Invisible man - Ralph Ellison [116]
"I'm so sorry that this had to happen," she said in a slow Yankee voice, "really and truly sorry. Some of our Brothers aren't so highly developed, you know. Although they mean very well. You must allow me to apologize for him . . ."
"Oh, he was only tipsy," I said, looking into her thin, New England face.
"Yes, I know, and revealingly so. I would never ask our colored brothers to sing, even though I love to hear them. Because I know that it would be a very backward thing. You are here to fight along with us, not to entertain. I think you understand me, don't you, Brother?"
I gave her a silent smile.
"Of course you do. I must go now, good-bye," she said, extending her little white-gloved hand and leaving.
I was puzzled. Just what did she mean? Was it that she understood that we resented having others think that we were all entertainers and natural singers? But now after the mutual laughter something disturbed me: Shouldn't there be some way for us to be asked to sing? Shouldn't the short man have the right to make a mistake without his motives being considered consciously or unconsciously malicious? After all, he was singing, or trying to. What if I asked him to sing? I watched the little woman, dressed in black like a missionary, winding her way through the crowd. What on earth was she doing here? What part did she play? Well, whatever she meant, she's nice and I like her.
Just then Emma came up and challenged me to dance and I led her toward the floor as the piano played, thinking of the vet's prediction and drawing her to me as though I danced with such as her every evening. For having committed myself, I felt that I could never allow myself to show surprise or upset -- even when confronted with situations furthest from my experience. Otherwise I might be considered undependable, or unworthy. I felt that somehow they expected me to perform even those tasks for which nothing in my experience -- except perhaps my imagination -- had prepared me. Still it was nothing new, white folks seemed always to expect you to know those things which they'd done everything they could think of to prevent you from knowing. The thing to do was to be prepared -- as my grandfather had been when it was demanded that he quote the entire United States Constitution as a test of his fitness to vote. He had confounded them all by passing the test, although they still refused him the ballot . . . Anyway, these were different.
It was close to five A.M., many dances and many bourbons later, when I reached Mary's. Somehow, I felt surprised that the room was still the same -- except that Mary had changed the bed linen. Good old Mary. I felt sadly sobered. And as I undressed I saw my outworn clothes and realized that I'd have to shed them. Certainly it was time. Even my hat would go; its green was sun-faded and brown, like a leaf struck by the winter's snows. I would require a new one for my new name. A black broad-brimmed one; perhaps a homburg . . . humbug? I laughed. Well, I could leave packing for tomorrow -- I had very little, which was perhaps all to the good. I would travel light, far and fast. They were fast people, all right. What a vast difference between Mary and those for whom I was leaving her. And why should it be this way, that the very job which might make it possible for me to do some of the things which she expected of me required that I leave her? What kind of room would Brother Jack select for me and why wasn't I left to select my own? It didn't seem right that in order to become a Harlem Leader I should live elsewhere. Yet nothing seemed right and I would have to rely upon their judgment. They seemed expert in such matters.
But how far could I trust them, and in what way were they different from the trustees? Whatever, I was committed; I'd learn in the process of working with them, I thought, remembering the money. The bills were crisp and fresh and I tried to imagine Mary's surprise when I paid her all my back rent and board. She'd think that I was kidding. But money could never repay her generosity. She would never understand my wanting to move so quickly after getting a job. And if I had any kind of success at all, it would seem the height of ingratitude. How would I face her? She had asked for nothing in return. Or hardly anything, except that I make something of myself that she called a "race leader." I shivered in the cold. Telling her that I was moving would be a hard proposition. I didn't like to think of it, but one couldn't be sentimental. As Brother Jack had said, History makes harsh demands of us all. But they were demands that had to be met if men were to be the masters and not the victims of their times. Did I believe that? Perhaps I had already begun to pay. Besides, I might as well admit right now, I thought, that there are many things about people like Mary that I dislike. For one thing, they seldom know where their personalities end and yours begins; they usually think in terms of "we" while I have always tended to think in terms of "me" -- and that has caused some friction, even with my own family. Brother Jack and the others talked in terms of "we," but it was a different, bigger "we."