Brother Jack turned to me. "Is this true?"
"I haven't read it," I said. "I had forgotten that I was interviewed."
"But you remember it now?" Brother Jack said.
"Yes, I do now. And he happened to be in the office when the appointment was made."
They were silent.
"Hell, Brother Jack," Wrestrum said, "it's right here in black and white. He's trying to give people the idea that he's the whole Brotherhood movement."
"I'm doing nothing of the sort. I tried to get the editor to interview Brother Tod Clifton, you know that. Since you know so little about what I'm doing, why not tell the brothers what you're up to."
"I'm exposing a double-dealer, that's what I'm doing. I'm exposing you. Brothers, this man is a pure dee opportunist!"
"All right," I said, "expose me if you can, but stop the slander."
"I'll expose you, all right," he said, sticking out his chin. "I'm going to. He's doing everything I said, Brothers. And I'll tell you something else -- he's trying to sew things up so that the members won't move unless he tells them to. Look at a few weeks ago when he was off in Philly. We tried to get a rally going and what happens? Only about two hundred people turned out. He's trying to train them so they won't listen to no one but him."
"But, Brother, didn't we decide that the appeal had been improperly phrased?" a brother interrupted.
"Yeah, I know, but that wasn't it . . ."
"But the committee analyzed the appeal and --"
"I know, Brothers, and I don't aim to dispute the committee. But, Brothers, it just seems that way 'cause you don't know this man. He works in the dark, he's got some kind of plot . . ."
"What kind of plot?" one of the brothers said, leaning across the table.
"Just a plot," Wrestrum said. "He aims to control the movement uptown. He wants to be a dictator!"
The room was silent except for the humming of fans. They looked at him with a new concern.
"These are very serious charges, Brother," two brothers said in unison.
"Serious? I know they're serious. That's how come I brought them. This opportunist thinks that because he's got a little more education he's better than anybody else. He's what Brother Jack calls a petty -- petty individualist!"
He struck the conference table with his fist, his eyes showing small and round in his taut face. I wanted to punch that face. It no longer seemed real, but a mask behind which the real face was probably laughing, both at me and at the others. For he couldn't believe what he had said. It just wasn't possible. He was the plotter and from the serious looks on the committee's faces he was getting away with it. Now several brothers started to speak at once, and Brother Jack knocked for order.
"Brothers, please!" Brother Jack said. "One at a time. What do you know about this article?" he said to me.
"Not very much," I said. "The editor of the magazine called to say he was sending a reporter up for an interview. The reporter asked a few questions and took a few pictures with a little camera. That's all I know."
"Did you give the reporter a prepared handout?"
"I gave her nothing except a few pieces of our official literature. I told her neither what to ask me nor what to write. I naturally tried to co-operate. If an article about me would help make friends for the movement I felt it was my duty."
"Brothers, this thing was arranged," Wrestrum said. "I tell you this opportunist had that reporter sent up there. He had her sent up and he told her what to write."
"That's a contemptible lie," I said. "You were present and you know I tried to get them to interview Brother Clifton!"
"Who's a lie?"
"You're a liar and a fat-mouthed scoundrel. You're a liar and no brother of mine."
"Now he's calling me names. Brothers, you heard him."
"Let's not lose our tempers," Brother Jack said calmly. "Brother Wrestrum, you've made serious charges. Can you prove them?"
"I can prove them. All you have to do is read the magazine and prove them for yourself;"
"It will be read. And what else?"
"All you have to do is listen to folks in Harlem. All they talk about is him. Never nothing about what the rest of us do. I tell you, Brothers, this man constitutes a danger to the people of Harlem. He ought to be thrown out!"
"That is for the committee to decide," Brother Jack said. Then to me, "And what have you to say in your defense, Brother?"
"In my defense?" I said, "Nothing. I haven't anything to defend. I've tried to do my work and if the brothers don't know that, then it's too late to tell them. I don't know what's behind this, but I haven't gotten around to controlling magazine writers. And I didn't realize that I was coming to stand trial either."
"This was not intended as a trial," Brother Jack said. "If you're ever put on trial, and I hope you'll never be, you'll know it. Meantime, since this is an emergency the committee asks that you leave the room while we read and discuss the questioned interview."
I left the room and went into a vacant office, boiling with anger and disgust. Wrestrum had snatched me back to the South in the midst of one of the top Brotherhood committees and I felt naked. I could have throttled him -- forcing me to take part in a childish dispute before the others. Yet I had to fight him as I could, in terms he understood, even though we sounded like characters in a razor-slinging vaudeville skit. Perhaps I should mention the anonymous note, except that someone might take it to mean that I didn't have the full support of my district. If Clifton were here, he'd know how to handle this clown. Were they taking him seriously just because he was black? What was wrong with them anyway, couldn't they see that they were dealing with a clown? But I would have gone to pieces had they laughed or even smiled, I thought, for they couldn't laugh at him without laughing at me as well . . . Yet if they had laughed, it would have been less unreal -- Where the hell am I?
"You can come in now," a brother called to me; and I went out to hear their decision.
"Well," Brother Jack said, "we've all read the article, Brother, and we're happy to report that we found it harmless enough. True, it would have been better had more wordage been given to other members of the Harlem district. But we found no evidence that you had anything to do with that. Brother Wrestrum was mistaken."
His bland manner and the knowledge that they had wasted time to see the truth released the anger within me.
"I'd say that he was criminally mistaken," I said.
"Not criminal, over-zealous," he said.
"To me it seems both criminal and over-zealous," I said.
"No, Brother, not criminal."
"But he attacked my reputation . . ."
Brother Jack smiled. "Only because he was sincere, Brother. He was thinking of the good of the Brotherhood."
"But why slander me? I don't follow you, Brother Jack. I'm no enemy, as he well knows. I'm a brother too," I said, seeing his smile.
"The Brotherhood has many enemies, and we must not be too harsh with brotherly mistakes."
Then I saw the foolish, abashed expression on Wrestrum's face and relaxed.