Summary: Chapters 27 & 28
Maya comments on the changes that occur in San Francisco
after the U.S. enters World War II. Provincial black migrants, not
dissimilar to the people Maya knew in Stamps, flow into the city,
working side by side with illiterate whites in the defense industry.
The black workers replace the Japanese, who have been unjustly interned
by the U.S. government in camps. Maya notes that no one ever speaks about
the Japanese displacement. She says the black community unconsciously
pays little attention to the Japanese because blacks focus on advancing
themselves in the face of white prejudice.
The constant aura of change and displacement in wartime
San Francisco makes Maya feel at home for the first time in her
life. Upon her entrance into school, she automatically gets promoted
a grade and later transfers to a white school where she
is one of only three black students. The white students appear aggressive
and better educated. Maya remembers only one teacher from school,
Miss Kirwin, who never played favorites and never treated Maya differently
for being black. When she is fourteen, Maya receives a scholarship
to the California Labor School where she studies dance and drama.
Summary: Chapter 29
The owner of numerous apartment buildings and pool halls,
Daddy Clidell becomes the only true father figure Maya ever knows.
She loves his strength and his tenderness. He is dignified, but
not haughty. He has no inferiority complex about receiving little
education, but he also lacks the arrogance usually associated with
men of great accomplishment. Daddy Clidell introduces Maya to his
con-men friends who have learned to swindle bigoted whites. They
once conned a racist white man from Tulsa who had a history of cheating blacks
into paying $40,000 for
a piece of property that did not exist. Maya cannot regard the con
men as criminals because she says the deck has been stacked against
them from the start anyway. Ethics, she notes, depends upon necessity
and are therefore different in the black community.
Summary: Chapter 30
Big Bailey invites Maya to spend the summer with him and
his girlfriend, Dolores. Dolores and Maya exchange letters and anticipate incorrectly
each other’s physical appearance. Both Dolores and Maya are shocked
when they meet for the first time. Big Bailey has promised to marry
Dolores, but he keeps postponing the wedding plans. Much to Maya’s
surprise, they live in a low-class mobile home. Nevertheless, Dolores
tries to maintain the home in prim-and-proper style, and Maya’s
messy nature disturbs Dolores from the beginning. Big Bailey watches
the mutual discomfort between Maya and Dolores with amusement.
A fluent speaker of Spanish and an avid chef both by
trade and in the home, Big Bailey makes frequent trips to Mexico
supposedly to buy groceries. One day Big Bailey invites Maya on
one of his shopping trips, inciting Dolores’s jealousy. During the
trip, he jokes with a guard by offering Maya to him as a wife. He
drives past the border towns and stops outside Ensenada. Women,
men, and children greet him warmly. Big Bailey becomes a different
person. He relaxes and stops putting on airs. Maya, who knows a
bit of Spanish from school, begins to enjoy herself, but when she
cannot find her father later in the evening, she becomes frightened
and sits alone in the car, waiting for him. Eventually
he staggers out drunk and passes out in the car. Maya drives fifty
miles back to the border even though she has never driven a car
before, let alone one with a clutch. She has a minor accident at
the checkpoint. Big Bailey regains consciousness and settles the
matter before driving the rest of the way home. He is neither surprised
nor angry about the accident. He does not seem surprised that Maya
could drive, and Maya dislikes the fact that he does not appreciate
the magnitude of her achievement. They ride home in silence.
Summary: Chapter 31
After returning home, Maya overhears an argument between Dolores
and Big Bailey. Dolores feels that Maya has come between them. Big
Bailey leaves the house in a huff, leaving Dolores sobbing alone.
Maya approaches Dolores and tells her that she never meant to come
between them. Maya feels strong and honorable doing her good deed,
but Dolores rebuffs Maya’s peaceful gesture and insults her, calling
her mother, Vivian, a whore. Furious, Maya tells Dolores she is
going to slap her and then does so. Dolores retaliates and Maya
realizes that Dolores has stabbed her with scissors. Bleeding, Maya
runs out of the house and locks herself in her father’s car. Big
Bailey hears Dolores screaming and returns to investigate. He takes
Dolores inside the house then drives Maya, who feels empowered by
the events, to a friend’s house, where a woman bandages Maya’s wound.
Afterward, he drives her to the home of another friend, where she
spends the night. Big Bailey visits her at noon the next day and
gives her some money, promising to return later that evening. Dreading
having to face her father’s friends, Maya packs some food and leaves.
She cannot return to Vivian, however, because she would never be
able to hide her wound. Telling Vivian would only precipitate trouble
between Vivian and Big Bailey, and Maya guiltily remembers Mr. Freeman’s
death all too clearly.
