Vicente pointed to the plantation manager’s mansion, his finger drawing an imaginary line from the grand house down to the houses of the lunas, then past the houses of the clerks, the plantation police, and down to the shanties.
Mr. Jackson’s gaze followed Vicente’s finger.
“I don’t think anything can be done about that,” Mr. Jackson said.
“It’s inhumane,” Valentina said.
“We’ll see what we can do.” Mr. Jackson looked at her and she was glad that she’d changed into her good dress.
“The planters brought us here with false promises,” Vicente said.
“Lies, lies, mentiras, mentiras . . .” the Puerto Ricans murmured.
“We were promised dollars for our labor.” Vicente waved a piece of cardboard. “This is what we get.”
Mr. Jackson consulted the plantation manager.
“You buy in plantation store,” Mr. Jackson said. “Why you need dollars?”
Valentina told her husband, “Ask him if he’s paid in scrip.”
“Mr. Jackson, it’s a human right to be paid in real money for a day’s work. Are you paid in scrip?” Vicente offered the scrip to the interpreter.
Valentina led the Puerto Ricans in the chant, “Dollars! Dollars! Dollars!”
Mr. Jackson conferred with Mr. White, then held up his hand.
The Puerto Ricans’ shouts dropped to whispers.
“We will pay in American dollars,” he said.
Men slapped Vicente’s back.
“Mr. Jackson, why don’t we get the full fifteen dollars a month that we were promised? Money is deducted from our pay,” Vicente said.
“I think those are your taxes,” Mr. Jackson said.
“Taxes! Why are we paying taxes? We don’t even vote!”
“All the plantation workers pay taxes.”
Taxes, they paid taxes, coño carajo, it was just like being back in Puerto Rico, first the Spaniards and then the Americans . . .
Mr. Jackson raised his hands and called for quiet. “We’ll end this meeting right now if you don’t act right.”
What were they, children?
“If we pay taxes, then we should vote.”
Mr. Jackson cleared his throat. “Only men who are Hawaiians or Americans can vote.”
Taxes, not votes, the Puerto Ricans repeated to each other.
Vicente shook his head. “What do we pay taxes for?”
Mr. Jackson didn’t say that their taxes helped to pay for the cost of the plantation policemen, for jails, for schools for other people’s children, for better sanitation in other places, and for salaries of government officials.
“Why can’t we vote?”
“You’ll have to talk to the US government about that,” Mr. Jackson said. “Anything else?”
“Plenty,” Vicente said. “We were promised a raise after a year’s work, and a bonus after three. In dollars.”
“Mr. White, he let you know,” Mr. Jackson said. “Maybe raise, maybe no bonus.”
The Puerto Ricans talked all at once. Back in Puerto Rico, the agents promised raises and bonuses! Mr. Jackson held up his hands for quiet.
“I have good news. You can write family,” Mr. Jackson said. “We’ll send on the letters.”
Some of the Puerto Ricans said, If only we knew how to write, if only our mothers and fathers knew how to read.
“Ask about schooling and finding Raulito and Sonia’s husband.” Valentina nudged Vicente’s arm. It didn’t look like they were going to get raises today, no matter how much talking they did.
“Yes, in a minute,” Vicente said. “The men are talking—”
What if Mr. Jackson said, Enough! No more requests granted or denied? Then how would they find Sonia’s husband? Or Raulito? How would the children get schooling?
“Patience.” Vicente put his hand on his wife’s shoulder.
“¿Paciencia? ¡Hombre, I live in a hovel! Don’t talk to me about patience!” Valentina shook off Vicente’s hand.
The Puerto Ricans moved away from her, the men shook their heads in disapproval. The women, ashamed for Vicente, whispered to each other, ¡Que vergüenza!
“Mr. Jackson, it’s very important—”
“Who do you belong?” Mr. Jackson asked.
“He’s my husband.” She pointed to Vicente.
“You mean, you are his wife.” Everyone laughed, even Vicente. The interpreter repeated his little joke to the plantation manager, who laughed along with the lunas and the henchmen.
“Coffee goes down the same way.” Valentina raised her voice. Men! They seemed to think the same in any language.
Vicente looked at Valentina. She knew he didn’t like it when she raised her voice. Too bad.
“Mr. Jackson, we need someone here all the time who speaks Spanish,” Valentina said in the manner of a mother to a child. “Even the doctor can’t understand us.”
“You learn English,” Mr. Jackson said.
“We want to learn English! We want to send our children to school to learn English! Where are the schools we were promised for our children?”
Mr. Jackson looked through some papers on the table. “There is a plantation school near Hilo.”
“Hilo! Isn’t that where we disembarked? Surely you would want your own children to have schooling,” Valentina said. “Or is it that you don’t care about our children?”
The Puerto Ricans said, They don’t care about our children . . .
Mr. Jackson’s voice was low when he spoke to Mr. White.
“Mr. Jackson, we came halfway around the world to make a better life.” Valentina pointed to the hovels. “Look where we live! And you don’t even care! And now you tell us that our children have to walk hours to school!”
“You work on the plantation?”
“I have.”
“Tú numero?”
“Why do you need my bango number?” Valentina crossed her arms.
“So I know who I’m talking to.” Mr. Jackson crossed his arms.
“Then ask me my name,” she said.
Vicente looked at his wife in admiration; the Puerto Ricans murmured, Que mujer, que mujer . . .
“¿Tú nombre?” Mr. Jackson tapped his fingers on the table.
“Valentina Sánchez.” She gave him a sweet smile.
“Valentina—”
“Señora,” Valentina said.
“Señora,” Mr. Jackson said.
“Maybe we should move to a plantation where there is a school,” Valentina said. “What’s to stop us?”
“On Mr. White’s plantation, you can leave, no need discharge papers,” Mr. Jackson said. “Not yet.”
“What plantation has a school and decent housing?”
“Don’t know.”
As far as Valentina was concerned, this Mr. Jackson knew very little.
Mr. Jackson conferred with Mr. White. “You leave, no bonus. You stay, get raise, get bonus.”
Some of the Puerto Ricans slapped each other on the back. They would get their raises and bonuses after all.
Valentina pointed to Mirta. “See this little girl? Her father was sent to another plantation. Her mother is dead.”
“Our business is sugarcane,” Mr. Jackson said, “not little girls.”
“The plantation lost him and the plantation should find him,” Valentina said.
“The plantation lost my brother,” Vicente said. “Can you find him? Raulito Villanueva.”
“Not our business,” Mr. Jackson said.
“Not your business! Then whose business is it?” Valentina placed her hands on her hips.
“Señora, these things happen when you import people,” Mr. Jackson said. “You can’t blame the Hawaiian Sugar Planters’ Association.”
“Then who can we blame? How can we find them?” Valentina’s voice rose again. People might say she was yelling, but why was it yelling when she was speaking with passion?
Mr. Jackson and Mr. White got up and went inside the manag
er’s office. The police waved the Puerto Ricans away. Vicente put his hand on her elbow; she shook it off.
They walked down the dirt road to the hovel.
He tried to take her hand, she pulled away.
“Aren’t you glad that from now on, we’re going to be paid in cash money?”
“It’s so little money! You should have demanded that they find Sonia’s husband and Raulito. That they open up a school, right here on the plantation.” Valentina knew that she was being unreasonable, but she also knew that they had to leave the plantation. She wouldn’t be responsible for her actions if their girls didn’t go to school and she had to live in a hovel much longer.
“It seems that I can’t do anything to please you,” Vicente said.
“You want to please me, Vicente?” Valentina stopped in the middle of the road. “Let’s leave this plantation.”
“We will,” he said.
“Today,” she said.
“Today?” He took her hand and this time she didn’t brush him off.
“We will get the girls and all our things,” Valentina said, “and walk to someplace better where we can live like people and not animals.”
Vicente winced. “Raulito might be on his way here, and what about the bonus?”
“You’ll only see that bonus in your dreams.”
“We still owe at the plantation store from when I was in jail,” Vicente said. “That’ll be paid off in a month, and then we can save a few dollars.”
Dolores called out to them as she wheeled the red wheelbarrow piled with groceries up the road.
“Vicente, you’re a poet,” Dolores said. “You’ll soon be making up décimas.”
“A man must take charge,” Vicente said.
Dolores gave Valentina a look that said a strong, good-looking man in charge could yield a woman a lot of satisfaction, but Valentina was distracted by the piles of tins and cans and sacks of foodstuff stacked in the wheelbarrow.
“So much food! You already owe the plantation a lot of money!” Valentina wished that she could be more like Dolores and charge everything they needed, but the knowledge that it would keep them tied to the plantation restrained her.
“We have to eat!” Dolores picked up a can of sardines. “Have you tried this? With a little olive oil, it’s delicious.”
Valentina examined the tin and was disappointed when Dolores took it back.
“Go on ahead, I’ll wait for Eugenio,” Dolores said. “I’ll send my boy over later with the wheelbarrow.”
“And maybe a tin of sardines?” Valentina lent the wheelbarrow to the women, who always returned it with a little something extra, like a few carrots or a tin of powdered milk.
Vicente glanced back at Dolores several times. “I’ve been meaning to ask you, Valentina, what about that thing?”
“What thing?”
“Tú sabes, that red thing.” He pointed to it.
“It’s a wheelbarrow,” she said.
“I can see that it’s a wheelbarrow,” he said.
“We used to have them back in Puerto Rico, remember?”
“I want to know how you got it.”
“I got it to take Sonia to the doctor.”
“How?”
“From the gardener,” Valentina said. “Didn’t I tell you?”
“No, you didn’t tell me,” Vicente said. “I never heard of a white man giving away something for nothing.”
“We were talking about leaving the plantation,” Valentina said.
“Tell me about the wheelbarrow,” Vicente said.
“Vicente, why are we talking about a wheelbarrow when we have so many more important things to talk about?” Valentina stopped. They had walked to the path that led to the Japanese camp. She pointed down the row of shanties that were a little better than theirs and said, “My friend Mikioki lives here.”
“¿Mikioki? Who is that?”
“Mikioki. A japonesa who was very nice to me when I hoe hana,” Valentina said. “We should go to talk to her about the strike.”
Vicente shook his head. “A woman? We need to talk to her husband.”
“Then we’ll talk to her husband.”
“I guess it’s worth a try. We’ll go there together.”
Valentina smiled, taking his hand and placing it over her heart.
“Feel it? How fast it’s beating?”
“For me?” He grinned.
“Yes, for you, Vicente,” she said. “But also because we will have to fight for what we want. No one is going to give it to us.”
Hawaii
February 14, 1902
My dear Elena,
I don’t know if you’ll ever receive this letter, but if by some miracle you do—you’ll be sure to think that I’ve risen from the dead. Darling sister, I write to tell you about this fracaso that we find ourselves in.
Elena, can you write the newspapers for us? Tell them some of what I write you? It might help make life better for us here. Write the newspapers that the Hawaiian Dream for Puerto Ricans is more like a Hawaiian Nightmare. In an earlier letter I wrote you about Raulito. He is still lost but Vicente won’t give up hope that one day we will find him. There’s so much I can tell you, but I must get back to sewing—I make a little extra money this way. I’m trying to bargain with one of the other puertorriqueñas for a sewing machine—like the one Mamá had—somehow she brought one with her on the boat and she doesn’t even know how to use it! We were able to pay off our debt at the plantation store, which we took on when Vicente was in prison—another letter, but don’t worry, Vicente is still a good man. The planters are liars and brutes and thieves. We are finally getting paid with dollars. We are saving every penny we can—and it is pennies—so that we can go to Oahu, where Vicente thinks he might find Raulito. Eventually from there I hope we can go to California. The journey is not without its challenges—the sea is rough—I considered jumping overboard on the way here, it was that terrible—and we’ll have to get to the harbor, which is hours away, but we are determined to get there and to pay our passage to Honolulu. Vicente thinks that he can find work there, and I will start sewing for others or work as a maid. Easy work after hoe hana! You wouldn’t recognize me if you saw me, hermana. Certainly our parents wouldn’t. (How are they? Is Mamá completely recovered? I hope so. My love to them, and better if they don’t know too much.)
Back to the newspapers—the promises Vicente was given—fifteen dollars a month, the first year, sixteen dollars the second—bonuses—housing fit for human beings (not pigs)—good medical care—school for the children—lies, all lies. Vicente gets fifteen dollars a month, and only recently has that been in dollars. (And we pay taxes!) We doubt that we will ever see a bonus. We live in a hut. Because the nearest school is too far, I’m teaching the girls to read—Lourdes and Mirta, mi hija de crianza. Her mother was my friend Sonia, who died. (I wrote you about her.) The doctor didn’t even bother to examine her. Mirta’s father was sent to another plantation, never to be seen again, and no one cares. The foreman is called a luna and he is very severe with the men. The plantation policemen are quick to arrest Puerto Ricans. Our lives belong to Sugar.
Don’t distress yourself, darling Elena. It hasn’t all been bad. Maybe el dicho is true: Dios aprieta pero no ahoga—maybe God doesn’t abandon you. I’m not sure. I’ve made some very good friends, and that’s the wonderful part. I haven’t had friends since I was married. Except for my beautiful Inés. I’ve run out of paper. I hope you get this letter so that you know how much I miss and love you and our parents. And I miss Puerto Rico and Ponce and my sweet Gloria and even the mountain in Utuado. A little. Ay bendito, Elena, we thought we were coming to something better.
I hope to hear from you, my darling sister.
Siempre,
Valentina
CHAPTER FIFTY-SEVEN
WHEN HE WAS DON VICENTE
After Sonia died, it seemed to Vicente that for Valentina, everything began and ended with her need to leave the plant
ation.
Valentina did the laundry on Sunday afternoon because then Vicente could help her carry the water and tend the fire. Boiling water was the best way to get rid of the dirt that stained everything red. Vicente didn’t even mind very much when the other men made fun of him for doing women’s work.
“We had such fun with the French mademoiselles, didn’t we, Valentina?” Vicente hoped for a smile.
She left the hovel without answering. Perhaps she didn’t want to think about French mademoiselles, but he did. On those days when he thought he might fall into despair, he liked to think about when they were first married. Mornings before he went out to the coffee finca, Vicente brought her hot chocolate because a French mademoiselle was served hot chocolate in bed when she had pleased her lover. Mamá had told him to take his head out from between his wife’s legs. (Vicente was shocked by his mother’s crudeness.) Some men might have thought him pitiful, still in love with his wife after more than ten years. When Valentina brought him a hot tisane of ginger and lemon to chase away the chill of cutting cane in the rain, or massaged his aching muscles with aloe, he wished with all his heart that they were back in Puerto Rico in their very own bed. He recalled the Sundays when Valentina would brew him a tiny cup of café negro with a teaspoon of sugar, and after he drank it, he would go out to see to the chickens and his horse. When he returned, she would spoon sugar into his café con leche, which he would enjoy with a bowl of avena sweetened with honey. Valentina was the French mademoiselle then, and he, Don Vicente the Coffee Farmer.
CHAPTER FIFTY-EIGHT
NO VAGS HERE
Raulito couldn’t make out his hand in the dark. On Cerro Morales, where he and his brothers were born, Raulito could find his way even in the fog. He knew that mountain like the lines between his mother’s eyes. In this place, Oahu, he stumbled about in the unknown, afraid of white men with guns.
Finally, it was morning, and birds cawed as they flew in the sky. The sounds of insects and critters reminded Raulito of his beloved mountain. He saw green that was not cane as far as the eye could see. Coconut palms. Trees. Ferns. Flowers like orchids, Valentina’s favorite. Raulito tucked a pink blossom behind his ear.
The Taste of Sugar Page 30