"Come right on wid me, man. I'se a-goin' to a meetin' to-night an' jine de ban'. Will ye jine us?"
"I jine anything dat'll lead me to de promise' lan'."
"Come on. Hit's over in Brooklyn but a nigger's gwine ter meet me at de ferry and take me dar."
Sam felt in his pocket for the money for the ferry. Luckily he had twenty cents. It was worth while to gamble that much on a trip to the promised land.
An emissary of the prophet met them on the Brooklyn side and led them to a vacant store with closed wooden shutters. No light could be seen from the street. The guide rapped a signal and the door opened. Inside were about thirty negroes gathered before a platform. Chairs filled the long space. A white man was talking to the closely packed group of blacks. Sam pressed forward and watched him.
He was old until he began to talk. And then there was something strange and electric in his tones that made him young. His voice was vaulting and metallic and throbbed with an indomitable will. There was contagion in the fierceness of his tones. It caught his hearers and called them in a spell.
His shoulders were stooped. His manner grim and impressive. There was a quick, wiry movement to his body that gave the idea that he was crouching to spring. It was uncanny. It persisted as his speech lengthened.
He was talking in cold tones of the injustice being done the black man in the South. Of the crimes against God and humanity which the Southern whites were daily committing.
The one feature of the strange speaker that fascinated Sam was the glitter of his shifting eyes. He never held them still. He did not try to bore a man through with them. They were restless, as if moved by hidden forces within. The flash of light from their depths seemed a signal from an unknown world.
Sam watched him with open mouth.