Chapter 16 Summary

The bean-picking season ends, but Janie and Tea Cake stay on, and Janie, with nothing better to do, starts making friends. She gets to know Mrs. Turner, whose husband owns one of the eateries. Mrs. Turner takes pride in her Caucasian characteristics, and idolizes Janie, who is even fairer than she is. However, Mrs. Turner despises Tea Cake, and every other black man and woman whom she feels laughs too loud and makes it impossible for white people to take him or her in. Because of their color, their features and their monkey climbing, Mrs. Turner says light-complexioned people cannot even make a separate race of their own. Instead, they have to be lumped in with all the blacks. Janie has never heard or thought such a thing, so she keeps quiet at Mrs. Turner's tirade, a little dismayed. However, Tea Cake overhears...