She gripped him in her arms for a moment and then with a gulping sob opened the door and went out into the street.
CHAPTER XXXI
"Keep out of the conflict!"
This admonition ran through Hertha's mind as she went to school Monday morning. She saw herself standing at the little table in the restaurant with the cynical old major looking at her kindly, admiringly. The conflict to which he had alluded had been that of the working-class, but his words might include all battle whether of labor or of race. If she married Dick she would be out of the conflict, out of the eternal worry of earning a living. But she would also be out of the conflict of race, forever removed from the life that had been hers such a short time ago. If she accepted the love of this young man from Georgia with his talk of "black wenches" and "buck niggers," she accepted complete ostracism from her past. And not only ostracism,—she had grown to realize that this was likely whatever course she chose,—but the past that had meant so much, that had helped to make her what she was, gentle-mannered, deft, well-educated, this past she must see despised. Dick might forgive those years but only if she would forget them. He would be ambitious for them both, and she must blot from her mind everything that touched upon the shocking disgrace, for so he would account it, of her world until eight months ago.
Sophie Switsky was in the conflict still, battling with the oppression that centered about her whirring machine. Kathleen was in it, demanding sunshine and health for the many in poverty. But if Hertha Williams married a Georgia cracker she left her conflict, turned from the battlefield into a place of quiet and safety. Ellen had predicted that when her sister went into the white world she would never join in the coarse abuse of the colored race; but if she married Dick she tacitly linked herself to these cruel lies. She abhorred the thought, and yet, all the morning, on her way to work and seated in the ill-ventilated classroom, she found the major's advice buzzing through her head, "Keep out of the conflict! Keep out of the conflict!"
In the afternoon, walking in the park with Bob, a new idea occurred to her. Why not, when school was over, try for a position as nursery governess? Such a place would be a grade above anything open to Hertha Williams, since as a governess she would not be a servant but would be received at her mistress's table. Loving children, inclining, too, to an outdoor life, she might in this way secure a summer in the country and postpone her final decision. Tom's comfortable advice to take her time remained with her, offering encouragement to this new plan. But the difficulty in the way of securing a position, the unfamiliar machinery of employment bureau, of advertisement, made her hesitate. It would mean publicity, the answering of questions, the entering of a new and perhaps unfriendly home. She who hated change ought not to have to make her way in an unfamiliar environment so soon again.
"Tell me about Tom-of-the-Woods," Bob demanded after she had been silent for many minutes.
"No," Hertha answered.
"Aw, come on," Bob said. "Tell about the night with the owl."