The Phoenix Tree. Jon Cleary

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СКАЧАТЬ to Idaho to work on sugar-beet farms, where the pay was no better but where the farmers, Mormons who themselves knew a little about discrimination, treated him better than had the Irish foremen. Four years later, having saved a little money won at gambling, he had moved to Los Angeles. Since the Mafia and Bugsy Siegel had not yet arrived in California, there was little call for a gunsmith; men were shot dead occasionally, but a Colt .45 was usually sufficient for the deed and it could be bought on mail order. He drifted to Gardena, where there was a small Japanese community, and there he started a nursery, as much by chance as by choice. It had been a hard struggle for the first five years; then he had begun to prosper. He had dreamed of going home to Japan, but he was still in disgrace with the family and he would not return till his parents wrote him to come back. His brother had divorced his errant wife and taken another, but that hadn’t altered his parents’ opinion of Chojiro.

      In 1914 he had married Tsuchi Yataba, a ‘picture bride’ he had chosen from a selection sent him by an agent. There had never been any love in the marriage, but there had been respect on both sides: it was enough for each of them. There had been three children: Tamezo, born in 1916 after Tsuchi had had a miscarriage with her first pregnancy; then the two girls, Etsu and Masako, born two and three years later respectively. Their father never forgave them for calling themselves, Tom, Ettie and Madge when they started going to school and, despite their protests, he never called them anything but their Japanese names.

      Ettie was now walking up the camp’s main road towards him, picking her way carefully through the dust. The camp these days was half-empty and the camp authorities put in no more than was absolutely necessary to maintain the roads and huts. Earth was piled up against the walls of the huts as insulation against the bitter winds that blew down from the mountains in winter; they reminded him of the sod houses, built by the pioneer settlers, that he and some of the other railroad workers had lived in all those years ago. He regretted, more than he could tell them, that his wife and daughters had to live in such conditions. But it was not his fault: everything was to be blamed on the Americans.

      ‘Another letter from Tom.’ Ettie held up letter, as she always did, though she knew her father, as he always did, would not ask what news it contained. But this time she did tell him: ‘He is not in the fighting any more, he’s safe somewhere. He said he can’t say where, just that it was some sort of training school.’

      Chojiro Okada said nothing, looking away from her.

      ‘Dad—’ Ettie was a pretty girl with a soft, sad voice that suggested she was ready to weep for the world; instead, she was an incurable optimist, an American trait her father found insufferable. ‘I’m going to Chicago.’

      ‘What for?’

      ‘To work as a nurse. I’m tired of living here at Blood Mountain.’

      Blood Mountain had been turned into a camp for incorrigibles, the ‘disloyals’ as they were called, those who had refused to take an oath of allegiance to the United States. Some of the women had been passed as trustworthy and were allowed to take jobs in nearby towns; Ettie worked for a dentist in Green River and her sister Madge was a cook on a neighbouring ranch. They were looked upon as traitors by some of the more aggressive men in the camp, but they were never subjected to any abuse because of the respect in which Chojiro, a true patriot, was held.

      ‘Madge is going with me.’

      ‘You will not be allowed.’

      ‘Permission has already been granted.’

      ‘Not by me.’

      Her voice was truly sad now. ‘Dad, Madge and I are grown women. You don’t try to understand that, just as you never tried to understand Tom’s point of view—’

      ‘Don’t mention your brother.’ He had stopped calling him my son. That implied some bond still existed between them, when there was none.

      Ettie bowed her head. Whenever she was with her father, speaking in Japanese as he insisted, she automatically fell into certain Japanese gestures. ‘Madge and I will be leaving in two days’ time. We’d like to go with your blessing.’

      He walked away from her, up towards the barbed wire that ran right round the camp. He was aware of the soldier, rifle slung over his shoulder, watching him from the nearest guard-tower, but he ignored him. There had been several escapes from the camp, including one attempt at a mass break-out; half a dozen of the escapers had been shot and all but three of the others had been recaptured. He had never himself attempted to escape, because he had known that his lot would not be improved: he would only have been at large in America. He was prepared to wait till the war was over, till Japan had won and he could go home again to the land of his ancestors. But lately he had been kept awake at night by doubts; if American propaganda could be believed the war was going badly for Japan. He was querulous with impotent rage at the gods. He had never been religious, but he had to blame someone other than the generals for the way things had gone. It did not occur to him to blame the Emperor.

      In 1923, when his brother had died, Chojiro’s parents had written to say he was forgiven and was no longer in disgrace. In the late summer of that year he went home alone, leaving Tsuchi and the children in Gardena. Getting off the ship in Yokohama he went straight to a geisha house, determined to plunge into old customs as soon as possible; if there were any geishas in Gardena, he had never met any. He was still in the house when the great earthquake of 1 September struck at just over a minute before noon. He had been dressed and ready to leave when the house suddenly fell down around him. He survived, unhurt but for cuts and bruises, and for the next seven days distinguished himself by his bravery and his devotion to the injured. Four hours after the earthquake struck, a cyclone blew up, fanning the burning buildings and houses into an inferno. Over 100,000 people died or were posted missing and Chojiro would carry the memories of that week with him forever. He was superstitious enough to wonder at first if it meant some omen about his return to Japan.

      But no: he went home to Nagasaki a hero. Both Asahi and Mainichi ran stories on him and he went home to more than just a prodigal son’s welcome. From then on he had known he would never be happy to die in America, that eventually he would have to be laid to rest in the shadow of the hills outside Nagasaki where he had grown up. He had gone back again in 1927, telling his father he would come home to stay when he had made himself a rich man in America. He had become Westernized to that extent: the prodigal son is even more welcome if he brings home his own fatted calf. He had come to realize, though reluctantly, that he lived better in America than his parents did in Japan.

      In 1929 he had returned to Japan once more, this time taking Tamezo with him. The 13-year-old boy had not minded going; after all, his best friend, Kenji Minato, was also going, with his father. The two boys had been left with their respective grandparents; at the end of two years Tamezo had been glad to return to America, but Kenji had stayed on, content to be thoroughly Japanese. Chojiro had been bitterly disappointed and almost uncomprehending when Tamezo, in his first fit of filial rebellion, told him how much he had hated Japan and everything about it. He had taken Tamezo with him again in the summer of 1937, when Hideki and Mieko Minato had gone home to live in Japan for good. But the visit had not been a success. Tamezo had been politely respectful towards his grandparents, but adamant towards his father that Japan was not for him.

      Tamezo had visited the Minatos in their new home in Tokyo and come away shocked. ‘Ken’s become one hundred per cent Japanese,’ he told his father. ‘Ken – he wouldn’t let me call him that, like I used to. He insisted on Kenji—’

      ‘As he should,’ said Chojiro. ‘You should take him as an example.’

      ‘Dad, I don’t want that sort of example. For Pete’s sake, I just want to be an American – what’s wrong СКАЧАТЬ