Eagle & Crane

by Suzanne Rindell

  “What’s tickling you, Chicken Legs?” Harry asked, elbowing her gently in the ribs.

  Mae shrugged, rolling her lips into a tight line.

  “C’mon,” Harry urged, smiling. “You can tell me. It’s okay to laugh. We don’t have to pretend this is all some big funeral. We have to laugh sometime.”

  Mae shook her head, but after a moment she gave in.

  “It’s only that I didn’t understand until now.”

  “Understand what?”

  “They’re afraid of us.”

  The easy smile vanished from Harry’s face. He sometimes forgot how old Mae was now.

  “Yes,” he said. “They’re afraid of us.”

  He winced as the words left his lips. It looked like something sharp pierced his chest as he said it.

  “But Ava’s not afraid of us.”

  “No,” Harry replied. “She’s too smart.” He paused, and a glimmer of his previous smile returned. “And too mean. She knows better than to be afraid of us.”

  “And Louis,” Mae went on, insisting. “Louis isn’t afraid of us.”

  Harry’s face went blank for the slenderest of seconds, then he shook his head.

  “No,” he said. “I don’t think Louis is afraid of us. I think he means to help us.”

  “So if our neighbors aren’t afraid of us, why must we be sent away, all the way out here?”

  “I suppose it’s the neighbors of our neighbors . . . and their neighbors, too, who don’t know us and don’t trust us,” Harry said.

  They fell silent, both somberly entranced by the scenery outside the window as the bus drove onto the property that was to be their new home. It was a dry, flat, dusty patch of earth. Wooden barracks had been erected—hastily, from the looks of them—and stood in rows in eerily generic likeness.

  Harry noticed there was no fence around the camp, no gate, and, noting this, he felt a sense of relief. Of course, he could not know: The fences, gates, and barbed wire would be added soon enough.

  A heavy haze of dust swirled around the bus long after it had rolled to a stop. The Yamadas followed the shuffling mass of people off the bus and were herded over to a series of tables, where the contents of their luggage were rifled yet again, and they were assigned a block number, a figure that was scribbled onto the end of the family number they’d already been given.

  “Where do we go?” Harry’s mother, who was confused by the camp’s numbering system and layout, kept repeating to his father.

  “Follow Haruto,” he replied, resigning himself to his own confusion. Harry could see it in his father’s eyes: For the first time in his eighty-one years, his father felt truly old. It broke Harry’s heart to see such a young spirit show its first splinters.

  The four of them successfully located their new home. It was not an encouraging discovery. The barrack they were assigned had been carelessly slapped together and bore the marks of shoddy craftsmanship: Irregular gaps showed between the pine planks, and no effort had been made to weatherproof this most basic of bungalows.

  There was also another family already inside. Harry introduced himself and learned they were to share the single rectangular room with this family, the Akimotos, from Los Angeles. A mother, two teenage daughters, and an adult son. They had lived on the coast and owned a fishing boat until it had been confiscated by the government. They would have been in Manzanar, they said, if not for the fishing boat, for the trouble it had brought them. Tule Lake, they told Harry, was a more serious place to be; Manzanar was better somehow. The father was not with them; after some vague, embarrassed discussion, Harry came to understand that Mr. Akimoto had been detained somehow at another camp somewhere in North Dakota.

  Everyone moved politely around the barrack, their footsteps echoing terribly on the plank floor, revealing the hollow space just beneath. The two families worked together to string up a sheet to divide the room and to create a sense of dignity and privacy. It was hardly enough to reclaim either, but it helped.

  Somewhere in the distance, a bell clanged.

  “What’s that?” Harry asked his new roommates.

  “The dinner bell,” Bill Akimoto replied. “You can follow us to the mess hall, if you want. It’s a little bit of a walk.”

  Harry thanked him, and the four Yamadas followed the Akimotos to the other side of the camp. Along the way, Harry and Mae took in the scene. The landscape was dismal. The camp was built on a dry lake bed, and the earth beneath their feet looked hard and parched, riddled with cracks. Dust got everywhere. Mae rubbed at her eyes where a tiny boulder of hard sand had already accumulated and solidified. There was a constant hum of commotion and chatter, a whole village of people trying to get a toehold in their new environment. It reminded Mae of the time she kicked over an anthill, and—wondering if that was how the Caucasian authorities saw her and her family—she suddenly felt disgusted, but also very small and ashamed.

  The barracks were nearly all identical; the public toilets—which none of the Yamadas had set eyes on yet—were located at the end of each row and gave off an odor so foul, to breathe it in made one’s eyes cross slightly. Later, when Mae and Shizue went to use the facilities, they were horrified to discover the toilets themselves were unpartitioned, with those who used them on display for all to see. As a little girl, Mae had had bad dreams like that; she never thought such unpleasant dreams would—or could—come true.

  They arrived at the mess hall. It was loud and crowded, with a long line that stretched out the main door.

  “You’ll have to be issued a mess kit first,” Bill Akimoto said, continuing to be helpful and pointing to a second line full of new arrivals. “It’s your job to clean it and keep track of it.” Bill appeared to be close to Harry’s own age. The Yamadas did as instructed and waited to be handed an Army regulation mess kit, which included a shallow tin bowl and a flimsy fork and knife. (The latter, Mae was soon to discover, made everything taste a little like pennies and nickels.) Then they rejoined the first line to retrieve some food.

  It was, to be frank, rather wretched fare. Everything came from a can—Spam and Vienna sausage, canned beans, canned corn, canned fruit. The only thing not from a can was an enormous vat of rice that had been so overcooked it had turned to mush; the rice scooped up from the bottom was burned. This, then, explained the hideously offensive aroma emanating from the latrines.

  Harry caught the look on his kid sister’s face. She looked tired. He thought maybe she would feel better if she sat down.

  “We can play a game,” he said, nudging her.

  She looked at him. She knew he was trying to sound casual and upbeat. Harry glanced around, then thought of something and reached into his back pocket for his handkerchief. It was a white handkerchief and he draped it over his arm like a dapper waiter. He bowed deeply at the waist.

  “We can play restaurant,” he said. “You sit, and I’ll bring your food to you.” He did a funny little shuffle and pretended to twirl an imaginary Frenchman’s moustache.

  Mae glared at him, annoyed he might presume she would be so easily placated with a child’s game. She was not a child anymore.

  “That won’t make it taste any better,” she replied flatly.

  Harry glanced at the food that was being scooped up and distributed in ugly, gelatinous mounds. He sighed.

  “Hmm, you’re right.” He held up his mess kit and draped the handkerchief temporarily over the top, performing a sleight of hand. The mess kit magically vanished.

  Mae arched an eyebrow.

  “Just like my appetite,” she said.

  Harry laughed.

  “Fair enough, kid. Me, too.”

  55

  Newcastle, California * September 23, 1943

  And you ran the orchards for the Yamadas, in their absence, with every intention of legally returning everything—the house, the land, their cars, the bi
plane—assuming they would be released one day?” Bonner asks. He is still in the front parlor of the Yamadas’ former house, asking Louis and Ava questions.

  “Yes,” Louis answers now.

  “That’s mighty generous of you.”

  Louis doesn’t say anything.

  “I’m sure you must’ve had to put up with some criticism for that,” Bonner comments. “Not a whole lot of folks around these parts are very sympathetic to the Japanese.”

  Louis gives a half nod and shrugs.

  “Only natural.”

  “And from what I understand,” Bonner continues, “your family might’ve had their criticisms, too.”

  “I suppose I caught some grief from my brother Guy.”

  “Guy Thorn?”

  “Yes,” Louis affirms, declining to elaborate.

  Bonner notices Louis’s eyes flick to the mantel over the fireplace. On instinct, Bonner stands up and crosses the room. His gaze lands on a framed portrait. He picks it up.

  “This him?” Bonner asks. “This your brother Guy?”

  Louis’s jaw clenches, a sign that he doesn’t appreciate Bonner touching the photograph, but he nods.

  Bonner takes a look at the man in the photo, noticing the uniform straightaway. “A Navy man,” he remarks, and Louis nods again. But then, as Bonner looks at the man’s face, he is startled by something he sees there. He squints to get a better look, scrutinizing the man’s features, taking in his height, his stance.

  “You see it, too, don’t you?” Ava pipes up to ask. “Uncanny, almost.”

  Bonner blinks, wide-eyed and as unsettled as any man might be upon realizing he has a doppelgänger in the world. He shakes himself and tries to recover. He sets the photograph back down and clears his throat.

  “Yes . . . well . . .” Bonner says now. “That is something.” He sits back down. He has forgotten his train of thought, the path of questioning he was in the midst of pursuing. He tries to get the conversation back on track.

  “You said your brother Guy gave you grief?”

  Louis nods.

  “What kind of grief?”

  “Well . . . just . . . he never liked the Yamadas. He felt the way our father felt—and how our grandfather before him felt. He said . . . he said if I gave this land back to the Yamadas, then I would be a traitor.”

  “Looks like you don’t have to make that choice anymore.”

  Louis and Ava stare at Bonner, caught off guard by the abrupt gall of it.

  “Awful lucky,” Bonner presses, “in some ways . . .”

  “Our friends died,” Ava says, openly fuming. “There is nothing lucky about it.”

  “I didn’t mean to offend,” Bonner apologizes.

  “You did,” Ava replies, refusing his apology. Bonner can’t tell whether she means You did offend us or You did intend the offense.

  Bonner glances at his watch and realizes they’ve been at it for over half an hour, and while Bonner has grown more and more direct in his questioning, he has yet to make his final move: to lay out all the evidence that gave Louis Thorn motive and to dare the young man to deny it. He makes up his mind to try to maneuver Louis outside and confront him alone. He wants to see Louis’s raw expression when he confronts him, and knows Ava is too smart to let that happen; she’ll intervene in the conversation in some way. Bonner flips his notebook shut and tucks it back into his inside jacket pocket.

  “I ought to be going,” he says. “But would you walk me to my automobile, Mr. Thorn? I’d like a word with you alone, if you don’t mind.”

  Ava’s face lights up with a mixture of panic and outrage. It is clear she senses what Bonner is up to, but can’t think of an appropriate way to object.

  “All right,” Louis says reluctantly, standing and following Bonner to the door.

  Ava watches them go, frowning, her complexion turning pink with frustration. Bonner places his fedora on his head and politely tips it at her, then steps through the front door. Louis follows him, and they descend the long, steep flight of wooden porch stairs.

  Bonner parked the Bureau car some distance away from the house on purpose, at the bottom of the hill, near the edge of the almond orchards. They walk in silence for a few minutes. Finally, Bonner speaks.

  “I think you know the question I need to ask you; it’s the one question I’ve never directly asked,” Bonner says.

  Louis neither looks surprised nor comments. It is as if he has been expecting Bonner’s direct approach, so Bonner gets on with it.

  “Did you have anything at all to do with that crash?”

  Louis shakes his head. “No,” he says. “It looked to me like an accident. And I was standing right there with you at the time,” he says, reminding Bonner of the morning they stood together on the Yamadas’ porch, staring dumbfounded at the sky.

  Bonner hesitates for a moment, then makes up his mind once and for all. It is a gamble, but he knows he’s out of chances.

  “Well . . . that’s where you’re wrong, as a matter of fact,” he says. “It wasn’t an accident.”

  Louis frowns.

  “What do you mean?”

  “We know it wasn’t an accident,” Bonner repeats, watching Louis’s expressions closely. “And the reason we know that is because somebody cut the fuel line.”

  Louis’s rhythmic stride hits a tiny hitch, but he carries on after the brief hesitation, playing it cool.

  “That so?”

  “Yes,” Bonner replies. “Somebody tampered with the plane’s engine.” He pauses for emphasis. “Somebody wanted that biplane to crash.”

  “I’ll admit, it did seem strange,” Louis says, “the way the engine cut out like that. I’d wondered.”

  “Not to mention how the plane plummeted,” Bonner reminds him, still steering the conversation.

  “That, too,” Louis agrees. “But I still can’t account for that part.”

  Bonner pauses a moment before springing his next trap.

  “I can,” he says.

  Louis looks at him, and a slight twitch appears in the line of his mouth. By now they’ve reached Bonner’s car and come to a stop before the driver’s-side door. Bonner takes his time before delivering the news, taking careful account of the tiny expressions flickering just under the surface of Louis’s stoic face.

  “The coroner found an enormous level of opium in Kenichi Yamada’s system,” Bonner says.

  Louis only shakes his head, his brow furrowed with confusion. Either he is acting, or else . . . or else he truly knows nothing. Bonner studies him closely.

  “Yes,” Bonner repeats. “Opium. A significant amount.”

  “In Kenichi Yamada’s body?”

  “That’s right.”

  “What about Harry?”

  “His body was too burned up for us to test,” Bonner answers. “But that much opium . . . there’s no way it was accidental. It had to have been administered somehow. We at the Bureau don’t jump to conclusions, but you can understand from an investigator’s unofficial point of view that the opium, plus the fuel line . . . it doesn’t look very innocent.”

  “I know what you’re accusing me of, and I ain’t done it,” Louis says. “You don’t understand. I would trade places with him if I could . . .” He trails off, as though a shocking thought has just occurred to him. There’s a funny look on his face, his jaw slightly dropped. Bonner has been hoping for a raw reaction but can’t tell what exactly this reaction means.

  “You said yourself,” Bonner continues, “you didn’t think Harry would do injury to himself or his father.”

  “No . . .” Louis murmurs in agreement, looking distracted, lost in thought.

  “As far as I can tell, Louis, you had the most reason to be harboring a grudge against Harry. You certainly had access to the biplane’s engine. And we both know you stood to gain th
e most from the Yamadas’ deaths.”

  Louis doesn’t answer. He appears to still be lost in thought, his eyes moving as though doing some kind of math problem in his head. But for some reason Bonner gets the impression that he isn’t focused on the F.B.I. agent’s accusation. He certainly doesn’t look outraged or offended, just thoughtful. Then, all at once, a sharp focus snaps into Louis’s eyes. His head suddenly jerks in the direction of the house.

  “Wait—” Bonner begins to say, but it is too late. Something has Louis jumpy, spooked. Before Bonner can get out another word, Louis turns to go, and in a near run hurries back in the direction of the house, taking the long staircase up to the porch two stairs at a time. Bonner stands powerless for a moment, uncertain how to make heads or tails of the interview. He’d laid all his cards on the table and wound up right back where he started.

  56

  Yamada property * May 31, 1942

  At first it was strange—being in the Yamada house without the Yamadas themselves.

  “Why don’t you move inside?” Louis complained to Ava. “There are empty beds—empty rooms, even! It doesn’t make any sense, you and your mother sleeping outside in that rat trap of a caravan when better bunks have freed up in here.”

  Ava dropped the bag of chicken feed she was lugging to the shed and looked at him in disgust.

  “Freed up?” Ava repeated back to him. “Is that how you think of it?”

  “No,” he insisted, but then stopped short. He picked up the feedbag and carried it for her. “Forget it,” he mumbled.

  He was embarrassed to admit as much to Ava, but the truth was Louis found himself deeply uncomfortable in the Yamadas’ house without the Yamadas—like he was a criminal squatting on someone else’s property. He didn’t dare sleep in Mr. and Mrs. Yamada’s bed. The first night, he slept on the floor of the sitting room, huddled under blankets he’d brought over from the Thorn household. Slowly he worked his way to Harry’s room, to Harry’s childhood twin mattress. He felt fairly comfortable there. The room contained Harry’s old things—things from as far back as the time of their first friendship: posters of Houdini, even a model airplane Louis had built and shyly given his friend. Who’d have guessed how fitting that gift would one day be?