Invisible man

            He opened his mouth and closed it like a fish. "I'll have you know that I'm married to a fine, intelligent Negro girl," he said.

            So that's what makes you so cocky, I thought, seeing now how the light struck him at an angle and made a wedge-shaped shadow beneath his nose. So that's it . . . and how did I guess there was a woman in it?

            "Brother, I apologize," I said. "I misjudged you. You have our number. In fact, you must be practically a Negro yourself. Was it by immersion or injection?"

            "Now see here," he said, pushing back his chair.

            Come on, I thought, just make a move. Just another little move.

            "Brothers," Jack said, his eyes on me. "Let's stick to the discussion. I'm intrigued. You were saying?"

            I watched Tobitt. He glared. I grinned.

            "I was saying that up here we know that the policemen didn't care about Clifton's ideas. He was shot because he was black and because he resisted. Mainly because he was black."

            Brother Jack frowned. "You're riding 'race' again. But how do they feel about the dolls?"

            "I'm riding the race I'm forced to ride," I said. "And as for the dolls, they know that as far as the cops were concerned Clifton could have been selling song sheets. Bibles, matzos. If he'd been white, he'd be alive. Or if he'd accepted being pushed around . . ."

            "Black and white, white and black," Tobitt said. "Must we listen to this racist nonsense?"

            "You don't, Brother Negro," I said. "You get your own information straight from the source. Is it a mulatto source, Brother? Don't answer -- the only thing wrong is that your source is too narrow. You don't really think that crowd turned out today because Clifton was a member of the Brotherhood?"

            "And why did they turn out?" Jack said, getting set as if to pounce forward.

            "Because we gave them the opportunity to express their feelings, to affirm themselves."

            Brother Jack rubbed his eye. "Do you know that you have become quite a theoretician?" he said. "You astound me."

            "I doubt that, Brother, but there's nothing like isolating a man to make him think," I said.

            "Yes, that's true; some of our best ideas have been thought in prison. Only you haven't been in prison, Brother, and you were not hired to think. Had you forgotten that? If so, listen to me: You were not hired to think." He was speaking very deliberately and I thought, So . . . So here it is, naked and old and rotten. So now it's out in the open . . .

            "So now I know where I am," I said, "and with whom --"

            "Don't twist my meaning. For all of us, the committee does the thinking. For all of us. And you were hired to talk."

            "That's right, I was hired. Things have been so brotherly I had forgotten my place. But what if I wish to express an idea?"

            "We furnish all ideas. We have some acute ones. Ideas are part of our apparatus. Only the correct ideas for the correct occasion."

            "And suppose you misjudge the occasion?"

            "Should that ever happen, you keep quiet."

            "Even though I am correct?"

            "You say nothing unless it is passed by the committee. Otherwise I suggest you keep saying the last thing you were told."

            "And when my people demand that I speak?"

            "The committee will have an answer!"

            I looked at him. The room was hot, quiet, smoky. The others looked at me strangely. I heard the nervous sound of someone mashing out a cigarette in a glass ash tray. I pushed back my chair, breathing deeply, controlled. I was on a dangerous road and I thought of Clifton and tried to get off of it. I said nothing.

            Suddenly Jack smiled and slipped back into his fatherly role.

            "Let us handle the theory and the business of strategy," he said. "We are experienced. We're graduates and while you are a smart beginner you skipped several grades. But they were important grades, especially for gaining strategical knowledge. For such it is necessary to see the overall picture. More is involved than meets the eye. With the long view and the short view and the overall view mastered, perhaps you won't slander the political consciousness of the people of Harlem."

            Can't he see I'm trying to tell them what's real, I thought. Does my membership stop me from feeling Harlem?

            "All right," I said. "Have it your way, Brother; only the political consciousness of Harlem is exactly a thing I know something about. That's one class they wouldn't let me skip. I'm describing a part of reality which I know."

            "And that is the most questionable statement of all," Tobitt said.

            "I know," I said, running my thumb along the edge of the table, "your private source tells you differently. History's made at night, eh, Brother?"

            "I've warned you," Tobitt said.

            "Brother to brother, Brother," I said, "try getting around more. You might learn that today was the first time that they've listened to our appeals in weeks. And I'll tell you something else: If we don't follow through on what was done today, this might be the last . . ."

            "So, he's finally gotten around to predicting the future," Brother Jack said.

            "It's possible . . . though I hope not."

            "He's in touch with God," Tobitt said. "The black God."