Butterfly's Shadow - Lee Langley [91]
He took her in, the body taut as wire, the steel-grey hair, the face ageless as an ivory carving.
‘Did you want to speak to one of the boys?’
‘I wanted to speak to you, Mr Pinkerton.’
‘You can call me Joey.’
‘But we are not friends.’
‘We’re fellow internees. Isn’t that enough?’
‘Enough for propinquity. Not for intimacy.’
Quiet, unnervingly confident, a trace of East Coast vowels in the wholly American delivery. Central Casting would have her down for an Ivy League academic. Or possibly a scary grandma.
Clearly she had something she wanted from him now. Tiny, she seemed to grow taller as she returned his gaze.
‘Mr Pinkerton. I have observed you.’
Again a woman watching him. Again he felt irritated.
‘I have observed you observing others.’
‘It passes the time.’
‘There are perhaps better ways of passing the time. You could become involved—’
He broke in. ‘I have no wish to become involved. I am here because of a bureaucratic detail. I have nothing in common with these people, I feel nothing—’
‘You know nothing. Why should you feel? You need to learn a little about . . .’ Pause. ‘These people.’
Her tone, her expression, were benign. The eyes behind their small glass shields were not.
He felt increasingly provoked. What did this woman want from him? Was she simply here to lecture him, to tell him to pull himself together? Acting the mother? Well he had two of those already, more than enough.
She said, ‘We have many children in Tule Lake and it is essential to keep them occupied. Also to extend their education.’
‘There are teachers.’
‘I was not thinking of formal lessons. There are children here who are falling between two languages. Lost between tongues, they grow mute. The right person could reach them, give them back a voice.’
‘I don’t speak much Japanese.’
‘Precisely.’
‘I don’t see it.’
‘You will.’
There were ways to deal with pushy old ladies: he could say, politely but firmly, that he was not interested; he could give her the silent treatment and then forget the whole thing. He could be actively rude and tell her to get lost.
She said, ‘It must be a consolation, Mr Pinkerton, to know you are superior to your fellow internees.’
‘I don’t regard myself as superior.’
‘But different?’
He waited.
‘And that gives you the freedom to behave impolitely.’
‘I can’t begin to fathom,’ Joey said savagely, ‘what the Japanese would regard as impolite.’
‘I think the way I am behaving now would be considered extremely impolite, Mr Pinkerton. I think I am behaving with quite American manners. That should make you feel at home. But whether or not you feel anything is of no interest to me. I want to do something about these children.’
Joey had heard of Chinese water torture. He thought this could be a matronly Japanese version.
‘Mrs Tanaka, you’re bullying me,’ he said.
They regarded one another for a moment.
‘If so, I must apologise; it would mean I was behaving very badly. But there are more ways than one of doing that.’
Joey decided that her eyes were indeed sharp, but not as sharp as her tongue.
She raised her eyebrows enquiringly. ‘Shall we talk?’
40
He walked into the classroom expecting trouble: inattention, a degree of fidgeting, possibly some impudence; the sort of brawling misbehaviour he recalled from his own schooldays. Instead he faced silence. Seated cross-legged on the floor – no chairs or desks were available – children of varying ages stared up at him impassively. He felt a flutter of panic in his guts: this could be even worse than he had thought.
Greeting them, to his own ears he sounded hearty, phoney. In their place he would mistrust a pink-faced jerk who spoke no Japanese, who didn’t even wear glasses: how clever could he be?
He decided to dip a toe, go slowly, work the room. There were kids here who, like him, spoke virtually no Japanese, alongside others for whom English was a second language. He would approach this thing from the other angle.
‘Ohay gozaimasu!’ he called out, cheerfully, using one of the phrases he knew.
They erupted in giggles, rocking in delight.