Invisible man

            "All right," I said, sitting down again. "But while ignoring my personal education for a second I'd like you to remember that the people have little patience with us these days. We could use this time more profitably."

            "And I could tell you that politicians are not personal persons," Brother Jack said, "but I won't. How could we use it more profitably?"

            "By organizing their anger."

            "So again our great tactician has relieved himself. Today he's a busy man. First an oration over the body of Brutus, and now a lecture on the patience of the Negro people."

            Tobitt was enjoying himself. I could see his cigarette tremble in his lips as he struck a match to light it.

            "I move we issue his remarks in a pamphlet," he said, running his finger over his chin. "They should create a natural phenomenon . . ."

            This had better stop right here, I thought. My head was getting lighter and my chest felt tight.

            "Look," I said, "an unarmed man was killed. A brother, a leading member shot down by a policeman. We had lost our prestige in the community. I saw the chance to rally the people, so I acted. If that was incorrect, then I did wrong, so say it straight without this crap. It'll take more than sarcasm to deal with that crowd out there."

            Brother Jack reddened; the others exchanged glances.

            "He hasn't read the newspapers," someone said.

            "You forget," Brother Jack said, "it wasn't necessary; he was there."

            "Yes, I was there," I said. "If you're referring to the killing."

            "There, you see," Brother Jack said. "He was on the scene."

            Brother Tobitt pushed the table edge with his palms. "And still you organized that side show of a funeral!"

            My nose twitched. I turned toward him deliberately, forcing a grin.

            "How could there be a side show without you as the star attraction, who'd draw the two bits admission, Brother Twobits? What was wrong with the funeral?"

            "Now we're making progress," Brother Jack said, straddling his chair. "The strategist has raised a very interesting question. What's wrong, he asks. All right, I'll answer. Under your leadership, a traitorous merchant of vile instruments of anti-Negro, anti-minority racist bigotry has received the funeral of a hero. Do you still ask what's wrong?"

            "But nothing was done about a traitor," I said.

            He half-stood, gripping the back of his chair. "We all heard you admit it."

            "We dramatized the shooting down of an unarmed black man."

            He threw up his hands. To hell with you, I thought. To hell with you. He was a man!

            "That black man, as you call him, was a traitor," Brother Jack said. "A traitor!"

            "What is a traitor, Brother?" I asked, feeling an angry amusement as I counted on my fingers. "He was a man and a Negro; a man and a brother; a man and a traitor, as you say; then he was a dead man, and alive or dead he was jam-full of contradictions. So full that he attracted half of Harlem to come out and stand in the sun in answer to our call. So what is a traitor?"

            "So now he retreats," Brother Jack said. "Observe him, Brothers. After putting the movement in the position of forcing a traitor down the throats of the Negroes he asks what a traitor is."

            "Yes," I said. "Yes, and, as you say, it's a fair question, Brother. Some folks call me traitor because I've been working downtown; some would call me a traitor if I was in Civil Service and others if I simply sat in my corner and kept quiet. Sure, I considered what Clifton did --"

            "And you defend him!"

            "Not for that. I was as disgusted as you. But hell, isn't the shooting of an unarmed man of more importance politically than the fact that he sold obscene dolls?"

            "So you exercised your personal responsibility," Jack said.

            "That's all I had to go on. I wasn't called to the strategy meeting, remember."

            "Didn't you see what you were playing with?" Tobitt said. "Have you no respect for your people?"

            "It was a dangerous mistake to give you the opportunity," one of the others said.

            I looked across at him. "The committee can take it away, if it wishes. But meantime, why is everyone so upset? If even one-tenth of the people looked at the dolls as we do, our work would be a lot easier. The dolls are nothing."

            "Nothing," Jack said. "That nothing that might explode in our face."

            I sighed. "Your faces are safe, Brother," I said. "Can't you see that they don't think in such abstract terms? If they did, perhaps the new program wouldn't have flopped. The Brotherhood isn't the Negro people; no organization is. All you see in Clifton's death is that it might harm the prestige of the Brotherhood. You see him only as a traitor. But Harlem doesn't react that way."

            "Now he's lecturing us on the conditioned reflexes of the Negro people," Tobitt said.

            I looked at him. I was very tired. "And what is the source of your great contributions to the movement, Brother? A career in burlesque? And of your profound knowledge of Negroes? Are you from an old plantation-owning family? Does your black mammy shuffle nightly through your dreams?"