GREGORY'S DREAM
297
stage, that antipathy was part of the range of my feelings toward
the Negro. Of course, I love to believe that it isn't, in other words,
that the dream didn't reveal anything, that it only was an erratic
incident, picturesque. And yet, you see what a weak word the word
picturesque is. In fact, I felt kindly disposed toward this Negro-and
did not even realize how close this came to patronizing him. What
happened afterward now clearly appears to have been this Negro's
revenge, and hence it
is
of immense relief to me. I feel immensely
relieved that he should have had his revenge, because it shows me that
he knew very much more about the equality of races than I did; more
precisely, that I still can learn, and that I learned from
him
toward
whom I feel so guilty. Indeed I learned a gr,eat deal-intellectually
at least.
As
far as my life is concerned, I'd better go on with the dream
first. Then perhaps you can tell me something about this.
"The young man had mentioned that he was studying in New
York. He had said this in the same way his sister had answered my
questions about her galoshes; she too, I believe, had told me what
she was doing, but I forget. I asked him what he was studying. It
was either then or only after he told me that he was investigating the
situation of the Negro in New York, that he asked me to mind my
own business, that is, to concentrate on my work in the city where
I had told him that I was living, rather than to meddle with his.
I forget which. But I definitely remember that I was shocked by his
lack of confidence, that I felt wronged by his hostility.
"Yet I did not have much time to think about my feelings, for as
we reached this stage of the conversation-whichever it was-we had
also
reached a narrow platform or square beneath and among high
houses, which again reminded me of Genoa, as the laundry had.
(Or did I say that I compared the rail laundry with the wash hanging
across the narrow deep streets in Genoa only after I had awakened?
I don't recall.) I had just time to tell him that I was a sociologist
at the University of M., and that I was especially interested in race
relations; just time enough to suggest that he was surely familiar
with the field and with the good motives that urged people to study
it-when I found myself in a quickly narrowing throng of people.
Most of them I don't remember, but they were all, or almost all,
Whites, and the Negro undoubtedly was with them, body and soul.
The cry 'Hunt<:man
!'
passed from one to the other in the group
around me, and I immediately understood not only that it referred
to me, but also what it meant: nothing less than that I was a German
spy. I think , I had told my Negro that I was a Jew thrown out of
Germany. At any rate, the situation was absurd, but it was troubling
