Cannon and the others were reading into Clay their own fears of Liston, rather than listening to what the challenger said. Cassius brimmed with confidence, affirming his masculinity and promising retribution against the army of journalistic naysayers. “I don’t know what it feels like to be afraid,” he told Leonard Koppett of the New York Times. “The only thing I fear is fear itself. . . . I’m going to win and be champion, and you writers better get on the bandwagon right now. If you’re voting for me, write it now. I’m keeping lists.” He was reading the papers, noting the doubters, and filing the information. “Right after the fight, I’m going to have my roll-call right there in the ring.”14
Although fifty-nine of sixty-two writers polled picked Liston to win the fight, generally by a knockout before the end of the third round, Clay was blithely confident, an attitude that Malcolm buttressed. Malcolm told him that it was the will of Allah that he would win, arguing that it was all part of a divine plan. The night before the fight he told journalist Murray Kempton that Cassius feared no man: “To be a Muslim is to know no fear.”15
George Plimpton wanted to discover more about the source of Clay’s fearlessness. After the weigh-in spectacle, he took a car ride with Archie Robinson, who asked if he would like to meet Malcolm X. Plimpton said certainly, and Robinson drove him to the Hampton House. He took a side table in the luncheonette, and soon Malcolm walked in, carefully weaving through the crowded room, tapping the floor with a walking stick identical to Clay’s. Wearing horn-rimmed glasses, Malcolm stood tall, giving the appearance of a stately professor. He sat across from Plimpton, opening a package of peppermints and popping one in his mouth.16
He was as serene as a monk. The troubles keeping him awake at night were invisible to Plimpton. He said his problems with Elijah Muhammad were over; in fact, he would be “unmuzzled” in March, less than a week away. Speaking gently, occasionally he jotted a word or two that he wanted to emphasize on the paper tablecloth. Plimpton watched him write, noticing the red ring with a small crescent on one of his thin fingers. Malcolm was polite, repeating “Sir?” when he did not hear a question in the noisy room, but Plimpton detected a slight mocking air about his fastidious manners.
He affirmed his belief that Clay was “likely to beat Liston.” Again, Malcolm stressed the importance of belonging to the Muslim faith. “[Cassius] has tremendous self-confidence,” he explained. “I’ve never heard him mention fear. Anything you’re afraid of can whip you. Fear magnifies what you’re afraid of. One thing about our religion is that it removes fear. Christianity is based on fear.”
Malcolm spoke respectfully, even lovingly, about Cassius, ignoring his athletic talents and concentrating on his intellectual and emotional assets. The boxer was kind, gentle, and humble, not at all like the clown that he played for public consumption. But the minister thought his pupil’s greatest gift was his political instinct. “He should be a diplomat. He has the instinct of seeing a tricky situation shaping and resolving how to sidestep it.” Perhaps it was that ability, the fighter’s instinct for avoiding the knockout punch, that Malcolm most admired. Malcolm had always been a magnificent debater, but maybe he was realizing that he gave too much of himself away when he talked, that he showed his weaknesses to his most observant opponents. He admired in Cassius the very quality that he lacked. Clay talked endlessly but had the ability to keep his options open.
Meanwhile, Malcolm’s options were closing. Officially silenced, instructed to avoid the press and to make no public statements, he continued to pop peppermints in his mouth and discuss black rage and revolution with Plimpton. The day of reckoning would come, he emphasized. “There must be retribution.” It was proclaimed in the Koran, chapter 20, verse 102. Later Plimpton checked the citation: “The day when the trumpet is blown. On that day we will assemble the guilty white-eyed (with terror).”
“These are the things you are teaching Cassius?” Plimpton asked.
Malcolm answered: “He will make up his own mind.”