Chapter 3
FIGHTING THE INSTINCT TO RUN, Josephine schooled her features and walked past the officers. She forced herself to match the pace of other travelers, fearing at any moment she’d feel a hand on her shoulder or a firm grip on her upper arm.
Uncomfortably aware that everyone around her had either a satchel or trunk, she joined the queue at the ticket office and discreetly counted the money Sarah had given her.
Four dollars and thirty-five cents. Sarah’s unflinching generosity encouraged tears again.
How would her friend get by? Then again, how would she?
They both basically lived week to week. At least they’d already paid Mrs. Lowery room and board this month, so Sarah wouldn’t have that to worry about.
“Next!” the ticket clerk said, only then looking up. A shadow flitted across his face as Josephine stepped forward.
“Yes, sir, thank you. What is your next departure?”
“That’d be Charleston, ma’am. Standard fare of fourteen dollars.”
“Fourteen?” Josephine searched the board again as though something might have changed.
“All aboard!” a man called from behind her.
She looked back. “Where is that train going?”
“That’s the Chattanooga-Tullahoma line, continuing to Nashville. It’s a Limited, only two stops. But it’s already boarded and ready to—”
“Please,” she whispered. “I need to be on that train. How much is the fare?”
The train gave two sharp whistle blasts.
“That train is full, ma’am. All except for the colored car, so you’ll need to wait and—”
“That’s fine with me. What’s the fare?”
His brow furrowed and his gaze moved pointedly to the left side of her face. Josephine clearly read his assumptions, along with pity. Which told her the injuries were likely worse than Sarah had let on.
“Miss, it’s clear you’re going through a very difficult time, but as it states right there—” He pointed to a printed sign. “It’s against the law for a white person to travel in a car designated for—”
“I am well familiar with the ruling in Plessy v. Ferguson, sir. But tell me, what ruling gives a man the right to beat a woman?” Her voice tightened. “I must get on that train.”
He hesitated, his mouth forming a thin line. “Fare to Chattanooga is four dollars even. Tullahoma, four dollars and twenty cents.”
Chattanooga, a growing city, she knew, but . . . “What kind of place is Tullahoma?”
“Mid-point stop between Chattanooga and Nashville. Tiny speck of a town. Not much to it compared to Atlanta.”
“Tullahoma, please.”
He took her money and pushed a ticket toward her. “Last passenger car.” He gestured, lowering his voice. “There’s a brief stop in Chattanooga but no changing trains. Don’t let a porter see you getting on or off. If you do, you’re on your own.”
Josephine walked briskly down the terminal, past porters closing doors, until she was nearly to the end.
Somewhere behind her, a train whistle bellowed a long, echoing blast and the Chattanooga-bound train lurched forward.
She started toward the car when a porter exited the rear door, torn ticket stubs in hand.
She immediately feigned searching for someone, peering down the long terminal, certain she was fooling no one. The man walked past her as the train chugged forward.
Glancing around one last time, hoping no one would see her, she spotted a woman watching her from inside the car.
Curiosity and mild disbelief registered in the woman’s expression and, for an instant, Josephine wondered if the woman might alert someone in authority.
But having no choice or time to waste, Josephine raced for the rear stair step, grabbed hold of the railing and pulled herself up, then climbed to the open platform as the train picked up speed.
Breath coming hard, her palm raw and aching, she opened the door to the car and stepped inside, and quickly realized it wasn’t only the one woman who had been watching her.
All eyes in the passenger car were fixed on her, and Josephine, a teacher for close to half her life, could think of nothing to say that her actions hadn’t already announced. They looked at her and knew her story. Or thought they did.
She moved to claim an empty space on one of the cushioned bench seats but the older woman occupying it scooted to the middle, preventing it.
Eyes lowered, Josephine looked to the right and although the elderly man seated there didn’t move an inch, his demeanor exuded unwelcome.
Same as every other person she passed as she walked toward the back of the car.
She reached the last row and glanced outside to see a porter looking in that direction. Instinctively, she ducked, fear outweighing shame even as the back of her neck heated. Once the passenger car was clear of the terminal, she raised her head.
“I hope you done give him hell right back,” a woman said, her voice barely audible.
Josephine peered up to see the woman she’d exchanged glances with before she boarded.
Similar in age, judging by her appearance, the young woman stared unblinking, challenge in her eyes. “Did you? Give him hell back?”
The image of Clay Darden’s lifeless body returned with painful clarity. “Yes,” Josephine whispered. “I . . . think I did.”
“Good for you then,” she said beneath her breath and indicated with the slightest nod that Josephine could share her bench.
Yet no sooner did Josephine sit than the woman abruptly stood and moved a few rows up.
Josephine stared after her. Had she mistaken the woman’s kindness?
Or perhaps that kindness, if made known, would come at too great a personal cost.
Grateful no matter the woman’s reasons, Josephine rested her head on the window, the glass cool against her forehead. Recalling what Sarah had said, she lightly pressed her cheek to the chilled pane and winced at the sting, but forced herself to repeat the act several times.
As the train sped north, eating up miles of countryside and leaving behind everything and everyone she knew, the air inside the compartment grew colder.
Which came as no surprise, because this particular car lacked the customary amenities such as cast-iron wood stoves, overhead luggage compartments, and even a water station.
A few of the many injustices her father and the firm he worked for had addressed repeatedly with the railroad commission, including the harsh working conditions of the nearly twenty thousand black men who served as porters on the railroad.
Justice will not be served until those who are unaffected are as outraged as those who are.
How often her father had quoted that. Yet when it came to fighting for women’s rights, he had explained that the wheels of justice ground exceedingly slowly, and that just as in a great war, battles had to be fought strategically.
Yet the battle for women’s rights was one he had never seemed eager to fight.
Only later had she begun to understand why.
He’d long attempted to dissuade her from joining the suffrage movement, stating his and her mother’s concern for her safety.
Those attempts had only intensified following Todd’s death.
Yet as she’d learned more about the movement and witnessed repeated efforts by local authorities to stamp it out, Todd’s mantra had become like a steady drumbeat deep inside her.
One specific exchange with her father returned with striking clarity.
Even now, she felt the heat of her anger from that day, and the deep disappointment she’d felt in him, both emotions exacerbated by Todd’s death just weeks before.
“But Father, it’s impossible to struggle for civil rights, or even equal rights for black men, without including all men.
And all women. Every tribe, nation, tongue, and people.
Isn’t that what you always say? Because equal rights, fair pay, justice, all of it .
. . It’s like the air we breathe. Either we all have it or none of us do.
That is why women must be granted the right to vote, same as men.
You of all people must understand that and take up the cause of suffrage now .
. . as I am doing. And should have done a long time ago. ”
Steeled determination had slipped into her father’s eyes. “Daughter, you well know that I forbid you from joining that organization. The women involved are not of sound mind or judgment, so again, I must—”
“Todd died fighting for justice, Papa. For a cause he believed in. He was doing something lasting with his life. I want to do that, too.”
“You are doing something lasting with your life. Teaching children is helping to prepare you for marriage, Josephine. To be a wife and a mother. For raising children of your own and organizing a household. That is what is most important for you.” His placating smile seemed intent on shutting down argument.
“Your mother and I knew you’d be a wonderful teacher.
That’s why we encouraged you to sit for your advanced certificate when you were yet so young.
The youngest but most mature candidate they’d ever considered.
And now look at you. Already instructing upper grades for years now. ”
“Redirecting the conversation no longer works, Papa. I’m not seven years old anymore. I’m a twenty-three-year-old woman with a mind of her own that you helped shape and mold, inadvertently as those efforts might have been . . . now that I look back.”
He rose from his desk chair, his movements slow and deliberate, more frail now than fierce, as though he’d aged decades in the weeks since Todd’s death.
“Politics is dirty, ruthless, and unfeminine, Josephine. Women are emotional creatures by nature, guided by sentiment, and are not equipped for political decisions.”
“But that’s simply not—”
“Allowing you to participate in such an organization,” he continued with force, “would expose you to ridicule and hostility. And I will not have you, or this family, thus humiliated.”