A Votive is Prepared
- Rojack has met Shago before. A while back, Deborah brought Rojack to one of his shows so she could get him to perform for a charity event, but Shago refused.
- In the present, Shago is standing in the doorway with an umbrella in his hand "taut as a sword in its case" (7.9), demanding that Rojack leave. Let's just hope that Shago isn't a spy, for Rojack's sake.
- When Rojack refuses, Shago pulls out a switchblade. The three of them argue until Shago breaks down in laughter and puts away his knife. Hilarious.
- Strangely, the two men shake hands and Shago seems in good spirits—but then Cherry says the wrong thing and that switchblade is right back out.
- Shago mocks Deborah to Rojack's face, pointing out the racist overtones of her charity request. He even claims that he and Cherry used to make fun of Rojack's television show all of the time.
- Shago offers Cherry a drink and she rejects it, which makes him realize that she's pregnant—or thinks she is, at least—and this flips his lid; he looks like "a big fish just speared" (7.41).
- Shago pushes Rojack and turns to walk away. Suddenly, Rojack loses it, attacking Shago with a frightening fury. Each time that Rojack thinks he has beaten Shago into oblivion, Shago talks some trash and Rojack keeps attacking.
- The fight ends after Rojack throws Shago down the stairs, leaving him in seriously rough shape. Rojack doesn't kill him, though, and instead he offers to hail Shago a cab when everything is said and done.
- Cherry is in a daze when Rojack returns. She talks about how she had such high aspirations for their relationship, but things went sour after they joined up with Civil Rights Movement. At some point, Shago "lost his dignity" (7.162) and never recovered.
- As for the little tussle that just transpired, the same exact thing happened when Cherry started dating Tony. Tony was terrified of Shago, though, and ran away scared—a sharp contrast to our boy Rojack.
- They talk about running off to Vegas, but the thought of meeting Kelly weighs heavily on Rojack's mind. Hesitantly, he hops in a cab and heads to the hotel, Shago's umbrella in hand.
- Throughout the whole ride, he feels a strange urge to change directions and head straight to Harlem. But why?