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Part 1, Chapter 7
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Harlem Shuffle, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Crime, Class, and Social Mobility
Identity and Duality
Community, Change, and Loyalty
Systemic Racism, Injustice, and Power
Betrayal, Vengeance, and Integrity
Summary
Analysis
While Carney is out, a detective (Munson) visits the furniture store. Rusty takes his card and is grateful that city police seem too busy to properly harass people. Carney spends the rest of his day brooding on his troubles. At home, he finds Alma washing dishes while Elizabeth and May sleep. She pauses before letting Carney into his own apartment. Alma offers to let Elizabeth and May stay in her and Leland’s house until the baby arrives, since it’s air conditioned. Using profanity, Carney snaps and tells Alma to mind her own business. Alma calls him a racial slur. While she answers the house phone, Carney leaves. He feels Alma is trying to steal her daughter back from him.
A detective visiting the furniture store is a significant blow to Carney’s respectable façade, suggesting his dual identities of crook and businessman are colliding. Although Carney’s nerves play a role in his fight with Alma, it is understandable for him to interpret her offer as a judgment on the way he is supporting (or failing to support) his family. Alma’s use of a racial slur exposes her internalized racism, which has convinced her that her wealth makes her better than Carney, despite their shared Blackness.
Themes
Carney walks through the Saturday night crowds in Harlem, heading for Riverside Drive. He is sure Alma and Leland mean to convince Elizabeth marrying him was a bad idea. Reflecting on his outburst, Carney knows he feels guilty for putting his wife and children in danger by getting involved in the Theresa heist. He suspects Pepper is right, and Miami Joe has double-crossed them. Still, he wonders if Joe might still be in New York, waiting to kill the rest of them. He thinks of Riverside as “the perimeter of a fort” or “a cage” to keep Harlem from ruining the rest of the city. Carney’s fantasies about the Riverside apartment are tainted by Alma’s derogatory view of him.
Carney tries to comfort himself in the usual way—by visiting his dream apartment—showing how financial success is central to his wellbeing. Even though he was an unwilling participant in the heist, Carney worries that his peripheral involvement will endanger his family. His ruminations on the city and Riverside being tainted by Harlem and its inhabitants seem to echo his fear that his criminal dabbling has ruined his life.
Themes
Considering what his father would do, Carney resolves not to sleep until he’s hunted down Miami Joe. He remembers Betty, the Theresa maid who acted as Joe’s source for the robbery, who lives in the Burbank. Carney pretends he is trying to return Betty’s purse, asking the night manager if he can give it to Joe, but the man denies him entry. Carney decides to head towards Baby’s Best, the club where the crew first met. Meanwhile, Miami Joe runs down the fire escape at the Burbank. The night manager alerted him to Carney’s presence. He considers Arthur—who he killed and robbed—to be insignificant. Now, seeing Carney, Miami Joe takes aim and shoots.
Significantly, Carney turns to his father’s memory for guidance, finally accepting his involvement in the Theresa heist and (to some extent) his criminal inheritance—which here expresses itself as a need for vengeance. Remembering Joe’s association with Betty suggests that Carney has a mind for important details, possibly implying that illegal schemes are, as he fears, in his blood. The brief shift into Miami Joe’s perspective exposes his narcissism and lack of empathy, which allows him to betray his coconspirators with ease.
Themes
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