mister

She took a deep breath and began, en français: “Good day, mister! I here arrive in look of job. If you please!”

“Claptrap, you say? You should know better, mister. Twelve moons in the year means twelve people at the séance. No more. No less.”

Although Colored people addressed Daddy as “mister,” White people, including children, called him by his first name.

Colored people might be hung, shot, dragged from the back of a vehicle, or burned alive for things like refusing to empty their pockets, addressing a White police officer without using the title “mister,” or knocking on the door of a White woman’s house.

“You bet your boots, mister. I’m on my way!”