J. Poindexter, Colored

by Irvin S. Cobb

I pities his ignorance, but I tells him where Paducah is located at. It seems like the very sound of the name detains his curiosity. He just shoots the inquiring questions at me. He wants to know how big is Paducah and what is its main business, and what river is it on or close to, and what railroads run in there, and a lot more things. So, seeing he's a seeker after truth, I pumps him full. I tells him we not only is got one river at Paducah, we is got two; and I tells him about what railroads we've got running in; and about the big high water of 1913, and about the night-rider troubles some years before that. I tells him a heap else besides; mainly recent doings, such as Judge Priest having retired, and the Illinois Central having built up their shops to double size. Then he excuses himself some more and steps away pretty brisk, and goes into a colored billiard parlor, and I continues on my lonesome way.

But inside of five minutes another fellow speaks to me, and by my own entitled name, too. Only, this one is a kind of a pale tallow-color with a lot of gold teeth showing and very sporty dressed. He comes busting up to me like he's overjoyed to see me, and says:

"Hello, Jeff Poindexter—w'en did you git yere? You shore is a sight fur the sore eyes! How you leave ever'body down in ole Paduke? An' how does yore own copperosity seem to sagashuate?"

All the time he's saying this he's clamping my hand very affectionate, like I was his long-lost brother or something. I tells him his manner is familiar, but that I can't place him. He acts surprised at that—surprised and sort of hurt-like. He asks me don't I remember George Harris from down home? I tells him the onlyest George Harris of color I remembers is an old man which he does janiting for the First National Bank. And he speaks up very prompt and says that's his uncle which he is named for him and used to live with him out by the Illinois Central shops. He says he really don't blame me so much for not placing him, because he left there it's going on eight or nine years ago just before the big high water; but he claims he used to meet me frequent, and says I ain't changed much from the time when I used to be working for Judge Priest. He says he's sure he'd a-recognized me if he'd a-met up with me in China, let alone it's New York. He says he's been living up North for quite a spell now, and is chief owner of a pants-pressing emporium down the street a piece, and has a fine trade and is doing well. And then, before I can get a stray word in edgeways, he goes on to speak of several important things which has happened down home of late. I breaks in and asks him how come he keeps such close track of events 'way down there seeing he's been away so long; and he says he's just naturally so dog-gone fond of that town he subscribes regular for one of the local papers and reads it faithful and hence that's how come he keeps up so well with what's going on.

"W'ich, speakin' of papers, 'minds me of somethin'," he says; "it 'minds me 'at on 'count of readin' the papers so stiddy I has a sweet streak of luck comin' to me this ver' day. I'd lak to tell you 'bout it, Poindexter?"

"Perceed," I says, "perceed."

"I'm goin' to," he says, "but s'posen' fust we gits in off this yere street an' sets down somewhars whar we kin be comfor'able an' not be interrupted. Trouble wid me is," he says, "I knows so dad-blame many people round yere, bein' prominent in business the way I is, 'at ef I stands still more'n a minute somebody is shore to be comin' up an' slappin' me on the back. Does you feel lak a light snack, Poindexter?"

Well, it's getting to be close onto eleven o'clock now and I has not et nothing since breakfast except fifteen cents' worth of peanut candy, so I tells him I is agreeable. We goes into a restaurant run by, for and with colored, and we sets down by ourselves off at a little table and he insists that he's doing the paying-for on account of my being a boy from his old home-town, and he says for me to go the limit, ordering. So I calls for a bone sirloin and some fried potatoes and coffee and a mess of hot biscuits and a piece of mushmelon and one thing and another. It seems like, though, he ain't got much appetite himself. He takes just a cup of coffee, and whilst I is eating all of that provender of his generous providing, he tells me about this here streak of luck which has come his way.

First off, he begins by asking me has I heard tell about the Colored Arabian Prince, which he is now staying in New York? I says no. He says then I will be hearing about him if I sojourns long, because the Colored Arabian Prince is the talk of one and all. He's stopping at the Palace Afro-American Hotel, and he's got more money than what he can spend, and he's going round the world studying how black folks lives in every clime, and he's got thousands and thousands of dollars worth of jewelry which he wears constant. But the piece of jewelry which he prizes as the most precious of all, he lost it only yesterday; which it is a solid gold pin shaped like a four-leaf clover with a genuine real Arabian ruby set in the middle of it. This here gold-tooth boy he tells me this while I is sauntering through the steak. And I can tell from the way he says it that he's leading up to something.

"Yas-suh," he says, "yistiddy is w'en he lose it. An' this mornin' he's got a advertisement notice inserted in the cullid newspapers sayin' ez how he stan' ready an' willin' to pay fifty dollars fur its return to the hotel whar he is stoppin' at, an' no questions asted. An' yere 'bout half-an-hour befo' I runs into you, I'm walkin' 'long the street right up yere a lil' ways, an' I sees somethin' shiny layin' in the gutter an' I stoops down an' picks it up, an' ef it ain't the Cullid Arabian Prince's four-leaf clover pin, dog-gone me! An' yere it is, safe an' sound."