“You don’t love me, hon.... You can get white girls prettier than I am—I know....”
“I don’t want them ... you’ve put a song in my blood, right in it.... I’m crazy about you.”
“I don’t think you mean it.... Lord knows, I’d like so to believe you....”
“You will, you will.... I’ll take care of that....”
He kissed her and then she withdrew, saying: “You funny, funny, dear, impatient boy!”
Another young negress with a dark-brown skin and a tall fullness to her body, was laughing violently beside a thin, white man with a little black mustache and a petulant face. She sang: “Mamma has her teeth all filled with goldun bridges ’n’ diamon’s small, but po-oor papa, po-o-or papa, got no teefies at a-all.”
“Not this papa,” he replied. “I’ll prove it to you.”
She drew back, laughing, while he sought to embrace her. They almost collided with a young negress who was dancing with a middle-aged white man. She was slim, with a straight-nosed, creamy face and straight brown hair, while her partner was floridly jowled and had the symptoms of a paunch, and sparse, black hair. They stopped their dance and stood, talking.
“Have you seen the Russian Players?” she asked.
“Yep, went down last night and took in that version of Carmen—‘Carmencita and the Soldier.’”