He can tell how hard it is for Carl to bring himself to make the offer. He doesn’t do it because he likes the idea of having his brother around in the coming years. No, he considers it his duty.

“That’s very kind of you, Carl,” he says. “I’ll think about it.”

7

New York, February 1939

THE NEXT DAY THEY WENT TO SEE SAMUEL JORDAN ON SEVENTH Avenue in Negro Harlem. Everywhere a roar and clatter. Smoke from open fires stung the eyes. Rats scurried past the buildings. Ahead of Josef, Arthur and the boy climbed a narrow stairway up to the third floor.

Jordan opened the door wearing a bathrobe, eyed them warily, and took a drag on his cigarette as they stepped inside. The floor was covered in newspapers. Jordan seemed to spend the day reading before climbing up on his soapbox in the evenings to warn the world about the white man.

They shoved the boy toward him. “All right, let’s go, apologize!”

“He’s just a kid,” said Jordan. “You let kids work for you? First colored folk and now children?”

“We’ve brought the right flyers this time,” said Arthur. The boy grabbed the bundles from the handcart, flyers with the legend DON’T BUY WHERE YOU CAN’T WORK, and set them down in two stacks.

On the shelf was a photograph of Hitler, a careworn and yet resolute expression on his face. A poster for the PACIFIC MOVEMENT OF THE EASTERN WORLD advertised a lecture, something about Japan being the ally of all black people in America. He had heard the idea going around that the Japanese came from Africa and were therefore also black, hence their supposed solidarity with their oppressed brethren in America. FIGHT THE BLACK REDS, read another poster—Japan was fighting Communism in China.

Jordan said quietly, “What about the other delivery?” Arthur pulled his chair close to Jordan and started to whisper. Josef heard him say something about a delay, and Jordan said, “It’s about time we started coordinating our efforts.”

“But we’re in this together,” Arthur continued in the confiding and earnest tone of voice he reserved for his customers.

“The day, the revolution,” said Jordan.

And then Arthur started speaking so quietly that Josef couldn’t hear anything more.

A blinding light flooded the street. They walked through Mount Morris Park, past the tall boulder-strewn hill that he sometimes climbed with Princess. The Harlem mountains. From the top you could see as far as the river. Black-green boulders all around, bleak, rough-edged, with patches of snow between them, spotted like cows.

They were silent, but in his head he kept batting questions back and forth. Finally he said, “What’s Hitler doing on the shelf of the leader of an organization for Negroes?”

“Mutual enemies: England and the Jews.”

“You’re planning a coup?”

No answer.

“You’re selling weapons?”