The thirteenth coach was the
Jim Crow car. Framed in a conspicuous place beside the entrance of the
car was a copy of the Kentucky state ordinance setting this coach apart
from the remainder of the train for the purposes therein provided.
The Jim Crow car was not exactly shabby, but it was unkept. It was half
filled with travelers of Peter's own color, and these passengers were
rather more noisy than those in the white coaches. Conversation was not
restrained to the undertones one heard in the other day-coaches or the
Pullmans. Near the entrance of the car two negroes in soldiers' uniforms
had turned a seat over to face the door, and now they sat talking loudly
and laughing the loose laugh of the half intoxicated as they watched the
inflow of negro passengers coming out of the white cars.
The windows of the Jim Crow car were shut, and already it had become
noisome. The close air was faintly barbed with the peculiar, penetrating
odor of dark, sweating skins. For four years Peter Siner had not known
that odor. Now it came to him not so much offensively as with a queer
quality of intimacy and reminiscence.
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