court decision, was on the stage entertaining the
audience. A drill team went through some close-order maneu-
vers to the blaring of the bugles and the loud pounding of the
drums. Then the musicians played “The Campbells Are Com-
ing.” When this was over, some wit in the crowd shouted,
“Can the Lucky Strikes be far behind?” There was laughter.
The musicians and the drill team marched off the stage,
and a score of men took their places, filling the chairs behind
the speaker's stand. Jay Blanship's ample figure stood at the
microphone. He was applauded, and he held up a hand for
silence, which gradually settled over the crowd. A sizable
number of women mingled with the predominantly male
audience.
“Greetings, townsmen and friends," said the hardware mer-
chant. “I'm glad a few of you accepted our invitation to
come out and talk over some of our problems together." He


114
THE WHITE BAND
W
19
waited for the laughter to subside. “If that fine drum-and-
bugle corps will give us an A-or is it a B-sharp? I wouldn't
know-we'll all sing the first verse of ‘America.'”
They sang the stanza lustily.
"Now then,” the chairman said, "we'll get down to busi-
ness. I'm not going to take up your time. We have eminent
speakers whom I know you are eager to hear. I just want to
say a few words. First, a word from your sponsor.” They
laughed. “I see a lot of men out there who are valued mem-
bers of the White Band. Others who sit or stand before me
-and I wish there were seats for all; we'll get a bigger hall
the next time the Supreme Court hands down a carpetbag
decision-others who sit out there are eligible, fine men I
know or should know, and we hope many of you will join
our fine fraternal order. But some of you, perhaps a good
many, may not know too much about the White Band. Well,
I want to tell you—and any of you that disapprove of this
had better not make application to join-we represent the
white race, the white race in the South, and in the North
and West too. You might be surprised if you knew how
many members we have already in Indiana, Iowa, and
Nebraska, even in Oregon.”
Jay Blanship paused. “The colored race has its organiza-
tions-some, I suspect, more red than black-and we feel that
we're entitled to ours. We have nothing against nigras. The
good nigra, and most of them are that, I'm glad to testify, never
had a better friend than the white Southerner. Our friends
up North hardly understand that. They think because we
don't take them home to dinner and invite their sons to marry
our daughters we hate them, we treat them like so much dirt.
I don't need to tell you what a lie that is. I'm sure many of
our best nigras don't want to see desegregation in our schools.
They prefer their own schools, just as they prefer their


THE WHITE BAND
115
theaters and dance halls and restaurants. They have their
own life; we have ours. Or perhaps I should say we had.”
He stopped for jeering laughter to fade. “The White Band
is frankly for the continuance of the segregated schools we've
had for generations. Does that shock you? I didn't think so.
We're for maintaining the integrity, the purity of the white
race, for the protection of our fine, pure womanhood from
dangers which I need not mention, for the protection of our
children, the new generation, from influences that would like
to make the South a region of mongrel people, of various
colors and God knows what habits, a sort of Mexico.”
Ramon Fernandez, one of the few Mexican émigrés in
Baynesville, winced. He sat in back with his wife, Maria. They
had a small shop. It sold Mexican novelties, which Ramon
brought in laboriously from Mexico twice a year, a trip he and
Maria made in their light pickup truck.
Blanship's voice, ample like his body, soared through the
microphone and was carried to the now sizable crowd clus-
tered outdoors. “So if you're not for white supremacy, don't
bother with us-you'll find us a waste of time. Otherwise,
if you're for our primary aim, the preservation of the white
race, we don't care whether you're a Democrat or a Repub-
lican, or what your religion is. I must add, though, that our
Catholic friends have shown a strange disregard of what hap-
pens to our race. At least their hierarchy, their bosses have.
And if you're a Catholic you've got to do what the priest,
the bishop, ultimately the head man, the Pope, says. You can't
even question it. If you don't mind them, they'll hand you
out a thousand years in purgatory as calmly as our good
friend, Judge Davis, would give a drunk thirty days."
There was laughter, and Tim O'Hearn felt his face flushing.
“They may even give you life in hell, which is worse than
life in our state prison-farm, I'm told. Well, the Catholic
ace. At least you've gothe Pope, say,


116
THE WHITE BAND
Bishop of this diocese has ordered desegregation in the
parochial schools, which puts him in the same class with
Justice Warren. I'm sure many good Southern white Catho-
lics don't approve-in fact I know of some families who are
withdrawing their children from parochial schools, but I'm
sorry for them. They'll catch hell, and I don't mean that
figuratively.”
The speaker waited for raucous laughter to subside. “So
I'm afraid Catholics wouldn't be very happy in the White
Band. The Pope might excommunicate them, which means
that when you depart this life you get no help from the
church, you're strictly on your own. They wouldn't be
happy with us unless, perchance, they gave up their foreign
religion, which has always been unsuited to America, and
become good Methodists or Baptists or Presbyterians. We'd
welcome them. I've been asked whether we take Jews. The
answer is sure, if they'll take us, which is doubtful. We'll
take anyone who is for us and who is of good moral char-
acter. Unfortunately, most Jews seem to be against us. I
don't quite know why. I'm sure they'll be welcome in Israel
if they don't like our American ways. But most of them
prefer to stay here and snipe at us. I suppose it's no accident
that when the F.B.I. cracks down on some Communist group
or individual, they nearly always have Jewish names. Have
you noticed that? I thought you had.
“I don't doubt,” Blanship added, “that most of these funny
outfits who have shown up down here to try to run our
business for us-you've heard of the National Association for
the Advancement of Colored People, but did you ever hear
of the League for Racial Justice or the International Friends
of Labor?-I don't doubt most of those stab-by-day and fly-
by-night organizations are financed by Red Jew money in


THE WHITE BAND
119
I do want to thank you all for your obvious and manifest
interest in the White Band and its mission of trying to pre-
serve ... I won't say the Southern way of life, I'll say the
white way of life. I could add, and perhaps would if it
wouldn't be lacking in tact, the white, American, Protestant
Christian way of life. As our chairman told you, this pro-
gram is appealing to an astonishing number of our Northern
and Western friends, who are joining the White Band in
droves.
“This fear of a mongrel America is no lurid imagining of
demagogues. It has a solid basis. Our eloquent fellow citizen,
Jay Blanship, referred to Mexico, not in criticism, I'm sure,
but merely explaining what happened when the Spaniards
intermarried with Indians, nigras, some Chinese, and God
knows what else. In Spain itself the Moors, who came in
centuries ago, stayed to merge themselves with the Caucasian
Spaniards, and as a result we have the predominantly dark
Spaniards of today. India might have had a race of pure
Aryans today. What happened? Ghenghis Khan and other
Oriental conquerors came through and left their mark. To-
day we have a mongrel race in India, of various kinds and
numerous tongues, many as dark-skinned as our nigras-
hordes pitifully underprivileged, who turn too readily-and
who can blame them?-to leaders who have fallen under the
spell of the Red fallacy.
“In Congress we've tried to discourage any widespread im-
migration from the Orient. Not because we look down on
Japanese, Chinese, or Malayans, and not merely because
China has gone Red-I have no doubt millions of helpless,
inarticulate Chinese would like to escape the Communist
yoke-but because we fear the racial heritage a horde of in-
coming Orientals would leave our children and our children's
children. Proud races who let down the bars to intermarriage


120
THE WHITE BAND
have waned in power and prestige as their blood deteriorated
through the intermingling of inferior people. Let's listen to
the voice of history, my dear friends, and tighten our lines,
preserve our racial integrity at any cost.”
Joe paused for applause, which rippled across the hall.
“Some of our Yankee friends say it's a long way from
mingling the races in school to intermarriage. But is it? Ever
since Reconstruction we Southerners have been getting along
fine with our nigra friends and helpers. The two races lived,
ate, went to school, traveled, and had their amusements sepa-
rately. Was that so terrible? Nobody seemed to think so
until the agitators in the North, the busybodies who called
themselves liberals and took on various other convenient
labels, began to move in on us and tell us how we should live.
"Well, say we accept desegregation in the schools. We
won't, you can bet your last dime, but only for the sake of
argument. We'll assume our schools are half or more colored.
In some places, because of the balance of population, they'll
be three-fourths colored, one-fourth white. Well, what's
next? The Supreme Court has already held that segregation
in common carriers-trains, buses, planes—is unconstitutional.
What's next? I predict that next they'll hold our state laws
against miscegenation, against the marriage of white and
colored people, unconstitutional. Then you'll have a certain
number of low-down white people—I'm sorry to say we have
them; probably you'll find them everywhere except in heaven,
for which we're not ready yet-a certain number of our white
people will marry nigras. Gradually the number of such
marriages will increase. Slowly, but with the relentless prog-
ress of a stone worn away by a waterfall or a tree dying
because its roots have withered, we'll have a different South,
an inferior South, a South where white faces will be rare,
but skins ranging from coal black to a dirty, shaded white
CIC


THE WHITE BAND
I21
will be prevalent. The South we love, the South our fathers
loved and our grandfathers fought for, will be as dead as a
crumbled splinter from a marble column dug from the ruins
of Babylon. A pure white family will be as rare as a pure
Spanish strain in Mexico or in Spain herself. Do you want
that?”
“No, no!” they shouted.
“I didn't think so. And friends, we won't have it. Never!”
Senator Duffield closed his address with a plea for able-
bodied men of good character, men who wanted to preserve
the South their grandfathers fought for at Chancellorsville
and Chickamauga and a hundred other battlefields, to join
the White Band. A dozen recorders would be on hand at
the doors to take applications.
As the speaker of the evening, who had been briefer than
the rest, but more pungent, more to the point, made his way
slowly down the center aisle, his progress was interrupted
constantly by reaching hands, by phrases like “Thanks,
Senator” or, more familiar, “You got 'em told, Joe.” These
personal greetings followed a prolonged ovation as he closed
his address. The warmth of this reception, the affection in
which he seemed to be held by these people and thousands
like them over the state, made Joe Duffield wonder, not for
the first time, if he had not made a mistake in quitting-well,
sidetracking himself from-politics at this time. Was the
White Band worth it? He doubted it; then he thought of
the fabulous profits promised, and he felt sure he hadn't made
the wrong decision. He could be independent for life if this
would last for even a year. His share....
In the slowly dissolving crowd he looked closely into a
familiar face, and sharp, merry eyes looked back at him. He
and Ned Tarver exchanged grins.
Tim O'Hearn, pressed slowly toward an exit, passed close


I 22
THE WHITE BAND
to a desk at which a man from the White Band was enrolling
new members. He passed by the waiting line as quickly as
he could, and was pushed into the cool night, where knots
of men still stood talking about the meeting.
He wouldn't, he reflected, give two cents for the other
speakers, with their appeals to prejudice and bigotry, but this
fellow Duffield had something. His speech had been on a
higher plane: no personalities, no talk of violence or attacks
on a man's religion. And, from what little he knew of history,
Joe Duffield was right. He had outlined the broad issue they
faced. Not that he, Tim O'Hearn, would ever join the White
Band, not in a thousand years, but there was something about
the Senator, a warmth, a friendliness, which drew him to the
man; an authoritative way, a way of saying only what he
must know to be true, that you had to respect.
Joe Duffield was glad that Sarah hadn't accepted his half-
hearted invitation to come down here. There would have
been no point in her coming, and you never knew when she
would allow herself to get plastered (there was always the
opportunity), and, moreover, it wouldn't have worked out
at all; the dinner, for example, was strictly stag, and the
meeting would have bored her.
He was escorted now to a little party at Jay Blanship’s
house, to which they drove in the merchant's glistening new
Cadillac. The house, one of Baynesville's more imposing resi-
dences, had some modernistic touches. It was built in a sort
of modified ranch style-two stories in the middle and one
story on either side-and boasted an all-glass sun parlor.
There were many picture windows. Joe had left his car in
a garage downtown. He was going on to some other towns


THE WHITE BAND
123
re-
to the south tomorrow, where appointments with local White
Band leaders had been made for him.
The Blanship house was in a plush suburban development
called Fenner's Acres, because it was owned by an operator
named Fenner. Jay explained that the owners had a strict
covenant forbidding the sale of property in the area to any-
one they did not approve. The development would be re-
stricted, he need hardly say, to white American Christians,
though it would be possible to sell to an immigrant or a for-
eigner if he were the right sort. For instance, there was that
fellow Pelletier, who lived in the Druid Grove section. He
was a high-class Frenchman whose father was said to have
been a count. Jay was aware that the Supreme Court had
held such covenants unconstitutional.
"But they haven't got around to taking us into court down
here,” he added, “and I don't think they will."
Joe laughed. “Why not?”
“Well, we have other methods, even if the courts held
against us, which I suppose they'd have to do. I don't mean
running an interloper off with a gun, either. There are more
subtle ways which may occur to you, Senator, such as ostra-
cism, which nobody ever enjoyed and probably nobody ever
will, and even certain—what some people might call boy-
cotts; certain of us can exert certain pressures here and there,
on the country club, even on tradesmen. I venture to say
that anyone who slipped in here through subterfuge, proxy,
which he'd have to do because Fenner wouldn't sell to any-
one we disapproved—any interloper would be glad in a few
months to sell and get away.”
“I see your point,” said Joe thoughtfully.
“That New Deal Supreme Court,” said Jay, “why, it's
getting so the law forbids you to choose your neighbors and
ean


124
THE WHITE BAND
see
friends. I wouldn't be surprised to see a ruling that you have
to entertain a nigger at dinner at least once a week."
Joe laughed as they entered the house. They were met by
Mrs. Blanship, a small, jolly woman who showed a big dimple
when she laughed. She said it was an honor and a pleasure to
welcome the Senator, and she regretted that he couldn't stay
overnight. Joe thanked her, and explained that he was stay-
ing at the hotel because he had to make a very early start in
the morning: several towns to visit during the day. She asked
about the meeting. She added that the three children seemed
to have sensed excitement around town; she'd had a hard
time getting them to bed.
Other cars began arriving, and men, some accompanied
by their wives, drifted in. Drinks were served in the spacious
living-room. Because of the women, the White Band was
hardly mentioned, and the general situation was alluded to
only occasionally. The talk was more general. These people,
Baynesville's upper crust, were well mannered, polite, some
of them quite amusing. Joe was hardly surprised to learn, in
the course of the evening, that Jay Blanship was a graduate
of the state university, and that most of the other men had
been to college. And yet they were, he reflected, as adamant
about segregation as the least-educated, the most ill-informed
Rednecks. It was a way of thinking, a way of life, not con-
fined to any social stratum. Of course there were exceptions,
Southerners who thought the South as a whole was all wrong
on the racial issue. He thought, inevitably, of the editor,
Harry Holmes, with whom he had a pleasant acquaintance.
Harry used to look at him with a little smile which, Joe felt
guiltily, seemed to say, “I'm on to you. I know. And I don't
blame you altogether. I know how it is. I even realize that
you know better."
Did he know better? Once, surely. But he'd been in


THE WHITE BAND
125
politics so long, and repeated the expected clichés so often,
that he had come to believe them ... almost.
“You're in a brown study, Senator,” objected a very pretty
girl.
"Well,” he said, “such is the study of the moment-brown
or black or yellow.”
She laughed shrilly. "You're a card, Senator. I'm Mrs.
James Hamby. My husband spoke just before you did; he's
principal of the Redfern school.”
“Of course.” He added gallantly, “I'd say offhand that
he's a very lucky man.”
In the course of the evening Joe took more drinks than he
really wanted. Not more than he could carry-he rarely did
that. Perhaps, once in a great while, at an alumni meeting
of one of his various schools or a reunion of his fraternity.
Sarah would have enjoyed this part of his visit to Baynesville,
and he was damned glad she hadn't come. She'd probably
have left walking uncertainly, and then when he showed his
displeasure-he should be more patient; she actually couldn't
help it any more-she'd have gone into one of her rages and
denounced him for some of the affairs he had had with women
and others which he'd never had but wouldn't have minded
having and perhaps had tried unsuccessfully to have.
Dave Bentley, one of the young businessmen, who, he
pointed out, had to drive slap through the town anyway,
since he lived on the other side, took Joe back to the hotel.
In his pleasant corner room on the ninth floor he stood at
the window, which he had opened a little way. It was a mild
night, vaguely suggesting autumn. The little city scattered
an intricate pattern of lights. There were dark patches in the
residential areas. Most people had gone to bed.
He undressed, fished his pajamas out of the suitcase, and
went to bed. He read a news magazine for a while, then, feel-


126
THE WHITE BAND
ing drowsy, pushed off the bed light. But he didn't sleep
for a long time. Sometimes when he took a good many drinks,
the effect was not soporific but livening. At such times he
wanted to walk and walk or else talk and talk to someone
congenial. Now he could only think. His thoughts moved
jerkily, in erratic circles. Then they settled on one episode.
He was a sophomore at Princeton, and he was home for the
summer vacation. He poked around home for several weeks.
His parents had a rambling Victorian house in what was then
a desirable residential area of Riverport, but years later, after
people had moved farther and farther out, became an area of
shops and automobile agencies. Somehow he always remem-
bered that summer better than others of the period, others
that blurred into an indistinct pattern after the years. He
didn't know why this summer stuck out in the tricky scheme
of memory; there was no dramatic event, no special reason.
His father was a lawyer, a reserved gentleman of forty-five
then, with a genteel civil practice and an unblemished repu-
tation for probity and for unselfish service in any plan for
civic improvement which he happened to approve. He was
an independent sort, who thought for himself and could not
be counted on to go along with prevailing opinion about any-
thing. He could be crusty, even pugnacious when it came to
his convictions. He was taller than Joe, too thin, with rather
an ascetic face, and sometimes in winter he developed a chronic
cough, which impelled his wife to persuade him to go down
to Pass Christian or Corpus Christi for two or three weeks.
Joe's sister, four years older, was married by then, and
lived in Nashville. His only brother was still a high-school
boy. His mother, a good-looking, energetic woman, who put
on weight as she got older, saw that Aunt Martha made him


THE WHITE BAND
127
cherry pies and other things he liked. She was essentially a
practical woman, and, though she was fairly well read, he
could rarely remember her discussing abstractions or even
political philosophies. Not so his father. John Duffield liked
nothing better than a philosophical or a literary or even a
musical (he knew music) parley. Joe could remember, as a
little boy, evenings when his father would entertain four or
five men, and his mother would appear only to greet them
and see that the house-boy, Ben, served the drinks. Joe would
peek in and hear scraps of talk behind fragrant wreaths of
cigar smoke until his mother pulled him back. Those men
would be the cream of the city's intellectuals, perhaps a college
professor or two, a doctor, maybe another lawyer or an engi-
neer or one of Riverport's handful of recognized poets or
novelists.
But that summer his father went with him for a week's
visit to John Duffield's brother Grady, who was twelve years
older than John. Grady had turned over an established mer-
cantile business to his sons, and retired to a place in the
mountains on the northern border of the state, a craggy spot
with a gorgeous view of a range of the Blue Ridge, a stream
fuming past his front gate. The fishing and hunting were
excellent; it was a summer paradise for a young man of
twenty. Grady was no intellectual, though he was an ex-
tremely shrewd, well-informed man, and he and John would
never discuss the differences between Hegel and Schopenhauer
and Nietzsche, or the Greek playwrights, or Debussy and the
new atonalists, or the writers of the day, Dreiser and Sher-
wood Anderson and the more agile Fitzgerald. Instead they'd
talk about (and deplore) Coolidge, and wonder whether
Woodrow Wilson had been tragically thwarted or merely was
an ambitious failure, and perhaps discuss the necessity for
diversifying crops if the South were to prosper in the future.


128
THE WHITE BAND
Grady's views were more conventional. John avoided dis-
cussing with his brother what then was called the Negro
problem, for John had some daring views which annoyed his
brother, and John was punctilious to a point: he was a guest,
even if his host happened to be his brother, and one didn't
offend one's host, though there were rare occasions when John
forgot and there was a torrid argument.
Grady Duffield lived in what he called his mountain lodge
most of the long summer, with only two servants for com-
pany, a Negro couple who had worked for the family for
many years. His wife was dead.
One circumstance which made that summer memorable to
Joe was nothing more than a long walk over a mountain path
which he took with his father. Uncle Grady had gone to the
nearest town in the Ford to get supplies. Joe could recall,
many years later, details of that hike: the hickory stick his
father swung as they followed the path, the woolen shirt,
open at the neck, which his father wore. Sometimes they
almost lost the path as it plunged into a thicket and thistles
clutched them and stuck to them. They rested on some big
rocks at a point where the path looked into a canyon hundreds
of feet deep. The path was carpeted with pine needles, and
the air was fragrant with several species of evergreens.
Some of the fellows he knew at college didn't believe in
anything, he was telling his father, not in God or democracy
or any of the prevailing ideas.
“That's a phase they're passing through,” John Duffield
said. “They'Îl settle down to believing in something." He
laughed. “Even if it's anarchy or pantheism or yoga. Mean-
while this skepticism, this distrust of everything, is a good
thing for them. Gets them to thinking, which is all too rare
in our incredibly prosperous country. Our minds wither as
our cunning at making money increases.”


THE WHITE BAND
129
“They quote Nietzsche and Upton Sinclair and Mencken,"
Joe said.
And his father said, “Good antidotes for Harding and
Coolidge and Brisbane and Eddie Guest.”
Then he told his father of the time he and three other
fellows went one evening to a tavern a couple of miles from
the campus and solved the enigmas of the universe over
needled beer. The point of this episode was that one of the
boys, a friend of a student, was a Negro. Could his father
imagine that!
“Yes,” his father said, “my imagination is capable of ab-
sorbing that circumstance quite easily.”
“I never thought,” Joe confessed, “that I'd be sitting there
taking drinks at the table with a nigger."
“I'm glad you did,” said John Duffield.
“You are!”
“I am indeed. Do you good. I hope you didn't feel em-
barrassed, or if you did you didn't show it, or make him feel
that you were condescending."
“Somehow," Joe said, “I wasn't embarrassed at all. It was
strange for a Southern boy who'd never run into such a thing,
but it seemed natural. And, do you know, that nigra boy was
as well read, had as good a mind as any of us.”
“I'm not surprised.” His father hefted his stick and smiled.
He had a sweet smile. “You know, son,” he added, "it's time
the South was forgetting the War Between the States and
Reconstruction. Some day we'll have to revise our attitude
toward nigras. We're all people together. They happen to
be a little darker. If you had been born an African or an East
Indian, a white face would have seemed as different, as alien
to you, as a dark skin does to us. Our nigras are rising rapidly.
They've been held back by slavery, first physical slavery,
then economic slavery. They'll come along; they may even


130
THE WHITE BAND
surpass us. Even today, individuals among them are equal to
our best, in any line you can name.”
Joe explained to his father that since that evening he had
felt differently toward Negroes.
“And a damned good thing," his father said. “And I hope
that if you become a lawyer, as you threaten to do, no matter
what I say, you'll try, whenever you can, to see that nigras
get equal justice.”
“Oh, I will,” he promised.
“The philosophy of the Rednecks,” John Duffield added,
“if you can dignify it with such a revered term, is as dead as
the worship of Moloch, though they'll never admit it-not in
our time.”
This little talk had flowed back across his mind many times
through the intervening twenty-eight years, as distinct as if
it had occurred last week. Other incidents, other discussions,
which had seemed more important, were lost in the vast and
fragmentary record of the years. Memory was strange.


13
On
LHINGS HAD GONE SMOOTHLY since Friday on the campus of
the Baynesville Teachers College, and Dr. Davison was elated.
It showed you could obey the law, at least begin integration,
without interference except from a hoodlum element you'd
expect to cause trouble. Put down the hoodlums—and that
was a task to which the police were equal—and the more
responsible people, most of the student body, would soon
get used to the idea. After all, what was one Negro
student? How could he annoy anyone, especially a quiet,
manly fellow like Jack Taylor, who'd never flaunt himself,
intrude where he wasn't wanted. There'd be others, of course,
but never many, not in this college.
But Dr. Davison had reckoned too soon. He had under-
estimated not only the determination, the perseverance of the
town element he despised, but the inherent prejudice of the
students-or most of them. These persons were simply wait-
ing, marshaling their forces.
131


132
THE WHITE BAND
Monday afternoon Jack Taylor left a freshman assembly in
the college auditorium. It was a meeting at which Professor
Hanley, who taught economics and sociology, had delivered
his customary address to the new students, spoken to them of
the aims and hopes of this college, and thrown out some
practical hints on how they could adjust themselves and get
along with the faculty and their fellow students.
The well-built Negro student, lithe, darkly handsome, was
smiling over some of the amusing things Professor Hanley had
said. Jack Taylor swung his strapped books and whistled a
snatch of a popular tune as he started across the campus. No-
body seemed to notice him, or to be aware that he was a
pointed-at, resented alien. Young men and girls were drifting
along the paths that cut through the lush grass. It was a
mellow day, warm, but the fierce heat of summer was tem-
pered by the approaching autumn. You expected to smell
wood smoke even if you didn't.
Jack Taylor was dressed a little more formally than most
of the students. He wore a well-cut blue worsted and a tie
with his white shirt, and he had added a blue sweater vest
against the expected chill of the evening. He was a little too
warm. He'd leave the sweater behind at his room in the town
tomorrow, perhaps wear a sport shirt open at the neck, as
many students did. He wore tan moccasins with thick rubber
soles.
As he turned away from the Science Building he came
abruptly on a waiting crowd. There must have been a hun-
dred men. Many of them were students, the rest were towns-
men of the type who had demonstrated their hatred in front
of the Administration Building Friday. They must have
plotted his course for the afternoon, knowing he would go to
the freshman assembly and also aware of his probable path
as he left the campus, for the moment they spotted him they
a


134
THE WHITE BAND
and running down the legs of his new blue worsted suit.
Another egg struck him in the forehead, its contents oozing
down his face.
“You dirty bastards,” he sobbed. “I'll fight any one of you.
Dirty, rotten ... C-cowards.”
From somewhere came a rock. It clipped a corner of Jack
Taylor's forehead, and blood began running down his face,
mingling with the odorous yolk of the egg.
At that moment three faculty members, attracted by the
clamor, came running out of the Science Building.
A tall, athletic, young physics instructor shouted, “Stop
it! Stop it! The police'll be here in a minute. They'll take
care of you. Get out, get out!”
The chant was altered. “Nigger-lover, nigger-lover, nigger-
lover ...”
"You goddam cowards!” the young teacher yelled back.
“One fellow! All you picking on him!”
Jeeringly the crowd defied him, but its ranks broke slowly,
began moving back, thinning, slowly melting. None of them
wanted to tangle with the police-not, at least, without muster-
ing reinforcements.
· The television hadn't been working right-its picture kept
blurring—but Harry Holmes worked with it patiently, turn-
ing the built-in antenna this way and that, touching the bright-
ener. At last he had a clear picture. There was President
Davison, standing in his office at the Baynesville Teachers
College, being interviewed by a nationally-known commen-
tator of the air, working from a portable transmission set.
“There it is,” Harry Holmes said to his wife.
“You've got a good picture, dear.” Louise Holmes settled
back in the chair she liked, which had a stiff back. Harry


THE WHITE BAND
135
hated the chair: he liked one with a soft, yielding back, on
which he could stretch out on the back of his thin neck. His
wife was a rather large, motherly-looking woman, with a face
still young, especially when she laughed. She was a well-
padded contrast to her husband, who, as she used to say in
urging him to eat well (it never made any difference in his
weight whether he did or not), would be blown away by a
good gust of wind.
The commentator was saying, “Dr. Davison, would you
have been willing to keep Jack Taylor, this Negro student,
despite the unpleasant, I might say brutal, demonstration
against him?”
"Absolutely,” said the president. “I urged him to stay, and
yet I don't blame him for his decision to leave. It was a situa-
tion nobody would have wanted to face.”
"If he had decided to stay on,” the newsman added, “how
would you have protected him?”
“The police ... or, if they'd have proved inadequate, I'd
have asked the Governor to send the National Guard.”
“Do you think Governor James would have consented to
send them?”
“I have no way of knowing,” Dr. Davison replied. “I didn't
ask him.”
"Do you feel, Dr. Davison, that integration will ever work
in the South–I mean in colleges, with which you are particu-
larly concerned?"
The educator paused, then said firmly, “I think it will-
both in colleges and other schools, primary and secondary,
grammar schools and high schools. It may take quite a while
for Southerners, at least in some sections, to get used to the
idea, but I'm convinced they will in time. Some places, espe-
cially in border states, but I mean places predominantly South-


136
THE WHITE BAND
ern in their outlook, already have effected desegregation or are
planning to do so shortly.”
The commentator paused. “And now we have here in Dr.
Davison's office the young man who has been the storm cen-
ter of this experiment on the campus of the State Teachers
College. I want to introduce Jack Taylor.”
The camera turned to Jack Taylor, who stood, nervous but
determined. He had on a gray suit; all traces of his experi-
ences had vanished except for a small scar high on his fore-
head.
“Now, Jack, will you tell us why, in the first place, you
decided to enroll at Baynesville. There were colored colleges
where you could have taken the teacher's course.”
Jack's voice was too low at first, but he raised it a little, and
it came out clearly. “It's true, Mr. Gray, I could have gone
to a Negro college, and we have some fine ones in the South,
or I could have gone North. My idea was it would be good
for me to go to college with white students, get to know them
better, get their-well, their point of view. It would broaden
my outlook, maybe help me as a teacher. I even thought,
this may sound a little crazy-I thought it might be a good
thing for the white students to go to school with a few Ne-
groes. It might sort of help to make a better feeling between
the races. I was evidently wrong, but that's what I thought.”
"It has been suggested, Jack, and this suggestion has been
pretty widespread in certain circles, that you were persuaded
to enroll by certain ‘influences'-influences from up North
somewhere, maybe Communist or anyway radical influences."
"That's not true at all,” said Jack. “Nobody influenced me.
I don't know any Communists, or if I do, they haven't told me
they're Communists and no one else has. It was my own idea.
Of course I talked it over with my parents and with a few
friends."


THE WHITE BAND
137
"I see. And I suppose that last demonstration against you,
where they threw things at you and even injured you, de-
cided you to withdraw.”
Jack Taylor smiled a little grimly. “Certainly nobody
would want to stay anywhere after a thing like that had been
done to him. But it wasn't that altogether. Dr. Davison prom-
ised me every protection if I'd stay. But, aside from being
attacked in the middle of the campus,and of course I didn't
want to let myself in for that again-aside from that, it didn't
seem right to upset a whole college for just one student. It
would have been a pretty selfish attitude. If I'd realized what
would happen, I'd never have gone there.”
The commentator said, “A very commendable spirit, Jack.
Is there anything you want to add?”
"Only this, Mr. Gray. I want to thank not only Dr. Davi-
son and the Dean of the College and other faculty members
who stood by me, I also want to thank some of the students
who were kind to me and others who at least accepted me
without making any trouble.”
“And what are your plans now, Jack?”
“Well, I haven't decided. I may go North to school. I've
been offered one scholarship in a fine college. Not entirely
because of what happened at Baynesville, but I had a pretty
good record in high school.”
"I understand you had. And thank you, Jack Taylor, for
coming here and explaining your own point of view to the
television audience. And thank you very much, Dr. Davison,
for talking to us and for allowing us to set up our portable
news television in your office. And, Jack, I wish you the best
of luck."
The camera turned once more from Dr. Davison to the
student. “Thank you, Mr. Gray,” Jack said.
The picture flickered off.


138
THE WHITE BAND
It was early afternoon, and Harry Holmes got his hat,
kissed his wife on the cheek, got out the six-year-old Pontiac,
and started for the office. He had always been sensitive to
trends and happenings, whether in his own life or in national
or world affairs. He didn't pretend to any special prescience,
but he could-and often his colleagues and the readers of his
editorials had noticed this-divine conclusions from premises
which did not always point too directly to what eventually
occurred.
Now, as he drove from his pleasant, thirty-year-old home
on the edge of town into the pulsing traffic of downtown
Riverport, he felt a misgiving, a personal feeling that was
ominous. Well, he decided, it took no gazer into crystal balls
to sense what was in the wind.
At his shabby office he filled and lighted his pipe and sat
down to the galleys which had been laid there. He went
through them and found the leading editorial for tomorrow
morning. It was about the Baynesville college episode, and it
was pretty severe, he conceded, but only one in a series of
editorials, all discussing what he called the Baynesville attitude.
Somebody, probably Durbin, the managing editor, had laid a
marked copy of a New York paper on the side of his desk. It
was open to an editorial page on which one of his editorials
had been reprinted, with due credit to the Riverport Dis-
patch. He glanced at the page, turned back to the galley. He
read the lead editorial for errors, marked a few, then sat con-
templating it for a while.
He reread several times the final paragraph:
Presumably Baynesville is proud of itself. This is not to
imply that there are not individual citizens who deplore what
has happened. But the town as a whole, our thriving neigh-
bor twenty miles to the south, whose enterprise and hospi-


THE WHITE BAND
139
tality we have always admired, has done nothing toward
punishing the cowardly mob responsible for this outrage,
nor has it taken any steps, so far as we are aware, toward
preventing the recurrence of such incidents if any Negro
student again should enter the college. It was, to all outward
appearance, whatever the secret differences of opinion, one
town against one young man. This was, it seems, an inof-
fensive young man, who went quietly about his duties as a
student, trying unobtrusively to begin acquiring a college
education, to learn in particular how to be a teacher. But his
complexion happened to be a shade darker than that of any
other student. And so the town, including much of the
campus, rose against him, set out bravely to wage war against
him. He lost. May we expect that the leaders of the valiant
force that took the offensive against him will receive some
sort of civic decoration for their courage?
He had commended highly, in earlier paragraphs, Dr. Davi-
son and the Board of Trustees for ignoring public prejudice
and following the law. This final paragraph was about the
town, its attitude. Who had denounced this attitude, its
translation into action? No one publicly. No public official,
no clergyman, no educator-none but Dr. Davison, who un-
doubtedly was in for a bad time. There were many ways he
could be harassed, professionally and personally.
Harry Holmes' pipe had gone out. He relit it. He could
tone down the last paragraph. It was pretty strong. But why
should he? To hell with them! And he included the editors
who wrote in apologia of the Baynesville episode and those
who deplored it timidly, like frightened rabbits deploring the
existence of foxes.
He no longer gave a damn. His neighbor, Fred Heiman,
could cut him. So what? Fred was scant loss. Even the cool
nods of some at the Cherokee Club he could absorb without


140
THE WHITE BAND
serious concern. He had loyal friends who would stick by
him to the end-whatever the end might be.
He sat for a while with the galley in his hand, then hur-
riedly went over the others, and took them all to the city
room, where he gave them to a copy boy to take to the com-
posing room.
He returned to his office, and another boy brought him
mail. He went over the letters, weeding out the handouts,
laying them aside. On the bottom was a small letter on crisp
stationery, marked personal. It was from John Braden. It
was brief.
Dear Harry:
The Dispatch, as you undoubtedly know, is losing circu-
lation. Worse, it is losing advertising. I have just been ad-
vised that one of your largest advertisers, Brill's Department
Store, has refused to renew its contract. I understand it is
going to give all its advertising to the Gazette. I think it's a
fair conclusion that your editorial policy in regard to de- ·
segregation has caused this defection and the other losses. I
suggested when I saw you recently that you at least be more
tactful, tone down your views somewhat. But you have pre-
ferred to go your own way. In fact, your editorials recently
have been more fiery than ever.
I now must insist that you curb your feelings and try to
placate some of our outraged advertisers and readers. You
may be right in everything you've written, but, after all, we
are running our newspapers for profit, like any other busi-
ness-or we would like to.
With kindest personal regards ...
Harry Holmes sat staring at the letter. His teeth were
clenched on his pipe, but it had gone out, and he did not
relight it.


14
son
THE POOL HALL on the downtown edge of Niggertown was
well filled. The bar in front was busy serving draft beer,
bottled beer, and an occasional coke. In back, watching a
fifty-point straight pool game for ten dollars, was the short,
dapper mulatto called Johnson. He nudged a fat man stand-
ing at the wall beside him.
"I'll bet you a dollar,” he said, “the tall one wins.”
“I ain't interested,” the other man said. “It don't make no
never mind to me who wins. They both pretty good,
though.” He looked at Johnson suspiciously, perhaps because
of his careful English.
“They are that,” Johnson conceded. “I ain't bad myself”-
he had remembered to use ain't, though he could, when called
on, make a speech in excellent English—“but I don't think I
could whup either one.” He was proud of himself for remem-
bering the way “whip” was pronounced down here by Ne-
groes and a good many whites.
141


142
THE WHITE BAND
“He won't make that side-pocket shot,” said the fat man.
“Bet you two bucks he does.”
The fat man turned away in disgust. Always wanting to
bet. But the shorter player did make the shot.
There were murmurs of greeting to someone who shuffled
along the side wall from the front. He was not a tall man,
perhaps five-eight, but his shoulders were broad. His face was
lined, thin, almost haggard, but he had an affable grin which
contradicted the worry his face expressed in repose. He was
trimly dressed in a checked suit, with a tan sport shirt. He
walked with a peculiar, almost stumbling gait. He was only
in his early forties, but he looked much older because his thick
hair, which was smooth, not at all kinky, was white.
The fat man joined the chorus, "Hey, there, Bearcat.
How's the boy?”
"Fine, fine, thank you all.” He shuffled back until he stood
near Johnson and the fat man, watching the pool game.
“Never seen you playing pool, Bearcat,” Johnson said.
“Ever play?”
"Nope.” Bearcat Turner reflected. “I did once, though.
I was pretty good.”
“I bet you was.”
“Yep, pretty good. I coulda beat them two bums."
"I'm sure you could.”
Bearcat's small, active eyes looked Johnson over. “You a
stranger, friend? Can't remember your name.”
“Johnson. I ain't exactly a stranger, but I been away a long
time. Up No’th, work ... wu’kin'."
“What you wu'k at?” Bearcat asked, his eyes still roving
over Johnson.
"Oh, anything, Bearcat. Railroads, shops.”
“I been up No’th a lot,” said Bearcat. “My best fights was
up there. Madison Square Garden, lots of good clubs.”


THE WHITE BAND
143
“I know. You were a crackerjack. They'd pay plenty to
see you.”
“I'm still good,” said Bearcat.
“Of course you are.”
“My manager,” Bearcat grinned, suddenly looking much
younger, “he's linin' up some fights. I'm gonta make a come-
back. All I want's a chance at that title again.”
"You'll take it too,” Johnson said.
“You think so?” Bearcat asked, as pleased as if some expert
had picked him to win a crucial bout.
“I know it, Bearcat.” Johnson noted that the fat man had
left, and there was no one standing near them. “You know
what I was telling you the other day, Bearcat, 'bout the white
folks uptown?”
Bearcat stared at Johnson, suspicious again. “What white
folks?”
"You know, this school thing."
“I don't know nothin' about no schools,” Bearcat mumbled.
“I heard talk about colored chillun goin' to white schools.
Didn't make no sense to me. Never been done.”
“I know, Bearcat, but ..." Johnson leaned forward and
lowered his voice, “there's been trouble, a lot of trouble, on
the campus-you know, up there where the college is, and the
white men blame all us niggers.”
"I ain't done nothin',” Bearcat pointed out.
“I know you haven't, but some way the white men blame
you for everything that happens here in Niggertown.”
The fighter looked up, with a baleful glint in his small eyes.
“I don't have no trouble with white folks. They been nice to
me. When I fust started fightin' they made up a pu’se here,
and they sent me No’th to fight. I got on in a prelim in the
Garden. They been mighty good to me.”
"I know,” said Johnson patiently. “I don't mean them. But


144
THE WHITE BAND
they're just certain white men got it in for you, blame you
for trouble, want to beat you up. I know. I got friends up-
town tell me. Ever hear of the White Band?"
“White band-white band? I don't know no white band.
What is it?”
“It's a secret society, like the Sons of Ham.”
Bearcat muttered darkly to himself, then said, “Sons of Ham
don't do nobody no harm. He'p you effen they can.”
"I know, I know, Bearcat. But the White Band's out to get
Negroes, make it tough for all of us."
“How's ’at?”
"They're sore because a few of us tried to get into white
schools."
Bearcat puffed out his lips in a scornful exclamation. “I
ain't studyin' no white schools. I ain't got no trouble with
white folks.”
“I know you haven't. But, Bearcat, there's a few after you,
not all the white folks, just a few bad ones. They're saying
they'll beat you up.”
Bearcat's expression changed. A hard, stubborn look came
into his small eyes. “Ain't nobody gonta beat up Bearcat
Turner. I fought plenty white men.'
“I know you did.”
“Whupped plenty too."
"Sure you did.”
Bearcat fumbled for a cigarette, but Johnson beat him to
it, whipping out a pack and proffering one. “I ain't never
seen the man I'm afeerd of, black or white. They better stay
away from me.” Suddenly he danced into a fighting stance,
his left fist out, his feet moving with pitiful sluggishness. “An'
if this ain't enough,” he held out a clenched fist, “I got more.”
He pulled a switch-blade from his pocket.


THE WHITE BAND
145
"I know you can take care of yourself. But there'll be a
bunch of them.”
"I got friends," said Bearcat scornfully, "some o' them can
fight too. One of 'em's K. O. Smith. He's a comer. Light-
weight.”
“I know. I just wanted to warn you, so you and your
friends wouldn't be tricked, surprised.”
Ignoring the last statement, Bearcat said: “I shoulda been
welter champ. I beat that guy ... Rav ... Raviola ... naw,
that ain't it."
“Tony Ravini,” Johnson suggested.
“That's it. They robbed me, them chalk-faced bastids. I
beat him, beat him good.”
“Everybody knows that, Bearcat. It was crooked, framed,
you didn't have a chance."
"You right, Jackson, you right, you know a thing or two."
With his winning, youthful grin, he nodded, and slapped
Johnson on the arm admiringly.
"But them white folks 'at's against me. I dunno.”
Suddenly he motioned to two men standing nearer the
front. They approached obediently. “Good-by, stranger. See
you later."
Johnson knew it was time to leave, and he moved toward
the front. The two men joined Bearcat, and the three went
to the back of the room. Soon several other men drifted back
and mingled with them. The little group, heads together,
talked in low tones.
The white men, an even dozen, sat around drinks in one of
the few suites the Baynesville Hotel boasted: bedroom, living-
room, bath, small balcony. Night was coming on quite cool,
and someone closed the wide-open window.


146
THE WHITE BAND
A man in shirtsleeves, with his coat draped over his chair, ad-
dressed the huge man who sat in one of the two armchairs,
filling it, almost obliterating it with his bulk. “Think you can
beat Auburn, Fats?”
The coach looked up with his fat man's false joviality and
chuckled. He had, underneath, a mean disposition, as his teams
and persons who crossed him always found out. “I doubt it
like hell, Sam. Their line's too tough. I doubt if we can
crack it.”
"But you can pass,” another man suggested.
“Who have we got this fall that can pass?” Fats Gilliam
countered. “Tim O'Hearn's fair, but he's a better open-field
runner. Jack Hotchkiss graduated. He was the best passer
we've had in years. Could pitch a football like you can throw
a baseball.”
“Wasn't he a honey!”
The talk lagged, and Fats Gilliam took a long sip of his
highball and cleared his throat. “Well, fellows, let's get to the
business at hand. The reason I asked you fellows to meet me
here, as you probably guessed, was to discuss what the papers
like to call this explosive issue. Explosive's not a bad word.
From what I hear, it's liable to explode in our faces any time.”
The others murmured appropriately. “That so?” “What
do you know?” But Sam Carruthers, a strong, thick-haired
young man, a machinist, said, “I thought it had done exploded.
Up on the campus.”
"Oh, that....” Gilliam laughed. “Well, we won that one.
They were not all White Bandsmen either. We just sort of
guided things. I guess that'll hold old Davey a while. He'll
think a long time before he allows another nigger to matricu-
late. That's the way to do it, put the fear of God into them.
Now we settled that in short order, and no one really hurt
n


THE WHITE BAND
147
either. That nigger got mussed up a little ... he was lucky, at
that. We could have taken him out and ..."
Fats drew his right index finger across his throat and made
a clucking sound. The others laughed.
“I've picked you guys,” he added, “because I know you all.
I've known most of you for years. I was in the war with a
couple of you.” (He didn't weigh so much then, and he man-
aged to slip by the doctors, as he used to say, and get a com-
mission.) “I know I can depend on you fellows. We're all
Bandsmen, but I thought we might form a sort of unofficial
... I don't know what we could call it. Execution squad?”
He laughed. “Well, I don't think we'll have to execute any-
body. But we sure can scare hell out of a few if necessary,
and we can beat the bejesus out of a couple if it seems indi-
cated.”
The others murmured approvingly and listened. Fats Gil-
liam went on, “I've heard some things straight from the feed-
box. I'm not just trying to stir up trouble. These Commies
are down here getting the niggers all hot and bothered, those
that'll listen, the dumber, the more illiterate ones. A fellow
came to see me, a white man. He was a radical, no doubt of
that, some sort of union organizer; by the way, he was once
a big-time prize fighter. Any of you remember Patsy Gro-
gan?” All looked blank except Bill Whitney, one of the older
men in the group-he was a little past forty-and he said,
“Sure, I remember him. He was plenty good.”
He told them about the ex-pugilist who now went under
the name of Graham, and what Graham had told him.
“The niggers-those that'll listen-are being stirred up by
this nigger that looks almost white, this Ned Tarver, who
represents something-a Commie outfit, if you ask me-called
the League for Racial Justice.”
They knew. He was the guy who brought the court action.


148
THE WHITE BAND
And now if niggers were arming themselves with guns and
switch-blades, whatever they could get . .
“Tarver," the big coach added, “is what we educated bas-
tards call an agent provocateur.”
Two of the others understood; the rest looked baffled. Gil-
liam explained: “That's some bastard who stirs up trouble,
tells one side lies about the other side and vice versa. Hitler's
Gestapo used to bait the kikes that way, and then, when the
poor devils would arm themselves maybe, they'd be slaugh-
tered for conspiring to revolt or something."
“When the two months is up,” said Carruthers, “they'll try
to get into that Taylor School and probably others.”
Someone pointed out that Judge Darcy's decision had been
appealed.
“That won't make no never mind,” said Ben Blackwell, a
tall man with a bulbous nose. He was manager of a garage
and repair shop. “He'll be upheld. The Supreme Court's done
spoken.”
"Sure,” Fats Gilliam agreed, “but meanwhile we can't let
any grass grow under us.'
The youngest in the group, Blake McLeod, a bank teller,
who was twenty-four and looked about nineteen, asked,
“What do we do now, Fats?”.
The coach started by recalling what Graham had told him
about Bearcat Turner and his pals.
"But Bearcat's nuts,” young McLeod interrupted. “He's
not responsible. He goes around talking to himself. He still
thinks he's going to be champ.”
“That's just it,” Fats said, “Bearcat's easy to work on. A
psycho can be harmless until somebody rubs him the wrong
way, then he can be mean as hell. That's Bearcat. He's
punch-drunk all right, but he was a fighter and a damned good
one, and he nurses a sense of injustice. He feels that white


THE WHITE BAND
149
men robbed him of the welter title and also of most of his
profits in the ring.”
"I think he's right about that,” Ben Blackwell said.
"Sure, he's right,” Fats conceded. “It's a rotten, crooked
game. And Bearcat was always a good nigger, who gave his
best in the ring. But lately he's run into bad company. Some
of those niggers he hangs out with are tough guys; they
wouldn't mind a scrimmage any time. Most of our niggers
don't want trouble, but there's a few that would just as soon
start a race riot as not. I wouldn't want to see Bearcat get
hurt-the poor devil, as we all know, is not quite compos
mentis (goofy to you, my friends) but we may have to put
him away a while till this thing blows over, maybe send him
up to Bannister, just for a while. They'd take good care of
him and keep him out of trouble.” Bannister was a state men-
tal hospital.
"Looks to me,” said Sam Carruthers, squaring his thick
shoulders, “as if this Tarver was the guy who'd ought to be
told the facts of life.”
"You catch it,” Gilliam said. “And there's a nigger he's
thick with, Tom Goodwin, the lawyer.”
“I know him," said a thin man. "He's always watched his
step. I never knew him to speak out of turn."
"He's clever enough not t)," Fats Gilliam said, “but I notice
he was in court with Tarver, speaking his piece, telling his
betters what to do. So he needs a working-over too. Tarver's
a stranger in Baynesville. Lives up in Harlem. In style, I'll bet
you. But Tom Goodwin knows the local niggers and could
steer Tarver right. Goddam Commie bastards!”
Blake McLeod lowered his voice. “Tom Goodwin borrows
money from us. There's ways ... of course I'm not an officer
of the bank, but ..."
Fats reached over and nudged the young man, hurting his


150
THE WHITE BAND
ribs with a playful poke. “That's one way. But I think more
direct action is needed.”
“So do I,” Ben Carruthers said.
“What do we do?” someone asked. “Bring it up at the next
meeting of the White Band?”
Fats Gilliam pondered that while the others silently sipped
their drinks and pulled at their cigarettes or cigars. “The
White Band's doing a lot of good,” he said. “But we had a
big demonstration, a parade. If we brought it up formally,
they'd chew it over. Some are opposed to what they call vio-
lence. So am I. But I believe in beating the other fellow to
the punch. If you see he's going to throw one at your jaw,
block it and cross your right real fast. I suppose the White
Band can't officially-well, take people out and talk to them
real earnestly.” He laughed, and the others joined in. “Joe
Duffield's a swell guy and smart as they make 'em, but he's
still a senator, and even as an ex-senator he'll have to maintain
a certain dignity. He can't come out for teaching these bas-
tards the only way they understand. The Yankee liberals who
have got our government by the balls would be taking out
injunctions or what have you against the Band, trying to sup-
press it, if we gave them half a chance. No, I think the-well,
direct action must be taken by little groups like this, secret
cells within the Band, to borrow a Commie term. I propose
that we twelve form a little secret order of our own. We're
still good Americans, good Bandsmen, good Southerners, but
we'll be helping the cause, doing what's necessary. We'll
keep the White Band off the hook. Now do you guys agree
with me? Speak up, tell me what you think.”
A lot of voices clamored to be heard. They were all ap-
proving, at least in substance.
The men talked, in soft tones, for a long time, making their
wer


152
THE WHITE BAND
Ned Tarver, flicking the ashes of his cigarette into a gaily
carved Mexican ashtray, said, “By the way, Tom, have you
run across a guy named Graham, a white man, who's down
here, so he says, to organize the textile workers, or get a lot
more of them into the union.”
“I've heard of him," said Tom. “Represents something
called ... I forget.”
“The International Friends of Labor."
“Whatever that is.”
“He claims it's only interested in organizing workers and
bettering their working conditions. I believe it's on the At-
torney General's list. That doesn't mean much.”
"No," Tom agreed, “a lot of well-meaning organizations
that are not Red at all are on that list.”
"Well, anyway,” Ned went on, “he waylaid me as I left my
hotel and walked with me a way. Mysterious fellow. Says he
used to be a prize fighter. He seems to have brushed up a
pretty fair education since he left the ring. He wanted to
warn me. He'd been tipped off we were in for real trouble
here in Niggertown. He said those White Bandsmen were
fixing”-now and then Ned lapsed into an Alabama colloquial-
ism, despite all his education="to retaliate, get even with
those who tried to enter children in the white school. Threat-
ening to burn houses, God knows what else."
“How did he learn all this?” Tom wondered.
“He couldn't tell me, or didn't. Confidential sources.”
“It may be.” Tom puffed on his cigar reflectively. Ella's
eyes widened in sudden fright. “I wouldn't put it past some
of 'em. If they could intimidate us into ignoring the mandate
of the courts and going ahead as we've always done, with our
children in Negro schools ..."
“I suppose that's the general idea. But they'd put them-


THE WHITE BAND
153
selves so clearly in the wrong. I credit at least their leaders
with more subtlety.”
Tom Goodwin laughed. “Subtlety has never been the
strong point of the Klan or of any of its imitators.”
"It may be a long time before we'll be in a position to ...
well, try to enforce the law. Their appeal ..."
"I have some doubt,” Tom said, "whether Judge Darcy will
stay execution of his order pending appeal. We'll ask that he
not do so."
“Naturally. That's a possibility I hadn't thought about.
They'll get absolutely nowhere with an appeal, and they
know it-it's just a delaying tactic.”
"Did you tell the police what Graham told you?”
Ned shook his head. “What's the use? They might make a
pretense of patrolling this neighborhood more heavily, most
of the cops hoping all the time somebody would burn a few
houses-show these goddam uppity niggers who is still boss
around here."
Tom laughed, but Ella didn't. She glanced around the liv-
ing-room she had furnished with such pride, decorated with
such care, and looked at the front door, thinking of the flow-
ers twining about the porch and in the front yard which were
Tom's special interest. There was a touch of terror in her
eyes, but she managed to smile reassuringly at her husband.
sua delaying tachu cesham told youicht make a
Ned Tarver took the self-service elevator to the third floor
and went to his room. A paper was attached to his door with
a thumbtack. He took it into the room, groped for the light
button, found it, and lighted the room meagerly with an in-
adequate bulb. The sheet was legal-sized paper of good
quality, the kind once called foolscap. Some words were type-
written on it:


154
THE WHITE BAND
YOU HAVE EXACTLY A WEEK (SEVEN DAYS) TO GET
OUT OF TOWN. IF YOU ARE NOT GONE BY THEN—-
A crude skull-and-crossbones design had been drawn at the
bottom of the page.
On an impulse, he stuck the paper in a coat pocket, left his
room, and pushed the elevator button. At the hotel desk he
asked a sleepy night clerk if a white man had asked for him
and maybe gone up to his room.
The night clerk, a forlorn-faced Negro with graying
hair who looked as if he were always on the verge of finding-
or missing-something, said, “Ain't no white man been in
here, least not while I was on duty.”
“What time do you come on?”
“Six o'clock.”
"It might have been a colored man," Ned reflected. “Who-
ever it was left a note for me pinned to my door."
"I can't keep track of the colored folks comes in here,” the
clerk said sadly. “They's strange ones staying here, and some-
times friends drops in to see them. I don't know half of 'em.”
“Naturally. Well, thanks. I just wondered. Whoever
wrote the note forgot to sign it.”
The clerk laughed, but his eyes still were sad. “And you
can't figure from the note who it was?”
“That's it. Good night.”
“ 'Night, Mr. Tarver.”
No, Ned felt, as he returned to his room, it wasn't likely to
have been a Negro. Still, you never knew. Not all the Ne-
groes, even in a town on the make like Baynesville, could read
and write, and whoever wrote the note might have given it to
an illiterate Negro to pin on his door, slipping him fifty cents
or a dollar. There were even literate Negroes who were not
too loyal to their race, but he didn't want to think of them.


THE WHITE BAND
155
He didn't burn this note, but left it in his pocket--for the
time being. He placed his coat on a hanger in the tiny closet,
put on his bedroom slippers, lit a cigarette and walked slowly
up and down. He wasn't sleepy at all. It wasn't just the note,
but many other things that pulled at his mind for attention.
He was inclined to think the note was a bluff or the work of a
crackpot. If the White Band had a flogging squad-and he
couldn't imagine Joe Duffield's standing for any such vio-
lence, if he knew of it-would it be likely to advertise its plans
with threatening notes? Of course this might be a bunch of
young hoodlums not associated with anything. The White
Band would be blamed not only for the excesses of its indi-
vidual members, but for any other rough stuff in a town
where it had a chapter. It could expect that. Why a man as
astute as Joe Duffield wanted to jeopardize his reputation-
what was left of it-in such a dubious enterprise ... Ned
thought he knew the answer: money. Perhaps power, too,
was part of the answer.
Ned's wife had written this week urging him to come home
as soon as he felt he could. He liked to think of Nell as she
sat at her easel, perhaps on the Palisades across the Hudson, or
somewhere on Long Island where the surf broke, anywhere
that happened to appeal to her. She never made any to-do over
her art. It was just something she did, without pose or fuss.
She used to laugh over the arty parties they sometimes went
to-people who, as she said, made such a production of dab-
bling in the fine arts, as if no one else had ever thought of it.
They had been married twenty-four years, and it seemed to
him that Nell got prettier as she entered her forties. She was
part Cuban, and she had the dark appeal and the rich com-
plexion of some Latin women, yet she was still slim; she'd
never be gross and prematurely aged, as some Latin women
na
neve
som
WONNEN
got.


156
THE WHITE BAND
Obviously Nell was worried about him, though she under-
stated in her letter what she evidently felt, not wanting to
challenge his duty. If she knew the restive atmosphere of this
town, if she were aware of the two personal threats, and the
looks he got as he walked the main drag, she'd worry a lot
more. She'd implore him to leave, duty be damned. But he
couldn't see himself leaving at this stage, with his job half
done. Baynesville was a test-a test for him as well as a test
of national policy. He had to stay and do his part toward
giving integration a fair chance. It wasn't a pleasant assign-
ment, but he couldn't plead surprise. He'd known what it
would be when he came down here.
He thought of his older son, Carlos, named for Nell's Cu-
ban-Negro, Spanish-speaking father. Carlos, a little darker-
unmistakably a Negro, unlike his father-was in the army,
stationed in Germany. He was a first lieutenant-an officer
and a gentleman, north of the Mason-Dixon Line. The other
boy, Bill, was still in high school. He wanted to be a lawyer
like his father. Heaven forbid that Bill should get himself
into anything like this. If Bill did take up law, he'd advise the
boy to stick to simple court practice: damage suits and mur-
der or assault cases, no messing around with race relations.
Ned ground out the stub of his cigarette in a cracked glass
ashtray and began to undress.
over a
Е.
Н.
RS
The next morning Ned pushed, reluctantly, hesitantly, into
the square, stone city hall, and went along a corridor until he
came to a sign over a wide-open door: POLICE HEADQUARTERS.
He spoke to the sergeant on duty, explaining his mission.
"I think you'd better see Lieutenant Wendell,” the ser-
geant said.
"Okay."


THE WHITE BAND
157
e
0
“That door over there. Go right in. He's there."
Lieutenant Wendell, it turned out, was chief of detectives
--head of a force that numbered all of fifteen men. He was a
short, thickset man, probably around forty, with a hard,
poker face.
“I'm Ned Tarver. I represent ..."
“Yes, I know who you are,” Lieutenant Wendell said.
“What can I do for you, Tarver?”
The officer did not ask his visitor to sit down. Ned Tarver
handed over the note. “This was stuck on the door of my
hotel room last night.”
Wendell studied the note silently, then looked up, betray-
ing nothing of whatever he felt. “Some crank maybe. I don't
know. It might be a real threat for all I know. It's hard for
us to control these hotheads. We haven't a large force, not
as large as we ought to have the way Baynesville's grown.”
Ned laughed a little. “I don't expect you to furnish me
with a bodyguard, lieutenant. I just thought I'd tell you, for
whatever it was worth.”
“We'll do what we can,” said Wendell. “Want to leave
that with me?”
“Sure, I don't want it."
“Anonymous letter-writers—there's not much way to trace
them.”
"I know.”
"But let me know if you hear anything else. We don't
want trouble.” Lieutenant Wendell suddenly smiled, an ex-
pression of which he had not seemed capable. “Look, Tarver,
it's not my business to advise you what to do. But you know
the feeling around this town. It came out on the campus last
week. You've been in court and won your case. Why don't
you clear out? Somebody may be laying for you, some
crowd maybe. It's better not to be here when a bunch like


158
THE WHITE BAND
that starts moving in. We can't guarantee you protection.
We try to patrol the town, but we can't be everywhere.”
Ned smiled back. “I appreciate your difficulties, lieutenant.
I don't feel I can go at this time. I feel that I must stay until
this thing is decided one way or the other. It's hanging in
the air right now, despite Judge Darcy's decision. I was
retained by this organization, and they'll expect me to stay
until the issue is settled or at least further clarified. And I
have to file an appeal brief, all that.”
“Okay, Tarver, it's up to you.” The plainclothes officer
turned away brusquely.
“Thanks, lieutenant.”
Ned left. This, he mused, had been a waste of time and
effort. But at least the town's law-enforcement arm couldn't
accuse him of ignoring it, of failing to cooperate by report-
ing such hints of violence as came to him. He hadn't relayed
Graham's warning, but the cops would have laughed at that.


OE DUFFIELD settled at the window of a rear seat in the
plane and looked down at the diminishing landscape as they
gained altitude. He had been summoned to Washington by
the clerk of the Committee on Freight and Cargo Rates in
Interstate Commerce. It had never been a committee that
enthralled him, though he realized its importance. And why
hadn't they shortened its name when they streamlined con-
gressional committees some years back? But nobody ever
used the full name, given to it some time back in the
eighteen-seventies when river traffic was as important as rail
shipping and air travel was still a theme for science fiction. It
was called simply the Rates Committee, in newspapers and in
the Senate cloak room.
They'd held extensive hearings on a proposed bill revising
the rate structure, or rather the principles behind it—actually
the Interstate Commerce Commission scheduled freight tariffs
in detail-and now they had to meet in executive session to go
159


THE WHITE BAND
161
had an uncanny way of learning things about him without
(and he never suspected her of this) prying or shadowing
him. Well, what did it matter, if she knew or not? Their
marriage was pretty well over as an intimate thing, even as a
congenial companionship.
It was a clear autumn day, and the Blue Ridge was spread
below them, looking, from the high altitude they had attained,
like a vast relief map of thickly wooded toy hills. It was as if
you could jump from ridge to ridge, from peak to peak. The
whole world must look thus to the all-seeing eyes of God. If
there was a God. There must be Something.
A flash of mundane indignation touched him as he thought
of some clippings he went over just before he left his office.
They were sent by his clipping bureau. Several big papers,
including the left-wing liberal Washington Post, the New
Deal New York Times and the nosy St. Louis Post-Dispatch
had discussed the White Band in connection with the regret-
table disorders on the campus of Baynesville Teachers College
and the decision of Judge Darcy. All these papers and a
couple of others had wondered how a man who was still a
member of the United States Senate could feel that he could
with decency and propriety head this White Band-an organi-
zation dedicated to defeating the law as laid down by the
Supreme Court, if not, in clandestine practice, to worse things.
Hell! But what did he care what they said? Still, it was
getting under his skin, and he was receiving some strange
looks, even from those members of that exclusive club, the
Senate, who were still around during the Congressional recess,
coming in and out of Washington for committee hearings or
personal reasons. Maybe he should ... But he wouldn't be
bullied into doing anything.
He patted the inside of his coat pocket, where his billfold
contained a check Hank Caldwell had handed him yesterday:


THE WHITE BAND
163
e more
She pretended to look angry. “No romantic lies, Joe. I
know damned well it was something else.”
“Well, dear, I had to have an excuse."
“To get away. I see. Our great man is held in thralldom.”
“Not exactly, but ..."
“Yes, I know. Well, what was the excuse?”
“Oh, a dull committee meeting.”
“The Committee on Subversive Activities?”
“Nothing that exciting. The Committee”-he paused for
breath—“on Freight and Cargo Rates in Interstate Commerce.”
“No!”
“But yes. Do you think I'd have bothered with that if it
hadn't been for you?”
“That's sweet, darling. And I'm glad you find me more
interesting than the Committee on ... whatever the hell it is,
I haven't that good a memory.”
They had more martinis, then Joe asked, “Where would
you like to eat?”
“Oh, anywhere. You name it.”
“Any suggestion?”
She pondered. He had never seen her lovelier, her mid-
night hair, her eyes, almost as dark, her Latin complexion,
shading into a dark blue dinner dress, sliced sharply in the
neck and back. “There's a new place, a French restaurant,
the Boul Miche, just off Connecticut, L or M, I think. I
haven't been there, but I hear it's good.”
"Fine. Let's try it.”
While she was out putting the final touches to her com-
plexion, he looked around the familiar apartment. How did
she keep it in such flawless order? Nobody had servants these
days, nobody but the very rich. But she was reported to have
received a handsome settlement when her last marriage was
dissolved-her husband had been what the gossip writers called


THE WHITE BAND
165
“You don't seem exactly the type, darling,” she conceded.
“And yet it must be a problem, keeping those—what do you
call 'em-Crackers?-keeping them in line."
“Crackers, Rednecks, hillbillies, sandlice ... what have you,
I suppose it will be. But what we're trying to do is use strictly
legal means to fight this thing, to preach peaceful ways and
condemn violence, but I suppose-well, I suppose the boys
will get out of hand now and then, it's inevitable. The Su-
preme Court and all the liberals back of it should have thought
of that.”
“But, Joe, would the sun stand still or the North Star fall if
Negro children did go to school with white children?”.
“It's happening in some places.”
“You know what I mean, everywhere, all over the South in
particular.”
He laughed. “Well, abstractly it's a debatable point. But
actually the South will never accept it, the vast majority of
Southerners-not in our time.”
“I suppose not.”
The driver pulled up in front of the restaurant, and they
went under an awning over the sidewalk down to a basement
room of subdued lights and friendly nooks.
He was glad when Myra dropped the subject. It was hard
for her to understand: she had been brought up in Nebraska.
The food was excellent, and the wine they had with the poule
de maison, a Bordeaux blanc, was excellent. They lingered
over the coffee, and he was squeezing the hand she had thrown
out in a typical gesture when a tall, gaunt man in evening
clothes came by their booth and glanced in. The man gave
him a glacial nod and walked out.
“Just who was that?” she asked. “Do you owe him money?
He acted like it.”
“No, I don't think he'd lend his mother ten bucks. That
TO


166
THE WHITE BAND
is Senator Livingston, who happens to be dean of the Senate
by reason of having fooled his constituents longer than any of
us."
“Well, he got a good look at us.”
“So what?”
“Wally Blake will crack down on us again in his column.”
“I'll crack down on Wally Blake if I ever catch up with
him. That's not his name, you know, and not many people
seem to know who he really is. He sneaks around protected
by the anonymity of his own name, whatever it is.”
"Well, I dare say he's not Senator Livingston.”
They left the restaurant laughing. There was a chill in the
air, unusual for late September in Washington.
Back at the apartment Myra dug up a bottle of B. & B., and
they sat sipping it and watching television for a while. When
he took her in his arms, in earnest this time, she was inclined
at first to stiffen, even to push him away.
“What's the matter?” he asked.
She did not reply, but, in the end, she surrendered and went
to her dressing-room; she came back wearing a purple robe
and rolled the bed out from its hidden nook.
But she made him leave shortly after one, explaining that
an old school friend was in town and was coming by in the
morning, she didn't know how early, and they were doing
the town together.
He returned to his hotel glowing with the delight their
lovemaking always gave him, regretting they couldn't make
a night of it, regretting that he didn't see her oftener. No one
else, no one in his whole life, had carried quite this physical
appeal, and this, in turn, was based on many things, for no
physical attraction ever stood alone, uncomplicated by the
other attributes that made up a woman.
The bar in the hotel was still open, and he went in and had
U


168
THE WHITE BAND
There'd been other affairs, of course, over the years, but
none that meant quite what his-his liaison (that was a hell
of a word to use!) with Myra had meant. His memories
merged into the beginning of a dream.
CIO
As he dressed carefully the next night for his television ap-
pearance he regretted that he'd accepted the invitation. There
was no sense in it. He wasn't running for anything. He
was to be the guest—the victim-on a network program
called “Interview of the Week.” Those newspapermen (and
women) would be laying for him, trying to catch him off
base. Why had he said yes? If he did well he'd help the
White Band-perhaps. But it was hard, as he knew from
his years in politics, to emerge unscarred from a hostile audi-
ence. It would be like running a gantlet. Oh, well, hell,
he was no novice.
Half an hour later the cameras focused on him as he sat,
flawlessly groomed, darkly handsome, youthful, looking far
more assured than he felt. The moderator, who was as bad
as any of them, an astute fellow named Ben Griffin, was say-
ing, “We're glad to welcome you as our guest, Senator
Duffield. I'll call first on the correspondent at my right,
Charles West of the New York ...”
“Senator Duffield, what is the real object of the White
Band?”
Joe smiled as the spotlight caught him. "Just those we've
announced, Charlie. To help preserve our way of life in the
South, the way we've been living for generations."
Charlie West bored in. “Does your way of life involve
keeping the Negroes down?”.
“No, Charlie, it does not. We want them to have the
advantages we have-decent housing, education, all the rest.


THE WHITE BAND
169
It does mean a certain separation of the races-segregation, if
you please. We've found that the two races get along better
going their separate ways.”
“But the Supreme Court doesn't agree with you.”
"It seems not.” Joe laughed a little. “We're not trying to
ignore or overrule the Supreme Court. But we feel that the
school decision was not a valid interpretation of the Federal
Constitution.”
"If the Supreme Court can't interpret it, who can?” Charlie
West demanded.
Joe smiled and spread his hands in a gesture of defeat. “I
don't know. I do know that the states have certain inherent
rights, which this Supreme Court has ignored. I also know
that the Court, as constituted at various periods, has made a
number of different rulings concerning Negroes, ever since
the Dred Scott decision. It might be that fifteen or twenty
years from now the Supreme Court will view the school-
segregation issue in a new light.”
“And meanwhile the South intends to defy the Court?”
“That's hardly correct, Charlie. But we feel that there are
remedies within the decision. Some states are threatening to
close the public schools. I don't know what the Supreme
Court could do about that. I'm not aware of any constitutional
provision or federal law requiring a state to maintain public
schools.”
The moderator turned to another correspondent, a small,
sharp-eyed young man named Bixby.
“Senator, how much is the White Band paying you?” Bixby
asked.
Joe suppressed an angry reaction. He might have antici-
pated the question. “As I announced, I'm serving without
nr 2
salary."


170
THE WHITE BAND
“That's not what I asked, Senator. I asked what you were
getting.”
"I have no guarantee of anything,” Joe said carefully. “My
expenses, I presume, and whatever else they may choose to
vote me for my services.”
“Well, didn't you try to convey the impression you were
serving the cause for nothing?”.
“Oh, I don't think so, Ed. I said 'without salary.'”
“What have you gotten out of it so far?”
“That,” Joe replied, an edge of temper slipping into his
voice, “is a personal matter."
“I see.” Bixby turned away with a satisfied smile.
Next on the panel was a woman, a small, fiery person named
Roberta Hays. “Why,” she demanded, “do you stay in the
Senate when you head an organization dedicated to ignoring
the Constitution as interpreted by our highest court?”
“I have announced,” said Joe blandly, “that I will retire
from the Senate at the end of my term, which is the end of
this year, three months hence.”
“But you're still a senator," Roberta Hays went on wasp-
ishly. She represented a string of small Western papers.
“I am, technically.”
“Technically! Aren't you here to attend a meeting of a
Senate committee?”
“That's true.”
“Well, if you're not still an active senator then I'm the
queen of Sheba.”
They all laughed, and Ben Griffin, the moderator, said,
“A number of instances of violence have been attributed to
the White Band, Senator. What have you to say about that?”
“We are against violence, Ben. We're doing all we can to
settle this problem, or compromise it, peacefully. I wouldn't
go into any organization that espoused or condoned violence.


172
THE WHITE BAND
people. He'd often had drinks at the National Press Club with
Ben Griffin and Charlie West and Ed Bixby. It was their job,
the policy of their papers, to make him look like a fool if
they could. He didn't think they'd succeeded, at least not
altogether. But he wasn't too happy as he went down in the
elevator.
He had a date with Myra Connell later that night. His
broadcast was through at nine o'clock, and she had told him
to come by when he was free; never mind supper, she was
dining elsewhere. Even if he was a little late it was all right;
she wanted to talk to him.
There had been a note in her voice he didn't like, and he
worried as the cab carried him up Connecticut to her apart-
ment.
She greeted him with her youthful grin and kissed him-
more perfunctorily than usual, it seemed to him. He wanted
to slide in beside her on the chaise longue, but she pointed to
the overstuffed chair which men always liked because it fitted
their backs. “Sit there, Joe. I want to talk to you. Drink?”
"I wouldn't mind,” he said.
She got Scotch and soda for them both. He didn't like
Scotch-few Southerners did, truthfully-and she knew it, but
he made no objection and sipped at his highball.
“Joe,” she said abruptly, as if afraid she wouldn't say it un-
less she blurted it out, “I'm getting married again.”
“Married!” He felt the sort of shock that tingles through
the body when you dive into cold water.
“Yes, Joe dear, married.”
"Well...." He got hold of himself. “Who is the-fortu-
nate guy?”
“Nobody you know, dear; at least I don't think so. Phil
Kammerer. He's Navy-a captain. His last marriage didn't
quite turn out. I'm one up on him.”


THE WHITE BAND
173
On
Joe drained his drink, making an involuntary grimace over
the smoky taste he'd never liked. “Do you love him, Myra?”
She looked at him with an impish grin. “Who said any-
thing about love? I was speaking of marriage. But I am very
fond of Phil. He's one of the grandest guys I ever knew.”
Joe mustered himself for the proper comment. “I hope
you'll be very happy, Myra.”
“Thank you, dear, and I'm sure you mean it.”
“I suppose," he added, “I suppose this means ... well, the
end of what we've had.”
She smiled, a little sadly. “I'm afraid so, Joe. I'm going to
try hard to make a go of this, and I'm going to play fair.
It's the only way.”
"I suppose so. I'll miss you like-like hell and damnation.”
She laughed. “Am I like hell and damnation? But don't
look so stricken, Joe. You've been married all these several
years I was seeing you-occasionally.”
"I know," he reflected. “But it was different. I wasn't
really married, except legally-especially after I met you."
“That's sweet, Joe. But every man who ever strays from
the marriage bed has a situation that's different. His situation
is always unique.”
Joe laughed in spite of the melancholy that gnawed at him.
“I guess you're right. His wife never understands him.”
“At least you were original enough not ever to have said
that."
“I'm afraid,” Joe added, “Sarah's always understood me,
only too well.”
“Well, you'll work it out, Joe. Don't take this too hard.
You'll meet someone else if you and Sarah never make up.”
The smile faded, and she looked serious, almost solemn. “Joe,
the years are piling up, and I've got to make one more try
for some sort of security, and I don't mean financial security-


174
THE WHITE BAND
VOTIV
m-
I haven't had to worry much about that-but a lasting com-
panionship, somebody who would be a buffer against the
world. I just can't go on alone.”
“I understand,” he said. He thought he did. “Well, I guess
I'll be going.”
She leaned over and kissed him. "You're a darling, Joe, and
you've given me happiness, if only at times-sporadically, you
might say. I haven't a single regret. I'm glad, I'll always be,
that we had ... what we had.”
“Thanks, darling.”
In a moment he had gone ... out of her life.
By ten the next morning he was at his office on Capitol Hill.
It was a dark, gusty day, with rain coming in spurts at hour
intervals. His office force, once numbering five-about aver-
age, for a senator-had dwindled to Miss Chapline, a mellowed
spinster with a soft voice, pretty in a faded way. They went
over the mail.
She looked up from her daily calendar pad. “Oh, Senator,
Mr. Smith, the clerk of the Subversive Control Subcommittee,
wants you to call as soon as you can."
He picked up the phone. What now? Miss Chapline heard
him say, “Yes, Jim. Yes. Is that so? Right away, huh? I didn't
know.... I see. Well, sure, I suppose so. I'll let you know.
I may miss the first one. I've got something lined up, but
I'll let you know. Thanks, Jim.”
Joe Duffield put down the phone with an angry clang. “I'll
be damned,” he said. “The chairman has arranged a series
of hearings for this fall. In Chicago, St. Louis, San Francisco,
God knows where else. Whatever got into him.”
"You'll attend them?” she asked.
“I don't know," he said, harassed. “I'm supposed to. They'll


THE WHITE BAND
175
be important, at least they'll be calculated to give old Lock-
ridge a lot of publicity. I just don't know. I've got a lot of
things on the fire.”
She moved unobtrusively to the outer office and her desk.
He stared down at his bare desk. He thought of the day
he took over this office, almost six years ago. By then he was
thoroughly used to the Hill; he had been in the House three
terms. And yet the Senate was different. It was a step up-
ward. There were 435 members of the House, only 96 Sena-
tors. You never heard the terms "upper house” and “lower
house” among members of Congress, and yet the newspapers
and the public thought of them this way. A senator was some-
body; representatives, congressmen, were a dime a dozen in
Washington-or so he had felt once. The day he took his
seat had been a high point in his life. Old Senator Preston,
the senior senator from his state, had escorted him down the
aisle. “I present the junior Senator from--Mr. Duffield,”
and formally presented him to the Senate.
There were other exciting days during the six years: debates
on the floor, battles in committees, meetings outside, politics,
policies, disputes, cocktail parties without end, trips to Europe
to investigate this or that, hearings in various American cities,
hurried trips to Riverport, interminable conferences, political
and legislative.
And now it was all over. He'd tossed it away. For what?
He thought of the turmoil which the White Band must in-
evitably drag along its path, like a bulldozer picking up sand,
gravel, all the debris of the earth. He had a moment of sharp
regret. More than once in his life he'd made a wrong decision.
Then he touched his inside pocket, where the check still
reposed, awaiting deposit to his account in Riverport. There'd
be other checks, a lot of them. What the hell. He wouldn't
worry. He knew what he was doing.


176
THE WHITE BAND
But these subversion hearings. They wouldn't be pleasant
for him. People would be asking him, tacitly if not articu-
lately, if the White Band too wasn't subversive. He'd be
embarrassed. The papers would continue to hound him. He
could duck the hearings. Then they'd say he was still a
senator but dodged his duties, put in all his time on this dubi-
ous organization. Hell and damnation! He was sick of it.
What did a few months matter? He'd taken the dice, thrown
them; now he'd abide by his throw.
He pushed the buzzer at his desk, and Miss Chapline re-
turned. “Get your pad please, Alice.”
He dictated a letter. There were two originals and copies
for the press. The originals went to Governor James and to
the secretary of the Senate. The letter was his resignation,
effective at once.
Let the Governor appoint whom he would-he, Joe, didn't
give a damn. James was a screwball. Let him name somebody
like Colonel Hutchins for the honor. They were close. The
colonel was as crazy as grandmother's quilt, but he couldn't
do the state much harm in three months, and the election
would be held in five weeks to choose whoever would take
over in January
Well, now it was the White Band or nothing. He'd dived
in all the way. At least he wouldn't have to worry about his
dual role for the next three months, his duty as a senator and
the demands of the White Band.
He was through with Washington, at least for a time. Now
that Myra was lost to him, he didn't give a damn if he saw the
place again. He'd had it.
When he signed the letter, twice, and went out to luncheon,
he was humming “La donna è mobile.” Most appropriate that
it should come into his head, he decided. Well, at least, in


THE WHITE BAND
177
resigning from the Senate, he was shedding half of what stu-
dents of the psyche called a dichotomy.
It was around three in the afternoon when the plane glided
into Riverport. The airport was eight miles from the center
of town, but he hadn't wired or called to ask Sarah to meet
him. He'd take a limousine. There were six other passengers
in the big car, and they were dropped at various places, mostly
downtown hotels, on the way to the north end and Duffields.
The weather had turned warm again-it must have been
around eighty-much warmer than Washington was at the
moment. He felt uncomfortable in his thick, dark worsted.
He held his topcoat in his lap. Somehow the muggy warmth
in the air made you feel that you were in the tropics, and it
never would turn cool again.
In front of his place he paid off the driver, absently added
a tip that caused the man in dark uniform and black boots to
exclaim, “Why, thank you, sir, thank you very much.” Many
trees straggled across Duffields. He'd never liked the formality
of perfect hedges and avenues of trees, but had always pre-
ferred the rugged disorder of, say, his uncle's place in the Blue
Ridge. If you were going in for nature, why make it fit man's
ideas of measured conformity? Now the maples and the
beeches and the two sycamores were turning yellow and red,
orange and russet. It seemed strangely incongruous on such
a warm day, as if snow had suddenly started falling in August.
The pines and cedars in back provided a basic green for the
picture.
He climbed the ascending walk, with its series of two and
three steps. He put down his suitcase and briefcase and let
himself in with his latchkey. The house was silent. He called
out, but no one answered. Ted wasn't in the back yard fool-


178
THE WHITE BAND
ing around with the dog. At the instant he decided everyone
was out, Sarah appeared from nowhere-actually from some-
where in back-moving with the silent grace of a cat. She
kissed him effusively, releasing a breath like an old, empty
whiskey barrel.
She stepped back and surveyed him. “Well, darling, how'd
it go?”
“All right, I suppose.”
“You should have had a nice time in Washington,” she
added, “without me around to inhibit you.”
“Now, Sarah ..."
She laughed with heavy sarcasm. “How's your girl friend?”
He tried to laugh, but succeeded in making only an ambigu-
ous sound. “Which one?”
“Which one! That's rich.” She laughed. “My Casanova!
I mean the love of your life-at the moment, the one that
columnist wrote up.”
“That son of a bitch. ... Well, I haven't got any girl
friend, much as that'll disappoint you, no love of my life.”
Sarah replied with raucous laughter. “Do you think I'm a
complete fool? Don't you think I know why you went up
there?”
“Oh, hell.” He picked up his luggage, started up the stairs.
He stopped and faced her. He had intended to break it more
gently, but let her take it. “Well, Sarah Duffield, you're no
longer married to a senator.”
"I'm ... what? What the hell do you mean? Did you file
suit for divorce?”
“No, I resigned from the Senate.”
Her eyes Aared like two jets abruptly ignited. “You did
what?"
“You heard me. I resigned as a senator, or from being a
senator, have it your own way.”
LOV


THE WHITE BAND
179
“But you'd already announced you were-were retiring at
the end of your term, in a couple months or so.”
“I know, but I decided I should step down at once. My
resignation is effective immediately.”
“In God's name, why?" she demanded.
He spoke softly. “It seemed best, Sarah. All of them, at
least all my enemies, were sniping at me because I was trying
to carry on as head of the White Band and be a senator too.
Hearings are coming up that will last all fall and which I'm
supposed to attend. I not only haven't time for them but
they'd be embarrassing, to put it mildly. People would keep
saying ...”
"Oh, the hell with people,” she broke in. “I suppose I
should be very proud to be wife of the Grand Mogul, what-
ever it is, of the White Band? Jesus Christ!”
“I don't think you'll turn down any of the checks which
will accrue from that job,” he said.
“What checks? I haven't seen any. You-you fourflusher.
You might'a got somewhere in-in politics, but you preferred
to be a big grasshopper in a little pond.”
“Do you call an organization that already has two hundred
thousand members in fifteen states-one that's growing by leaps
and bounds-a little pond?”
She turned away, her once-lovely face looking red and
bloated. “What do I care. You make my ...".
Her voice trailed off in a string of obscenities. Leaving his
luggage on the steps, he went out the front door and slammed
it behind him. He saw that the car was in the garage, but he
didn't feel like bothering with it. He descended to the curb
and hailed a taxi returning from the north-end suburban area.
“The Cherokee Club,” he told the driver.


THE WHITE BAND
181
their thinking that. Though we didn't have a goddam thing
to do with it, we'd have done it if we'd thought of it and could
have put it over. No, what strikes me as so funny is the ...
ah ... 'secular' press, the daily papers and the fascist speakers
all giving the Party due credit. They didn't believe Taylor
when he said on TV nobody put him up to it. I don't know
all his connections, but I think he was speaking the exact
truth. I think it was his idea.”
“It couldn't have worked out better-for us.”
“How's Project Bearcat coming?”.
Johnson took two quick, reflective puffs, keeping the ciga-
rette in his mouth. “Fine. Couldn't be better. Bearcat, the
poor devil, and about fifteen, sixteen of his pals have actually
formed a sort of vigilante group, if you can imagine that.”
“I can. I have a well-developed imagination."
"They're all armed with something a few with guns, the
rest with switch-blades or blackjacks. They've worked them-
selves up to the point where they have patrols, three or four
of them, guarding Niggertown at night, and they have signals,
whistles. If white men come over bent on trouble, they'll get
quite a reception, believe you me."
“Splendid. Well, I've got to see Ned Tarver.”
Ned Tarver, going to his room in the late afternoon, opened
the letter from his wife which the clerk had just handed him.
DEAREST NED,
It seems a long time you've been gone, though I realize
it has been less than three weeks. Can't you run back for a
few days while things are dull, just simmering, as you say?
You could fly, and that would give you the maximum of
time at home. I haven't heard from Carlos since the letter I
sent you. Bill is fine. Oh, I sold that scene of the Hudson at


182
THE WHITE BAND
dawn from the Palisades. For $150. Your wife might yet
prove a profitable investment. ... Darling, I worry about
you. You tell me everything's under control, there's nothing
to worry about, things are quiet and all that, but I wonder if
you're not just trying to ease my mind. I read of outbreaks
of violence here and there. I know what they must think of
anybody trying to do his duty as a lawyer and an advocate,
as you are. I know you are fearless; you've proved that
more than once. But don't take foolish chances; think of
your family. Not that I don't appreciate the fine work you
are doing, and I know it's a gesture of idealism-you could
make more prosecuting a damage suit, or even defending
some hood. Do take care of yourself-that's my prayer.
All love,
NELL
The phone rang. The clerk said a gentleman named
Graham, a white man, wanted to see him. Graham? Oh,
sure. “Tell him I'll be right down-no, tell him to come up to
my room.”
Ned wondered, momentarily, whether he had been fool-
hardy. How did he know the man actually was Graham? It
might be that anonymous letter-writer.
There was a soft knock, and Ned opened the door a crack.
There stood Graham, broken nose, irregular teeth, ambiguous
grin. Ned opened the door wide. “Come in, Mr. Graham.
Have a seat. Smoke?”
“Thanks.” Graham sat down in the one comfortable chair
and lit the cigarette.
"Sorry I haven't a drink,” Ned added. “Come to see me
in Harlem, and I promise to have one."
Graham laughed and spilled ashes on his rumpled gray
slacks. “I may drop in on you at that.”
Ned, seated on the bed, waited for his visitor to go on.


THE WHITE BAND
183
Graham began, tentatively, “Well, Mr. Tarver, the truth is
I'm kind of worried about you.”
"Worried about me?” Ned looked at Graham, wondering
what was back of the ready, noncommittal grin, the shifty
eyes.
“Yes, worried. You've been threatened, haven't you?”
“Maybe. It's what you can expect when you're on the un-
popular side."
"Don't I know it though!" Graham laughed. “I've found it
out in my work with labor. Some places I go they ask me
how'd I like to swing in the breeze with a rope around my
neck, or walk around with my guts exposed to the four
winds.”
“I suppose,” said Ned, “we have to expect and discount such
things."
"Sometimes.” The grin faded from Graham's face, and
he turned on a serious look. “Sometimes they mean it. You've
received two written threats, haven't you?”
"How did you know that?” Ned looked steadily at
Graham.
“Me? Oh, I have, as I told you before, ways of learning
things-what you might call sources of information.”
"Perhaps the police?” Ned suggested.
Graham laughed. “Oh, hell, no. The fact is I'm allergic to
cops, and I don't agree very well with them. We sort of
avoid one another. Well, I'd hate to see anything bad happen
to you, Tarver, and so I've brought you something you may
find a friend in need."
"You've ..."
“Yeah.” Graham reached inside his coat and extracted a
.32-automatic from a holster that hung over his shoulder. He
laid the gun on the bed. “This is for you, my friend. And


184
THE WHITE BAND
you may need it. Careful, it's loaded. And I have some extra
cartridges."
“I don't want it,” Ned said quietly. “Thanks. I appreciate
your thoughtfulness. But I don't want it. I'm not down here
for this."
Graham slapped a heavy fist into a palm. “Oh, come down,
Ned. You don't want to be carried off, abducted, taken for a
ride maybe, without being able to put up a struggle."
“No, but what good would a gun do? They'd simply kill
me and claim self-defense. There'll be more than one if they
come after me—maybe fifteen or twenty or more. I can't fight
them all, even with a gun.”
“No, but you sure as hell can give them pause. Listen, Ned,
guys like that are chicken. I never saw one that wasn't. Pull
a gun on any ten of them and mean it, and they'll back out
every time. I know. I've had the experience. Now it's not
easy for a colored man to buy a gun in this town at the
moment. They won't sell you one. You don't look colored,
but everybody in town's got you spotted by now, so they'd
never sell you one.”
Ned got up, walked to the window and turned back. “But
I don't want one, Mr. Graham.”
"I know you don't, but you should have one-for pro-
tection. Listen, it's not only those threats I know you've
received, but I have another tip. Some of the White Band
boys are planning to get you. I think you're in real danger.
That's no bull. It's fact.”
“Well, I'm not going to foment trouble by going around
with a gun in my pocket. What if a cop should stop and
search me? He'd say I was about to put on a race riot. They'd
send me up for carrying a gun, and my whole mission here
would be a flop.”
“Maybe I could even get you a license to carry that gun.”


186
THE WHITE BAND
Graham took the indicated seat. "Sorry about Saturday's
game, coach.”
“Oh, that. Well, sometimes they catch you first of the
season before you've had a chance to shake out the kinks.
We'll do all right, I think. What's on your mind?”
“More of the same.” Graham laughed. “Bearcat Turner's
gang has formed a sort of-well, vigilante committee, you
might say."
The big man whirled around on his swivel chair. “Well I'll
be good goddamned. What do you mean—'vigilante'?”.
"Well, coach, they've formed themselves into small squads,
and they patrol Niggertown armed, some with guns, others
with switch-blades or blackjacks. They're really out courting
trouble. I'm told too that Ned Tarver's going around with a
gun in his pocket.”
“So that's it. And they say we're always the ones that start
trouble! Well, I'll take care of this. I mean I'll talk to the
police, see what can be done. Thanks for your help-Patsy.”
Graham laughed and shook hands with the grim-faced
coach. When he had gone Gilliam picked up the phone. He
dialed a number. “Could I speak to Mr. Carruthers? Yeah.
Okay. . . . Sam? This is Jake Gilliam. Fine. How're you?
Say, Sam, think you could get the boys together for me, say
tomorrow night or next night? I'm so damned busy I won't
get time. Sure, I've got some dope for them. Call me back,
Sam, will you? Fine."
Gilliam put the receiver back in its nest. He sat staring at
his desk, at the paper on which he had been writing some
tentative line-ups. A mild elation at the prospect of excite-
ment, of punishing someone, was succeeded by a suffusing
rage. Goddam niggers! His hatred for Negroes dated back
to a day when he was in grade school. He was a fat little boy
then; it was not until later that he got hard and strong and


THE WHITE BAND
187
excelled in all athletics. He and some of the fellows were on
their way home from school when they encountered several
Negro boys. He had taunted one of them, a skinny runt in
ragged clothes. The runt had turned on him and hit him.
“Let 'em fight," the others had yelled, and they formed a
ring. Jake (he was called Fats or Fatso even then) waded in
to teach the little nigger a lesson-teach him proper respect
for white boys. But the scrawny black boy moved his fists
fast and sure, hitting so often Fats couldn't get set to hit back.
In a little while his nose was bleeding, his eyes were blacked,
and there were lumps all over his face. He was thoroughly
beaten, and finally the Negro boys helped pull off the ragged
piece of fury.
The white boys razzed him all the way home. Let a nigger
beat him up! Couldn't whup a nigger! He had determined
on that humiliating day so long ago that he'd give them the
worst of it every chance he got.


THE WHITE BAND
189
se
neatly handwritten letters addressed “Dr. and Mrs. William P.
Davison.” She took them.
She recognized some of the handwriting: old friends,
women she'd known several years at least. But she wondered.
It was the Davisons' turn to entertain next week a group of
seven or eight couples they called the Supper Club. They met
at each other's homes once a month, in rotation. After cock-
tails and supper they played bridge or had a musical evening
or an evening of discussion. She had an idea all these notes
were from members of their little club. But why the formal-
ity? They were all on easy terms, and usually they phoned:
they'd be along, thanks a lot, or they were so sorry they had
to be in Riverport or were going to Florida. As it happened
there was only one faculty couple in the group, and they had
already phoned that they were coming.
Eva Davison opened the first letter. It was strangely formal:
... regret very much that we will be unable to accept your
kind invitation. ...
It was signed “Sincerely, Josephine Cranston.”
Jo and Wilbur Cranston. Wilbur was president of the
Baynesville National Bank.
The other letters were all in identical language, as if they
had been copied from a form. They were from other mem-
bers of the Supper Club. “... regret very much that we will
be unable to accept your kind invitation. ..."
No explanation; no personal word. And these friends were
on a first-name basis. Mr. Cranston was Wilbur to the group,
and Dr. Davison was Bill, she was Eva. These notes were
addressed, “Dear Dr. and Mrs. Davison.”
Without a word she passed them over to her husband, and


192
THE WHITE BAND
T
Turtle laughed apologetically. “Oh, I forgot. Course you
wouldn't go.”
Their beer came, and they kidded with the waitress, who
sparred back at them. The hardware clerk said, “They won't
be in a hurry to have another nigger at Teachers, my way of
thinking.”
“I reckon they did sort of get told,” Hefty said casually.
When they had finished the fresh bottles, the other football
player, Joe Boehmer, an end, interrupted a crossfire of talk
about nothing in particular. “Say, I got an idea!”
Hefty Brown laughed. “That I'd have to hear. What is
this idea you think you got?”
Boehmer leaned over the table. “Let's go down to Nigger-
town, walk around a little.”
Why? they wanted to know.
“Oh, we might have some fun,” said Boehmer cryptically.
“I don't want no dark meat,” Turtle said.
“Not that,” Boehmer explained. “I hear there's niggers
roaming around, sort of patrolling Niggertown, like. They
think they're tough.”
“They ain't half tough,” said Hefty.
“Course, if you guys are afraid of a fight,” Boehmer sug-
gested.
They disclaimed that. “Who's scared? ... I'm not afraid
of no black son of a bitch. ... We got a right to take a walk
on a public street, I guess. ... We won't start nothin', but if
they do...."
They left change for the waitress and started out. The
night was cool and blazing with stars, but they did not look
above the neon lights. “I've got a switch-blade,” Turtle con-
fided.
It turned out that the other soda jerk and the hardware
clerk also carried these weapons.


THE WHITE BAND
193
"I got this,” said Hefty, holding up a heavy fist. “It gen-
erally looks after me.”
"I don't need no switch-blade either,” Boehmer assured
them.
They entered Niggertown on a dark, still street. The street
was empty. It was nearing ten o'clock, and the only sugges-
tion of life was what you imagined behind the soft lights in
the seamy houses. They walked three blocks, and met no one.
“Aw, let's go back," said Turtle, “this here's a false alarm.”
Then at a corner they almost collided with a small group
of colored men, perhaps six or seven. Bearcat Turner was in
personal command.
“Whar you white boys goin'?” he demanded.
“What's it to you, uncle?” Hefty retorted, catching in the
street light a patch of gray hair. He didn't know Bearcat.
“I bet I make you say uncle,” Bearcat came back.
“You think so?” Hefty stepped back in a fighting pose.
Bearcat laughed. “You clumsy white boy. I could teach
you a lot."
“Want to try?" Hefty challenged. The other white boys
clustered around him, and those with switch-blades held them
in their pockets ready to draw. The Negroes stood close to
Bearcat, awaiting his orders. They too had been taking on
drinks, beer or whiskey, against the chill of the night, and
none much cared whether or not there was trouble.
The white boys had never heard of Bearcat Turner, or, if
some of them had, none recognized him. To them he was
just another nigger trying to act tough.
“You ain't got no business down here messin' around with
us,” one of the other Negroes put in.
“We'll go wherever we goddam please,” said Boehmer,
taking a step forward.
none


194
THE WHITE BAND
One of the Negroes behind Bearcat pulled a blackjack and
swung it gently at his side.
Turtle saw the blackjack and drew his switch-blade, snap-
ping it open and holding it menacingly above his shoulder.
So intent had the two groups been that none had heard
approaching footsteps. Now a man stopped and took in the
situation. He hesitated, then squared his shoulders and stepped
close to the hostile groups.
“What's the trouble?” he asked, raising his voice to give it
the color of authority, without which he knew they wouldn't
listen to him. They stared at him, the Negro with the black-
jack still swinging it easily, Turtle still holding his switch-
blade high, ready for use.
They didn't know him, or didn't recognize him. He was a
white man; at least he looked like one in the dim path of the
corner light. He might be a cop; there was something about
him, perhaps his assurance, that suggested the law, or at least
some authority.
arcat muttered to himself, then spoke up. “They got no
business down here. We gonta show 'em, too.”
Hefty Brown said, “We wasn't doing nothing, just walking
along, and they stopped us and asked us where we was going.
They got no right ...”
The stranger did not let him finish. “Look,” he said, taking
in the poised blackjack and the readied switch-blade, “you
fellows haven't really got any grievance against one another.
Neither crowd has done a thing to the other. It's just a little
misunderstanding. Now look. If you go ahead and fight,
what'll happen? Some of you'll get hurt. It won't matter
which side wins, some of you'll be hurt, and hurt bad. Knives
and blackjacks, and some of you may have guns for all I know.
What's the sense in that? Getting hurt, going to the hospital,
maybe some of you to the morgue, all for nothing. Forget it,
no


196
THE WHITE BAND
spectacles, and a ready smile. "How are you, Tom?” he asked
pleasantly.
“I'm fine, Mr. Haynes."
“What can I do for you?”
Tom Goodwin pulled out his billfold and extracted a notice.
“It's just that this note is due, Mr. Haynes. I thought I'd pay
a hundred on it and ask you to renew it.”
The executive vice president took the notice and studied it.
“Just a minute, Tom.'
Mr. Haynes went down the row of officers' desks and con-
ferred with the cashier and with another vice president. Then
he went into the president's private office. In a little while he
emerged and resumed his seat. He seemed to regret what he
had to say. “I'm sorry, Tom, but we can't renew this note.”
Tom Goodwin looked stricken. “But why not, Mr.
Haynes? My credit's always been good here. I've always
looked after my notes promptly, always paid something on
them and paid them off within a reasonable time. What's
wrong?”
"I'm sorry, Tom, but the officers of this bank don't feel
that they can renew it, so it will have to be paid in full.”
“But I haven't got the money, Mr. Haynes. I had no
idea ..."
Bailey Haynes shrugged. “I don't know how you'll man-
age, Tom. But there's nothing we can do."
“But I don't see what I've done to ..." But it occurred to
him what he had done, and he was suddenly silent. He had
never supposed that such a thing could go this far, invade a
transaction which was entirely business, break off a well-estab-
lished credit. It seemed incredible. How far could prejudice,
hatred, retaliation go?
The lawyer stood up. “I think I do understand,” he said
stiffly.


THE WHITE BAND
197
Mr. Haynes looked embarrassed. “Good-by, Tom,” he said.
Tom Goodwin went out with worry gnawing at him like
an insidious pain. Where would he get the money? Would
they levy on his furniture? What would they do? Ella would
be worried sick. He hated to tell her, but he had to.
Dr. and Mrs. Davison stood against the wall, watching the
other dancers. The band, an elaborate eleven-piece affair,
Baynesville's best, was playing a carioca.
The Davisons had danced three times. There were always
men eager to dance with Eva, and her husband usually danced
with the wives of their closest friends.
But no one came near them. A few bowed distantly as they
passed. The ballroom of the Baynesville Country Club was
decorated with all the trappings of autumn: pumpkins, bright-
tinted leaves, corn shucks, gourds fluttering flamboyant
streamers. The floor was well filled, and another little crowd
was clustered around the punch bowl.
Eva leaned over to Bill Davison, her laugh strained. “Wall-
flower.”
Bill said nothing. He was studying the dancers. The num-
ber ended, there was perfunctory applause, and some of the
dancers drifted to the punch bowl; others stood about chat-
ting till the next dance. Arriving at a sudden decision, he
excused himself from Eva, and, as the band tuned up for a
fresh number, he approached Thelma Hutchinson, wife of the
town's leading realtor. “Good evening, Thelma."
“How'do, Dr. Davison,” she said coldly.
“May I have this dance?"
Thelma Hutchinson, a bosomy, handsome woman on the
near side of middle age, molded into a brown velvet evening
gown, stared at Bill Davison as if he were somebody she ought


198
THE WHITE BAND
SOL
to know but could not quite place. “I'm sorry, Dr. Davison,”
she said crisply, “it's taken.”
“Then a later one?” he suggested.
“All taken,” she said.
“I see. Thank you.” He turned away, chuckling to him-
self.
Eva still stood against the wall, alone. When her husband
rejoined her she said, “I guess you're a wallflower too.”
"So it seems.”
Bill Davison glanced at his wife in impersonal appraisal.
She looked gorgeous, he thought, in the sky-blue gown; there
was not a prettier woman there. They were all spiting them-
selves.
But suddenly a figure disentangled itself from the knot at
the punch bowl and came swiftly toward them. It paused in
front of Eva Davison. “Am I in time to ask you for this
dance?"
“You are,” she said, “thank you.”
Eva whirled away in the arms of Harry Davis, who was
said by the mothers of unmarried girls to be just about the
most completely eligible bachelor in town. In his early forties,
he was easy for the girls to look at. Also-and more to the
point-he was reputed to be wealthy. He headed a Baynesville
link with Wall Street, the local branch of Stowe & Hanson,
members, New York Stock Exchange.
Harry Davis was a marvelous dancer, Eva reflected. She
said in his ear, “I should have turned you down. You'll catch
whatever it is I've got.”
He laughed. “I know what's going on-the goddam nar-
row-minded ..."
“So you took pity on me?”
“Not at all, damn it; it's because I'm proud to be seen with
you. You're the best-looking gal here."


THE WHITE BAND
199
“Thank you, sir.”
The Davisons left early, but not so early that it would
appear they were running away. Many had left before they
did.
In the car they were silent half the way home. Then Bill
Davison said, “I was wondering ..."
“What, dear?”
“Well, whether that college in Pennsylvania, Claybank, has
found a president. You know, they offered me the job just a
few weeks ago.”
“You might find out,” she said. “We might like it. You
said it was up in the mountains, somewhere near the New
York border. Sounds like a pretty spot.”
"It's a good college too.” He paused and added more em-
phatically: “not that I'll let a lot of dimwits who don't think,
but only take their prejudices out for air-I won't let them
run me out. But my staying might hurt this college.”
“I hadn't thought of that,” she said.
"I wouldn't want to hurt this college,” he added.
“Of course not.”
He turned into their driveway.


18
E'LL NEED,” Dave Beckett was saying, “about a dozen
more file clerks and general utility people. This office is being
inundated with paper work.”
“Is that bad?” Hank Caldwell asked.
“I'd say it was damned good,” said Dave. “It means about
a hundred new memberships a day, sometimes more. We call
them applications, but that's a mere formality. The local
chapters decide."
The two young men sat in Dave's office in the executive
suite on the top floor. Hank went to one of the windows.
The skyline of Riverport was dimmed by fog, which hid the
river except for patches here and there, making it look like a
series of lakes.
“The main thing,” said Hank, “is for 'em to send us our
share of the check or cash that accompanies each application."
Dave laughed. He changed the subject. “You know, Hank,
Joe is worried about these little outbreaks of trouble here and
3.
200


THE WHITE BAND
201
there. I call them little because none has been really serious.
He's more worried than I am.”
"The White Band,” Hank pointed out, “is sure to get
blamed every time somebody gets a black eye. I don't give a
damn, except that we can't afford to be known as the tar-and-
feathers boys."
“Naturally not,” Dave agreed. “We're hated by enough
people now-Yankee liberals and Southern do-gooders and
bleeding hearts. So we've got to watch our step. They could
make a lot of trouble for us.”
Hank recalled, “As Grand Recorder, I have to write most
of the policy letters, and Joe's made me write several calling
down some chapters pretty sharply, telling Protectors they
had better watch their step and try to keep order in their
towns, even if they are not directly responsible for recent
trouble. Joe never asks to see the letters, and I generally tone
them down a little. Hell, we wouldn't want to lose any chap-
ters.”
“You're so right,” said Dave. He caught Hank's arm, pulled
him closer and lowered his voice. “Joe's worried about his
own reputation. He's not out of politics, not by a damn
sight."
The door opened and Joe Duffield pushed in. “What's
new, boys?”
They disclaimed knowledge of anything in particular. But
Dave thought of something. “Now that you're no longer a
senator, Joe, can't we book you for more speeches here and
there? You're our most effective organizing aid.”
Joe lit a cigarette. “Thank you, and I'm at your service.
It's a relief to have Washington off my back. I never knew
when I'd have to go winging up there, or else attend to some
bothersome thing down here for my dear constituents. I was
splitting myself in two, and I should have foreseen how it


202
THE WHITE BAND
would be and resigned in the summer. Well, it's done now,
and I can devote myself to advancing our cause."
Dave said, “Swell,” and Hank added, “We're all set now.”
"Well, I guess I'll go in and open my mail. If you need me,
I'll be in my little hideaway."
Joe left, retreating to his spacious corner suite. The mail
was piled on his desk. He shuffled it over. Not one letter
looked interesting. He stepped over to the windows and
looked down on the fog-haunted city. The air was chill and
clammy, and the office felt pleasantly warm.
The committee from an organization long forgotten, the
Independent Citizens' Association, had come to his home that
night, in the spring of 1933. He was unmarried then, only
three years out of Georgetown Law, and he still lived with
his mother. His father had been dead several years. His
mother had ushered the men into the parlor and left.
He walked in and shook hands with each of them and
waited, puzzled, for them to explain their mission. They
wanted him to run for district attorney. It seemed absurd.
He was, he felt, too young, too inexperienced. But they
didn't think so; they thought he was a comer and said so;
they had heard him speak, some had observed him in the
courtroom. They wanted somebody young and unencum-
bered with political and God knew what other alliances. Old
Tom Maxwell had had the job four terms; that was long
enough. Besides, he didn't care how he administered the
office. He was a bully. He was devoted to obtaining con-
victions for the record, not to doing justice. There was more
than a sniff of suspicion that he was tied in with a crooked
ring of bondsmen and gamblers and bootleggers, though no-
body had been able to get enough evidence to go before the


THE WHITE BAND
203
grand jury. He, Joe, could feel free to do what he thought
was right. They wanted somebody young and progressive;
they were sick of weary old politicians. Furthermore, they
could command a lot of support.
In the end, he succumbed. He ran. He was brimful of
ideas and ideals. He promised the people to do his utmost
to see that justice was administered, regardless of who was
convicted, who exonerated. He wasn't out to send people to
jail; he was there to see that people got a square deal, insofar
as a prosecutor could. ... “I don't care, friends, what a man's
color is, what his antecedents, whether his people were born
here or came from the old country to establish themselves in
a freer land. They'll all get the same deal. I don't care
whether a man has wealth and influence, if I think he's guilty
he'll be prosecuted to the limit of the law. I don't care
whether a man's a poor Negro without a friend, if I think
he's innocent I'll move to exonerate him, to turn him
loose....”
Old Tom Maxwell had a gay time. “My youthful oppo-
nent, no doubt in his inexperience and innocence, is prom-
ising you something he calls justice. What is justice? When
a guilty man asks for justice, he means turn him a-loose. ..."
(He stuck to Redneck idiom, which made him more popular.)
“I don't prosecute or persecute poor, downtrodden niggers.
But I do make it red-hot for bad niggers-for those who steal
you blind, for some who would rape your daughters if they
got a chance, if they dared. I don't protect people of influ-
ence, as my youthful opponent calls them. What is a person
of influence? I don't know what young Duffield means, but
I take it to mean a person who is looked up to, who influences
others because he has accomplished something in the world,
earned the respect of his neighbors and friends. Such people,
I've observed, don't often go wrong. Certainly I'd take the


204
THE WHITE BAND
testimony of such a person against a nigger or a poor white
who nobody knew and who was probably too lazy to learn
his letters. I don't know whether my baby-faced opponent
would or not. The way he talks maybe he'd prefer to take
the word of a nigger or some poor white that blew in from
God knows where after robbing heaven knows what hen-
roost. ... Another thing, neighbors: Our fine young friend
is soft-pedaling it-he didn't mention it in any of his speeches
--but he went to law school at a college named Georgetown.
I don't know's you folks know what Georgetown University
is. Well, it's a university at Washington City run by Jesuits,
a Roman Catholic order. I haven't time to go into the Jesuits,
but I might say they're known far and wide for their devious
ways. No telling what kind of law the Jesuits taught our
young friend. No wonder he took up for foreigners. Remem-
ber, the Catholic Church is a foreign outfit. ..."
The Klan denounced young Joe Duffield, asked its members
to reelect District Attorney Maxwell.
The Independent Citizens' Association turned out to have
less influence than it had hoped for.
Joe lost by a landslide.
But he learned a lesson that he never forgot. For a short
time he played with the idea of abandoning politics at the
threshold. Then, a few years later, he was tempted to run for
the legislature. He was very careful what he said. And peo-
ple had forgotten all about his sad race for district attorney.
This time he won.
He never lost another election.
Sally Duffield had come home to pack for Bryn Mawr.
She was getting things out of the fragrant cedar chest in which
she kept her winter outfits when her father's strong steps


THE WHITE BAND
205
ascended the stairs. She ran out and kissed him. “Hi, Dad.”
“Hello, pet.”
At twenty, Joe reflected, his daughter reminded him of
Sarah when he first met her, that summer he graduated from
law school and was down at Virginia Beach for ten days.
Sarah was never quite so pretty, but she'd had the same big,
dark eyes which widened so provocatively when she was
amused, the same natural touch of color in her cheeks. Sally's
nose and mouth were better proportioned, more symmetrical.
But it was more in the total effect that you found beauty;
if you had to analyze it, you lost it-like a lot of other things.
"How was No'th C’lina?” he asked.
“No’th C’lina was very fine,” she said. “Especially the part
where I was, the mountings.'
"Have a good time?”
“Grand. Come in a minute, Dad. You won't interfere with
the trying process of packing."
She caught his hand and pulled him into her room. She
wore a cream duster. Dresses, coats, and sweaters were strewn
about the bed and the chairs. A nearly empty trunk awaited
her selections.
She bustled about. “How've you been, Dad?”
“Oh, fine.”
“I think,” she said, touching his hair and cheeks, "you did
just right in resigning from the Senate. You couldn't carry on
up there, even temporarily, and still ... Of course I'm not
happy over this White Band, but you already know that."
He said nothing, and she went on, “But I'm sure, Dad, all
this talk of violence ... I know you'd never countenance
anything like that.”
"You're right, pet, never.”
“But how can you stop it?”
“We'll stop it, at least so far as the White Band as an


THE WHITE BAND
207
that plush place in the mountains that they call a rest home,
not a sanitarium?”
“I doubt it, but if she did she'd probably start in again soon
after she came out. You've got to want to quit.”
“I know. Poor Dad, it's a terrible worry for you.” She put
her arms around him, smoothed his thick, dark hair.
“I think I'll go up and see her,” he said. "See how she is.”
“Okay. Oh, Dad, I felt bad too when you quit the Senate.
I was so proud of you as a senator, if I didn't always agree
with you. After all, I reckon a Southern senator or congress-
man can go only so far.”
“That's just it,” he said. “But I'll be back in politics one of
these days. You'll see.”
“I hope so. You've got a positive genius for politics.”
“Thanks, pet.”
It was still daylight, but Sarah had darkened her room as if
the light hurt her. She lay on her back on top of the neatly
made bed, enveloped in her purple bathrobe. She looked up at
him with widening eyes. "Hello, Joe.”
"Feel better, Sarah dear?”
“I feel like hell,” she said in a grating voice. “Oh, Joe, I'm
sorry I gave you such a bad time the other day. Remorse
has hung over me like a fog at dawn.”
He laughed. “Forget it, Sarah. Anything I can do for
you?”
"I can't think of anything, unless it's another drink.”
“If you need it, you'll get it,” he said. “What would you
prefer?"
"Anything. What difference does it make to an alcoholic?”
She was remorseful: she rarely admitted her addiction. He


208
THE WHITE BAND
ran downstairs, mixed a palatable drink of gin and grapefruit
juice, and took it up to her. She sipped it gratefully.
He took advantage of her mood. “Look, Sarah dear, how'd
you like to go up to the mountains to recuperate?”
“That would be nice. ... Oh, you mean the Blue Ridge
Rest Home. No, I wouldn't. Absolutely not.” She had
turned angry.
“Okay, okay, dear. It was just a suggestion.”
“I'll recuperate right here,” she said, mollified. “You'll see.”
“Sure, you will. Try to rest now. I'll see you later this
evening.”
She caught his arm, pulled him close and kissed him
"You're sweet, Joe, and so patient with me. I don't deserve
it. I know I'm as difficult as—as a problem in calculus.”
He laughed, extricated himself gently, and left her.


19
LIM O'HEARN was dressing for the Harvest Festival Prom.
It was held in the gym, which was always gaudy with autumn
leaves (sometimes they had to send up to the mountains for
them, so slow were the leaves around here to turn), pumpkins,
and autumn flowers.
His roommate at the Phi-O house, Jack Talley, was looking
for his black tie. Jack was one of those boys who can never
find what they need urgently at the moment. “It was in this
drawer,” he said, “I know damn well.”
“Hell, I didn't take it,” said Tim, “and I doubt if any of
the other guys did.”
“I wouldn't put it past any of them,” Jack Talley said, “if
he happened to need it.”
Tim fished in the second drawer, which was his, and drew
out his hand triumphantly. “There it is! What'd I tell you?
You must have stuck it here. I'm not hoarding black ties.”
Jack Talley laughed and reached for the tie. “Thanks, I
209


210
THE WHITE BAND
don't see how ...” He was a slight but well-muscled youth.
He was on the track team, ran the dashes up to the 440.
Phi O bragged that it had more letter men than any frat on
the campus. It probably was true, so what? Eggy (for Egg-
head) Prentice had commented. He was the chapter's intel-
lectual. He knew what music the three Strausses had written,
and Bach was more than a name to him. He played the piano
quite well, and planned to teach music and compose. He had
even read Proust and Thomas Wolfe, or said he had. He
hadn't made a thing except the glee club and the school
orchestra, but his fraternity brothers forgave him. It looked
well for the chapter to have at least one highbrow.
Jack Talley said, as he adjusted the restored tie, “I thought
this integration thing had died down, but I heard something
today.”
“What?" Tim O'Hearn asked.
"Well, I heard there was some vigilante stuff brewing."
"What do you mean, vigilante?” The football captain
stared in the mirror to see that his collar and tie were just so.
"Well, there's a guy named Bundy I know. We went
through high school together. He works for a real estate out-
fit. His boss is in the White Band, and Bill Bundy overheard
him telling another Bandsman about it. Seems a bunch of
them are all set to take some niggers out and work them over.
Those niggers, he gathered, are agitators, causing a lot of this
trouble.”
“I didn't know there was any trouble,” Tim said, “except
what happened on the campus.”
“How about all this court stuff?”.
“Well, you could expect that after the Supreme Court ...”
“Goddam niggers,” said Jack Talley. “It's not only the
court stuff. I heard things were boiling in Niggertown, jigs
going around armed.”


THE WHITE BAND
211
“That so?”
"Sure. Maybe if they work over a couple of the leaders
it'll put the fear of Christ in the rest."
“Maybe.” Tim said indifferently. “I guess it's time to go.”
They were going in Tim's car. “We'll stop at the Sig house
and pick up your girl, then drop by the Delta house and get
mine. We should have arranged to have gals in the same
sorority.”
“I was gone on a Delta,” Jack recalled, “but she tossed me
for some dumb, beefy football player.”
Tim laughed. “It wasn't me."
"You're not beefy. This bird plays somewhere in the line.”
“I'm just dumb.”
“Well, at times.”
In the exhilaration of dancing and making a little innocent
love to Lou Purcell behind the gym, Tim O'Hearn didn't give
the racial situation another thought until he and Jack Talley
deposited their girls at their respective sorority houses and
returned, well after midnight, to the Phi-O house. It was a
gorgeous October night, chill enough to suggest autumn, with
2 high moon spilling its silver-golden glow over the campus.
Jack went in, but Tim lingered on the porch to savor the
quiet, mysterious night. The dry tone of insects came from
the hedge. The night had a grassy, piney smell, and his
thoughts turned back to Lou.
Eggy Prentice loomed out of the half-light and climbed the
porch. He wore a light topcoat open over his evening clothes.
“Hi, Tim."
"Hi. Have a good time?”
“So-so. I had a better time after I found a guy with a flask,
and we slipped out around the boiler room and had us a few."


THE WHITE BAND
213
“Of course he wasn't. Same goes for most nigras. But I
didn't bring up this thing just to moralize. I started to say
we've got two ardent White Bandsmen right here in the
house."
"I think I know who they are.”
“You probably do. Well, another fellow on the campus I
know real well-he told me something that gave me pause.
He was talking to Fats Gilliam. Fats has some national office
in the Band, I understand. This friend of mine, this student,
is a Bandsman. He told Fats he heard there was trouble
brewing in Niggertown. Fats said he knew it, but he didn't
think it would last long, that some fellows were going to take
a couple of the leaders out and teach them the facts of life.
I don't doubt that's what'll happen too.”
"Did Fats say he was in on it?”
"Fats didn't say. But I wouldn't put it past him.”
“He surely couldn't afford, in his position ...”
"Maybe he'll sit back and let some other goons do the
work,” Eggy Prentice suggested.
"Could be. As I say, I'm not won over to integration, but
I'm not for that sort of thing. I'm for peaceful opposition.”
“There's no such thing,” Eggy Prentice said bitterly.
He got up. “Guess I'll turn in.”
“ 'Night.”
Tim O'Hearn sat on for a while, vaguely aware that he was
chilled but unaccountably reluctant to enter the house and
go to bed as he should. The thin sounds of the night were
shattered now and then by the raucous starting of a car or
the distant snort of a diesel or the laughter of homeward-
heading revelers. Well, it was none of his business what the
White Band did or any of its members. But he couldn't help
seeing Jack Taylor as he stood that day hesitating in the
labyrinth of campus buildings, reluctant to ask his way.


214
THE WHITE BAND
Tim hadn't seen any of the rioting, but he had heard about
it from witnesses and read long accounts of it in the River-
port papers. (The Baynesville Daily News had dismissed it
with a few colorless paragraphs.) Every time he thought of it,
he felt indignant. It seemed to him that even from that
momentary contact he knew Jack Taylor. The boy, he was
sure, would never intrude, never push himself on anybody.
What did it matter if his skin was dark?
Well, Jack Taylor was out of whatever it was that simmered
in town; he'd gone, far away probably. But what were they
like, the ones some Bandsmen would teach what they called
the facts of life? Were they as innocuous, as polite and in-
conspicuous as Jack had been? Who could say? It didn't
matter what they were like; they were human beings with
bodies and souls, just like everybody else.
Tim got up, opened and closed the door softly, climbed to
his room. Jack Talley was in his bed asleep. Tim undressed
silently. Before he got into bed he knelt and said an “Our
Father” and a “Hail Mary.” Then he added, “Oh God, give
me guidance. Is this any of my business? Should I ignore it
or do something about it? What could I do, anyway?"
No answer came into his mind.
Ned Tarver had been at Tom Goodwin's house. Tom,
bless his hospitable heart, had insisted on dinner there, and
Ella had remarked that Ned was part of the family now, so
it wasn't like entertaining a guest.
Afterward the two lawyers had gone over their appeal
brief, which was neatly typed and stapled between covers.
Tom would file it in Federal Court tomorrow. They couldn't
find anything wrong with it or think of anything to add.
Tom Goodwin said he wanted a walk-too many hours in


THE WHITE BAND
215
his office poring over documents—and he went back to the
hotel with Ned. On the way they stopped and had a couple
of beers.
They had both heard disquieting rumors about trouble im-
pending.
“I can't put my finger on it,” Tom said. “I sort of sense
it. Oh, I heard things. I've heard Bearcat Turner and some
of his friends were patrolling Niggertown armed with various
things. I've heard the White Band was planning summary
justice for some of us. Probably you and I head the list.”
“I've heard all that,” said Ned, draining his glass. “But I
discount it. You know, I've had two threats. Two notes. I
told you. The last one said I had one week to get out of town.
That was nearly three weeks ago. I'm still here, and nobody's
bothered me yet, beyond a few hard looks. I can take them.”
Tom laughed. “If looks could kill, a lot of us would be
long in our graves.”
Then Tom told of his experience at the bank. He had
confided in no one except Ella, but he thought Ned should
know. "So that's the sort of thing we're up against.”
Ned whistled. “Gee, I never thought it would come to
that. And they're simply spiting themselves, cutting off busi-
ness, perhaps in a small way with you, but it might spread.
I'm sure you were a good credit risk.”
“I always thought so. I was never turned down before.”
“What lengths they won't go to...."
They finished their beer. Tom left Ned at the entrance to
his hotel, saying he'd see him in a few days. Tom had to go
to Birmingham tomorrow to plead a case.
Ned's room seemed stuffy, and he opened a window wide
and stood by it, tasting the cold night. It was almost Novem-
ber, and autumn had set in definitely at last.
Why not fly back to New York for a few days, now that


216
THE WHITE BAND
he d phone the airlinlaybe he could get meeting
the brief was finished? He longed to see Nell, and to get
away from Baynesville even for a short time; the place was
getting on his nerves. He did have to be here most of the time
to see what would happen from day to day, to report to his
organization, perhaps to visit other towns. But there was
nothing to compel him to remain here every moment.
Well, tomorrow night he'd promised to speak at a meeting
of the Toussaint Elks' Club. Maybe he could get away the
next day. He'd phone the airline at Riverport tomorrow about
a seat.
He closed the window; the room was getting cold.
An old compartment of his life suddenly flew open. It
was the summer he was seventeen. He was a senior at Dunbar
High School, making his way by working in old Bianchi's
grocery as messenger boy-janitor-handy man. Bianchi was
a kindly old man who had come over from Naples in his
youth. He had no prejudice against Negroes, but he had lived
in the South a long time. He knew the score. One day, when
there were no customers and Bianchi and Ned were just
standing around, the old man talked to him about his life.
"You plan go North to college, eh, Ned?”.
"Yes, sir, I do.”
“What you wan' be, lawyer, doctor maybe?”
“Maybe a lawyer, I'm not sure."
“Good for you, but she's hard to do, make your way like
that, you being colored. I got nothing against coloreds, noth-
ing in my book, but lotsa people they have. I never know
why. They same as anybody else with me, good and bad,
mean and kind. But I live in New York some years after I
come over from the old country. See? I knew Negroes been
to college, got-what you call it?-degrees. And working in-a
restaurants-waiters. Or maybe janitors-apartment houses.
See? They can't get started in-a better jobs.
TV


THE WHITE BAND
217
mo
ve
“Look, Ned. You do better stay right here. When you get
outa high school I make you my assistant. You wrap packages,
ring up-a cash. I give you more money. You save maybe.
One these days I retire, sell out. You maybe buy me out, eh?
We right on edga Darktown, we got mostly colored people
now. You run grocery for coloreds. You do all right, maybe
get rich, eh? Do lot-a better'n me, eh?”
He thanked Bianchi. He was touched by the old man's
interest in him. He'd think it over. But he didn't have to
think about it much. Ever since his grammar-school years, the
later ones, he'd felt a compulsion to push on, to go to college
at any cost, to get somewhere. He'd known all along it
wouldn't be easy. A Negro was born with two strikes on
him. Still, he had that third chance. He could only try to
make the most of it.


AKE (FATS) GILLIAM put away some diagrams in the top
drawer of his desk. Practice had ended an hour ago; it was
completely dark, and the strong light hanging over the desk
did not fully illuminate the cluttered office under the gym.
There were dark corners revealing ambiguous shapes, which
actually were hunting boots, a worn sport coat, discarded
shoes, and boxes containing a miscellany of old athletic equip-
ment.
The coach stood at the mirror, studying his thick face with
its small, piggish eyes. He didn't need a shave. What if he
did? That bunch wouldn't notice. There'd be no dames
around.
He thought of his wife. A nice morsel she'd been when
he married her and no mistake. But she'd developed shrewish
traits. She was the worst nagger he'd ever imagined. Why did
he do this, and why didn't he do that? Why did he leave his
clothes and his hunting things around to clutter up the house?
218


220
THE WHITE BAND
“We're going in two sections, Will. I'll have the first one,
and we'll pick up one guest near the nigger Elks' hall. He's
speaking there. We'll be waiting when the meeting's over,
not right in front of the hall, of course. The other section-
and I'll ask you to join that-it'll meet with the rest of us in
Payne's pool hall about eight o'clock. You'll be hosts to the
other guest.”
“Where'll we find this other jig?”
“Be careful what you say,” Fats Gilliam cut in. “You're
talking through a switchboard. Your guest probably will be
at the same meeting. That's very likely. But in case he's not,
he'll undoubtedly be at home, and you can pick him up there.
Bill Dade'll be in charge of your section, and he has the
address. You won't have any trouble locating the other
guest.”
"I see. I'll be at Payne's on time.”
“We're meeting, both cars, out beyond Ben's Tavern on
the Spread Creek Road. But Bill has full instructions, what
you're to wear, so on. I suggest you call him tonight or in the
morning.”
“I'll do that. Thanks, Fats. Sorry I can't make it tonight.
See you tomorrow.”
“So long.”
The coach put down the phone, lighted a cigarette, and
again switched off the light. He left his office, making sure
the spring lock had secured the door. He pushed into the
brisk autumn night, got into his car, which was parked in a
corner of the athletic field, and drove toward the center of
town.
Tim O'Hearn stood frozen against a wall of the Athletic
Association Building, just under a window of the coach's
office. Now he took a deep breath of relief as he saw Fats'


THE WHITE BAND
22 1
car leaving the grounds. He had heard everything Fats said
over the phone. It was clear enough, especially after what
he'd heard at the frat, what was to happen tomorrow night.
Tim had come to see the coach to offer him a play he'd
thought up since last practice-a variation on the fake forward,
quick lateral. But after hearing the coach answer the phone,
Tim, for some reason he couldn't quite understand, had
slipped along the brick wall under the window and listened.
It was no credit to him to do such a thing, he knew, but
he felt impelled to. After he'd heard, he'd been afraid to
waylay Fats and tell him about the play. The coach would
sense that he'd been eavesdropping, would probably have read
it in his face. So he stood rooted to the spot until Fats left.
Now that he knew, what should he do? Forget it? Might
as well, for all the good he could do. He didn't know any of
the others involved, didn't know the victims chosen, but
assumed they were Negro leaders in this fight against segre-
gation. Should he go to Fats, when he could get hold of
him? He knew what would happen. The coach would deny
it, laugh at him and tell him not to be ridiculous, not to make
a horse's ass out of himself. They were simply going out on a
party. He'd misunderstood some harmless joke he might have
said over the phone. No, he'd get nowhere with Fats. But
he might frighten the big bully into dropping the project.
After all he, Tim, had incriminating evidence which wouldn't
sound well before a grand jury, the coach's own words. If
they went through with this thing, Mr. Gilliam's overheard
words could come back to haunt him.
But who cared about evidence in this segregation fight?
Who cared what was done to niggers or who did it? Fats
would simply deny it, say he'd never said any such thing to
anybody. It would be his word against the coach's. Fats
would make it so tough for him-a coach knew how-that
he'd have to quit football. Then Fats would spread it around


222
THE WHITE BAND
the campus that Tim was a nigger-lover and had tried to pin
a false charge on him because he was sore at the coach over
a personal misunderstanding involving football. Maybe this
Tim O'Hearn whom the frosh looked up to with awe would
end up a campus pariah. Stranger things had happened.
Maybe he'd better just forget the whole thing. After all,
it wasn't his affair. It was doubtful if he could stop it anyway.
Tim, his hands in the pockets of his heavy sport coat,
started back across the athletic field. But how could he forget?
The thing would gnaw at him all night; he wouldn't sleep.
After all, for better or worse, he had a conscience. It must
be better not to have one. Conscience makes cowards of us
all. In more ways than one. He thought of some Negro like
Jack Taylor taken out, beaten, maybe killed, for all he knew.
Integration might be a bad thing, but so was mobbing, savage
cruelty. No, he couldn't forget. But there was no use bring-
ing Fats Gilliam into it at all; that would get him nowhere.
Nobody would believe him.
Still, there must be some other way. The police? Surely
they didn't want a thing like this to happen, to give the town
another black eye. What had happened on the campus was
bad enough. What cops did he know? Not many: some
traffic cops, a couple of plain ones that pounded beats. They
wouldn't do a thing, except maybe refer him to higher au-
thority. Should he go to Doc Davison? But what could even
Doc do? Tim didn't know the chief of police, Steve Bannock,
but maybe he'd take a chance and walk in on him. That
would be better than fooling around with somebody who had
no authority.
n
2
Tim said to the desk sergeant, “I'm Tim O'Hearn. I'm a
student at Teachers and ..."


THE WHITE BAND
223
“Don't you think I know you, Tim?” said the sergeant.
“You think I haven't seen you play? I seen you make that
seventy-yard run against State U last year. That was the
prettiest run ever I see.”
“Thanks. I wanted to see the chief, Mr. Bannock, if I
could.”
“Oh, sure, Tim. His office is right around the corridor to
your right. Can't miss it. He'll see you, I'm sure, if he's still
around, and I think he is.”
“Thanks a lot.”
The chief had an outer office where a girl presided. But
when he told her his name and she relayed it to the inner
office, he was promptly asked to step in. A handsome, gray-
haired man in his early fifties got up from his desk. He wore
a trim gray uniform with a gold badge. “So you're Tim
O'Hearn? I think I'd have recognized you from seeing you
play, though I don't think I ever saw you close up.”
Steve Bannock held out his hand, and Tim shook it. The
chief said, "Sit down, Mr. O'Hearn. It's a pleasure to meet
you. Going to lick L.S.U. Saturday?”
"I doubt it, sir, but we'll give it the old try.”
"I know that. What can I do for you? Somebody break
in the frat house?”
"Not that, Chief, this time. I thought I'd pass on something
I heard-on the very best authority.”
The chief leaned forward and waited for Tim to go on.
“It's about this segregation or desegregation thing, Chief. I
understand some nigras mixed up in it are going to be picked
up near the Elks' tomorrow night and ... I don't know what's
to be done to them, but nothing good, you can bet.”
“That so?” Steve Bannock looked across at Tim, his light
manner gone. “Who are they planning to work on?”
"I wish I knew, Chief-I'd tell you."


224
THE WHITE BAND
"Well, who's mixed up in this?”
“I don't know that. I realize my information is pretty
vague, but it comes straight from the feedbox.”
"How did you hear it?” the chief pressed. “Who told
you?”
“It was-well, confidential,” Tim explained. “I'm not try-
ing to hold out on you, Chief, but I simply can't tell where I
got the dope, but I believe it absolutely. I'm satisfied it's
going to happen, or I wouldn't have come to you with it."
Chief Bannock looked perplexed. “You don't leave me
much to go on, Tim. I know how it is when somebody tells
you something in confidence, swears you to secrecy. We get
lots of confidential tips, and sometimes they're very helpful.
But in a case like this ... well, we don't know who's fixing to
do what to who. All we can do is look out for trouble and
hope it doesn't happen. We've heard a lot of things about this
situation, and all the tips have been duds so far, except what
happened on the campus, and that was pretty well expected.
I've heard the niggers had an armed patrol roaming around
Niggertown, and some white men were all set to burn down
half the place, but you can't put your finger on anything.
One of their leaders—the niggers', I mean-has received threats,
but nothing's come of it. Anyway, thanks for coming in, Tim,
and if you decide you can tell me more about what you've
heard, come in again. If I'm not here, call me at home. I
don't want to see any more trouble than we've had, but I wish
these agitators would go home and leave our niggers alone.
We get along with 'em.”
"Okay, Chief.”
"All we can do meanwhile is be on the lookout. Good luck
Saturday, Tim.”
“Thanks a lot, Chief.”
Tim left city hall. It was almost dinner time, cold and quite


THE WHITE BAND
225
dark, and people were leaving their stores and offices and
streaming homeward.
He paused at the street curb, in front of his car, wondering
what else he should do. Why had he protected Fats? Because
he was afraid of the coach? Not physically-he could never
recall being afraid of anyone physically, and it had cost him
some lickings when he was smaller-but afraid of the coach's
influence, overpowered by his reputation. The man was
known nationally for the teams he'd turned out at this
comparatively obscure college. Well, that was part of it-the
man's prominence. He, Tim, was a big shot only on the
campus, and what would that amount to when it would be his
word against Coach Gilliam's? If only he had some proof,
if someone else had overheard the phone talk. Could he,
possibly, have been mistaken, could the “party” Fats had
talked about have been less sinister than he thought? If it were
merely a drinking party, they wouldn't be calling at the nigger
Elks’ for a guest. And then there was Fats' sharp warning to
whomever he was talking to, not to forget they were talking
through a switchboard. That hadn't indicated any innocent
purpose. Then there was the tied-in report that had come,
separately, from two of his frat brothers. It all added up.
But he felt that he had made himself look idiotic to the
chief. How could even someone who sincerely wanted to
prevent trouble act on anything so vague? Well, at least the
police must know who the colored leaders were, and they
could guard them. But would they? He doubted it.
In his mind Tim asked the Holy Ghost for guidance. But he
already knew what he had to do.
He got in his car, drove a few blocks, and stopped at a
filling station.
“Fill her up,” he directed.


THE WHITE BAND
227
October. I don't think those gals do any work. They just
pose around and act like college students.”
“You're mistaken, son,” said Joe, “they do work. The stand-
ards at a school like Bryn Mawr are very high.”
“She'll be here three weeks for Christmas, I bet you.”
“I hope so,” said Sarah. “The Yuletide flows in but once a
year.”
Ignoring his wife's rather pathetic effort to turn and twist
phrases, a practice at which she was more adept years ago,
when she used to write some fairly creditable lyrics, Joe said,
“Ted, you'll be glad to get your holidays when you're off at
college. You'll find it's not all fun, that you have to work.”
"Well, at a boys' college,” Ted insisted.
They had finished their dessert and were lingering over
coffee. The muffled, musical sound of the doorbell brought
Martha's quick steps from the kitchen to the front hall. They
heard her talking, a man's voice answering. They were quiet,
and Martha said, “Well, come in, I'll see. He's still at dinner.”
The door was closed, and Martha appeared. “Senator,
they's a young man calling. Says his name's O'Hearn, I think
it is. Says it's real terribly important to see you. I told him
you was at dinner and ...".
Joe got up. “O'Hearn? I don't know anybody by that
name. But maybe I do. When you're in politics you can't
remember half the people you're supposed to know. I'll see
him, Martha.”
“I'll bet he wants something," Sarah commented. “They
always do. But he's nervy to come to your home at this hour.
I wouldn't see him.”
“Well, I will,” said Joe quietly. “It may be important.”
He found a supple young man wearing woolen slacks and
a heavy sport jacket, with a muffler dangling around his neck.


228
THE WHITE BAND
He was seated uncomfortably on the edge of a bench in the
front hallway.
He got up. “I'm sorry to disturb you, Senator."
“That's all right,” said Joe. “What can I do for you?”
"I'm Tim O'Hearn. I'm a student, a senior at Baynesville
Teachers College.”
The name meant nothing to Joe. He did not keep up with
football as he once had.
“I have something important to tell you,” Tim added, a
little diffidently. “I wouldn't have bothered you if I hadn't
thought ..."
"Come in here,” Joe said, pointing into the small reception
room on the left, which rarely was used except for storing
wraps at parties. “Sit down.”
“Thanks.” Tim went on, hesitantly at first, gaining assur-
ance as he continued. “I heard you speak, Senator, at that big
meeting in Baynesville last month. It was a fine speech, and
I was glad to hear you say the White Band wasn't for violence
or trouble, but for-well, peaceful opposition.”
Joe nodded, and waited for the young man to go on. “I've
always admired you, Senator, and I haven't come to ask for a
thing. I simply didn't know who else to go to. I understand,
and I've got it pretty straight, that some men, and I'm told
some of them are in the White Band, are fixing to take some
nigras out tomorrow night and work them over.”
"What nigras?” Joe asked.
“That I don't know, Senator, but I'd assume they're leaders
in this integration fight, maybe outsiders who came down to
push for it. I don't know. I didn't hear any names men-
tioned.”
“Well, Mr. O'Hearn, who are the fellows planning this
thing?"
Tim hesitated. He was close to blurting out Fats' name.


230
THE WHITE BAND
that made you trust him and want to tell him what you felt
you should withhold.
Impulsively Tim said, “I'm going to tell you who it was,
against my better judgment. It was Fats Gilliam, our football
coach.”
“Fats?” Joe's eyes widened with incredulity.
“Yes, and please, Senator, don't tell him or anyone I was
the one told you. It would put me in a very tough spot.”
“I'll protect you,” Joe promised, and Tim knew that he
would.
"I'm on the football team,” Tim explained. “And I had
some business with Coach late this afternoon, less than three
hours ago-it was almost dark then. I was starting into his
office when I heard him talking on the phone. I suppose I
should have walked away, but I didn't. I listened.”
He told Joe Duffield what he had heard. Joe expelled his
breath in a half-whistle. “Christ! It doesn't seem possible Fats
Gilliam would be that dumb. Don't you think you might
have misunderstood a word here and there, or that maybe Fats
was kidding? He's an awful kidder."
"I know, Senator. I couldn't believe it at first, and I tried
not to, but then ..." He stressed the reference to the nigger
Elks' and Fats' caution to his friend to remember he was talk-
ing through a switchboard. Tim added, “It only confirmed
what I heard last weekend from two fellows at my frat house.
Two guys told me separately they heard this—this flogging
party or whatever it is had been set up.”
“It does sound like something's up, all right,” Joe mused.
"I'm certainly grateful to you for coming to me. I don't want
to see such a thing happen any more than you do. Even if I
condoned violence like that, which I don't, it would be a bad
thing for the White Band; it would hurt us a lot. We don't


THE WHITE BAND
231
want to be known as a bunch of night-riders and floggers.
We're not. Some individuals who belong..."
"I know, Senator. I went to the chief of police at Baynes-
ville, Steve Bannock. But I was afraid to mention Fats' name.
It's just my word against his—I haven't any proof that I'm
telling the truth-and he'll deny it from now till judgment
day. I know that. I didn't intend to tell you who I over-
heard; it just sort of slipped out.”
Joe smiled. “I know. And don't worry. Nobody will ever
know who told me. And I'll certainly look into it on my own
hook, take steps to see that such a thing, whatever they
planned, doesn't happen. Thank you again, Tim. Have you
had dinner?”
“Yes, I have,” Tim lied. “And I must get back.”
They shook hands, and Joe opened the front door. Tim got
in his car and started his twenty-mile ride back to Baynesville.
Joe found Sarah and Ted in the living room. Sarah asked,
“What'd he want? How much?”
“Nothing," said Joe. “He's from Baynesville. Just some-
thing about the White Band. Nothing important.”
“Oh, the White Band.” And she added, “Well, it could've
waited till morning. He could have gone to your office.”
"I suppose so,” Joe said.
Joe had to go to a civic meeting. He had promised to drop
in and “say a word.” But he left early. The chairman thanked
Joe for coming and giving them the benefit of his counsel and
explained that Senator Duffield had to leave because of an-
other appointment. There was no appointment, but Joe was
glad to get away by nine-thirty.
He got into his car, and instead of heading home drove
around Cherokee Boulevard and slowly through Evergreen
Vas
arou


232
THE WHITE BAND
Park. The night was almost cold, at least by contrast with
the hot September and early October days, and the spiced
breath of pines and spruces was heady. He met few cars.
His first impulse had been to phone Fats Gilliam and ask
what the hell was going on. But Fats wouldn't fall for that.
If Fats was in it, it was some secret project, perhaps within
but not officially of the Band. The successful coach was too
adroit to stick his thick neck out too far. He'd never admit
anything. Besides, Fats would be here in the morning, pre-
sumably, for the board meeting. He could say whatever he
decided to say to him then.
He knew Steve Bannock, the chief of police. This Tim
O'Hearn had already spoken to the Chief. True, he hadn't
told him much. Maybe he, Joe, would call Steve too; he'd
have more influence than Tim. Perhaps the Chief would
throw a bodyguard around Ned Tarver and whomever else
the hoodlums might have marked for discipline. Ned would
have to be at the head of the list: he was the spearhead of the
Baynesville drive for integration. No matter what Ned had
done-and he'd done nothing he hadn't a legal right and duty to
do, whatever your views on desegregation-Joe couldn't even
think of allowing anything bad to happen to him. If he could
prevent it. But of course he could! What the hell was getting
into him?
The board meeting was at ten o'clock. Shortly before nine
Joe hurried to his office at White Band headquarters. He
didn't want to make the call at home. He had his secretary
get the Baynesville police chief.
“Steve, this is Joe Duffield.”
“Hello, Senator, how are you?”
"Fine, thanks.”


THE WHITE BAND
233
“We'll sure miss you in the Senate, but of course you're
doing another important job.”
“Yes. Look, Steve, I hear there's trouble in the wind down
there. I've got a tip to the effect that a whipping party is all
set to pounce on some nigras–I don't know who-tonight.”
Steve Bannock said, “Thanks, Senator. Nice of you to call
me. Matter of fact, we've heard the same thing, and we're
doing what we can to be on guard. The fact is, Joe, these
tips have been going around ever since the Supreme Court
handed us this dose. We've heard all kind of rumors, and
nothing much has happened, outside of that thing on the
campus, and we couldn't very well stop that-we couldn't put
every officer we had out at the college, and that's what it
would've taken.”
Joe said, "I know."
“We'll have a patrol in Niggertown tonight. That's about
all we can do."
“If anything happens,” Joe added, "the White Band'll be
blamed.”
“I know the position you're in. But personally, Senator, I
wish to hell these fancy niggers who came down here to run
this integration thing-í don't know how many there are, but
I know of several—I wish to God they'd go home and mind
their own business. If it wasn't for them, most of our jigs
would forget there was ever any Supreme Court ruling, and
some of them never knew about it until they were told.”
There was a pause, then Joe said, “Steve, of course you
know Ned Tarver?”
“Naturally. I'd be a pretty dumb policeman if I didn't.
He's their leader.”
"Well, look, Steve, as a personal favor to me, will you sort
of keep an eye on him tomorrow night-I mean, have some
of your men look out for him? I understand he's the chief


234
THE WHITE BAND
target of this vigilante outfit, whoever and whatever it is.”
“He naturally would be if there's such a thing afoot. He's
been warned a couple times. He came to us once about it.
But he's been here quite a while, and not a thing's happened
to him yet. Sure, Joe, I'll do what I can. He's been asking
for it, but I happen to be on the side of law and order, and I
know you are too.”
“Thanks, Steve. I'll let you know if I hear anything more
specific.”
"Be sure to do that, Senator. Thanks a lot for calling.”
Joe put down the receiver.
It was obvious that Steve Bannock didn't care much what
happened to Ned or to any of the others, but the chief
couldn't ignore this threat. If there was more violence, it
would reflect on the police, and Northern liberals and radicals
would raise hell; even some Southerners would. There'd be
investigations; maybe the F.B.I. would come down. All this
Steve had sense enough to know. He'd try to prevent trouble,
however he felt about it.
The board members straggled in, and it was nearly ten-
thirty before Joe could start the meeting. Fats Gilliam was
one of the last to arrive. He came in panting from his hurry
to get over from the parking lot. “Sorry,” he said, “I seemed
to get behind all the slow trucks in the country. It's a short
ride, but it sure can seem like a long one.” He chuckled.
Jake Gilliam was Grand Instructor of the order, and his
duties were rather vague, but he put out propaganda for the
chapters and prepared material for the publicity man they
had recently hired.
Hank Caldwell read a number of communications from
local Protectors, outlining problems of organization and pro-
cedure and telling of plans for parades and oyster roasts and
excursions.


THE WHITE BAND
235
Dave Beckett reported on the state of memberships and
finances. The organization, as he said, was rolling along at
an amazing rate.
"I'm for these parades,” said Fats Gilliam. “I think they
put the fear of Christ in the niggers. Just a bunch of men
going by with white masks over their faces and carrying a
few banners has a salutary effect. When the Ku Klux was
organized after the War Between the States, it didn't have to
do a lot of killing and flogging to stop the niggers from taking
over. Just to see them parading by in their white sheets and
white hoods scared most of those niggers so they almost turned
white. Some of those black boys thought they were hants.”
He laughed.
“They're a little more sophisticated now,” Dave pointed
out, “even the most ignorant of them.”
“That's true,” Fats conceded, "but a parade of masked men
puts the fear of Jesus in them just the same.”
“Parades are all right,” Joe said, "if we don't carry incendi-
ary banners, threatening people. That would put us on the
spot. We'd be blamed directly then for anything anybody in
the community did. They could prove that at least we in-
spired violence."
There were murmurs of assent.
The meeting was largely routine. It lasted a little over an
hour. As it broke up, Joe leaned over and touched Fats' arm.
“Could you come to my office a minute, Fats?”
“Sure, Joe.”
Joe shut the door of his inner office, had Fats Gilliam take
one of the big chairs, and offered him a cigarette. The coach
so covered the chair that it was hardly visible; his 260 pounds
might have been suspended in space. Joe pulled over his desk
chair.
“Fats, I hear there's trouble impending at Baynesville.”


236
THE WHITE BAND
Fats chuckled, but without mirth. “There's been trouble
impending there ever since the Supreme Court acted, but
nothing to amount to anything's happened, and I don't think
much will.”
“I heard it pretty straight,” Joe added, "that some white
men were planning to take some niggers out and work them
over.”
“Could be,” said Fats. “But it's the first I've heard of it.
We've heard all sorts of things, though. I know there's a
bunch of nigger hoodlums been running around Niggertown
armed with switch-blades and guns-whatever they could get
hold of-looking for trouble. I wouldn't be surprised if there's
a fight there some night. Some of our tough kids might take
’em on. Maybe that's what you heard.”
“But you don't know anything about it?” Joe looked
straight into the big man's small eyes, and they narrowed into
a porcine glare.
""Only what I've told you."
“You don't know of any plans to take anybody out?”.
"No. But they wouldn't be apt to tell me. Some of the
men in the Band wanted to take direct action and run some
of these agitators out of town. I told them the Band had to
stay out of that sort of thing. We couldn't afford to get
mixed up in it.”
"You were right,” Joe said. “I don't want anybody in the
Band pulling any vigilante stuff, and you can tell them all that
for me.”
“They already know it,” the coach said. “You said it in
your Baynesville speech, and you've said it other times. No,
if there's anything stirring, it's not the Band. I don't know
what some individuals might be up to. I can't keep track of
everybody in town.”
OTT


22
TROM THE POOL HALL, Johnson saw Graham slouching up
the street, and the small, sporty Negro slipped out of the place,
unobtrusively, as he did everything. Maybe Graham had tried
to catch his friend's eye, and Johnson had failed to feel it. He
always said he could feel anyone looking at him.
"Hi,” Johnson greeted.
"Hi.”
“What's up?"
The untidy ex-pugilist sucked on his cigarette. “I gather
tonight's the night.”
"So I hear,” Johnson said. “Big doings.”
“That's all we need,” said Graham, "something big-what
the lawyers call an overt act. You know ..."
"I know what an overt act is,” Johnson explained patiently.
“I've even read some law, though I'm not qualified for prac-
tice-not yet.”
"It's all we need,” Graham repeated. “And I'll sign up a
238


THE WHITE BAND
239
hundred members. Not here, necessarily. But the locale
doesn't matter; it's the numbers we want."
“Quite right, the numbers.”
Johnson lowered his voice, although there was no one in
sight. “I understand Mr. Tarver's the candidate who's to be
initiated.”
Graham dropped ashes on his shirt and trousers and brushed
some of them off. “So I hear. I don't want anything bad to
happen to Mr. Tarver, but, after all, our cause ...'
"Sure. Bien compris.”
“Dominus nobiscum,” Graham added.
"I'm sure He is,” said Johnson.
They laughed, and Johnson said, “The only hitch is, word
has sort of got out, I hear, and there may be some cops on
hand.”
Graham uttered a disdainful obscenity. “Baynesville cops?
They couldn't get out of their own way.”
“Maybe not, but the law, as they say, is the law, and per-
haps the vengeance committee will take fright.”
“Well, it should be warned.”
"Exactly."
"I'll attend to that.”
“I'm sure you will. Meanwhile, unless I can help, I'll return
to my den of iniquity. I stand to make twenty, thirty bucks.”
“More craps?”
“Nope, they've sort of got on to my influence over the
bones. But I've still got 'em thinking that as a pool-player I'm
an in-and-outer, liable to blow his important shots. So I figure
I cash in on that, hein?”
“Well, watch your step.”
“That I'll do.”
They parted, Graham throwing back a canine grin. The
afternoon was fading before its brief time because of a fog
on W


THE WHITE BAND
241
"Properly segregated?”
“Quite properly. Listen, Nell dearest, I was going to sur-
prise you, but I'll let you in on a secret. I'm Aying back home
tomorrow, for a few days.”
Her voice broke a little. “Oh, wonderful, Ned, I was hop-
ing you'd come home soon.”
"I've got a reservation,” he explained. “It's an afternoon
flight. I'm due in New York at seven o'clock.”
“I can hardly wait to see you. Is it International or La
Guardia?”
“La Guardia, I think.”
“I'll check, and I'll be there with the car.”
“Grand. Sold any more paintings?”.
“Not yet. Give me time.”
“Remember, I'm depending on you. I'm thinking of aban-
doning the law and living on the proceeds of your art.”
She laughed. “I'm afraid you'd be mighty hungry some-
times. Gee, I've missed you, even more than the time you
were in Texas on that long case.”
“I've missed you a huge lot too, darling.”
"Well, I won't keep you. I suppose you're getting ready
for your speech.”
“More or less. I was just dressing.”
“Are they treating you all right?”
"Sure. So far I've got no complaint. They haven't given
me the keys to the city yet, but, after all, they think I'm a
Commie, and so I can't blame them.”
“Well, take care.”
“You bet I will."
"And I'll see you tomorrow."
“Tomorrow."
Her voice faded, and he hung up. He brushed the coat of
his blue suit, the only extra suit he'd brought.


242
THE WHITE BAND
Every dissenter, he reflected, was a Commie to the con-
formist, the reactionary, the person who distrusted all ideas
advanced since the turn of the century. So, on the other hand,
to the Commie or fellow traveler everyone else was a fascist
or a dirty capitalist. This mania for labeling everybody ...
He thought of that winter in New York when he'd been
unmoored, adrift, lost, wondering what to believe and how to
live. It must have been 'thirty-one. The depression had seized
the country. The jobless, many of them homeless and hungry,
were wandering the hard, merciless streets of Manhattan and
the Bronx. He was out of law school and admitted to the bar,
but his practice was somewhere in a future he couldn't really
hope for. He'd opened an office, put up his name, but nobody
retained him; if anyone wanted to, it was for free or for some
vague promise to pay later. He was married, he had Nell, and
he was desperately afraid he couldn't support her. He worked
when he could, at anything, laborer, salesman, chauffeur. He
had to make something.
There was that fellow he ran into in a speakeasy. Wasn't
his name Ballard? Something like that-it had been so long.
Ballard, if that was his name, was a white man, hanging around
the streets of Harlem, friendly with Negroes, who were in-
clined to distrust him, wondering what he wanted. Ballard
asked him one night to go to a house in a distant part of the
city, meet some friends. They took the subway down to
Union Square, then cut into the Village and climbed three
flights to an attic apartment, which had a living room whose
walls were closely pressed by the rafters. The place, bright-
ened with some modern prints, was rather attractive, but still
a cold-water flat in January, drafty, ill-heated by a coal stove.
There were perhaps fifteen sprawled on the few chairs and
on the floor, men and women. One was a Negro, another an
East Indian. They were drinking from a gallon jug of red


THE WHITE BAND
243
wine. The talk was stimulating, flashing back and forth about
everything under heaven. There were no set dissertations on
the economic situation, but a general assumption that capi-
talistic democracy was all through, which even Hoover and
Mellon had begun to realize.
When he and Ballard had left and were walking toward the
subway, Ballard said that at least half the people there be-
longed to the Party, and others were interested. Why not?
Where else could the average pushed-around sap turn?
That winter Ned saw bread lines. He saw men with no-
where to sleep crouching in the heat expelled from street
gratings. He saw veterans of the World War, toasted by
a grateful country thirteen years ago, selling apples and shoe-
laces. He wondered if Communism wasn't the answer. He
went to some meetings, met some minor leaders. He signed
nothing, but he listened closely. At one conference he heard
his friend Ballard get a dressing-down for assuming the re-
sponsibility of doing something or other without permission.
He heard others receive similar scoldings from bush-league
commissars. There was always that attitude: we don't ask
you, we tell you, and you do what we say or else. It was like
the army: you don't think, we think and you obey. He
decided that if this outfit ever got the power here it had in
Russia it would dictate every last act of every citizen. It
would be worse than any defect which the present system
had or was likely to develop. No, it wasn't for him. He'd
string along with what we had, however imperfect. After
all, he felt, most of the things which caused depressions could
be avoided, probably, with safeguards and changes which
wouldn't upset the entire foundation of this government.
He dropped Ballard and the others. He stuck it out, doing
the best he could, though it wasn't easy. In time things got


244
THE WHITE BAND
better. In time he was able to practice law, to make a decent
living.
And now they called him a Red.
Fats Gilliam was eating dinner with Sam Carruthers, Ben
Blackwell, and Blake McLeod in a rear booth at the Central
Café. Nobody seemed to be noticing them. They not only
spoke quietly but were extremely guarded in what they said.
“Somebody's tipped it off,” the coach was saying. He fin-
ished his highball and attacked his soup. “Some son of a bitch.
I wish I knew who.”
Sam Carruthers said, “It wasn't any of us, I could reasonably
take an oath to that. I've known most of the fellows longer
than you have, Fats-most of my life. They wouldn't..."
“I don't suspect any of them,” Gilliam said firmly. “I
picked out the Bandsmen I could trust most when I started
this-this little sideshow. It's just that fellows inadvertently
let remarks fall, or maybe tell their wives too much, and if any
woman keeps a secret it's only long enough to decide who
she'll tell it to.”
The thick-haired, big-shouldered young machinist laughed.
“I guess you're right, Fats. It's hard even with a dozen men
or so in on something to seal it up so's nobody can stick a
wedge in.”
Blake McLeod, the boyish bank teller, said, “I'm sure I've
kept my lips buttoned. I haven't even hinted anything."
Ben Blackwell, tall, with a beak of a nose, leaned forward.
“Me neither. What do we do now?”
"I'll tell you in a minute,” said Fats. “Patience. But I un-
derstand there'll be cops around.”
"Cops!” Ben Blackwell said scornfully. “Steve Bannock
was in yesterday to get a wash and grease-job, and he said he


THE WHITE BAND
245
wa
vas
was sick of hearing about Niggertown and what-all was
liable to happen on one side or the other. He said he was tired
of people coming to him with mysterious tips. Said he
thought it was all a lot of crap, but then he had to take no-
tice, spread more of his small force around where there might
be trouble, or he'd be in for criticism. So you see, he don't
take it very seriously.”
Fats leaned over the table and spoke just above a whisper.
"It even got to Joe.”
“The Senator?” Blake McLeod asked incredulously.
“The same. He hopped on me about it, up in Riverport this
morning. Somebody must have told him I was in on it, what-
ever it was. I don't think he really knew a thing, but some-
body had handed him one of those feedbox tips. Jesus. You'd
think it was a racetrack.”
“What'd he say?” Ben Blackwell asked
“Oh, nothing much except what he felt he had to say. We
were to understand the Band wasn't in for things like that. I
didn't get sore. He's on the spot. He's gotta take that atti-
tude. He doesn't want to see our fine fraternal order all
messed up. Who does? I told him sure, he was right, and I
had told the Band here we must stay out of everything that
wasn't strictly legal and peaceful.” He gave one of his pro-
fessional chuckles.
Ben Blackwell, the auto repair manager, repeated, “What
do we do now? Postpone it?”
Fats softened his voice again, no easy feat for him-he could
speak across a football field without a megaphone-and the
men at the table could barely hear him. “What do we do? I'll
tell you. We'll join the others at Ricky Payne's pool hall at
a quarter to eight. The four of us will get a pool table if we
can and be playing. The others'll drift in and look on, and
we'll manage to sift out complete instructions. I don't believe


246
THE WHITE BAND
in postponing something you've decided on-that is, unless it's
absolutely necessary. We'll see how things shape up and
govern ourselves accordingly. Even if our friend is escorted
back to his hotel, we might call on him later. There are ways
... without embarrassing identifications. By the way, his
room looks out on a fire escape.”
Sam Carruthers let out a low whistle. “I bet we manage
some way.”
“It's an even-money bet,” said Fats. “But I don't want to
say any more here. I've got it pretty well thought out, what
each detachment is to do under the circumstances, but it'll be
a whole lot safer to announce the line-up at Ricky's. Won't be
anybody snooping around. Nobody'll think a thing about
some guys playing pool and others looking on and chewing
the fat here and there. I've told the others to meet us there.
That's all set. And the two cars are gassed up, and even the
license plates ... But I better shut my big mouth, even if I
have got the soft pedal over it.”
They laughed. They ate in silence for a while. Then Ben
Blackwell said how about the game Saturday, and Fats said,
“Must you bring that up?" And they laughed again.


THE WHITE BAND
249
down at the fresh-lit streets and the luminous buildings rising
like irregular peaks.
Suddenly he missed Washington. Not the great, drawn-out
small town, with its endless mausoleums, its Greco-Roman
temples, but his official life, with its varied demands, its un-
expected turns, its exciting moments. He felt a pang for his
lost senatorship, the power and prestige he had tossed away
on an impulse. No, it was more than an impulse; he had given
weeks of thought to it, decided that this was his big chance to
make some money, to become independent. Or did anyone
ever become independent? Wouldn't there always be obliga-
tions of one sort or another, compounded of duty or affection,
of inescapable necessity, holding you down, preventing you
from doing half you could maybe afford to do?
He thought, with a more acute sense of loss, of Myra Con-
nell. The hell with the senatorship-he could run for office
again any time he wanted-but he wouldn't find another Myra.
She wasn't just another pretty, susceptible girl who was out
for a good time if she liked you. She was a subtle, complex
personality he'd hardly begun to know after all the times he'd
seen her. All at once, he wanted to know her fully, not her
body-he knew that-but her mind, her emotions, her tastes,
her feelings about things. A woman's body was, a man found
out when he had known it, only a small part of her, although
at first nothing else seemed to matter. There were, he sup-
posed, men who never cared about anything else, but they
were men without perception, without imagination.
He saw Myra as he'd seen her a hundred times, her dark
hair swept up or Aung back, lending charm to the beauty of
her face. She'd be laughing over some angle of something
they'd thought of-they found the same things funny, liked
the same music, the same sort of paintings. He'd found their
secret hours together delicious, but he'd never bothered much
en


THE WHITE BAND
251
lynchings-they were extremely rare these days-without a
federal law policing the states below the Mason-Dixon line.
The New Deal had done a lot of good, but it had been car-
ried just about far enough; we needed not more but less
socialism. So far as foreign policy went, he realized the world
wasn't what it was a hundred years ago, when a country was
a self-contained entity (he'd said that, but it had come out “a
spot on the map off by itself,” which probably was better,
even for a reader who had barely passed the fourth grade).
He didn't think he'd missed a political platitude. How else
could you satisfy your lords and masters, the voters? He
hadn't served two terms in the state legislature and three terms
in the House of Representatives without learning something.
At the time of the magazine interview he had been elated
over winning. Naturally it had been a Democratic primary-
general elections were only a formality in the Deep South-
and he had defeated two formidable opponents, a result by no
means certain at any time during the campaign. He had, sur-
prisingly, received a clear plurality, so that no runoff would
be necessary. Sure, he was riding high the day the crew from
Events came. He poured them drinks, and they toasted him
and he toasted their magazine for child-minds.
But the very next week, looking at his pictures in the maga-
zine (excellent photographs) and reading what was written
around them, his delight was clouded. Not by anything on
the two large pages devoted to Duffield, but by his own
melancholy reflections. Was he a success? In one way, he
certainly was. Not every aspiring politician made the Senate,
and to gain admittance to that exclusive club at his age was
an achievement that had startled even him.
And yet, if he was a success, it was at the expense of ...
well, whatever made up a man's inmost self. He'd grown up,
gradually emancipating himself from certain prejudices, cer-
0
1


252
THE WHITE BAND
W
1
tain taboos, with the help of his father and of a few enlight-
ened fellow-students (among them, of course, Ned Tarver!).
By the time he finished law school and began to practice
law in Riverport he felt that he had, in a way, a mission,
though he didn't think of it as anything so pretentious. He
saw himself as a Southerner freed from a slavery as complete
in its way as the physical bondage that once shackled Negroes:
prejudices, inflexible ideas, most of them untrue. Despite his
father, and some other dissenting voice now and then, it had
been hard to shake off the tribal beliefs all about him in his
boyhood, like the idea that white persons were ordained by
God to be superior and run things and especially to see that
their inferiors, whose skin was darker, stayed in their place.
Other kids knew more than your old man; he was just an old
crank with peculiar notions. Even some of their public-school
teachers told them that while it was all right to play with
colored boys and it was never right to be unjust to them, it
should be borne in mind that they belonged to a lower racial
and social order, so that white boys should never go too far,
never give these dark ones the idea that they were as good as
white people.
But he had come a long way from that. As a young lawyer
just starting out he had determined to do what he could, with-
out being a zealot and antagonizing everybody, to spread
tolerance, undermine prejudice. He'd said things quietly,
when he could, and nobody had been too stirred up against
him; after all, you could still discuss ideas in the Deep South,
so long as you didn't try to put into effect anything too
revolutionary. He had defended, without fee, several home-
less and wandering Negroes charged with various crimes, had
even gotten one acquitted. They could, of course, have asked
for court-appointed counsel, but the chances were their de-
fense would have been perfunctory, and he had put every-


THE WHITE BAND
253
thing he had into it. Nobody had criticized him for that.
Anybody who had noticed such obscure trials had merely
thought he was gaining experience.
It was only when he ran that time for district attorney and
told the people publicly how he felt that they slapped him
down. If he could have stayed out of politics ... but somehow
politics kept luring him until it seduced him into running for
the legislature, and he knew then that if he wanted to win
he had to hold his tongue, manage to leave the impression
that he was for home, mother, and white supremacy, and
advance things that no one quarreled with seriously, such as
good roads, better schools, more parks.
But during his years of success in politics this practice of
suppressing what he really felt and saying what was popular
or at least innocuous hardened into a habit. It had to. Other-
wise you couldn't go anywhere in Southern politics, and he
had determined to go as high as he could. Why settle for
anything small like the legislature, or even the national House?
Well, he reflected that week as he got used to the certainty
that he would sit in the Senate, a senator was powerful, he
could say and do things lesser political breeds dared not. He
was elected for six years, while a representative had to face
his constituents every two years. Perhaps in the Senate he'd
recover his voice, his own voice.
But he found, as the weeks in Washington passed into
months, the months into years, he no longer cared ... much.
He could be progressive, liberal about foreign policy or trade
agreements or development of natural resources, or federal-
aid highways or something else that meant little to Rednecks,
if he remembered to do nothing that would seem to advance
racial equality, or give immigrants too much of a break, or
otherwise upset the hold his people had on 100 percent white
Protestant Americanism.


24
ICI
THE OLD, bruised desk, looking as if it had been tossed about
a wharf, dropped, and picked up in some game played by
gigantic longshoremen, yielded old letters, notes, stray memo-
randa in close-stuffed profusion as Harry Holmes delved into
it. The trouble was, he reflected, he could no longer even
remember to whom most of these long-guarded fragments
referred, what they concerned, why he had saved them, be-
yond a cluttering habit of sticking away everything-letters he
meant to answer and never did; notes to remember to do this
or that at a certain time, which hadn't helped if these things
had faded from his memory; memos informing him of some
new style of make-up or heads which had been abandoned
years ago; torn-off pieces of copy paper reminding him to
call persons with names that now meant nothing to him.
Oh, well. There was no sense in going over them. He
knew he would find little, if anything, of present importance.
He began unpacking the pigeonholes and dumping their con-
255


256
THE WHITE BAND
tents into the high wastebasket. The old-fashioned roll-top
desk, which hadn't been rolled down in many years, also had
odd corners and unsuspected crannies jammed with meaning-
less papers. The drawers likewise were crammed until some
wouldn't open. It was a job even if he just pulled everything
out with not so much as a glance.
The new editor, Warren Ashley, came in with some galley
proofs and sat on one of the stiff chairs. He was a dynamic
man of forty-five, with a thick neck and a generous middle.
He would be fat before he was fifty if he didn't watch what
he ate and drank, which he probably wouldn't. Warren
Ashley regarded the old editor with the smiling tolerance of
a man still young enough to doubt that he would ever be an
old man who was through. “That's a job, isn't it?” he said
pleasantly. “I had to do the same thing before I left my
cubbyhole in Chicago.”
He had been sent down by John Braden from the mother”
paper of the chain. Riverport and the South were enigmas to
him; he had asked a hundred questions in the three days he'd
been here. But he had his orders, quite specifically, and he
meant to carry them out. The coach had sent him in from
the bench, instructing him what plays to call.
Harry Holmes laughed a little. “I hope they'll get you a
new desk.”
Warren Ashley laughed in response. “But I think I'd like
that desk. It must be fairly haunted by old events, traditions.”
“I suppose it is.”
The new editor picked out a galley and handed it to the
old editor. “I'd like you to see what I wrote about this. See
if you think it's okay."
Harry Holmes wanted to laugh, but didn't. What possible
difference could it make what he thought? He took the galley
gravely and read:


THE WHITE BAND
257
William Davison, who is leaving his post as president of
the State Teachers College at Baynesville, will be missed. He
has made many friends, in the state and throughout the
South. He brought to the position an excellent background
of education and experience, and in the ten years he has been
at Baynesville he has built up the enrollment and bettered the
faculty and, with the cooperation of the legislature, enlarged
the facilities and equipment of this important institution. It
is unfortunate that Dr. Davison's final days at the college
were disrupted by the turmoil which followed the enroll-
ment of a Negro student. The president's judgment in con-
senting to this radical departure from custom and tradition
might be questioned, but we are sure no one could question
his honesty in believing this was his duty. Many, perhaps
most, Southerners probably felt that he should at least have
waited until such a move was forced on him. In view of the
general attack on his judgment, it probably is true that his
usefulness at Baynesville was hopelessly impaired and that he
was wise in his decision to resign. No doubt he will be hap-
pier, considering these regrettable circumstances, at his new
post in Pennsylvania. His friends wish him success there.
Harry Holmes handed back the galley without comment.
“Think it's okay?” Warren Ashley asked.
“Sure, Warren, it's fine.”
“It won't offend anybody?”
"I'm sure it won't,” the old editor said.
What would he have written? Well, it didn't matter.
"You see,” the new editor added, “John Braden's anxious
to ... well, placate the die-hards, the more rabid River-
portians. We ...”
“I suppose,” the old man broke in, “he told you I'd just
about wrecked the paper."
Warren Ashley laughed. “Not exactly, Harry. He did say
10us


258
THE WHITE BAND
you were ... well, in rebellion against unreconstructed
rebels.”
“That's a mouthful.”
“I'm a Yankee,” the younger man hastened to say, "and
it's new to me, all this boiling up over a few darkies in the
schools. I've read a lot of your recent editorials, and I'd be
inclined to agree with them all, but John feels ..."
“I know how he feels.”
“And you've got to go along with the guy who's paying
the bills, whatever your personal opinions.”
“Evidently,” Harry Holmes agreed.
“I suppose, anyway,” Warren Ashley added, "that you're
tired out and ready to enjoy yourself.”
The old editor looked away. “I should be.”
Warren Ashley pulled out a cigar case and proffered it, but
the old man thanked him, pointing to his pipe which lay on
its side like a discarded memento among the clutter of others
on the desk. The new editor picked out a cigar, bit off the
end, and lit it carefully. "I guess you'll be heading for Florida
soon.”
“Maybe. My wife likes it. I don't care so much for it.
Too much gilt and bunk for me. But my wife likes it, so I
reckon we'll go, for a while anyway."
Warren Ashley laughed and looked at his wrist watch.
"Excuse me, Harry. There's an editorial conference, and I'm
supposed to sit in.”
"Sure. See you later."
Harry Holmes turned back to the desk and resumed shov-
eling the old papers into the tall wastebasket, which already
was half full. He'd thought of tearing up these forgotten
scraps of the past, but what was the use? Who would ever
bother to decipher them? And what if someone did? He
doubted that there was anything mildly diverting in them.


THE WHITE BAND
259
He felt a passing regret that his life had been so uneventful, so
free from even a touch of scandal. If he had it to do over,
he'd be damned if he wouldn't ... but he doubted that
he would. His revolts against the choking pressure of mass
opinion had been all mental. His editorials. Who gave a
whoop in hell about them now? He'd deliberately signed his
own journalistic death warrant. He had, as the boys in the
city room would put it, been asking for it. But what else
could he have done? He could have compromised, let an
absentee owner in a distant city dictate his policies, what he
wrote. After all, it was this absent landlord's paper, not his.
John Braden could advocate obeisance to the moon goddess,
or telling Internal Revenue to go to hell when income taxes
came due, or driving at night without headlights, or anything
he damn well pleased.
But how could you be an editor and write what you didn't
believe? Easily. Most editors did. Even if they owned their
papers, they felt the bruising pressure of what was called
"public opinion,” which was a cliché meaning mass prejudice,
the idées fixes of unthought-out thought, of impressions un-
challenged. It was all the more credit to the few editors who
did their own thinking, who led instead of following.
Suddenly he was proud to have been part of that little
company for a while, grateful of the opportunity to have led
for a time, in his own halting way. Even his wife thought
him a quixotic fool, though she'd never say so; her affection
for him was too deep. Perhaps he was. He didn't care one
single damn.
He was humming a gay tune off-key as he retrieved his
pipe, which he'd been about to sweep into the wastebasket
with a hillock of papers.
He sang on as he filled the pipe and lit it.


262
THE WHITE BAND
Eggy Prentice hesitated. Then he said, “Sure I'll go along.
What time do we go?”
“Oh, probably around seven-thirty, eight, maybe.”
“Oke.” And Eggy added, “I'll bet all seven of our pledges
against two Deke pledges that the place is as quiet as a mill-
pond.”
“I hope so," Tim said. “Ordinarily I don't mind seeing a
little excitement, but this time ...
“I get you.”
Eggy returned to his magazine, and Tim went upstairs to
stretch out on his bed a couple of minutes before it was time
to go to Bailey Hall for supper at the training table.
“You're slipping,” laughed Sam Carruthers as Fats Gilliam
Aubbed an easy shot.
“Could be,” said Fats, who was paying small attention to
the game of pool which he and Sam and Ben Blackwell and
Blake McLeod were playing. Six other men slouched about
looking on. Fats had been right. None of the other pool-
players or hangers-on gave them the slightest heed. It was
too familiar a scene to attract suspicion or even the interest of
the kibitzers. Even those at other tables who recognized Fats
probably felt, well, a coach is a busy guy these days. He's
gotta relax some with his friends.
Fats called out softly, “Bill.”
Bill Dade, a muscular young man who was a foreman at
the Cherokee Iron Works, came to the table as Fats pretended
to measure a shot with his eyes.
The big coach spoke very quietly. No one beyond the
table could have heard, but the others in their crowd were
close enough to hear. “Look, Bill, here's the line-up. You
know what my car's to do. Grab Tarver if we can without


THE WHITE BAND
263
running down a dozen cops. If we can't make it after the
meeting, we'll get together later out on Spread Creek Road
and plan how we can maybe grab him at the hotel later. Your
car's to try to get Goodwin if you possibly can. But you wait
around a while-you can drive slow back and forth—and see
if we succeed. If we don't, we give up the other project, for
the moment anyway, because it's more important to get the
buttinsky from Harlem. We can always get the other one,
any time. If you see we've given up trying to get him from
outside the nigger hall or on his way back to the hotel, you
drive around and meet us on Spread Creek Road at the place
we picked out before, just beyond the little bridge over that
ravine-you know, a mile or so beyond the city limits. If,
on the other hand, you see us drive off with him-and I think
you'll be able to see what's going on by trailing us-you carry
out the original plan. If Goodwin's at the meeting, just trail
him along till you find a quiet spot-he'll have four good
blocks, and he'll surely walk—and then pull him in. If you
don't spot him at all, and we've got our man, you drive to
the other guy's house and get him there; chances are he'll be
home. And when we've got 'em both, we'll meet just as we
planned.”
Fats paused. He thought of something else. “Oh, if your
man should go along with ours to his hotel-and that's possible,
they're pretty thick, those two niggers-you'll know what to
do. If cops are around, or too many passers-by, we won't try
it, of course. We'll drive on. But if the two should be alone,
it'll be easy to get them both at the same time, one for my
car, one for yours. Any questions?”
“I guess not,” said Bill Dade tentatively, and Fats knew the
young man was thinking up a further observation. Bill had
burly shoulders and a slim waist-he was the athletic type-
and his lips habitually were pressed together in a grim ex-
were
e


264
THE WHITE BAND
or
pression, even during his lighter moments. “It's just this,
Fats,” he said, “if there are a bunch of cops, as you think
likely, it won't look so good, two cars trailing along as if
they was about to start a race riot or something."
“But we won't trail along,” Fats explained patiently. “I'll
roll along, about ten miles an hour, and maybe park somewhere
a few minutes, in some spot where nobody'll notice, and then
maybe roll around the block slowly. And you can trail me
without seeming to, just stay a couple hundred yards behind.
I don't think we'll attract any attention. And we'll stay out
of the way entirely till the niggers begin tumbling out of
their Elks' hall. You forget, too, Bill, that Hanley Street is
a thoroughfare which happens to pass through Niggertown.
It's a straight shot from Courthouse Square to the Mobile
Turnpike.”
“Okay,” Bill Dade said, still a little doubtful of their
strategy.
“Lots of cars pass back and forth on Hanley all the time.
You know that.”
“I s'pose so," Bill conceded. “I guess it'll work."
“Sure it will,” Fats assured him. “It's not like it was a side
street where not many cars go. I'll drive and stay in the car.
Not that I'm trying to get out of the tough jobs, but somehow
I figure people would recognize me, false face or not. I can't
imagine why.” They all laughed. “Well, anyone else any
questions?”
The others made negative sounds. “Then we're all set,"
said Fats. “I don't figure that nigger meeting'll be over before
ten, but we'll be around at nine-thirty just in case it breaks
up early. Now, Sam, it's your shot, and I've sewed you up but
good.”
“I hope you haven't,” Sam said.


THE WHITE BAND
265
Fats had put the package containing the special masks under
his hat on the rack.
There would be only ten of them, five for each car. The
other two of their little club-within-a-club that Sam Car-
ruthers had named the Dirty Dozen were unavoidably absent.
One was out of town, the other home sick. Fats thought it
was just as well. Ten would fit better into the plan than
twelve. For one thing, the cars would be less crowded. But
he wouldn't have wanted to cut down the number arbitrarily.
None of them would voluntarily have missed the fun.
The hall was well filled. It was attractive, Ned Tarver
thought, very creditable for an organization that couldn't have
much money. The walls had been done over recently in a
cream finish, and the place was clean and neat as a cellophaned
package. Seated on the stage, he looked down at the dark
faces, of various shades and expressions, some half-smiling,
others looking up with solemn earnestness. He heard but
didn't listen to the other speakers, because what they had to
say little concerned him: announcements about the Toussaint
Elks, committee reports, plans for a barbecue and dance in the
hall next month for the benefit of old or disabled Elks.
It had become a cliché to speak of his people as a happy
race. They were, it was said, always laughing. True, at least
to an extent. But laughter could hide as well as exult. There
was often about their faces in repose, beneath the mask of
everyday expressions, a deep sadness. Perhaps it went far back
into their turbulent, tragic history; perhaps it told the story
down to the present, when their lives were still held within
spiked walls. ...
What was there about Negroes that made so many white
people fear and distrust them, want to keep them on the other


266
THE WHITE BAND
side of the fence? It couldn't be altogether their color. Dark
people from India and Asia, people often darker than most
Negroes, were accepted socially, considered of exotic interest.
A good many G. I.'s had married Japanese girls—a race far
more alien than the descendants of African slaves generated
through white dalliances, brought up in recent generations to
do the same things white Americans did, to like the same
things. Nobody got much exercised over Japanese brides,
though some undoubtedly disapproved.
It must be a deep-seated, unrecognized sense of guilt. Guilt
for what their great-grandfathers, themselves descendants of
more ruthless traders, had accepted and clung to, a past that
white Southerners of today had been forced, reluctantly, to
repudiate, to disclaim. Many Northerners, too, resented the
Negroes, particularly if they lived or worked among them.
After all, slavery had been accepted, if not practiced, for a
long time in the North. They too were guilty, so they too
were angry. As for the immigrants who came after slavery
had been ended, no doubt they were not sorry to find people
whom even they, poor and harassed as they were, could look
down on.
There was-you couldn't get away from it-a certain obli-
gation to do something for these freed (probably too soon)
niggers. You often resented whomever you felt forced to
help. Why couldn't they have gone back to Africa, gone
anywhere, not stayed around to flaunt their black and yellow
and brown faces at their betters and demand white men's
jobs, even a chance to get educated and compete with white
folks in business and in the professions? Yes, you could see
the genesis of a lot of resentment, but you couldn't make
them, the white people, see that they were not actuated by
any rational compulsion (however more simply you might put
an


THE WHITE BAND
267
it), but were nursing a tribal taboo which their witch doctors,
their politicians, their leaders, encouraged.
He did listen to the entertainment. There was a soprano
with a too-shrill voice, a tenor of real quality, a pianist, a boy
of sixteen or so, who had a true gift, who played two Chopin
waltzes with understanding and a touch of poetry. This tall
boy with long arms and thin, tapering fingers should get some-
where.
The chairman introduced Ned. He had planned to speak
briefly-the program had been rather long—but he had come
to the hall hardly knowing what he would say. He was think-
ing, as he uttered the usual opening amenities, what he would
tell them. Then it came to him what he should stress.
“Your chairman, Dr. Simpson, has explained to you why
I'm here, though I'm sure most of you already knew. We
Negroes have no desire to throw the South into turmoil, de-
spite substantial opinion to the contrary. And yet we have
felt, many of us, for a long time that desegregation of the
schools, integration if you like, was a necessary step not only
toward a fairer, more equal educational opportunity for us,
but also toward better race relations. That may sound strange
to you, in view of the noticeable lack of enthusiasm with
which this move has been received. However, I firmly be-
lieve that if it is given a fair trial, integration will be a means
of better understanding between the two races. If the white
people could get to know us at closer range, they wouldn't
find us so bad, after all. And it wouldn't hurt us either to
know more of the white people. We'd find out, I'm sure,
that they are not all hard-hearted, arrogant, and eager to
keep us from the better things in life. The French have a
saying which means that to know all is to forgive all. Like
most sayings, that one is not altogether true, but there's a
lot of truth in it.”


268
THE WHITE BAND
He paused, and looking over the rows of earnest, upturned
faces, he added, “Of course, individually we've always had
understanding, even affection between the races. Hardly one
of us but knows some white man or woman who has done
innumerable kind things for him or perhaps for his family.
And we've reciprocated. We've helped to bring up their
children. We used to drive and look after their horses when
they were the means of getting around; now we drive their
cars. There is already as close a relationship as there could
be between children in a schoolroom. But mass opinion al-
ways lags behind individual knowledge and belief. Sometimes
it's necessary to pass a law before that vague and yet tangible
thing, mass opinion, can catch up with what you and I have
known for a long time.
“Another thing I want to mention. You've heard it said
Communists are behind this thing. I wouldn't know. I'm
not one.” They laughed. “I dare say they are, particularly
behind the opposition it has aroused. For they thrive on tur-
moil. But one angle I want to point out to you, and remember
it if anyone comes along trying to sign you up for the Party
or trying to tell you our democracy is a failure. This decision
of the Supreme Court decreeing an end to segregation in the
schools was handed down in the regular order of our demo-
cratic government. The case went to the highest court in a
routine way and was decided there as any other case is. It
was not the act of revolutionaries, nor did it result from the
sudden seizure of power by some clique. No, it was an ex-
pression of our democracy.
“One thing more I want to add. I'm simply repeating what's
obvious, what's evident to you all, when I say that unfortu-
nately the feelings stirred up by the desegregation decision
have made a tense situation all over the South, particularly
here in Baynesville, probably because it happened to be the


THE WHITE BAND
273
ce
V
U
tmost
SCA
find on a jury or coming out of a show or watching an ex-
cavation for a building.
At the order of the Riverport chapter's Instructor, they
raised their right arms and repeated after him, “I pledge myself
solemnly to rededicate myself to God and country and the
white race. I promise to obey the lawful orders of the officers
of the White Band. I pledge allegiance to the flag of my
country and to the white race and agree to do my utmost
to advance the cause of both.”
A little ambiguous, Joe reflected.
Another officer of the chapter came around with a tray
of the beautifully wrought masks. The cloth must be satin.
The recruits put them on and formed a platoon in front of
the others. They were happy; they'd been swallowed by a
secret organization, and Joe imagined he could see self-con-
sciousness and obsequiousness melting into the anonymity of
the order, to be replaced by a new courage.
There were several speeches by officers of the two chapters
in the suburban areas. They were dull, droning talks, filled
with platitudes about our glorious heritage and the threats of
inferior races and alien radical influences. Joe stopped listen-
ing. He was thinking of his early days in the Senate-the brief
time he imagined that he might step out and be his own man.
The war had ended less than four years before, and the
Senate chamber was clamorous with discussions about the
new U. N., reconversion, inflation, and other postwar com-
plexities. He tried to face these problems with a lofty posture
-idealistic, above regional or even partisan considerations.
But the South, his own state, kept intruding. It was fine when
they got on federal-aid highways or federal aid to schools,
perennial subjects which everybody was for, at least in princi-
ple. But then somebody would drag up that old, beaten-up
anti-lynching bill, which kept returning in slightly different


278
THE WHITE BAND
.
They talked football a while. Then they were self-con-
sciously quiet. Sam opened the second quart and passed it
around and they got lively again. Somebody told a dirty
story, which reminded someone else about the traveling man
and ... It was some time before they ran out of stories.
Nobody was showing the liquor too much, but all of them
felt bolder, more ready to carry out their plans, especially
Blake McLeod, the youngest, who, until he got four or five
drinks, had been walking about nervously.
ner
Ned Tarver came out of the colored Elks' hall with a lot of
others. The officers of the lodge shook hands with them.
The Exalted Ruler offered to drive him to his hotel, but Ned
explained that it was only four blocks, and he'd sleep better
for a little walk. Then Ned noticed a cluster of police around
the entrance.
A captain spotted Ned and pointed him out to two police-
men. They approached the lawyer. One of them said, “You
Tarver?”
“That's right.”
“Mind if we ..."
At that moment there were cries up the street, in the opposite
direction. Only four or five houses away flames suddenly
swept from a roof.
Everyone, including the policemen who had been about to
guard Ned, ran toward the burning house. Ned, left alone,
hesitated, then followed the crowd.
He had gone only a few steps when a car stopped. Three
men got out. Ned hardly noticed them; he assumed they were
going to the fire. But, without a word or an instant's warning,
he felt an arm circle his neck. He had no time for an outcry.
He tried to struggle, but the powerful arm shut off his breath.


THE WHITE BAND
279
Another man seized his legs. They lifted him off his feet, car-
ried him to the car, thrust him in.
On the floor of the car he still tried to fight, to call out. But
one of the men quickly circled his face with a gag ... adhesive
tape. He was held down, helpless. He heard the door slam.
The car started up, gathered speed.
He'd had a confused impression of grotesque faces-animals,
a leering clown. Masks, he realized as he lay helplessly on the
floor of the back seat.
No one, no passer-by, no hanger-on from the meeting, had
seen the incident. They had all run to the fire.
In a little while a big crowd was pressed around the side-
walk and street in front of the blazing house. The fire must
have been burning quite a while before it was discovered. No
one saw it when it was a small glow in a back room. No one
saw an undersized Negro run from the back, climb a fence,
and escape down an alley.
The scream of sirens announced fire engines, summoned by
radio from a police prowl car. The twelve policemen who
had been on duty outside the Elks' hall pushed back the
crowd. “Get back, get back, watch yourself, liable to get
hurt."
Six fire-fighting trucks dashed up. Hose was spun out, at-
tached, and firemen ran toward the crackling, smoke-fogged
house. The place was all in flames by now. It was too late to
save it. But the firemen could and did prevent the fire from
spreading. Negroes who lived in adjoining houses had run
out in terror, some in their night clothing.
“ 'Twas empty'," a Negro told the police captain. "Ain't
nobody lived there sence las' year. House 'bout to fall apart.”
Others confirmed this fact. Then the captain remembered


THE WHITE BAND
281
"That's good. The old dump, what you can see of it,
doesn't look like it's much loss.”
A police sergeant touched their arms lightly. “Please get
back, fellows. That front wall's tippin' over, and there'll be
sparks from here to hell.”
The two students retreated. The crowd, pushed by the
police, began edging back, faster when those on the outer
fringes realized the danger.
Tim and Eggy slipped through to the far side of the back-
ward-surging Negroes. There was a house set back on an
elevation from the street, and they climbed up the three steps
from the sidewalk and stood in the yard. They could see fine
now. The big hoses were being played on the houses on
either side of the fire. This prevented sparks from taking hold.
A little knot of Negroes, perhaps six or seven, climbed up
beside the white students in the yard. Eggy was watching the
fire, and Tim, noticing them, turned away, thinking they had
come for a better look. He didn't notice the approach of a
well-built Negro, not tall, hatless, with a young face and gray
hair.
“What you white boys doin' here?” he demanded.
The students turned around. “Same as you,” Eggy said.
“Watching the fire.”
“Maybe you done set it off,” said the Negro, stepping
closer.
“Oh, you're crazy,” Tim O'Hearn said. “We just happened
to be passing.”
“I'se crazy, is I?” The Negro stepped closer, and his com-
panions gathered around him. The leader gave Prentice a
shove. Infuriated, Tim jumped forward and swung his left
fist swiftly. It landed solidly on the Negro's face, and he
staggered back into the arms of his followers. They surged
about the two students. Tim's fists moved fast, landing here


THE WHITE BAND
285
“What people have blamed the White Band?” he countered.
"Well, Doctor Gavin.”
He was president of a Negro college; you'd expect him to
blame them.
“And Harry Holmes.”
"I thought Harry had retired,” Joe said.
“He has, but he's editor emeritus, and a figure around here.”
"Sure.”
“And Payne Foster.”
Payne Foster was a leading Southern liberal. He wrote on
economic and sociological subjects for learned journals.
"It's the first I've heard of it,” Joe said. “I can tell you this.
I'm sure the White Band didn't do it. Our policy is strictly
against violence. However, I intend to make my own investi-
gation of ... whatever happened down there. If any Bands-
men are involved, they'll soon cease to be Bandsmen. We
can't control all the hoodlums on the fringes of this—this ten-
sion between the races. I can say this: We'll help the au-
thorities in every way we can to control the more lawless
elements and keep order."
“Thanks, Senator. That's fine.”
Joe hurried back to the hall. He took Dave and Hank off
in a corner and told them what had happened. “I think I'd
better go down there right away,” he said. “Get the Band off
the hook. See what the situation is. Want to go along, Dave?”
“Sure, I'll go,” Dave agreed.
“Want me too?” Hank asked.
“You'd better stay and hold things down at headquarters,”
Joe said. “Of course the trouble's probably exaggerated, but
you'll get plenty of queries. And you know what to tell
them.'
“I know."
Dave and Joe went to the office in back of the hall and


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287
Tarver were at law school. That night Ned had asked him to
go somewhere. “I want you to meet somebody.” They went
along U Street, in the heart of a Negro district, down a side
street and up to Ned's small apartment. A woman, an older
woman, was waiting there.
“This is my mother,” Ned explained. “Ma, this is Joe Duf-
field. I've told you a lot about him.”
Joe had felt a shock. Somehow he had thought of Ned's
mother as light-skinned, almost, if not quite, as white as Ned.
Here was a dark yellow woman. It didn't seem possible that
she was Ned's mother. But she was a handsome woman, with
fine, regular features, a winning smile. She glistened as if
scrubbed, and a faint perfume surrounded her. She had on a
pretty blue coat-suit, which Ned no doubt had bought her.
Joe held out his hand, and Ned's mother shook it firmly.
"It's shore nice to meet you, Mr. Duffield. Anyone 'at's been
as good to my boy as I know you have. Do sit down, Mr.
Joe.”
He sat. She still stood, and he got up. “Sit down, please,
Mrs. Tarver.”
Finally she sat down on the edge of a chair, looking uncom-
fortable. "My name's Liz,” she said.
“All right, Liz then. Your boy's a credit to you.”
She laughed a little sadly. “Ain't no credit to me, Mr. Joe.
He done it all hisself. And it warn’t easy, I know that. We
never had much back home, but of all the chillun, Ned he was
just dee-termined to get someplace.”
"He will,” Joe assured her. “He has already."
Ned went to the tiny kitchen to make coffee and fix sand-
wiches. Liz Tarver turned away. When she looked back at
Joe there were tears in her eyes, though she was smiling. “If
other white folks had been as good to him as you have, Mr.


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Joe, 'twouldn't have been half the job it's been, him gettin' an
education an' all.”
"I haven't really helped him any,” Joe said. “He's done it
all himself. But I'm proud to be his friend."
He had been ... once.
Dave Beckett touched his arm. “Watch yourself, Joe.
We're inside Baynesville, and you're still driving like a dervish.
We don't want to start out by getting ourselves put in the
pokey."
Joe reduced the speed to thirty, and they rolled along a
silent street that led to Courthouse Square.


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They returned to the living room. Ella had kept the chil-
dren quiet, telling them it was all a game and the men would
leave directly.
She spoke to them calmly, though her voice was trembling.
“You believe me now? Will you go now, so we can go back
to sleep?”
"I guess so," Bill Dade replied. “But we'll be back, gal,
don't think we won't. We'll find him.”
Doc had tossed away a smoked-down cigarette. It landed,
unnoticed, in a curtain. A moment later the curtain flared up.
Ella screamed. “Water, water,” she cried, “get water!”
But it was too late to think about a pitcher or a bucket of
water. The flame licked across to the curtain of the adjoining
window. The woodwork caught. The fire swept upward,
enveloping the whole side of the living room.
Ella caught the children, pulled them out of the room and
onto the front porch.
"Let's get the hell out of here,” Bill Dade shouted.
The men ran out to their car and jumped in. Ella stood on
the porch, helpless. She saw the whole living room blazing,
the house darkened with stifling smoke, the fire spreading
to the back, urged by a stiff draft from the open door. She
stood in shocked despair, watching the fire destroy the house
they had furnished with such delight. There'd been no time to
save anything, not one of the little treasures they had accumu-
lated patiently, one at a time.
The smoke drove them off the porch. Holding little Ella
with one hand, Hamp with the other, Ella ran screaming to
the nearest house.
Bill Dade turned the car around, headed for the Mobile
Turnpike. “We can't fool with tryin' to meet Fats,” he ex-
plained, pushing the accelerator. “Before you know it the
street'll be crawlin' with cops and firemen. I know a place


294
THE WHITE BAND
torn down; it was about to fall in. The firemen smelt kerosene
in the ruins, in back, and they figure somebody set the fire.
They couldn't save the house, but they did prevent the fire
from spreading. Down the street a fight broke out between a
couple of white boys, students at the college, and some nig-
gers. What it was all about I haven't been able to find out.
But one of the boys was hurt pretty bad, and he was promi-
nent. Tim O'Hearn. He got stabbed in the chest with a
switch-blade. His condition is reported serious.”
“He's a football player, isn't he?” Joe asked.
“A football player! Don't you keep up with our athletes,
Senator? He's one of the best in the South. An outstanding
back. May make all-American this year, if this don't stop him.
Didn't you read about that seventy-yard run he made against
Alabama last Saturday?”
“I'm afraid,” Joe explained, “I don't follow football so
closely any more. I certainly used to. I'm sorry he was hurt.
What was he doing in Niggertown?”
"He tells me,” Chief Bannock said, “he and his friend had
just run to the fire, and were watching it from a little distance
when these niggers jumped them. I believe him. He wouldn't
hardly have gone into Niggertown looking for trouble with
just one other guy, and that one no athlete but a sort of book-
worm, I hear. I'm holding four niggers. One of them is Bear-
cat Turner, the former prize fighter. Some of those niggers
had switch-blades, and a couple of guns were found on the
ground of this yard where the fight took place.”
The chief swished his handkerchief across his face. “That's
all there was to it. There wasn't any riot. God almighty!
The Dispatch sent three reporters and two photographers,
and they're still cruising around, thinking we've suppressed
something. The A. P. and the U. P. sent men from their
Riverport bureaus. Three New York papers and two Chicago
eau


30
A ROPE HELD HIS ARMS tightly to his sides, and, with the
adhesive sealing his mouth, Ned Tarver was helpless. There
was no use trying to struggle or shout. Three men sat over
him, one resting his feet against Ned's back. He breathed
with some difficulty, for the adhesive touched the lower part
of his nostrils.
He lay on the floor of the back seat and felt the car riding
smoothly, apparently not too fast. The three men in back and
the two in front were silent except for a few muttered com-
ments between the driver and the man beside him, apparently
about where to turn, which road to take. There was no use
even trying to think. He could only wait and dread and hope
something would intervene to save him from whatever these
men planned.
He felt the car jolt over a bump, then travel less smoothly.
It seemed to go in and out of ruts. It obviously had turned
into a dirt road in indifferent condition. He had on his over-
297


298
THE WHITE BAND
coat, and he wasn't cold, although the air that swished in from
the front was sharp.
The car jolted over the bad road, slowly, carefully, for
maybe ten minutes. It stopped, and there was low-voiced talk
back and forth among several of the men. The driver said,
“Just ahead,” and they jolted a little further, then turned
again. The side road actually was smoother. They went
along it a short way and stopped.
All the men got out. The three in back stood by their door.
One called, “All right, boy, get out.”
He got up, with some difficulty, since he couldn't move his
arms. One of the men helped him out, and he stood blinking
in the car lights. The five men gathered about him wore their
absurd Halloween masks. He had a glimpse of thick woods
all about, and in the distance he heard a stream, a quiet night
voice. The air filtered through the woods was cold and
touched with fragrance.
The big man with a clown's face-thin, yellow hair, long
nose, leering grin of hideous teeth-gave an order which Ned
could not understand. But the two men close to him unfas-
tened the rope binding his arms against his sides. Then they
ripped off the adhesive circling his face, taking, he felt, some
of the skin.
He stood free, ungagged, but the five men were close
around him. It would have been folly to try to get away. He
could have called for help. Who would hear him in this wild
spot? There was not a sound except the faint noise of a small
wind brushing fallen leaves and the purring of the stream. If
he fought or tried a break, probably he'd be hurt worse than
they planned to hurt him. So he stood and waited, suppressing
a stifling fear, unable somehow to believe that anything bad
would happen to him.
The men seemed to be waiting too-for something. They


THE WHITE BAND
303
S.
Jesus, it hurts like hell. Let's get the hell out of here. Sam,
you drive. I can't.”
They helped the big man into the back seat, where he set-
tled down, groaning and cursing.
“Wonder what happened to Bill Dade?” Ben Blackwell
asked.
“I don't know,” Fats spoke with difficulty. “Further-more
-I don't-give a good goddam. I'm sure they didn't-get Tom
Goodwin-or they'd-been out here with him. Something
happened to-to stop 'em. But what the hell do we care? We
took care of Tarver but-good.”
“Should we have left him there?” Blake McLeod wondered.
“Why the bejesus not? He'll-he'll come to in a couple of
hours, though the last guy I hit didn't come to for three hours.
He'll-find-oh, Christ!- find his way back. He's lucky we
didn't-string him up.”
Sam Carruthers drove as fast as he could over the deep-
rutted road. When they got to the highway, he let the car
spurt forward. There wasn't any danger now. Nobody could
pin a thing on them.
But Fats Gilliam, for all his groaning, was thinking hard.
As they approached the city he said, “Look-you guys. Take
me up to my-my apartment, and all of you-come along.”
“But don't you need to see a doctor?” Blake McLeod asked.
“Shut up,” Fats snapped. “I'm gonta see a doctor. But first
we-we gotta make it look good. Don't you-you damn fools
ever use your heads? Now slow down, Sam, and go into town
-a roundabout way-I'll tell you where to turn-goddam, my
back hurts. I'll tell you each turn-to make.”
Under his direction, Sam drove around back streets, slowly,
and then rolled down the street to Fats' apartment house. No
one was in sight. This had been Baynesville's first modern


304
THE WHITE BAND
apartment house. Six stories, with all the gadgets, and it was
still one of the best in town.
They parked in front and got into the building without
meeting any one. They piled into the self-service elevator
and went to the fourth floor. Fats found his key and gave it
to Sam to insert-it was hard for Fats to bend over. They
entered the apartment very quietly, as Fats had directed, and
got the lights on. It was a pleasant, bedroom-living room
apartment, with larger rooms than you found in the newer
apartment houses. The living room was lined with football
pictures, the mantel with golf and skeet-shooting and football
trophies.
Fats settled down on a sofa, still moaning that his back was
killing him. But he wasn't in too much pain to give directions.
“Look, you guys—but first, you, Sam, look in the cupboard
in-oh, God!-the kitchen. You'll find liquor there. For
Christ's sake get me a drink-quick.”
Sam did as he was told, and emerged with a whiskey bottle,
an empty glass, and a glass of water. Fats poured out a quar-
ter of a waterglass, tossed it off, and chased it with water.
“Help yourself, fellows. Goddam, that jig's got a kick like
a mule.”
The bottle of bourbon was almost full, and they found
more glasses and helped themselves. Blake McLeod poured a
drink the size of Fats' and drank it straight.
Fats, his pain numbed for the moment by the whiskey, gave
more orders. “Look, you guys, you'll find a card table in that
closet over there. Get it out, set it up. You-you'll find cards
and poker chips in the drawer of that desk on the other side.
Get them. Put them-oh, Jesus!-stack chips around, and
cards. Get down some-some ashtrays from the mantel.”
“God,” Ben Blackwell objected, "you ain't gonta start no
poker game now?”


THE WHITE BAND
305
“Don't be a damn fool, Ben, any more’n you can help. No,
we're not. Just fix it like I said, and-ouch!-put some chairs
around.”
They bustled around, setting up the table, arranging the
cards and chips. Then, at Fats' direction, they put their
smoked-down cigarettes in ashtrays on the corners of the
table, so that the air was filled with stale smoke.
"Good,” said Fats. “Now, listen. Try to get it through
your heads if you can. We-we've been-Jesus! -playing
cards here-all evening. See? I got up to change that overhead
light. It-it was burnt out, and I slipped and fell-on my side
-against that coffee table. See how sharp its edges are? Get
it? Nobody-nobody will ever know the difference. We
gotta have an alibi. That son of a bitch's liable sic the F.B.I.,
God knows who else on us. So nebody's al-already spread
something about me, I wish I knew who. So this'll fix us up
fine. Everybody understand?”
They said they did.
"Good,” Fats went on. “If any of you forgets where we
were all evening, and makes-damnation!-a crack out of the
way, I'll personally cut his throat. Got it? Okay. Now then,
you Sam, you've still got most of–Jesus!-most of your senses,
such as they are. You phone Doc Hurley. Hurley, James A.
He's surgeon for the team. Best man in town on-on trau-
matic surgery.”
“Traum what?" asked Til Wheeler. Til, a wizened, hard-
faced man, the oldest in the little group, seldom spoke. He'd
said almost nothing all evening, but you could depend on him.
He'd sat on Ned Tarver's legs while Fats wielded his belt.
“Traumatic, Tilford. Means surgery for conditions involv-
ing injuries, as distinct from-goddam it!—from those involv-
ing sickness, like appendicitis or stomach ulcers."
Sam Carruthers found the number and phoned. There was


306
THE WHITE BAND
a long delay, then they dimly heard a man's voice answering.
Sam explained what had happened and hung up.
“He'll be over as quick as he can throw some clothes on and
get his car out of the garage.”
“Thanks,” said Fats. “Now-God, it hurts to breathe-you,
Blake. You've-you've been to college, though I don't know
what good it did you. You go by the News office and tell
'em what happened to me. I'm sure Doc'll take me to the
hospital. It's—it's bad.”
“Me go by the paper?” Young Blake McLeod shuddered.
“Yes, just tell 'em what we-we've agreed on-I mean, what
happened. It's better to give it to them that way than have it
leak out. That goddam Tarver. Next time I'll strangle him
and dump him in the-Olgoochi Swamp. Jez!”
Blake took another drink. "All right then, Fats, if you like.
But they'll ask me a lot of questions.'
“So what? Can't you answer 'em? Good God! It's simple
as a straight end run. We played cards. I had a fall. Sam, you
go with him, see he doesn't get himself balled up, add a word
where-ooh!-you have to.”
Ben Blackwell pulled out his handkerchief and dropped a
souvenir which he'd forgotten that he picked up. He looked
at it. Must be Tarver's lodge pin.
He held it out to the others, laughing. “The Sons and
Daughters of I Will Arise?” he suggested.
Fats blinked over at the pin. He was in heavy pain again.
He did not bother to tell Ben that it was a Phi Beta Kappa key.
Ben put it back in his pocket.
The doorbell buzzed. The doctor.


308
THE WHITE BAND
And the read-out head said:
Two Houses Burned in Negro Area
Football Star Hurt in Rioting
Desegregation Leader Missing
He read the account over rolls and coffee. There was noth-
ing he didn't know. He looked at the local paper. It had the
same story, but played down and written more conservatively.
He went back to the room. Dave was astir. Joe gave him
the papers, and Dave sleepily read the accounts. “Well, Joe,
what do we do now?"
Joe, pacing the room smoking, paused. “I don't know.
Wait, I suppose. I have a hunch something worse has hap-
pened.”
“Maybe not.”
“I wouldn't offer odds either way. I think I'll go back to
headquarters and stick around a while. Might be something
new. You join me there when you've had breakfast.”
"Sure.” Dave, in his undershirt and shorts, went into the
bathroom to shave with the set they had picked up at an
all-night drugstore. They'd come away from Riverport with-
out anything; they hadn't wanted to take time to go by their
homes and pack bags.
The morning was sharp but clear; the sun, struggling up
through mist, would bring a fine, temperate day. Joe walked
briskly the three blocks to the City Hall.
Steve Bannock was home getting some sleep. A Lieutenant
Wendell, chief of detectives, was in charge. He was a short,
broad man with a hard, expressionless face.
“Yes, Senator. I've heard you speak, a number of times.
Things are quiet in Niggertown, not a sign of trouble since
the fire at the Goodwins was put out. No, the house is dam-


THE WHITE BAND
311
Joe glared at the coroner. The doctor went over to the
basket, lifted back one side of the cover.
“His name is Ned Tarver,” Joe said.
“Did he maybe work for you once?” the coroner asked.
Joe, controlling his voice with difficulty, said, “He never
worked for me. He is a nigra, though he's an important man.
He was. He was a lawyer, general counsel for the League for
Racial Justice.”
"Oh, that.” Dr. Koester spread his hands in an ambiguous
gesture. “The desegregation thing."
“Yes.”
The line of Ned Tarver's jaw was blue, the right side.
Otherwise his face was unmarked. His eyes were slightly
open, as if he were musing over something he had seen. There
was no expression of pain or anguish on his face, but a
strangely peaceful look, as if he had found sudden surcease
from the hard struggle, the turmoil, the frustrations he had
fought through all his life.
His voice shaky, Joe said, “I'd advise you, doctor, to make
a thorough examination. There'll be hell to pay when his
friends in the North learn what's happened.”
The coroner nodded. “I don't doubt it. And I'll do that.
Thank you, Senator.”
Joe turned away, left the morgue. On the street he stopped
to light a cigarette. This, then, was the end of all Ned's
dreams, all his hard work, his persistence against heavy odds,
his long, brave journey to escape the fate he was born into,
the fetch-and-carry life of the cabin between the cotton patch
and the pines. A slab in the morgue. It was, eventually, the
end of every man, but not in this dreadful way, this violent
early thwarting of all he had become and all he hoped to be.
Joe turned to self-blame. It was his fault. He could have
prevented it if he had acted more decisively. But what could


THE WHITE BAND
313
“I believe you told me once that you knew him.”
"I didn't tell you how well I knew him. We were in law
school together-close friends, too. I admired him. I still do
... did. I don't care if he was a nigger, or whether you or
anyone else likes it.”
The dark young man laughed. “You should know I'm not
that kind of a bigot, Joe. I don't care. I went to school up
North too. I sometimes met nigras at parties and places. It
didn't bother me. I could imagine being much more congenial
with some than with a lot of white men I've known.”
Joe did not respond directly. He said, “I didn't tell you or
Hank, because it was pretty vague, but I was tipped off to
this.”
"To what?” Dave finished his whiskey sour. “You mean
that something would happen to Tarver?”
"His name wasn't mentioned, but I was tipped that a bunch
of goons planned to work over some leaders of the integration
fight. Wouldn't he be first on the list?”
“I guess so.”
“I heard, too, who was leading the bunch.”
“You did? Who?"
Joe lowered his voice and leaned across the table. “Fats
Gilliam.” .
"Fats! Hell, he wouldn't be that big a fool. I've known
Fats a long time, and he never struck me as dumb. Besides, he
couldn't have done it!"
“Why?”
“Because he's in the hospital.”
"Since when? He was at our board meeting yesterday
morning.”
"I know. I just heard about this. He and some fellows were
playing poker at his apartment last night, and he got up on a
chair to fix a light, and he fell against a table. He may have a


314
THE WHITE BAND
ruptured kidney. They don't know how bad it is, last I
heard.”
"When did they take him to the hospital?”
“I don't know, Joe, maybe one or two o'clock this morn-
ing.”
“And his friends were with him when he was hurt?”
“Of course—they were still playing. There were four fel-
lows with him. They called the doctor, and the doctor carted
him off to the hospital and shot him full of dope. He was in a
lot of pain.”
Joe laughed mirthlessly. “I see. Well, he's got an alibi you
couldn't break with a sledge-hammer, however he was actually
hurt. Those guys would swear they were with him all eve-
ning.”
“Of course. I assume so.”
"I reckon you're right, Dave; he's not dumb.”
“But if you heard he was in for such a thing,” Dave sug-
gested, “why didn't you ..."
“The information,” Joe explained, "was a little vague. I
don't think it would hold up in court. I couldn't accuse him.
I talked to him after our meeting. I went as far as I could
without accusing him. I told him I'd heard there was trouble
impending. I made it more specific. I told him I understood
some nigras in Baynesville were to be taken out and worked
over. He said he hadn't heard anything about it. He was sure
no Bandsmen would do such a thing. Of course you couldn't
control all the young hoodlums. ... The goddam hypocrite!”
“Maybe he wasn't in on it. Maybe your information was
phony, or let's say mistaken. He could have been doing just
what he and those other guys say he was-playing cards all
evening at his apartment. He does have poker parties. I sat in
on one once. They took everything but my shorts.”
Dave beckoned to the bartender for another round. “Well,


THE WHITE BAND
315
we'll have to put out some kind of statement. Tarver's friends
in the North will raise hell.”
"It's your baby now," Joe said.
"What do you mean?”
“What do you think? That I'm through with the White
Band.”
Dave leaned over the table, touched Joe's arm. “Now wait
a minute, Joe. The Band had nothing to do with this.”
“How do I know? I wouldn't take one to eight there were
no Bandsmen in on it. At least an organization like ours is an
excuse for all sorts of violence, provides a cloak of safe ano-
nymity for men who are ordinarily too cowardly to do what
they'd like to do.”
“Look, Joe,” Dave said earnestly, “we need you. You've
provided the big name we needed to help put us over.”
“Then you can get another sucker,” Joe retorted.
"We want you,” Dave rushed on. “You're the ideal Grand
Protector. Nobody's ever successfully attacked your charac-
ter, your integrity. Everybody knows you're against lynch-
ing, flogging, any sort of violence. This horrible thing won't
reflect on you.”
“It won't do me any good. Besides, I don't want anything
more to do with this desegregation thing, with something
that's cost the life of a man like Ned Tarver.”
“It's a tragic thing, I'll grant you,” Dave admitted. “But
remember, it probably would have happened if there hadn't
been any White Band.”
"That may be. But we'll be blamed. We're the big secret
society fighting integration. Do you think the papers in the
North'll discriminate, pause over such niceties as whether
some Bandsmen did it on their own or some chapter author-
ized it by resolution? You'll hear plenty from Capitol Hill
too.”


316
THE WHITE BAND
“It might help us actually to tighten up on the chapters,”
Dave argued. “Tell 'em they'll be held responsible for vio-
lence in their areas. But after all, we couldn't control every
man in ..."
"I've heard that till it nauseates me.”
Dave had another whiskey sour. Joe waved away another
drink. Dave lowered his voice. “You haven't done anything
to be ashamed of. And if you get out now you'll be passing
up ... well, the opportunity of a lifetime. Such a chance
won't come again. It's not as if you had to scuttle your con-
science to go along with this movement. Nobody's ever
asked you to condone or wink at the tendencies of the more
sadistic Rednecks and Crackers and hillbillies."
Joe did not reply. The dark young man thought of some-
thing else. “Here's an angle maybe you haven't considered,
Joe. If you quit now it will be admitting, in effect, that you
think the White Band was to blame, that you want to get out
from under. You can stay and insist it was innocent.”
“At least,” Joe said, “in quitting I'll be repudiating all such
goddam cowardly forms of vengeance, this and others prob-
ably to come.”
Dave paused and said, “Just promise me one thing, Joe.
We've known each other a long time. You were a sort of
hero of mine when I was in school and you first went to con-
gress, Riverport's brilliant young political leader.”
Joe laughed. “A hell of a hero you picked.”
“Anyway we've been friends a long time. Promise me this
much, Joe, promise an old friend. That you'll wait until to-
morrow before you do anything, issue any statement. Sleep
over it.”
“I don't have to sleep over some things."
“No, but promise me anyway.”
“I'm going back to Riverport,” Joe hedged.
il consenso


THE WHITE BAND
317
“Okay. Go home and think it over carefully. It won't
matter if nothing's done one way or the other for twenty-four
hours. Then I'll see you in Riverport."
“All right,” Joe said wearily. “I'll grant you that much,
Dave. But I think I'll come back here tomorrow, see what's
been done. For the moment I've had enough of this horrible
little town. I'll be back to see what's been done in the way
of investigation, though anyone's a sap to think Steve Bannock
and his small-town cops could get anywhere even if they
wanted to, or that a sheriff's office filled with political semi-
pros would make a move. You stick around, Dave, see what
you can find out. I'll meet you right here in this tavern at
ten-thirty tomorrow morning."
“Good. And think it over from all angles, Joe.”
"I'll do that, Dave, though I don't see what I can think of
that I haven't thought of already.”
They got up. Dave paid the bill, and they left the tavern.


320
THE WHITE BAND
wizard, that guy. He says he'll get me through without an
operation. At first he didn't know. He kept me doped up all
yesterday, but the pain's about gone. He says it's clearing it-
self up. I guess I'm lucky. It wasn't a serious break in the
kidney-more of a bruise, I think, though I'm not too clear
about what happened.”
“It was tough, having a fall like that.” Dave sat down.
Fats chuckled. “And I'd been winning all evening. The
others were crabbing, like losers always do, and I said I
guessed I was just lucky. Then the light burned out, and I
got up to fix it and ... blooey, I fell and hit my side on that
table. Jesus, how it hurt!”
“I'll bet.”
“Any more excitement around town?”
Dave said everything was quiet, had been since that last
fire. Hardly a soul on the streets last night.
“It's too bad about that nigger Tarver,” Fats said carefully.
“Yeah. Joe's all upset about it.” Dave didn't tell Fats that
Joe was resolved to quit; no use spreading that until there was
no chance he might change his mind.
Fats crushed out his cigarette in an ashtray. “Joe's a good
guy, good as they come, and he has as much actual ability as
anybody in that Senate, but he's soft in some ways, in some
ways a bleeding heart. He worries too much.”
“Maybe.”
"I'm sure that bunch, whoever took Tarver out, didn't in-
tend to kill him.” Fats caught himself. “I mean, my theory is
they gave him a hiding, and some way he got hurt worse than
they intended. That's just my theory. Naturally, I don't
know what happened. But it looks to me like if they'd in-
tended to kill him they'd have just strung him up or shot him
full of holes. See what I mean?”
some


THE WHITE BAND
321
Va
use
“Yeah, but the effect was the same, whatever they in-
tended.”
"Sure. Well, it looks like Georgia Tech and maybe Ole
Miss-we've got to play 'em both-have tried to put a jinx on
the team. I get knocked out, and then my bright and particu-
lar star, Tim O'Hearn, gets sent here. He's on the next floor.”
“I understand,” Dave said, “he's getting along fine."
“Yeah, I heard this morning he'd be out in a week and
maybe back in uniform in another week. He was just lucky.
You know, I heard there was trouble brewing in Niggertown.
I was tipped. I heard some niggers were going around with
switch-blades and guns and blackjacks. Well, it turned out
they were.”
"From what I hear,” said Dave, “that boy, your backfield
star, wasn't doing a thing. He and another boy were just
watching the fire, the first one, where that vacant house
burned up.”
“I'm sure that's true,” Fats said. “Tim wouldn't bother
anybody. I know the boy. Those tough niggers just jumped
him, for nothing at all. You know, I was just thinking. Yan-
kees and nigger-loving Southerners start out to tell us what
we're to do. Well, they ain't doing so well at it."
“What do you mean, Fats?”.
"Well, take Doc Davison. He had a nice job as president
of our college for ten years. Where is he now? Not here.
He's someplace in Pennsylvania, having to get adjusted to a
new job. Why? Because he undertook to do some integrating
on his own. Take Harry Holmes, the great editor. Where's
he? Out, retired, fini. He won't write any more editorials
telling us what a bunch of bastards we all are for not wanting
to live with a swarm of smelly niggers. And Tarver, coming
down here from Harlem to try to force us to run our schools
the way they think we ought to, and stirring up our local


324
THE WHITE BAND
of his life. But he hadn't been able to bring himself to divorce
(and she wouldn't take the initiative) or simply clear out and
leave her. There had been his political career to consider.
But now ...
Well, what had he decided about the White Band? He
found that he didn't know. Nobody could think straight with
someone carrying on as she had all evening. He could have
gone out, but he was too tired, too dispirited, and he simply
sat and took it, trying to calm her, which was like trying to
quiet an electrical storm. He hadn't mentioned his dilemma
to her. What was the use? At such times she was concerned
only with her own irrational problems, her chaotic thoughts.
As well talk back to a record-player.
He lit a cigarette, saw the dawn brightening the foliage in
back of the house. But he had decided once. With finality,
he thought. In such a situation your first conclusion was gen-
erally the wisest. Then Dave had started in on him, trying
with his beguiling sophistries to change his mind. There was
no logical reason for changing it.
He saw Ned Tarver lying in the morgue basket like worn-
out clothing placed in a hamper to be discarded. He wouldn't
bother the South any more, and the South wouldn't bother
him. In the North, even among some of the more thoughtful
Southerners, he would be a martyr. But how many Rednecks
were thinking: serves him right, goddam uppity nigger. It
didn't matter to Ned what anyone thought. Praise and hatred
were alike to him.
To thy high requiem become a sod.
He wondered if Ned were somewhere, looking, listening.
It was hard to get away from some conception of eternity,
even if you didn't believe in it. At least it was comforting.
ception of eternity


THE WHITE BAND
325
It was agonizing to think of something as unique as a human
soul decaying as the body decayed. But it was, after all, part
of the body, inseparable from it.
The grass withereth
The flower fadeth ...
Nothing lasted.
But the word of our God endureth forever. ...
That's what it said. Who knew? The simple could believe.
But let's be practical. The White Band ... perhaps it was,
in a technical sense, innocent. But was it in the larger sense?
Other men would be beaten, some killed, before this issue was
settled one way or another, or merely forgotten. Could the
White Band be blamed? Yes and no. His successor might
wink at violence, if not encourage it. Even if officially it con-
tinued to insist it was for lawful resistance (and could there be
lawful resistance when the law had spoken its final word?),
men would be encouraged and incited by the anonymous,
protective masks to do, alone or in little groups, what they'd
be afraid to do without the tacit force of that collective cour-
age.
No, if he stayed he'd feel that in a way he was condoning
the fate of Ned Tarver.
Well, what would he do now?
He went to the bathroom, began shaving.
He could practice law. But he'd abandoned his Riverport
practice when he went to Congress, or almost so. It would be
better to set up in Washington, where he knew the ropes. But
the only lucrative practice there was as a lobbyist of a sort:
your clients were corporations or associations, and you went


328
THE WHITE BAND
politics, especially Southern politics—but there had been com-
pensations. He had been successful, achieved more in a few
years than many men accomplished all their lives. He had
been honored, looked up to, he had his position. Why should
he keep downgrading himself, attacking himself for losing
aims, dreams, ideals, which had dropped by the wayside, one
at a time, inevitably? There was no sense in it. He was just
being a damned fool.
But still he didn't know what he'd do. He'd have to de-
cide once and for all in two or three hours.
Right now he wanted coffee more than anything-several
cups.
OU
Joe drove into Baynesville at twenty minutes to ten. He
had fifty minutes to kill before meeting Dave. He rejected a
glancing thought of going by the hotel. The time of the ap-
pointment was soon enough. Besides, Dave might have gone
home last night.
The incongruity of their rendezvous in Baynesville sud-
denly amused Joe. They could just as well have met at their
offices in Riverport, or anywhere else. He recalled that when
he had suggested the place he had felt that he wanted to return
to Baynesville to see what was going on, if anything more had
happened, if there was any pretense of an investigation. All
this he probably could have learned as well in Riverport.
There was a conspiratorial air about their meeting here, as if
they had some dark secret to discuss. Well, in a way they
had.
The morning was crisp, with the sun fighting through an
early mist and slowly driving it away. Cars and buses felt
their way into Courthouse Square, discharging men and
as a
S7


THE WHITE BAND
329
women who did not have to be at their offices or shops very
early. The town looked busy and tranquil.
He drove slowly out of the square, down two blocks, and
found himself in front of the Baynesville General Hospital, a
new, square, brick-and-stone building of five stories which
covered a whole block. On an impulse he parked and went in.
He asked the young woman at the information desk how
two patients were getting along, Mr. Jake Gilliam and Mr.
Tim O'Hearn. Both, she said, were doing fine.
"Did you want to see Mr. Gilliam?" she asked.
“No,” he said, “but I'd like to see Mr. O'Hearn if I could.”
“Go right up. It's the third floor, 301. The elevators are
straight ahead.”
“Thank you very much.”
He found Tim O'Hearn seated on an armchair, in a pale-
blue bathrobe. His color was good, he did not look at all
sick, and he leaned forward in the chair in an attitude that
reminded Joe of a prize fighter on his stool eager for the bell
to ring. It was what hospitals call a semi-private room, but
the second bed was unoccupied.
Tim grinned and got to his feet. “Why, Senator Duffield!
Gee, it's nice of you to come to see me.”
“Don't stand up,” Joe said. “Take it easy. I'm glad to see
you so well.”
“Oh, I feel fine, Senator. I think they should let me go, but
they're keeping me a few days longer. I guess I was lucky.”
"I understand you were.” Joe pulled up a small chair and
sat down.
The young man looked away, suddenly serious. “Senator,
it turned out just as I was afraid-that man getting lynched,
those fires. I feel like some way I should have been able to
prevent it, with what I knew.”


330
THE WHITE BAND
“I've felt the same way,” Joe confessed. “And I did what I
could-at least, all I felt I could at the time. I went to the
police chief, Steve Bannock, and to others. I even talked to
... our friend, but I didn't feel that I could directly accuse
him. After all, what you heard..."
“I'm still willing," Tim interrupted, “to tell what I told you
to the grand jury or the prosecuting attorney or anyone
who'd do anything about it.”
"I know you are,” said Joe, “but it would do no good. For
one thing, our friend has an airtight alibi.”
"I read in the paper how he was hurt. How he was sup-
posed to have been hurt. I still think maybe ..."
“Well, we don't know, Tim, but he has four witnesses.
You can't get around that. We'll have to forget ... what was
our little secret, yours and mine. Even if he didn't have this
alibi, I'm compelled to say, Tim, I don't think your evidence
would hold up in court.”
"I don't suppose it would. I don't know much about
courts.”
Joe laughed. “The less you know the better."
“But, Senator, the way it happened ... wasn't it just like I
told you, that fellow Tarver at the nigger Elks', everything?
Of course I didn't know who they meant.”
“That's true, Tim.”
“But we can't prove anything?”
“That's the whole difficulty, Tim.”
The student recalled, “I've read every paper I could get
hold of. Do you think maybe those guys in Halloween masks
that burned the nigger lawyer's house were the same ones that
killed this Ned Tarver?"
"It could be,” Joe reflected. “How can anyone know?"
“They might've had him trussed up in their car all the time."
"It's possible.”


THE WHITE BAND
331
"I'm not for desegregation, integration, whatever you want
to call it,” Tim added, “but I've always hated bullies. Only
cowards would gang up on somebody.”
“You're right, Tim.”
“And this Ned Tarver, he was an educated nigra, a lawyer,
wasn't he?"
“Highly educated, a very able man.”
Tim turned to something else. “You know, Senator, I didn't
do a thing to get that switch-blade in my gullet. Eg–Tom
Prentice and I were just watching the fire when those niggers
jumped us. I'll never know why.”
“I believe you, Tim.”
"We decided we'd drop down to Niggertown and see if
there was any excitement, see if there was anything to what
we'd both heard was going to happen.”
“That's natural enough.”
They paused, and Joe started to get up, but settled back
when he saw that Tim had something more to say.
“They say I can play football in ten days or two weeks.
That would get me in our three biggest games. But I think
I'm through with football.”
Joe leaned forward. “Why, Tim?"
“I don't want any part of that big lug any more. I don't
care how many witnesses he has, I'll always think ... well, the
thing is just too pat, the way he tells it.”
Joe did not answer directly. He turned away reflectively,
then said, “Tim, it's not my business to advise you. That's a
matter for your own conscience, even your own taste. But I
do feel you'd be making a mistake to quit. You wouldn't be
spiting the coach alone. You'd be taking it out on the whole
campus, on the students, the alumni, all the friends of the col-
lege who trust you to do your best. It would cripple the team