When Cassius checked into the hotel, he visited with Malcolm for “a secret conference,” only they did not meet in his mentor’s office. Instead, Malcolm came to him, knocking on Clay’s suite door. Even before Cassius became champion, from the moment Malcolm set foot in Miami, their relationship fundamentally changed. Cassius, the title contender, altered Malcolm’s thinking. In a moment of weakness, he exploited his friendship with Clay, manipulating him and withholding the truth about his future in the Nation. In a desperate attempt to prove his value to Elijah, he offered to deliver Clay to Chicago after the title fight, treating Cassius like some prize that could be bartered or traded. But Elijah did not have to buy Clay’s loyalty. He already owned it.7
Reporters assumed that Clay was Malcolm’s most devoted follower. One New York writer claimed that “an insider” told him that Clay was “solidly in Malcolm’s corner and would” prove influential in helping “his friend to establish a cult of his own.” Other writers speculated that if Cassius teamed with Malcolm, then Elijah would lose many of his followers to their rival Muslim movement.8
By all appearances, Cassius and Malcolm had never been tighter. After Cassius arrived, later that afternoon, they toured Times Square, parading the streets and shaking hands with strangers as if they were running for office on the same ticket. When a reporter from the Amsterdam News spoke to Malcolm, he gave no indication of trying to persuade Clay to leave the Nation. He was still waiting for just the right moment to tell him the truth about Elijah. Cassius, he told the writer, “dances like Sugar Ray, punches like Joe Louis, and thinks like Elijah Muhammad.” In time, Malcolm would wish that Cassius thought more like him.9
LATER THAT EVENING, after watching a film of Clay’s championship match at a theater, Cassius and Malcolm were surrounded by a crowd of nearly five hundred on Broadway at Times Square. While Clay signed more autographs, photographers snapped pictures of Malcolm standing beside him with a satisfied smile on his face. Seeing them together, reporters concluded, no one could doubt that they were planning a bold political initiative. Clay felt he had jumped beyond the world of sports. “I’m shaking up Times Square now,” he declared. “In a few days, I’ll shake up the United Nations. I’m going to meet all the delegates.” After speaking with writers and fans for about twenty-five minutes, Clay and Malcolm squeezed through the crowd, making their way toward a limousine, and disappeared.10
The next day, March 2, Malcolm arranged for them to visit the offices of the Amsterdam News, where Clay said that he would no longer acknowledge the name of “a Kentucky slave master.” Now, he said, “I will be known as Cassius X.” When a reporter at the News asked him about Elijah and Malcolm, he feigned ignorance of any rift between them. “Elijah Muhammad is the sweetest man in the world,” he said. “Malcolm X? I fell in love with him after watching him on television with those educators—leaving them with their mouths wide open.”11
Malcolm was not the only friend Cassius visited in New York. The following evening, he met Sam Cooke at a Columbia recording studio on Seventh Avenue, where they cut a snappy rendition of “Hey, Hey, the Gang’s All Here.” Since the previous summer, when he’d covered Ben King’s hit song “Stand By Me,” Cassius had become more comfortable in the studio, though he still sounded a bit tentative when he sang. On his album, The Greatest, he did not really sing—he mostly recited poems—but his unbridled confidence and Sam’s encouragement convinced him that he could become a singer. Realizing Cassius’s range was limited, Sam arranged for him to perform a simple, fun tune that accentuated his soulfulness.12
Later Sam and Cassius appeared on BBC’s Grandstand. Host Harry Carpenter had met Clay in England before the Cooper fight and now detected that Cassius was “a changed man.” The champ admitted that he had changed, and that he no longer needed “to talk like I used to.” Yet he struggled with his identity. He was unsure how he would express his new freedom now that he was champion and the world knew that he was a Muslim. Only a few months earlier, he’d told the Louisville Sponsoring Group that he no longer wanted to be a showman. He was not interested in being a clown on television. He’d said that he wanted people to take him more seriously. But now his representatives at the William Morris Agency were in the middle of negotiating “a deal involving millions of dollars” where he would perform on television, on tour, and on more records. It was an enticing offer that made him reconsider his position. Ultimately, the negotiations broke down when booking agents and record executives learned more about his relationship with the Black Muslims. “Malcolm X,” one New York columnist learned, “has cost him a fortune in endorsements, TV shots, and disc sales.”13