Hawaii - James Michener [462]
The fourth place in Honolulu where the manifesto occasioned an unexpectedly violent reaction was in the Japanese consulate, on Nuuanu. There the second secretary got a copy at about eight o'clock, read it, felt the blood leave his face, and rushed in to see his superior, who studied it with quivering hands. "Those fools! Those fools!" the consul cried. He had not yet seen the editorial in the Honolulu Mail, but he could visualize what was going to be said. Throwing the document down, he strode back and forth in his carpeted room, then shouted at his assistant, "Why don't those damned Japanese laborers learn to be content with what they have? The fools! Their wages here are twice what they'd be in Japan. And they get good treatment." He continued fuming, then assembled his entire staff.
"You have severe orders," he said coldly. "This consulate will do absolutely nothing to support the strikers. If a deputation marches on this consulate, as it has always done in the past, they are to be received with no warmth whatever. It is imperative that this strike be broken quickly."
"Suppose the strikers seek repatriation?" an underling asked.
"Their job is to stay here, work here, and send their money back home," the consul snapped.
"What shall we do if they appeal against police brutality?" the same underling pressed.
"Summon me. I'll make the usual formal protests, but we must avoid seeming to be on the side of the workmen. Remember, workmen do not govern Hawaii, and our responsibility is to people like Whipple Hoxworth who do."
"One more question, sir. Suppose the strikers ask for food?"
"Not to be granted. Gentlemen, this strike is a dangerous manifestation. If the phrases appearing in this document were to be used in Japan, those responsible would be jailed for life ... or would be executed. I am appalled that decent Japanese field hands would dare to use such language. Our job is to force these men back to work. The strike must be broken, because if it isn't, the newspapers will begin to accuse the emperor of having fomented it."
The strike was broken, of course, but mainly by a series of adventitious developments, for on the day in February when the plantations evicted the Japanese laborers, telling them to live in the fields if necessary, by purest chance an influenza epidemic of the most virulent dimensions erupted, and in one crowded rural area where the strikers were living ten to a room or under trees, more than fifty of the workmen died. In all some five thousand strikers collapsed, many of them with no beds to sleep in and without hot food, and the subsequent death toll was interpreted by the superstitious as proof that the strike was against the will of God.
The Sakagawa family trudged twenty-six miles into Honolulu, hoping that Mr. Ishii could find them some place to stay, but he could not, and they at last took up residence with more than four hundred others in an abandoned sake brewery, where rats crawled over the children at night. There Reiko-chan caught the flu and it seemed that she was going to die. At first her mother was tempted to rail at Kamejiro for having supported the strike and having brought such misery upon his family, but when she saw with what passionate care he tended Reiko, even though she was a girl, the stolid woman forgave her husband and said, "Danna-san, we will win the strike this time, I am sure."
But next day the Board of Health met and listened to Wild Whip Hoxworth as he pointed out: "We're engaged in war, gentlemen, and in war you use every weapon you have. Every one. I passed by the old sake brewery last night, and if s a health menace. I want the people in there evicted, and I want it closed."
"Sir, there's a lot of children in there with the flu," a doctor protested.
"That's why it's got to be closed," Hoxworth replied.
"But these people will have no place to go," the doctor argued.
"I know. I want them to learn what it means to strike against the elements of law and order in a community."
"But, sir,