Daughter of Moloka'i Page 5

  At bedtime Taizo brought out a smaller futon from a closet and laid it at the foot of the one he and Etsuko shared. Ruth climbed on and Etsuko covered her with a blue-and-white fleece blanket, brightly embroidered with a Japanese wave design, and tucked her in. “There. Now you are—what do they say?—‘snug as a bug in a rug.’”

  Ruth giggled. It was so good, Etsuko thought, to see the happiness in those sparkling brown eyes.

  She said, “There is a saying in Japanese: ‘To love a child as if it were a butterfly or a flower.’ Will you be my flower, little one?”

  Ruth considered that. “I’d rather be a butterfly.”

  “Then so you are. Good night, butterfly.” She leaned over and kissed her on the forehead, then went to join Taizo, who was already asleep.

  Ruth lay there in the dark for a minute, listening to her father’s soft snoring and the rustle of blankets as her mother settled into bed.

  Her father. Her mother. She had a father and a mother! It was a source of wonder and delight to her. She would have to work extra hard at mastering the chopsticks and pronouncing the Japanese words, so they had no reason to send her back to Kapi'olani Home.

  That was her last waking thought before, exhausted, she drifted asleep.

  Etsuko woke in the dark hours of the morning to find Mayonaka, as was her wont, curled up on her hip. Etsuko lifted the cat up, gently and quietly so as not to wake her, then carried her over to Ruth. She lay the cat down beside her daughter—my daughter; how strange and wonderful that sounds!—with Mayonaka’s back brushing Dai’s arm. The cat stirred, eyes opening to take in her new surroundings; then, deciding it wasn’t worth the effort to move, she closed her eyes and drifted back into cat dreams.

  Etsuko smiled and returned to Taizo’s side.

  Later—when Mayonaka decided, for reasons only a cat knows, to turn 360 degrees around and then curl up again in precisely the same position—Ruth woke. When she saw the cat dozing contentedly on her arm—felt the soft warmth of its fur on her skin—her eyes filled with tears of joy. She smiled, then closed her eyes, doing her best not to move, and was lulled back to sleep by the soothing trill of Mayonaka’s soft purr.

  * * *

  In September Ruth entered the first grade at Kauluwela Grammar School, where she was part of a class of about thirty students—Japanese, Chinese, Filipino, and Hawaiian. Even her teacher, Miss Fukuda, was a Nisei born twenty-two years ago in Honolulu. Ruth liked Miss Fukuda; she was smart and nice and made learning the alphabet fun.

  But after the Kauluwela school day ended at three P.M., classes were far from over. Each afternoon she and her brothers had to attend Japanese school in the basement of the Buddhist church. There they learned about Japanese culture—etiquette, piety toward ancestors, patience, courtesy, obligation, and the Japanese language itself. At her first class the teacher began by declaring “Kiritsu!”—“Attention,” as Ralph whispered to her—and all the students stood and recited the kōkun, the school motto. To Ruth, at first, the Japanese words were unintelligible, like one of the sinister magic spells, spoken in Hawaiian, in the ghost stories Maile used to tell. But over the next four months, Ruth’s six-year-old brain soaked up both the English alphabet and the Chinese kanji characters as a sea sponge absorbs water, and within four months she was able to join in reciting the kōkun and understood it to mean:

  Let us become worthy individuals.

  Let us study together in a friendly atmosphere.

  Let us take care of our health by eating properly.

  Let us be good to our parents.

  This was a far cry from a kahuna sorcerer’s spell and, frankly, a bit of a disappointment.

  But Japanese school was valuable in explaining the unspoken, often mystifying rules that Ruth found herself unknowingly breaking at home: Lift your rice bowl politely with both hands to ask for more, but it is acceptable to lift it with your left hand when eating from it. Never, ever cross your chopsticks when putting them down. Always remove socks or stockings before walking on a tatami mat, as their finely woven fibers are very delicate. When being taught by an elder, always be attentive, deferential, respectful, and display a willingness to learn.

  The hardest thing for Ruth to learn was to speak more softly, avoiding loudness, confrontation, and physical displays of affection in public.

  It was also at Japanese school that Ruth heard something that would soon become a disturbing refrain. On her first day she overheard a boy ask Stanley in pidgin, “Why your parents hānai a girl? Dey pupule or somethin’?”

  Hānai, Ruth knew, meant “adopt”; pupule meant “crazy.”

  “I dunno why,” Stanley shot back, “but dey ain’t pupule so no talk stink about ’em!”

  The other boy shrugged and let it go. Ruth tried to do the same.

  But she overheard variations on this from other boys and each time her brothers defended their parents with a very un-Japanese belligerence.

  She shrugged it off as silly boy-talk until, one day, she and Ralph were walking home and they passed Mr. Komenaka’s general store. They saw him watching them from the doorway, then laugh and say to a coworker:

  “Shinji rareru? Ano bakana Watanabe ga on’nanoko wo morrate kitanda!”

  Ruth was surprised to find that she understood both the laugh and the words: “Can you believe it? That fool Watanabe adopted a girl!”

  She turned and glared at the man, who saw the hurt and confusion in her eyes and quickly retreated to the safety of his store.

  “Hey,” Ralph said, “it’s okay, Ruth, he’s just a—”

  Ruth burst into tears and ran. She raced down Kukui Street, jostling pedestrians, nearly colliding with rickety food carts, Ralph in hot pursuit but half a length behind. At the back door of the store, Ruth rushed past a startled Etsuko in the downstairs kitchen, kicked off her sandals, then ran upstairs and into the apartment’s sleeping area, where she flung herself, sobbing, onto her futon.

  A few minutes later—having been told what transpired by a still-huffing-and-puffing Ralph—Etsuko appeared and said softly, “Butterfly?” When Ruth didn’t respond, Etsuko sat down next to her, put a hand on her back consolingly, and said, “I’m sorry, little one. Komenaka-san was very rude. I will never enter his store again.”

  “It’s not just him!” Ruth said between sobs. “I hear it at school too!”

  Etsuko sighed. “I had hoped you would not. Dai, come here.” She gathered Ruth up in her arms and held her close. “Do not take this personally. It’s just that …

  “In Japan, the birth of sons is favored over that of daughters because boys carry the family name, and the family name is very, very important. A girl marries into someone else’s family, you see, and takes their name. So Komenaka-san could not understand why we would choose to adopt a girl.”

  Ruth sniffed back her tears and said, “Why did you?”

  Etsuko said quietly, “I had always secretly hoped to have a girl, so I might have someone to make a pretty kimono for, to teach how to sew and cook and pass on all I’ve learned in life. But after Ralph was born, the doctor said I could not have any more children. Your father is not like other men. He knows what sorrow is. He knew my sorrow and was willing to brave the smirks and ridicule of foolish men.” She smiled. “But the reason I wanted you, butterfly, was because I fell in love with you the instant I saw you.”

  Ruth said meekly, “So—you’re not going to give me back? To the sisters?”

  “Oh, dearest one, no, never, never. We will love you forever.”

  Ruth held tight to her mother, more tightly than she had ever held anyone. For the first time in her life, she felt she truly belonged somewhere.

  Etsuko held on just as tightly. What she told Ruth was only half the truth—but it was Etsuko’s truth.

  * * *

  Ruth celebrated the New Year, 1922, in Japanese fashion, enjoying a feast of special foods including New Year’s soup, mashed sweet potatoes with chestnuts, fish cake, sweetened black beans, and—Ru
th’s favorite—mochi, sticky white rice cakes (she helped her mother prepare them by gleefully mashing the grains of rice with a wooden mallet). She was thrilled to learn that by tradition, the birthdays of everyone in the family were all celebrated on New Year’s, with even more gifts and sweets. Being Japanese was fun!

  Sister Lu visited on Ruth’s actual birthday, February 8. After she hugged her, Ruth ran over to Mayonaka, snapped her up, and brought the startled cat to Louisa. “This is Mayonaka,” Ruth said as if introducing a queen.

  Louisa scratched the cat’s head and smiled. “Oh, she’s quite beautiful. You are a lucky girl, Ruth.”

  Later, after drinking hot tea and sampling mochi prepared by Etsuko, Louisa gave Ruth a small stuffed cow as a birthday present: “This is to make sure you don’t forget all the people who loved you at Kapi'olani Home.”

  But of course she would, eventually. And soon even Honolulu itself would recede like a dream into memory.

  Late in the year, as the red fruit of the Christmasberry tree could be seen gracing the slopes of Mount Tantalus, Etsuko was mopping the floors when she heard Taizo ascending the stairs. Usually he only came up once a day, for lunch. Now he stood in the doorway looking like a scarecrow that’s had the straw knocked out of it, holding a letter in his callused hands.

  “I just received this,” he told her in Japanese. “From Jiro.”

  Jiro—“second son”—was Taizo’s brother, older by three years. He had been the first in the family to immigrate to Hawai'i when, according to tradition, their eldest brother, Ichirō, inherited the family farm in Hōfuna. Taizo, who had always idolized the brash, boastful Jiro, followed him, seven years later, to Hawai'i—only to discover that Jiro, after years of work as an itinerant laborer, had saved enough money to move to faraway California, where he was eventually able to purchase his own farm.

  Etsuko had never cared much for Jiro but was still alarmed by her husband’s demeanor. “Taizo, what is it? Is Jiro all right?”

  “He has a rich man’s problem. Says the farm has grown too large for him to manage on his own.”

  “How large is it?”

  “A hundred acres. A huge estate by any measure.” He read: “‘All of my daughters have married and I have only my son Akira to help me. The farm is not producing as abundantly as it once did, and I have need of someone with your experience. You always were the better farmer, little brother.’”

  Etsuko could see the pride in Taizo’s eyes as he looked up, but she couldn’t help frowning. “A braggart’s flattery is not worth filling a thimble.”

  Taizo ignored this, finished reading: “‘And so I humbly ask you, Taizo, to give due consideration to becoming my partner in the farm.’”

  Etsuko was genuinely astonished. “What?”

  “He is serious. He says he will give me half ownership in the farm if I—if we—move to California.”

  Etsuko, as stunned as if Jiro had reached across the Pacific to swat her on the head, sank slowly onto a zabuton at the dining table.

  Taizo had expected this response and said dryly, “Such fervid displays of enthusiasm are most unseemly, Okāsan.”

  She looked up at him, in no mood for jokes. “You cannot be serious.”

  “Land, Etsuko! We can own our own land, as we always dreamed of.”

  “Land in Hawai'i, yes,” she countered. “We have built a life here, fifteen years’ worth. You would toss all that aside?”

  “I would exchange it for a better life, in California.”

  “And what of the keiki?” She had been here so long she used the Hawaiian word as a matter of course.

  “Children can adapt to any circumstance.”

  Etsuko shook her head. “I don’t understand any of this. Why doesn’t he just hire someone to help him?”

  “Because he wants me, his brother. Is that so unusual?”

  “It is for Jiro.”

  “Etsuko, believe me. I would not consider moving you and the children across another ocean just because Jiro’s words please me.”

  “Then why?”

  Taizo sat down beside her. “You know why. I love farming. Not laboring on a plantation, but our own farm, growing the food my family eats and the crops we sell—as my ancestors did. And if this is not my ancestors’ land, it would be ours to bequeath, in part, to Haruo and his children. You knew me in Hōfuna—have you ever seen me as happy doing anything else?”

  Etsuko saw the light in his eyes and knew she could not deny him. In Japan, a husband would not even have bothered to discuss this with his wife. But this was America, and it had worked its alchemy on Taizo as it did on all who settled there.

  She softened, trying to put aside her trepidation. “You say he offers—half ownership?”

  “It would have to be done in Haruo’s name once he comes of age, since noncitizens cannot own land in California. The other half is in Akira’s name, since he is an American citizen. There is more than enough land for us all.”

  She had to admit to herself, it was a substantial offer.

  “It would be a blessing,” she allowed, “to be able to pass on land to our children. Would it not?”

  He nodded.

  She considered a long moment—then forced a smile, feigning an excitement she hoped someday to feel.

  Here, in the privacy of their home, she tenderly put a hand on his.

  “Then when the children come home from school,” she said, “we shall tell them they are about to go on an exciting new adventure—in California.”

  The joy in his face made her heart sing.

  “We will have a better life. Trust me.”

  She smiled. “I always have.”

  Their children would have been quite shocked, then, to see their decorous, undemonstrative parents seal that trust—with a long, ardent kiss.

  Chapter 4

  It was early in April of 1895—just before the start of the school year in Okayama-ken—when Jiro, then fifteen, invited Taizo, twelve, on a fishing trip to the Asahi River. The sky was overcast with a light wind combing the water’s surface, which Jiro preferred: “The fish don’t move as much on a cloudy, windy day.” His theory seemed to be borne out. At first they caught only tiny tanago, but soon they were pulling in some of the larger, rainbow-hued kyusen, a few smaller shiro-gisu, and finally, one or two big suzuki, Japanese bass. The flopping, twitching fish soon filled the big metal bucket they had brought along. But before they turned to the long trek back to Hōfuna, Jiro spontaneously began stripping off his work jacket.

  “What are you doing, Niisan?” Taizo asked.

  “Going for a swim.” Jiro slipped his shoes and trousers off and stood there in his undergarments. “Race you across!”

  “The water seems a little cold,” Taizo noted warily.

  “If you are afraid of a little cold water,” Jiro taunted, “then stay here with your tail between your legs until I return.” He dove into the crystalline waters.

  The taunt stung, as usual, and Taizo began peeling off his clothes. He really didn’t want to go swimming, but he would not let Jiro think he was afraid. He jumped in, and the frigid slap of the water chilled him to his marrow.

  But Jiro was happily swimming across the river and Taizo was damned if he would get out now. Stroke for stroke, he followed his elder brother.

  At this point, the Asahi was fairly narrow—barely a hundred-odd yards wide—so swimming across it was hardly difficult. And Taizo had to admit that it was lovely looking up at the mountains, like towering green pagodas on either side of the river.

  They swam to the other shore and back again. Jiro won, of course. When Taizo emerged from the water the wind gave him goose pimples, but he followed Jiro’s example of toweling off with his jacket, then dressed quickly and picked up his fishing pole and the bucket of fish they had caught.

  Soon the wind raking his wet jacket set Taizo’s teeth to chattering, and though at first Jiro joked about this, he quickly realized his brother’s discomfort. “Here, let me tak
e those,” he said, grabbing Taizo’s fishing pole and the bucket of fish. Taizo nodded his thanks, then crossed his arms and tried in vain to warm himself with his hands, like a wet match that could not be lit.

  When they got home Taizo barely ate his supper, was allowed to take a hot bath in the furo even before his father, and then went straight to bed.

  By morning he was running a high fever. The doctor arrived and grimly diagnosed Taizo as having “winter fever,” pneumonia. He prescribed a treatment regimen that would only increase Taizo’s discomfort: hot mustard plaster on his chest, back, and soles of his feet, to bring the fever down; yaito, the application of burning herbs; and the drinking of fluids Taizo preferred not to think about, such as the blood of a carp and an extract of boiled earthworms.

  And bed rest. Complete bed rest for—how long? No one could know.

  Privately, Jiro apologized to Taizo for goading him into swimming but asked that Taizo not tell their parents it was his idea. As usual, Taizo complied.

  Taizo would remain bedridden for the next six months, getting worse before he got better, coming close to losing his battle with the winter fever. In fact, he would have lost it, if not for …

  * * *

  “MI-AOWW!”

  Taizo sighed, reminded again—as if it were ever in question—that Mayonaka was not happy. Her miseries had begun with her being unceremoniously forced into a small cage and then obliged to share quarters with assorted dogs, cats, parrots, and cockatoos on the lower deck of the Oriental Steamship Company’s America Maru. The Watanabes had booked second-class passage bound for San Francisco—the whole family sharing a single cabin with six bunks and a communal bathroom in the passageway—but pets traveled steerage. Ruth had spent as much time as she could belowdecks, stroking Mayonaka’s head through the wire mesh of her cage for as long as Okāsan allowed her to stay—or until they both grew seasick in the rocking bowels of the ship.