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“Listen, Bigger,” said Britten. “Did you see this guy [Jan] act in any way out of the ordinary? I mean, sort of nervous, say? Just what did he talk about?"

In this passage from Book Two, in which Britten questions Bigger about Mary’s disappearance, we see Bigger’s astute ability to deflect suspicion away from himself by playing upon white prejudice against Black people and communists. Bigger assumes a slow-witted, subservient attitude that completely conceals his sharp intellect and capability for drastic action, and then uses this attitude to cast subtle suspicion upon the innocent Jan. Bigger utterly outsmarts the whites by telling them exactly what they want to hear, saying that, on the night of Mary’s disappearance, Jan was talking about these “things the Reds were always asking for.” Bigger knows that simply associating Jan with communist rhetoric will make Jan appear guilty in the minds of his white listeners, even though they already know Jan to be an avowed communist. Bigger uses his long experience with racial prejudice shrewdly, manipulating the prejudices of his white questioners. This passage suggests that, had Mary’s bones not been discovered in the furnace, Bigger may have gotten away with his crime completely.

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