Saving Savannah

by Tonya Bolden

  Applause.

  “How is it—”

  Nannie Burroughs paused, shook a clenched fist in the air.

  “Imagine how much more Negro women can achieve when women have the national vote, the right, as the honorable Frederick Douglass used to say, ‘by which all others are secured.’”31

  Looking wise, steadfast, ready to head a parade, Principal Burroughs pointed out into the audience.

  “My sisters, I say to you, rise up, rise up, rise up! Rise up for woman suffrage. Get up petitions! Flood Congress with letters. Bombard that Woodrow Wilson with letters. Negro men, I say to you, don’t hinder your womenfolk—your mothers, your wives, your sisters, your daughters. Stand not in front of them. Stand alongside them!”

  The crowd was on its feet. The applause would have shaken a weaker building’s rafters.

  ALL DAY?

  Yolande was returning from a Lillian Evans concert with her parents when she saw Mr. Riddle tinkering with his car.

  “What’s the trouble, Wyatt?” her father asked.

  “Won’t start.”

  “Didn’t you have a fella here working on it recently?”

  “Indeed. And what’s that about a fool and his money?” Mr. Riddle laughed. “Won’t be using him again.”

  Yolande looked up at the Riddle living room window to see if Savannah was looking out.

  With the hood of his car still up, Mr. Riddle asked, “Oscar, do me a favor, see if it’ll crank now.”

  Yolande’s father got behind the wheel. The car started.

  “Keep it going while I pop back in and wash my hands.” Mr. Riddle closed the hood.

  “Is Savannah in, Mr. Riddle?”

  “No. I’m on my way to pick her up. She begged us to let her attend a lecture at Nannie Burroughs’s school.”

  “She’s been there all day?”

  FAR-OFF HOPES AND DREAMS

  It was more than a minute before the clapping ceased, before Nannie Burroughs left the podium, stepped behind the curtain, before people filed out dropping coins into baskets the Allen twins held on either side of the door, before Savannah, Nella, and Lloyd made their way out of Alpha Hall and over to Pioneer’s porch.

  “We’ll wait with you until your father arrives,” Nella had said.

  Savannah was beaming. “Nannie Burroughs is a tonic!”

  “That she is,” replied Nella.

  “She’s a strong, strong woman,” said Lloyd, “but too bad she don’t see the big picture. Why she thinking woman suffrage will change anything?”

  Savannah was flabbergasted. “You don’t support woman suffrage?”

  “I’m not against it. I just don’t think it will make a difference for Negroes.”

  “When women have the national vote, we will be able to vote in just people.”

  “How many white women you think will vote for people who want justice for Negro people? Wunna never read about how white women turn out for lynchings with picnic baskets and they children?”

  “But—”

  “The bulk of Negro people live in the South, right?”

  “Yes,” replied Savannah.

  “And how long Negro men have national suffrage?”

  Savannah did the math in her head. “Going on fifty years.”

  “And going on fifty years, don’t the white men in the South do everything in their power, terrorizing people, to keep as many Negro men as possible from voting?”

  Yes, there were poll taxes, literacy tests. Savannah had also heard of Negro men beaten, murdered even for trying to vote, of black families kicked off land they leased because the Mister talked of casting a ballot. “But—”

  “Now how many white women ever stand up for the Negro man to keep his right to vote?”

  One, two, a couple of names came to mind, but not enough to counter Lloyd.

  Savannah felt small and at a loss too. Why was Nannie Burroughs—like other women in the Association—so on fire for the Anthony amendment to pass? Was there really no point in the “Votes for Women” flyers Mother had her design, flyers handed out in churches, at the Negro Ys, during steamboat outings, picnics?

  Months back Savannah had asked her parents why they were so keen on the Anthony amendment, seeing as how people in the District couldn’t vote for president, had no senators, no representatives.

  “We live not for ourselves alone,” Father had replied.

  “Some things we crusade for are urgent,” said Mother. “Take lynching. That abomination needs to stop immediately! Other things we crusade for are in service of our far-off hopes and dreams.”

  Savannah turned to Lloyd. “We have far-off hopes and dreams, you know!”

  Lloyd snickered. “Far-off hopes … See, the problem with wunna is that wunna want to work within the system—my kind say the system needs overturning, just like the earth in spring so we reap good things. Wunna say, oh, if we get a good education, if we speak like the white man, if we don’t laugh out loud or wear red, if we vote …”

  “What are you talking about? What system?”

  Under Lloyd’s piercing gaze Savannah felt a bit of a nitwit.

  “The capitalist system.”

  Nella’s mouth was poked out. “Let us speak of something else.”

  “Let me guess,” sneered Lloyd. “Your parents belong to societies dedicated to uplifting the race, right?”

  “Well, yes.”

  “And they subscribe to magazines like the Crisis.”

  “Well, yes.”

  “And I bet they didn’t even say a peep when that Du Bois fella betrayed the race.”

  “Dr. Du Bois never betrayed us!” Savannah was livid.

  “Close Ranks.”32 Lloyd practically spat.

  “Close what?”

  “When America entered the war, he urged Negroes to rally round the flag, to ‘forget our special grievances’ while the war is raging ‘and close our ranks shoulder to shoulder with our own white fellow citizens.’ ” Lloyd paused. “So Negroes closed ranks, rallied round the flag. Negro men went off to war and—”

  Nella tapped Lloyd on the shoulder. “Please, let’s just enjoy this wonderful evening air. Stop! Stop your friction!”

  Lloyd turned to Nella. “Lemme finish, lemme open she eyes, save she from delusion.”

  Rosetta popped out of Pioneer Hall. “Savannah, your father just called. He had trouble with the car but hopes to be here soon.”

  “Thank you,” said Savannah.

  And Lloyd went back to having his say. “So Negroes close ranks. Did lynching stop? Can you or I eat in any restaurant we please in this town? Thousands of Negro men fought like tigers in the so-called war to make the world safe for democracy, and what have they gotten for their trouble?”

  “New York City gave the 369th a grand parade.”

  Lloyd laughed. “Can a parade fill bellies? Can a parade raise wages?” His fury, like the moon, was rising. “That ‘Closed Ranks’ editorial of Du Bois was as stupid as his notion that the salvation of the race will be folks like you. You so-called Talented Tenth. Hogwash!”

  “Hogwash?”

  No one puts down Dr. Du Bois!

  “Dr. Du Bois probably never sleeps. He spends all his time fighting for the race!” Savannah paused to compose herself. “And you’re wrong about the Talented Tenth.” For the first time in a long time Savannah was proud of her parents. “My father’s insurance company employs over twenty people. He has agents in Baltimore and in other places. He provides insurance for Negroes whitefolks won’t do business with. Father gives generously to the NAACP, to our church, and to, to—have you heard of Camp Pleasant?”

  Lloyd shook his head.

  “It’s for the less fortunate women and children. Father gives money to that too!”

  Nella paced the porch. “All this politics is getting on my nerves.”

  And Savannah stood taller.

  “My mother is a member of the National Association of Colored Women. They saved Frederick Douglass’s estate. T
hey are always raising money to help the poor. At Thanksgiving, at Christmas, at Easter, they—”

  “Lemme guess, they make up baskets of food, pack up clothes they tired of.”

  “There’s nothing to be said for feeding and clothing people?”

  “People need more than patches.”

  Savannah glared at Lloyd. “Well, what’s your solution?”

  Lloyd glared back. “Workers of the world unite!”

  Savannah couldn’t keep her eyes from going wide. “You’re a—a socialist?” she whispered.

  “I’m not a party member. But I see eye to eye with a lot of the thinking. Your kind favor reform. My kind revolution.”

  The black Buick pulled up.

  Lloyd whipped out something from his pocket, shoved it into Savannah’s hand.

  “What’s this?”

  “Things you need to ponder.”

  In the darkness Savannah couldn’t make out all of the magazine’s title. Just the Mess—. She tucked the magazine into the pocket of her coat, headed down the steps. Nella, Lloyd followed.

  “Hello, Nella!” said Father when the three reached the car.

  “Evening, Mr. Riddle, sir.”

  “Father, this is Nella’s cousin Lloyd.”

  “Pleased to meet you.”

  “Likewise.”

  “Can we give you a lift?” asked Savannah.

  “Oh, no, Miss Riddle, that’s not necessary.” But Nella sounded awfully half-hearted.

  “Oh, hop in, you two,” said Father.

  Lloyd looked away. “We can take the—”

  Nella elbowed Lloyd.

  Savannah tried not to laugh.

  “If you’re sure it won’t put you out, Mr. Riddle, sir,” said Nella.

  Savannah moved to sit up front, then stopped. “Lloyd, you sit next to Father so Nella and I can sit together in the back.”

  Unable to get but a peep out of Nella about her day, about anything, Savannah tuned in to the talk up front.

  Lloyd worked some days as a mechanic at the Belt railway company, she learned as she listened to him tell Father the likely root cause of his car trouble. Lloyd also did construction work on the hotel John Lewis was putting up on 13th and T.

  “Some sight that will be!” said Father. “The District’s first high-class hotel for our people.”

  Lloyd shook his head. “I gotta say that I find it curious he choose to name it the Whitelaw.”

  Father humphed. “Never thought of it that way. But you see, Whitelaw is his mother’s maiden name.” After a pause Father asked, “Think it will open on schedule?”

  “If things keep going as planned,” replied Lloyd.

  Hypocrite! thought Savannah. He runs down the Talented Tenth but works for a man like John Lewis, who owns the Industrial Savings Bank! Can’t get more capitalist than that!

  When Father turned onto Nella and Lloyd’s street, Savannah observed that it was a bit nicer than the street of drab row houses, Barrows’ Meat Market, and the Open Eye Saloon, the street that had sent her into a panic weeks back. The row house he parked in front of was a simple, sturdy brick number. The staircase’s latticed risers were in something like a fleur-de-lis pattern. The building had an arched lintel above recessed double doors, and there were lovely cream crocheted curtains at the three-quarter-length windowpanes of those double doors. In a downstairs window was a neat sign: BOARD AND ROOMS.

  “How fortuitous,” Nella said. “I just remembered that your kind mother’s order is in. If you give me a minute—”

  “Let me come up with you and get it,” Savannah offered.

  “Oh, no,” said Nella, emerging from the car.

  “It’ll spare you a trip back down.” Savannah got out of the car. “I’m sure you’re knocked off your feet,” she added, caring nothing about Nella’s feet but curious to see how they lived.

  What did that make her? Savannah wondered as she and Nella headed up the stairs, leaving Lloyd and Father before the hood of the car.

  HELLO, MISS FINE LADY

  The third-floor apartment was tiny.

  Its kitchen couldn’t hold but two people at a time, maybe three if skinny.

  The inscrutable Miss Gertie rose from an old broad-back mahogany-and-cane armchair, a crochet hook and yarn in her hands.

  “Good evening, Miss Riddle.”

  “Good evening, Miss Gertie,” said Savannah. “And please, Miss Gertie, don’t stand on my account.”

  “Mr. Riddle was good enough to give us a ride home,” said Nella. “Savannah come up to get Mrs. Riddle’s product.” Nella turned to Savannah with a smile. “I won’t be but a jiffy.”

  Savannah’s eyes followed Nella, saw a door on the right, another, narrower, at the end of the hall. A bedroom, a bathroom she guessed.

  She figured Lloyd slept in the front room, on the metal cot with a chenille bedspread near the small window. Someone, she guessed Lloyd, had concocted a way to hang a curtain from the ceiling that could be drawn around the cot.

  Miss Gertie sure loved to crochet.

  There was a stack of crocheted doilies on the table by her chair.

  Crocheted doilies on the chair and on the small settee.

  Crocheted runner on the small round table in the center of the room. On it, cut-glass salt and paper shakers and violets in a wide-mouth mason jar.

  Around the table were two matching oak fiddleback chairs and a lath-back chair of a different wood.

  The place was neat as a pin. Savannah caught a whiff of Lysol F&F.

  “Here you are,” said Nella. She handed Savannah a mint-green crocheted bag. “Do tell her I thank her kindly for the order and I hope she will continue to use Poro products.”

  “Hello, Miss Fine Lady!” Bim shot up from the bottom step as Savannah exited the building.

  “Hello there, Bim.” Savannah reached into her purse, brought out a dime.

  The hood was up. Father stood before it watching Lloyd work a wrench.

  “It won’t start?” asked Savannah.

  “It will,” replied Lloyd. “Just making some adjustments so it will still start ten years from now.”

  Work done, hood down, Father and Lloyd wiped their hands on rags, then shook.

  Savannah moved to open the door to the front seat—

  Lloyd beat her to it.

  “Why, thank you, Lloyd.”

  As the car pulled off Savannah looked back. She was touched by the way Lloyd took Bim by the hand, led him down the street.

  MONKEY-CHASING, TREE-CLIMBING …

  “How about Gaskins’?” asked Yolande.

  No.

  Dade’s?

  No.

  Board’s? Lee’s Lunch Room? The—?

  No.

  No.

  No.

  “Well, after we change our clothes let’s go for a walk.”

  “I had a long day yesterday. I just want to stay in.”

  They were yards behind their parents, en route from church.

  Yolande stopped. Arms at her sides. Fists balled up.

  Savannah stopped too. “Yolande, look—”

  “No, you look, Savannah! Weeks ago you apologized for being so beastly to me. But ever since you’ve taken up with that monkey-chasing, tree-climbing Nella and started spending Saturdays at that stupid school, you’ve been downright—”

  “What did you call Nella?”

  “You heard me.”

  “Who is being beastly—downright ugly now, Yolande? How could you say such things? West Indians, Africans … they are, well, like our cousins. We are all Negro, Yolande. More alike than not.”

  Yolande’s fury, her fear made her deaf, blind to all reason.

  “You’ve been eating strange food out there. It’s like that Nella has put a spell on you.”

  “Nella isn’t even there on Saturdays! But you know what? If she was I’d be past glad.”

  “But what about me!” Yolande stamped her foot.

  “What about you, Yolande? How many time
s have I asked you to come with me? But, no, you want to stay in your—your little cocoon.”

  They were walking again, picking up their pace.

  Yolande felt a crushing shame over her outburst. I’ve gone and done it now!

  A few steps later Savannah gave her hope.

  “Tell you what. After you change, come over.”

  Yolande vowed to contain herself. To not say another harsh word about Nella or Nannie Burroughs’s school.

  THREE CRUDE WOODEN STEPS

  “First, as workers, black and white, we all have one common interest …”

  Higher wages.

  Shorter work days.

  Good working conditions.

  None of that struck Savannah as unreasonable, nor wholly impossible.

  She had read A. Philip Randolph’s editorial the night before. On that Sunday afternoon, while waiting for Yolande—wondering what on earth they’d talk about, do, wondering if she’d run out of patience with her again—Savannah decided to reread Randolph’s piece, “Our Reason for Being.”

  “The introduction of women and children into the factories proves that capitalists are only concerned with profits and that they will exploit any race or class—”33

  The footsteps had to be hers. Sure enough, within seconds a contrite-looking Yolande poked her head in, then bounced into the room. Something behind her back.

  Savannah put the magazine down.

  “Sorry for the things I said earlier.” Yolande was almost at Savannah’s bed, eyes down and fidgety. “Here.” She handed Savannah a peach ribbon necklette. “You look better in this color than I do.”

  “Why, thank—”

  Yolande shrieked.

  “What is it?”

  Yolande grabbed the magazine, waved it in the air. “You’re reading the Messenger? You must throw it in the trash! No, tear it up into a million tiny pieces! Burn it!”

  Savannah snatched the magazine back. “What’s wrong with you?”

  “It’s a—” Yolande lowered her voice. “It’s a socialist magazine.”

  “Yes. So?” Last night Savannah had hidden the magazine between her mattress and box springs. But she wasn’t about to admit that to Yolande.