The Collected Autobiographies of Maya Angelou (116 page)

When we were at last in the apartment, I checked Guy’s room, and found him asleep. That part of my life was comfortably accounted for. Now all I had to do was face my lover and one-time love, whom I heard dragging furniture around in the living room. I went into our bedroom and stood in the dark, wondering how to begin.

“Maya. Maya, don’t go to bed yet.” I walked out and down the hall. The big man sat composed, and had arranged a chair to face him.

“Sit down here, Maya. I want to talk to you about Mendinah. Mendinah and all the others.”

There was a moment’s relief. At least I didn’t have to start the conversation. That brief easement was pushed away with an abysmal fear. If he insisted that I accept his infidelity, I’d have to leave him. Condoning it would increase the misdeed. I had heard of men who brought other women into their homes, into the beds they shared with their wives. If Vus was planning such flagrancy, I would have to pick up my son and my heels, and get on the road, one more time.

I sat facing him, our knees touching.

“I am a man. An African man. I am neither primitive nor cruel. A nation of interlopers and most whites in the world would deny me on all counts, but let me deal with each of those stated conditions.” It was going to be a long night.

“A man requires a certain amount of sexual gratification. Much more than a woman needs, wants or understands.”

“That’s a lie, Vus. You’re not a woman, how do you know what I need?”

“I do not choose to argue a point which cannot be proved, but which is tacitly agreed upon. I will continue. As an African man, in my society, I have the right to marry more than one woman.”

“But that is not true in my society and you knew that when we met.”

“I met you in the U.S.”—he smiled—“but now we are in Africa.”

Was he implying that geography affected his gonads? I reminded him that he had been unfaithful in New York.

He looked shocked. “You have no evidence of that.” He was almost correct. I had only the lingering scent of perfume, and the unforgotten cosmetics on his clothes.

When I said nothing, he relaxed and leaned back in his chair, spreading his vast thighs. “To an African man, the act of sex is only important as long as it lasts. It is not the factor which holds a family together. It pleases and relieves tension, so that one can get about the business of living.”

I asked with sarcastic sweetness, “And what about African women? Don’t they want pleasure and release?”

He frowned, offended. “Haven’t I always satisfied you? Have I ever left you wanting? I have come home many nights, physically drained, and abstracted with my work, but I have done my duty to you. Deny that if you can.”

The conversation was getting away from me. Onus and guilt were shifting into my lap, where they surely didn’t belong.

“I don’t love you anymore, Vus.” It was the truth, but I used it not for declaration, so much as to startle him and take back a little advantage.

He stayed at ease. “I know that, my dear. I’ve known it for a long time. Nor am I, any longer, in romantic love with you. However, we respect and admire each other. We have the asset of mutual goals: the struggle for freedom, loyalty to Mother Africa.” He paused for a second, then went on in a softer voice. “And Guy’s future as an African man.”

At that second, I hardened my heart. I didn’t believe all the legitimizing
drivel Vus concocted about African male infidelity and I would not allow him to teach such nonsense to my son.

“What about Mendinah? Tell me about her. Tell me why you put my name into your mouth, when all you wanted was to get her in bed?”

“I apologize to you for that. Sincerely.” His quick mind served him quickly. “Although I did hear you say you wished there was another black woman in your office.”

There have always been, for me, periods in arguments when my thoughts swirl around in semi-solid circles, leaving no protruding phrase for my mind to grab. I am rendered mute until the eddying jumble slows down and I am able to pick out enough words to form a first sentence. The moment had come. Ideas rushed around like crazed children in a mad tag game. Vus was African and his values were different from mine. Among the people I knew, my family and friends, promiscuity was the ultimate blow in a marriage. It struck down the pillars of trust which held the relationship aloft. It was also physically dangerous. Venereal diseases could easily be the result of indiscreet momentary gratification. It was disloyal and, finally, unfriendly. Nor was it a characteristic solely of African men. From the beginning of human history, all societies had tried to cope with the custom. The Judeo-Christian Bible forbade adultery, for both sexes. Usually, however, women paid the highest price, losing their hair to rough barbers, or their lives to an affronted community that stoned them to death.

In the United States white men, with the implements of slavery and racial oppression, had taken from black men their names, languages, power, wives, daughters, innate senses of self-value, their confidence. Because they had been unable, however, to kill the sexuality, white men began to envy it, extol it, adore and fear it. A number of black men, finding that they had one thing left which was beyond the reach of their enemies’ grasp commenced to identify themselves, to themselves, as sexual masters, possessors of the big dicks, the artful penises, the insatiable lust. White men greedily and enviously agreed. White women, in secret fantasies and rare public displays, yearned over the huge private parts. Some black women agreed that black men had rapacious
appetites, and allowed their husbands and lovers the freedom of the fields. Some other women, with knives and guns, boiling water, poison and the divorce courts proved that they did not agree with the common attitude.

“Mendinah. It is said that she is a sexual glutton. Women like that are only good for one, at most two experiences.” He had been talking for some time. I suddenly remembered the drone of his voice. “The men who have spoken about her consider her a pretty but temporary vessel.”

I nodded, assured. I had finally found my words.

“I’m leaving you, Vus. I’m not sure when or where I’m going. But I’m leaving you.”

His face didn’t change from the placid sheet of control when I got up and went to bed.

Banti’s telephone call at my office came unexpectedly. I had gone to her house early the morning following the Mendinah incident and told her of my plans to leave Vus. Her response had been that of a wife who had a faithful husband. “Sister, you have been a giant. Everyone admires your patience. Truly, you have proved yourself.” With my decision made, the burden of tolerance lifted and the approval of my friend, I had gone to work buoyant.

“Sister,” I heard her say on the telephone, “Joe and I want you to come to us, this evening. After dinner. Nine o’clock. Will you?”

I agreed. The day rushed along. Entire paragraphs leaped out of my typewriter, needing little, if any, revision.

Vus didn’t appear for dinner, so Guy and I ate alone. He was reading, so was happy to hear that I had an appointment and he would have the house quiet and to himself.

The heavy door of the Liberian Residency was opened by a servant. I stepped into the foyer and heard a cloud of low voices. Banti hadn’t advised me to dress for a party. But then, the tone wasn’t party-like. I walked past the doorman two paces, and I was at the door of the salon, where a multitude of faces peered at me.

It was a surprise birthday party, months off schedule and lacking the gaiety of a fete.

About twenty people sat in a crescent of chairs. Kebi, Jarra and Banti were together. I hastily examined the familiar faces and felt that I had stumbled, unluckily, into a secret ritual or a dangerous kangaroo court.

No one smiled, not even my friends, and the awkward moment could have lasted forever. Joe Williamson’s high melodic voice preceded his presence.

“Sister Maya. We are waiting for you. Come in. Come in. Abdul will bring you a drink. Come, you are to sit beside Brother Vus.”

My eyes followed the general indication of his right hand. Vus sat, stiff and sober at the center of the row of chairs. I knew that I was befuddled, thrown and totally mystified, so I smiled and obeyed Joe’s directive, finding an empty seat beside my husband. The low thrumming of voices did not stop. I leaned toward Vus and whispered, “What is this? What’s happening?”

He gave me a calm look and said, “This is all for you.” There was only weariness in his tone.

“Brothers and sisters.” Joe walked in the center of the floor. “You know why you are here.” I was handed a drink of Scotch. “Our sister from across the seas, and across the centuries, is planning to leave our brother from South Africa.”

Damn. Vus knew it, I knew it, and I had told Banti a few hours earlier. I gazed at the African men and women, and found that the information was not news to them. No eyes widened, no jaws tightened at the announcement.

“Our sister and her son have returned to Africa. We all know that she has worked very hard and that she feels herself an African.” A mumble of agreement followed his statement.

“Our South African brother wages a fight for all of us. No day passes but that he is on the battlefield. No night comes without Vusumzi Make at the gun, threatening the fortress of white oppression.” Another rumble of accord lifted and floated in the room.

“Now, I, the brother to all of you, have called for palaver. Neither of these young people have family in Egypt, outside this small community. So I have asked you so that we can examine the points and
weigh the matter.” Panic was rising in my mind and paralyzing my legs.

Joe said, “I will ask this side of the room to argue for our sister, Maya, and this side for our brother, Vus.”

I shook myself away from the numbing shock and stood up.

“Excuse me, Joe, but I’m not on trial. I’m going home.” Joe spoke to me over the undertone of disapproval.

“Sister, you are going to stay in Africa. You have a son and a name. If you can sit through this palaver, the outcome will be news in Africa. You know, Maya, our people do not count on papers or magazines to tell us what we need to know. There are people here from Ghana, Mali, Guinea, Nigeria, Ethiopia and Liberia. Sister, try hard and sit down.”

Years before I had understood that all I had to do, really had to do, was stay black and die. Nothing could be more interesting than the first, or more permanent than the latter. In truly critical moments I reminded myself of those discoveries. I walked back and sat down beside Vus, who had become a large, black stranger.

Joe Williamson placed a dining-room chair in the middle of the half-circle, talking all the while.

“The group from Maya, going right, will defend our brother. People left of Vus will support our sister. And please remember, folks, we are the only family they have in this strange land.”

I looked to my right, and my heart raced. My friends, Banti, Kebi, Margaret Young, a Nigerian close friend, and Jarra would be arguing for Vus. I turned and looked across to the other side and saw three infamous lechers, a few old indifferent men and three women whom I didn’t know well. My team looked hopeless.

Joe took his seat and spoke to me.

“Sister, tell your complaint. Tell your side.”

Black Americans had no custom of publicly baring the soul. In old-time churches, people used to rise and complain about the treatment they had received from fellow members, but those conferences had died out, leaving only the memory in ribald jokes.

Mrs. Jackson stood up in church and reported, “Reverend, brothers
and sisters. I accuse Miss Taylor of going ’round town saying my husband has a wart on his private part.” The congregation’s “uh huh huhs” sounded like drumrolls. Miss Taylor got up and said, “I have to speak to clarify what I said. Brothers and sisters, I did not say that Mr. Jackson had a wart on his private part. I never did. ’Cause I never saw it. What I said, and this is all I said, was it felt like it was a wart.”

There was no precedent in my life for airing private affairs. I held myself still and erect.

Joe repeated, “Sister, tell your part. Why do you find our brother impossible as a husband?”

I looked at Joe, then at my dear friends, lined up in Vus’s defense. Banti, Kebi and Margaret know all my complaints, I had cried in their arms, and laid my head on their laps uncounted times. Now they sat with straight flat faces, as if we were strangers. I turned to look at the company gathered in my behalf. Their faces were also cold, unsupportive and strange. I was alone again, but then, since I was already black, all I had to do was die.

I said, “The man stuffs his thing in any opening he finds. I am faithful, he is not.”

A few coughs fell from the mouths of my squad, and Vus’s troop twitched and cleared their throats.

“I slave my ass off.” (African women hardly ever used profanity in mixed company, but I wasn’t strictly an African, and, after all, they had gathered to hear me speak and I was a black American. Mentioning slavery in present African company was a ploy. Their forefathers had been spared, or had negotiated for the sale of my ancestors. I knew it and they knew it. It gave me a little edge.)

“I put money into the house. At ten o’clock I go alone to the Broadcast Building to narrate an essay, and I’m paid one pound. Vus spends money as if we are rich. He expects me to be faithful and steady and he comes home smelling of cheap perfume and a whore’s twat.” They may not have heard the word before but everyone knew what it meant.

I reveled in the rustle of discomfort. They asked me and I told them.

Joe Williamson clapped his hands. “All right, Sister Maya has spoken. I call upon Vus’s defense.” In a snap, queries were directed at me.

“Have you kept yourself clean?”

“Do you refuse your husband his marital rights?”

“You are an American, after all; how well can you cook African food?”

“Do you curse and act unbecoming?”

“Do you try to dominate the man?”

“Do you press him to have sex when he is tired?”

“Do you obey him? listen to him carefully?”

I answered every question with openness and sass. The sooner they rejected me, the sooner this odd ritual would be over. I would be free or get whatever was coming to me.