One day, when arguments were abundant, it came to a point where Wyeth made mention of the fact that so few teachers showed any interest in current events; did not read the magazines, and Negro literature they almost held in contempt.
"Is it because they feel that no Negro knows enough to write anything they would care to read?"
"The idea," cried Miss Palmer, indignant. "All the teachers take the magazines, and as for Negro literature, it has been the teachers who have robbed themselves to make the same possible."
"And yet other than 'Up From Bondage' and the works of the dead poet, you can seldom find a volume by a Negro author in any of their houses.... And, if I have investigated correctly, ninety per cent of this was placed there, after the white people had bought it and proclaimed the authors great. In the many houses I have been in with you, I have not yet seen any of Derwin's. Though one of them he wrote, and which is named after our souls, had a great sale among the white people even."
"I cannot see, nor appreciate either, your point of view with regard to the teachers' lack of literary interest, when not two weeks ago, twenty-six teachers among a list of thirty, purchased a set of twenty volumes each, and which cost them all that many dollars."
"And every volume by an author few know of, further than that he was white, and, therefore, knew something," he retorted.
It ended there and they were both relieved that it did; but neither forgot it.
Effingham, with its sixty thousand black people, had scores of drug stores which sold literature. Many newsstands also did such a business exclusively. There were four drug stores operated by colored people, and, like Attalia, not one sold magazines and newspapers as a side line; nor did any sell literature, which were operated by whites that depended upon Negro trade. Granting, of course, that many colored people bought such at white places, when they desired to read, it may reasonably be imagined how much literature was in demand among the colored people.
Wyeth usually purchased a work of fiction weekly, and sometimes more; while some weeks, of course, he omitted this custom. One day, he was asked by the clerk of the leading book store in Effingham, what he did with so many books when he had read them. "We have sold," he said, "seven copies of the book you sold us; but I guess you'll be surprised to know that we have not, as yet, sold one to a Negro." Wyeth was not surprised, but didn't say so. "That ad we placed in the colored paper, and have had standing a month, would bring dozens of curious white people in to see what it was. And, of course, some would purchase it to see what was said. Then, if the contents did not thrill or please, indifference would follow. But when nobody buys, not even inquires, we can only feel that your people don't have much interest in books, and we have had the same experience before." He smiled when he had finished, a smile that was embarrassed. He disliked to say it, apparently, but when Wyeth was so pleasant, he added: "We have bought what few books your race has written, for the purpose of sale, and have naturally expected some evidence of interest from them, by a call and an occasional purchase. And I am telling you the truth, if we depended on them to unload this stuff from our shelves, it would be there yet, as some of it is. You have personally bought more literature, in the way of current books, since you came in here, than all the rest of your people in this town together."
Wyeth went his way then, but he was no longer surprised, as he once was, for he had heard that many times before.