nationalism.
But something else was happening to Jay.
His political focus was beginning to shift to a higher plane.
The more he read, the more he was starting to see injustice as a
global problem. Oppression was pandemic, like a cancer; wher
ever it existed, it would spread. And maybe justice could work
the same way; maybe it could spread too. Which meant that the
problems in Africa, say—poverty and the imperialism that cre
ated it—were as important as the problems here at home; they
were actually one and the same.
While Bumpy and Lloyd got more and more heated about
“black power”—refusing to coordinate rallies with SNCC or any
white groups on campus—Jay kept an eye on the war and com
munism, and global economics in particular, working the topic
into speeches and editorials for local papers and traveling on his
own dime across the lower states to speak to other colleges and
political leaders.
He knew he was being followed.
They found bugs in the phones on Scott Street. They spotted
undercover cops at every rally. And Jay knew somebody was stag
ing break-ins, stealing drafts of speeches and fund-raising ros ters. But it wasn’t until the feds shot those boys in Chicago that Jay began to believe his life might be in danger—not just a ran dom act of violence, but a planned execution. By 1970, you could feel the tension running under everything. There were suddenly guns on the table at every meeting. No one knew who they could trust. Even brothers and sisters who went way, way back, had been friends for years, were suddenly tight lipped around each other. They started spending almost as much time testing each other’s loyalty as they did talking about their fledgling political
programs.
It was a brilliant strategy.
If no one knew who the rats were, then no one could be
trusted. It was just the kind of thing that would tear a political
organization apart.
In all this, Roger Holloway had completely escaped Jay’s atten
tion. His lack of political passion and his high-level interest in
bedding most of the sisters affiliated with Jay and Bumpy’s group
made Jay think of him more as a lazy lothario than a revolution
ary, a fox who’d found his way into a well-stocked henhouse. He
did, however, take a strong interest in something Jay was trying
to pull together: an African liberation rally to be held on cam
pus. It was already shaping up to be the biggest political move of
Jay’s life. Jay wasn’t sure Roger could find Africa on a map, but
he was willing to do grunt work—making cold calls and mimeo
graphing flyers—so Jay kind of took him in, teaching him how
to organize a rally, who to call for money, and what lies to tell
the administration to keep them off your back. Alfreda Watkins
was on fund-raising then, a one-woman committee. She was a
beautiful, long-limbed sister with a big soft Afro, and Jay had a
sneaking suspicion she was Roger’s true African inspiration. Cynthia turned away from the water, turning her whole body around to face him. She wrapped her hands behind his neck, locking them. He could feel the heels of her bony feet digging into the small of his back. She rested her forehead on his. “I love
you,” she whispered. “You know that, right?”
He dug his fingers into her flesh, the folds of her skirt.
Cynthia pressed her cheek against his.
She whispered in his ear, “I’m just saying . . . be careful, Jay.” He would think about this night many times
