Page 10 of Edge of Eternity (The Century 3)

She laughed.

He said: "But please don't spread that around. It would spoil my reputation."

The bus crossed the Potomac and headed into Virginia on Route 1. "You're in the South, now, George," said Maria. "Are you scared yet?"

"You bet I am."

"Me, too."

The highway was a straight, narrow slash across miles of spring-green forest. They passed through small towns where the men had so little to do that they stopped to watch the bus go by. George did not look out of the window much. He learned that Maria had been brought up in a strict churchgoing family, her grandfather a preacher. George said he went to church mainly to please his mother, and Maria confessed that she was the same. They talked all the way to Fredericksburg, fifty miles along the route.

The Riders went quiet as the bus entered the small historic town, where white supremacy still reigned. The Greyhound terminal was between two red-brick churches with white doors, but Christianity was not necessarily a good indication in the South. As the bus came to a halt, George saw the restrooms, and was surprised that there were no signs over the doors saying WHITES ONLY and COLORED ONLY.

The passengers got off the bus and stood blinking in the sunshine. Looking more closely, George saw light-colored patches over the toilet doors, and deduced that the segregation signs had been removed recently.

The Riders put their plan into operation anyway. First, a white organizer went into the scruffy restroom at the back, clearly intended for Negroes. He came out unharmed, but that was the easier part. George had already volunteered to be the black person who defied the rules. "Here goes," he said to Maria, and he walked into the clean, freshly painted restroom that had undoubtedly just had its WHITES ONLY sign removed.

There was a young white man inside, combing his pompadour. He glanced at George in the mirror, but said nothing. George was too scared to pee, but he could not just walk out again, so he washed his hands. The young man left and an older man came in and entered a cubicle. George dried his hands on the roller towel. Then there was nothing else to do, so he went out.

The others were waiting. He shrugged and said: "Nothing. Nobody tried to stop me, no one said anything."

Maria said: "I asked for a Coke at the counter and the waitress sold me one. I think someone here has decided to avoid trouble."

"Is this how it's going to be, all the way to New Orleans?" said George. "Will they just act as if nothing has happened? Then, when we've gone, impose segregation again? That would kind of cut the ground from under our feet!"

"Don't worry," said Maria. "I've met the people who run Alabama. Believe me, they're not that smart."

CHAPTER THREE

Walli Franck was playing the piano in the upstairs drawing room. The instrument was a full-size Steinway grand, and Walli's father kept it tuned for Grandma Maud to play. Walli was remembering the riff to Elvis Presley's record "A Mess of Blues." It was in the key of C, which made it easier.

His grandmother sat reading the obituaries in the Berliner Zeitung. She was seventy, a slim, straight figure in a dark-blue cashmere dress. "You can play that sort of thing well," she said without looking up from the paper. "You've got my ear, as well as my green eyes. Your grandfather Walter, after whom you were named, never could play ragtime, rest his soul. I tried to teach him, but it was hopeless."

"You played ragtime?" Walli was surprised. "I've never heard you do anything but classical music."

"Ragtime saved us from starving when your mother was a baby. After the First World War, I played in a club called Nachtleben right here in Berlin. I was paid billions of marks a night, which was barely enough to buy bread; but sometimes I'd get tips in foreign currency, and we could live well for a week on two dollars."

"Wow." Walli could not imagine his silver-haired grandmother playing the piano for tips in a nightclub.

Walli's sister came into the room. Lili was almost three years younger, and these days he was not sure how to treat her. For as long as he could remember she had been a pain in the neck, like a younger boy but sillier. However, lately she had become more sensible and, to complicate matters, some of her friends had breasts.

He turned from the piano and picked up his guitar. He had bought it a year ago in a pawnshop in West Berlin. It had probably been pledged by an American soldier against a loan that was never repaid. The brand name was Martin and, although it had been cheap, it seemed to Walli a very good instrument. He guessed that neither the pawnbroker nor the soldier had realized its worth.

"Listen to this," he said to Lili, and he began to sing a Bahamian tune called "All My Trials" with lyrics in English. He had heard it on Western radio stations: it was popular with American folk groups. The minor chords made it a melancholy song, and he was pleased with the plaintive fingerpicking accompaniment he had devised.

When he had finished, Grandma Maud looked over the top of the newspaper and said in English: "Your accent is perfectly dreadful, Walli, dear."

"Sorry."

She reverted to German. "But you sing nicely."

"Thank you." Walli turned to Lili. "What do you think of the song?"

"It's a bit dreary," she said. "Maybe I'll like it more when I've heard it a few times."

"That's no good," he said. "I want to play it tonight at the Minnesanger." This was a folk club just off the Kurfurstendamm in West Berlin. The name meant "troubadour."

Lili was impressed. "You're playing at the Minnesanger?"

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