Malcolm X's arrival sent officials of Dr. King's Southern Christian Leadership Conference "into a
tailspin." Quickly, the SCLC's Executive Director Reverend Andrew Young and Reverend James
Bevel met with Malcolm X, urging him not to incite any incidents and cautioning him that his
presence could cause violence. "He listened with a smile," said Miss Faye Bellamy, secretary of
the SNCC, who accompanied Malcolm X to a Negro church where he would address a mass
meeting. "Remember this: nobody puts words in my mouth," he told Miss Bellamy. He told her
that "in about two weeks" he planned to start Southern recruiting for his Harlem-based OAAU. At
the church where he would speak, Malcolm X was seated on the platform next to Mrs. Martin
Luther King, to whom he leaned and whispered that he was "trying to help," she told Jet. "He
said he wanted to present an alternative; that it might be easier for whites to accept Martin's
proposals after hearing him (Malcolm X). I didn't understand him at first," said Mrs. King. "He
seemed rather anxious to let Martin know he was not causing trouble or making it difficult, but that
he was trying to make it easier.... Later, in the hallway, he reiterated this. He seemed sincere...
."
Addressing the mass meeting Malcolm X reportedly shouted: "I don't advocate violence, but if a
man steps on my toes, I'll step on his.".. ."Whites better be glad Martin Luther King is rallying the
people because other forces are waiting to take over if he fails."
Returned to New York City, Malcolm X soon flew to France. He was scheduled to speak before a
Congress of African Students. But he was formally advised that he would not be permitted to
speak and, moreover, that he could consider himself officially barred forever from France as "an
undesirable person." He was asked to leave-and he did, fuming with indignation. He flew on to
London, and reporters of the British Broadcasting Corporation took him on an interviewing tour in
Smethwick, a town near Birmingham with a large colored population. Numerous residents raised
a storm of criticism that the B.B.C. was a party to a "fanning of racism" in the already tension-
filled community. On this visit, he spoke also at the London School of Economics.
Malcolm X returned to New York City on Saturday, February 13th. He was asleep with his family
when at about a quarter of three the following Sunday morning, a terrifying blast awakened them.
Sister Betty would tell me later that Malcolm X, barking commands and snatching up screaming,
frightened children, got the family safely out of the back door into the yard. Someone had thrown
flaming Molotov cocktail gasoline bombs through the front picture window. It took the fire
department an hour to extinguish the flames. Half the house was destroyed. Malcolm X had no
fire insurance.
Pregnant, distraught Sister Betty and the four little daughters went to the home of close friends.
Malcolm X steeled himself to catch a plane as scheduled that morning to speak in Detroit. He
wore an open-necked sweater shirt under his suit. Immediately afterward, he flew back to New
York. Monday morning, amid a flurry of emergency re-housing plans for his family. Malcolm X was
outraged when he learned that Elijah Muhammad's New York Mosque Number 7 Minister James
X had told the press that Malcolm X himself had fire-bombed the home "to get publicity."
Monday night, Malcolm X spoke to an audience in the familiar Audubon Ballroom. If he had
possessed the steel nerves not to become rattled in public before, now he was: "I've reached the
end of my rope!" he shouted to the audience of five hundred. "I wouldn't care for myself if they
would not harm my family!" He declared flatly, "My house was bombed by the Muslims!" And he
hinted at revenge. "There are hunters; there are also those who hunt the hunters!"
Tuesday, February 16th, Malcolm X telephoned me. He spoke very briefly, saying that the
complications following the bombing of his home had thrown his plans so awry that he would be
unable to visit me upstate on the weekend as he had said he would. He said he had also had to
cancel his planned trip to
Jackson, Mississippi, which he was going to try and make later. He said he had to hurry to an
appointment, and hung up. I would read later where also on that day, he told a close associate, "I
have been marked for death in the next five days. I have the names of five Black Muslims who