I started to say, 'Maybe they think the few of you are white,' but thought better of it.

'I'm really hurt and worried about you, Bob,' she went on incoherently. 'You must talk to Alice about this. White people are trying so hard to help us, we've got to earn our equality. We've got to show them that we're good enough, we've got to prove it to them. You know yourself, Bob, a lot of our people are just not worthy, they just don't deserve any more than they're getting. And they make it so hard for the rest of us. Just the other day the doctor went into a restaurant downtown where he's been eating for years and they didn't want to serve him. Southern Negroes are coming in here and making it hard for us…' Tears came into her eyes. 'We must pray and hope. We can't get everything we want overnight and we can't expect the white people to give us what we don't deserve. We must be patient, we must make progress…' She was just rattling off phrases now that didn't even make any sense to herself.

'Maybe the white folks can run faster than we can,' I muttered. 'Then what do we do?'

But she didn't even hear me. 'You must read Mrs. Roosevelt's article in the Negro Digest,' she was saying.

The old sister was so sincere I felt ashamed; I had no idea I'd touch her that much. I got up and took her hand. 'You're right, Mrs. Harrison,' I said. 'Perfectly right, you and Mrs. Roosevelt both.' I had to bite my tongue to keep from saying, 'How could you and Mrs. Roosevelt possibly be wrong?' Instead I said, 'I really didn't mean it the way you construed, but you're right about it.'