Character guide

Pat

major

Also known as Shine

A big, feared street fighter called Shine, whose reputation for hardness hides a terror of being seen as soft, especially by the woman who reads him clearest.

Linda Young

major

Also known as Linda, Miss Linda Young, Miss Young, Sarah Long, Sarah Bell Long, Lindy

Sharp-tongued and self-aware, she calls out the wall of false hardness around the man she loves while confessing the lies she tells herself about wanting him.

Miss Agatha Cramp

major

Also known as Agatha Cramp, Miss Cramp, Miss Agatha, Agatha

A formidable presence in the novel's social world, Miss Cramp moves through the story with the weight of respectability and the complications it brings.

Fred Merrit

major

Also known as Merrit, Fred, Mr. Merrit

A man whose burned house and stricken figure haunt the story's memory, Merrit stands at the center of a wrong that demands answering.

Bubber Brown

supporting

Also known as Bubber

A lively storyteller in the neighborhood circle, Bubber retells the Jericho sermon with comic flair, turning scripture into street-corner philosophy.

Jinx Jenkins

supporting

Also known as Jinx

Bubber's partner in talk and mischief, Jinx trades the Jericho story with him, their banter carrying the novel's folk wisdom and humor.

Henry Patmore

supporting

Also known as Patmore, Mr. Henry Patmore, Mr. Patmore

Patmore moves through Harlem as a man others step around, his size and temper doing the work of a reputation he never has to fully earn. When Linda invokes Father Tod's sermon on Jericho, she names the wall around him: not cruelty but fear, a terror of being found out as someone who could be hurt and could love. That confrontation—his silence, her tears, the accusation that he plays safe by making her quote Scripture—sets the emotional stakes for his arc, forcing him to choose between the hard shell and the person it protects.

Mrs. Arabella Fuller

supporting

Also known as Mrs. Fuller, Fuller, Arabella Fuller

Mrs. Fuller occupies a place in the novel's social world where respectability and gossip carry real weight, and her opinions about who is behaving well and who is not ripple outward. She represents the pressure of communal watching—the sense that private choices become public property—which complicates the freedom of characters like Linda and Patmore to act on what they feel. Her role in the early and middle arc is to embody the standards against which the central figures measure themselves, whether they obey or defy them.

Nora Byle

supporting

Also known as Nora, Byle, Honey

Nora Byle belongs to the interconnected world of Harlem families whose ties—by blood, marriage, and long acquaintance—determine who trusts whom. The nickname Honey suggests a sweetness that others rely on, but the novel's social fabric is woven from obligations and secrets, and her position within the Byle family places her at the intersection of affection and duty. As the story develops, her presence helps illuminate how private desires and public roles collide in a community where everyone knows everyone else's business.

Tod Bruce

minor

Also known as Bruce, Tod

A minor character in the novel.

Joshua Jones

minor

Also known as Joshua, Josh

A minor character, also referred to as Joshua Jones.

J. Pennington Potter

minor

Also known as Potter, J. Pennington

A minor character, possibly a lawyer or official.

Noel Dunn

minor

Also known as Dunn, Mrs. Dunn, Mrs. Noel Dunn

A minor character, possibly part of the Dunn family.

Mr. Shine

minor

Also known as Shine

A minor character, possibly related to Pat.

Tony Nayle

minor

Also known as Tony

A minor character, described as debonair.

The Hon. Buckram Byle

minor

Also known as Buckram Byle

A minor character, possibly a politician.

Bess

minor

A minor but recurring character.

Cornelia Bond

minor

Also known as Cornelia

A minor character in the story.

Irene

minor

A minor character mentioned in the narrative.

Mrs. Byle

minor

A minor character, likely related to Nora Byle.

Conrad White

minor

Also known as Con, Conrad

A minor character in the novel.

Betty Brown

minor

Also known as Betty

A minor character, possibly related to Bubber Brown.

Gloria Dunn

minor

Also known as Gloria, Dunn

A minor character, likely part of the Dunn family.

Dr. Peter Long

minor

Also known as Mrs. Long, Peter Long

A minor character, a doctor, and his wife.

Jimmie Polio

minor

Also known as Jimmy, Jimmy Polio, Jim

A minor character in the novel.

Sam Tyler

minor

Also known as Sam

A minor character in the story.

Shrimpie

minor

A minor character with a nickname.

Old Man Isadore Isaacs

minor

Also known as Isaacs, Old man Isaacs

A minor character, an older man.

Lottie Buttsby

minor

Also known as Lottie

A minor character, described as voluptuous.

Babe Merrimac

minor

Also known as Babe

A minor character in the novel.

Mr. Byle

minor

A minor character, likely related to Nora Byle.

Joe West

minor

Also known as Joe

A minor character in the story.