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“Mike was born in California and went to college there. He knocked around for a while and was doing graduate work in Louisiana when the war, the first world war, started. He’d left California because he didn’t like the way the white people treated the Japanese and he was happy in Louisiana because they treated him like a white man there. So, when the war came, he wanted to get into it and did. He spent a year in France, came back, joined the VFW, returned to California, and got into the produce business. He did well, got married, and had two children. Then the second war started. When talk about the evacuation started, he wouldn’t believe it. He was an American and a veteran of the first war. He thought there might be justification in interning some of the outspokenly pro-Japanese aliens, but he scoffed at the idea of the government doing such a thing to him. When it became apparent that the government proposed to do just that, he burst into a fury of anger and bitterness and swore that if they treated him like a Japanese, he would act like one. Well, you know what happened and he stuck to his words. Along with the other rabidly pro-Japanese, he ended up at the Tule Lake Center, and became a leader in the troublemaking, the strikes and the riots. His wife and children remained in this country, but he elected to go to Japan, a country he didn’t know or love, and I’m sure he’s extremely unhappy.”

“I can’t say I blame him.”

“I’m sure he wishes he were back here.”

…

[Ichiro] patted her back awkwardly, trying to think of what to say to soothe her.

“Ralph won’t come back because of Mike. He’s ashamed,” she whimpered. “How am I to tell him that it makes no difference what Mike has done? Why is it that Ralph feels he must punish himself for Mike’s mistake? Why?”

Explanation and Analysis:

Emi’s husband Ralph, a man of Japanese descent, enlisted in the army but now refuses to come home. Lonely and sad, Emi’s only friend seems to be Kenji. She spends her days farming and hoping Ralph will return. Kenji has introduced Emi to Ichiro...

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Romeo

(aside) She speaks.
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(to himself) She speaks. Speak again, bright angel! For tonight you are as glorious, there up above me, as a winged messenger of heaven who makes mortals fall onto their backs to gaze up with awestruck eyes as he strides across the lazy clouds and sails through the air.

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