Ralph Ellison - Invisible man

"Well, yes," I said. "It's the most meaningful thing that I know."

"Oh, I'm so pleased to have you agree with me. I suppose that's why I always thrill to hear you speak, somehow you convey the great throbbing vitality of the movement. It's really amazing. You give me such a feeling of security -- although," she interrupted herself with a mysterious smile, "I must confess that you also make me afraid."

"Afraid? You can't mean that," I said.

"Really," she repeated, as I laughed. "It's so powerful, so -- so primitive!"

I felt some of the air escape from the room, leaving it unnaturally quiet. "You don't mean primitive?" I said.

"Yes, primitive; no one has told you, Brother, that at times you have tom-toms beating in your voice?"

"My God," I laughed, "I thought that was the beat of profound ideas."

"Of course, you're correct," she said. "I don't mean really primitive. I suppose I mean forceful, powerful. It takes hold of one's emotions as well as one's intellect. Call it what you will, it has so much naked power that it goes straight through one. I tremble just to think of such vitality."

I looked at her, so close now that I could see a single jet-black strand of out-of-place hair. "Yes," I said, "the emotion is there; but it's actually our scientific approach that releases it. As Brother Jack says, we're nothing if not organizers. And the emotion isn't merely released, it's guided, channelized -- that is the real source of our effectiveness. After all, this very good wine can please emotion, but I doubt seriously that it can organize anything."

She leaned gracefully forward, her arm along the back of the sofa, saying, "Yes, and you do both in your speeches. One just has to respond, even when one isn't too clear as to your meaning. Only I do know what you're saying and that's even more inspiring."

"Actually, you know, I'm as much affected by the audience as it is by me. Its response helps me do my best."

"And there's another important aspect," she said; "one which concerns me greatly. It provides women the full opportunity for self-expression, which is so very important, Brother. It's as though every day were Leap Year -- which is as it should be. Women should be absolutely as free as men."

And if I were really free, I thought, lifting my glass, I'd get the hell out of here.

"I thought you were exceptionally good tonight -- it's time the woman had a champion in the movement. Until tonight I'd always heard you on minority problems."

"This is a new assignment," I said. "But from now on one of our main concerns is to be the Woman Question."

"That's wonderful and it's about time. Something has to give women an opportunity to come to close grips with life. Please go on, tell me your ideas," she said, pressing forward, her hand light upon my arm.

And I went on talking, relieved to talk, carried away by my own enthusiasm and by the warmth of the wine. And it was only when I turned to ask a question of her that I realized that she was leaning only a nose-tip away, her eyes upon my face.

"Go on, please go on," I heard. "You make it sound so clear -- please."

I saw the rapid, moth-wing fluttering of her lids become the softness of her lips as we were drawn together. There was not an idea or concept in it but sheer warmth; then the bell was ringing and I shook it off and got to my feet, hearing it ring again as she arose with me, the red robe falling in heavy folds upon the carpet, and she saying, "You make it all so wonderfully alive," as the bell sounded again. And I was trying to move, to get out of the apartment, looking for my hat and filling with anger, thinking, Is she crazy? Doesn't she hear? as she stood before me in bewilderment, as though I were acting irrationally. And now taking my arm with sudden energy, saying, "This way, in here," almost pulling me along as the bell rang again, through a door down a short hall, a satiny bedroom, in which she stood appraising me with a smile, saying, "This is mine," as I looked at her in outrageous disbelief.

"Yours, yours? But what about that bell?"

"Never mind," she cooed, looking into my eyes.

"But be reasonable," I said, pushing her aside. "What about that door?"

"Oh, of course, you mean the telephone, don't you, darling?"

"But your old man -- your husband?"

"In Chicago --"

"But he might not --"

"No, no, darling, he won't --"

"But he might!"

"But, Brother, darling, I talked with him, I know."

"You what? What kind of game is this?"

"Oh, you poor darling! It isn't a game, really you have no cause to worry, we're free. He's in Chicago, seeking his lost youth, no doubt," she said, bursting into laughter of self-surprise. "He's not at all interested in uplifting things -- freedom and necessity, woman's rights and all that. You know, the sickness of our class -- Brother, darling."

I took a step across the room; there was another door to my left through which I saw the gleam of chromium and tile.

"Brotherhood, darling," she said, gripping my biceps with her little hands. "Teach me, talk to me. Teach me the beautiful ideology of Brotherhood." And I wanted both to smash her and to stay with her and knew that I should do neither. Was she trying to ruin me, or was this a trap set by some secret enemy of the movement waiting outside the door with cameras and wrecking bars?

"You should answer the phone," I said with forced calm, trying to release my hands without touching her, for if I touched her --

"And you'll continue?" she said.

I nodded, seeing her turn without a word and go toward a vanity with a large oval mirror, taking up an ivory telephone. And in the mirrored instant I saw myself standing between her eager form and a huge white bed, myself caught in a guilty stance, my face taut, tie dangling; and behind the bed another mirror which now like a surge of the sea tossed our images back and forth, back and forth, furiously multiplying the time and the place and the circumstance. My vision seemed to pulse alternately clear and vague, driven by a furious bellows, as her lips said soundlessly, I'm sorry, and then impatiently into the telephone, "Yes, this is she," and then to me again, smiling as she covered the mouthpiece with her hand, "It's only my sister; it'll only take a second." And my mind whirled with forgotten stories of male servants summoned to wash the mistress's back; chauffeurs sharing the masters' wives; Pullman porters invited into the drawing room of rich wives headed for Reno -- thinking, But this is the movement, the Brotherhood. And now I saw her smile, saying, "Yes, Gwen, dear. Yes," as one free hand went up as though to smooth her hair and in one swift motion the red robe swept aside like a veil, and I went breathless, at the petite and generously curved nude, framed delicate and firm in the glass. It was like a dream interval and in an instant it swung back and I saw only her mysteriously smiling eyes above the rich red robe.

I was heading for the door, torn between anger and a fierce excitement, hearing the phone click down as I started past and feeling her swirl against me and I was lost, for the conflict between the ideological and the biological, duty and desire, had become too subtly confused. I went to her, thinking, Let them break down the door, whosoever will, let them come.

I DIDN'T know whether I was awake or dreaming. It was dead quiet, yet I was certain that there had been a noise and that it had come from across the room as she beside me made a soft sighing sound. It was strange. My mind revolved. I was chased out of a chinkapin woods by a bull. I ran up a hill; the whole hill heaved. I heard the sound and looked up to see the man looking straight at me from where he stood in the dim light of the hall, looking in with neither interest nor surprise. His face expressionless, his eyes staring. There was the sound of even breathing. Then I heard her stir beside me.