Caged Eagles (12 page)

Each nodded in turn and Sam gave them a little wave.

“Please, sit, join us,” my father said.

Sam plopped down into the open spot right in front of him, and I took the spot beside my father. Sam leaned over his tray and, using the big spoon, began shoveling in the food. He made loud chewing noises and it sounded like he hadn't eaten for weeks.

I had to admit that the way he was digging into it made it seem like it must be pretty good. I looked at the stew, poking it with my spoon. There were potatoes, lots of potatoes, some carrots peeking out and a couple of pieces of meat at the surface. I dipped in my spoon and gathered up a little bit of everything. I popped it in my mouth. It was … it was … nothing. There was almost no taste whatsoever. And it wasn't just the taste, but the texture. The carrots and potatoes were mushy and soft.

It was sort of like … baby food. I remembered when Yuri was little and my mother would take food and mush it all up before she fed it to her. Why was it so awful?

Sam picked up his plate and scraped off the last of his stew. I was amazed by both how fast he'd eaten and how he seemed to enjoy it so much.

“I'm going for seconds,” Sam said as he got up.

“Anybody else?”

“Not yet,” I answered.

“Suit yourself,” Sam said as he stuffed his entire piece of bread in his mouth and then walked off.

I looked over at my mother. Her food had hardly been touched. Nor had my grandmother's. My sisters were picking at their food, but for the most part it looked like they hadn't eaten hardly anything.

“This is not so good,” I said.

“It's awful!” Yuri responded.

“I don't understand why they won't let you cook,” I said to my mother.

She shook her head.

“They said it was because of the danger of fires,” my father answered.

“But why is it so bad?” I asked loudly.

My mother shot me a sharp look, which left me with no doubt that I had been rude.

Sam suddenly returned. He was unexpectedly empty-handed.

“They stopped serving,” he explained. “Are you finished?”

Did he want to eat what was left of mine? “Um … I guess so … except for maybe the bread.”

“Good. Wanna come with me to check something out?”

“Sure,” I said, rising to my feet and grabbing the tray. I hoped he was going to let me in on the secret … I stopped. I turned back toward my father. “Is that all right with you … can I go with Sam?”

He nodded.

“Thank you. I'll be back soon,” I offered, although I didn't know how long it would take. I trotted after Sam and caught him just before he reached the exit.

“Where are we going?” I asked.

“Out back. I have a meeting.”

“With who?”

“Be patient. Haven't you heard patience is a virtue?” he smirked.

We circled around the side of the mess hall and then around to the back. Two large army trucks were parked there, backed right up to the building. Sam squeezed by the truck and I followed, and we entered through a large door that led back into the mess hall — at least, the kitchen of the mess hall.

There were three large stoves. Atop each was a pot — the three largest pots I'd ever seen in my life.

Steam rose from each pot and filled the air. There was a woman standing on a stepladder right beside one of the stoves. In her hands was a paddle, a canoe paddle, and she dipped it into the pot and began stirring. Over to the side, lined up beside a long counter, were four other women. They were peeling and chopping and slicing up potatoes.

I couldn't help but think about the kitchen back on the army base. Jed and his mom and me, peeling potatoes, getting the meals ready for the soldiers, the smell of the coffee filling the air. I wondered what Jed was doing right now.

“Come on,” Sam said, grabbing me by the arm. He pulled me into a room off to the side of the kitchen.

There was a woman — one of the women who had been serving us out front — waiting there.

“Hi, Betty, this is my friend, Tadashi.”

“Any friend of Sam's is a friend of mine,” she offered. “I got most of what you wanted,” she said as she handed Sam a paper bag. What was she doing, giving him more stew? No, that made no sense.

“Thanks. How much do I owe you?” Sam asked.

“Four dollars and twenty-four cents.”

Sam stuffed a hand into a pocket and pulled out some money. He held a roll of bills in his hand. He peeled off a dollar bill, and then another, and another, and a two-dollar bill. The roll still looked awfully big.

He handed the bills to the woman and stuffed the rest back into his front pants pocket.

“Thanks,” the woman said.

“I appreciate your help.”

“Same for next week?” the woman asked.

Sam nodded.

“And would you like me to pick up some things for you?” Betty asked me.

What sort of things? What was in that bag? “No … no … that's okay,” I said, holding up my hands.

“If you change your mind, let me know. It's no harder shopping for two than for one.”

“I'll keep that in mind,” I mumbled, although I didn't intend, or have the money, to have her buy anything for me.

We strolled back through the kitchen and again squeezed by the trucks as we left the building. Sam unfolded the top of the bag and peered inside.

“Still hungry?” Sam asked.

“Maybe a little,” I admitted. Actually, I was very hungry.

“Here,” Sam said as he handed me a chocolate bar.

“Dessert.”

“Thanks.”

“Don't mention it. I have a lot of them.”

“Is the whole bag filled with chocolate bars?” I asked in amazement.

“Not the whole bag. There's lots of chewing gum, and some candy and licorice and this,” he said as he pulled a newspaper out of the bag. “Today's paper.”

The gum I should have expected, but the newspaper I didn't understand.

“You have to know what's going on out there,” he said, answering my unspoken question. “My father tells me, but he isn't allowed to bring the newspaper back in to the camp. Nobody is.”

“What do you mean?” I asked.

“Just like there's no radios allowed, there are no newspapers allowed in here. They want us to know nothing.” Sam paused. “Funny, I never used to read the paper at all, except for maybe the sports pages, before I came here. Now I try and read it every chance I get. Let's see what's happening today.”

Sam sat down and rested his back against a tree.

He opened up the paper. I looked around. There were people visible in the distance. If he wasn't supposed to have a paper, was this a good place to read it, where anybody, including one of the soldiers or RCMP officers, could see him? Sam didn't seem worried at all.

“Here, look at this story,” Sam said, tilting the paper toward me.

In big bold type the headline read, “Japs A Threat.”

I started to read the first column, but Sam pulled it away from me.

“There's one of those on the front page almost every day. The worst, though, aren't here but in the letters-to-the-editor section. I'll show you,” Sam said as he started to flip through the paper. He folded it over and started to run his finger down the columns.

“Here's one! Let me read it to you,” Sam said. “‘And the continued presence of the Japanese could spell the difference between freedom and slavery for Canada.

Only a fool doesn't understand the danger of the yellow peril' — and now I don't understand this part … maybe he was … yeah, he was answering another letter to the editor … I'll go on. ‘Would the Japanese be so kind to us? How can you expect them to adhere to Christian values when they are nothing more than heathens? I for one am not prepared to allow them to circulate on the streets amongst us.'” Sam abruptly folded the paper back up and stuffed it into the bag again.

“It's all so stupid that it just drives me crazy!”

Sam got back to his feet, and then looked at his watch. “I better get going. My parents should be coming in soon. How about if I call on you tomorrow?

Maybe we can get into a baseball game.”

“I'd like that.”

“Good. Do you know how to get back to your building from here?”

“I think so,” I said. I wasn't that sure, but I wasn't going straight back anyway. I was going to go back into the mess hall to find my family.

“Okay, see you tomorrow.”

I lay on the mattress beside my grandmother with all my family, except my father, around me. It was dark, but there was more than enough light for me to make out my sisters, sleeping just over from me. Behind them, the bars of the stall were still visible. Staring straight up I could make out the vague outline of the beams high above my head.

More than what I could see, though, was what I could hear. The night was continually disturbed by the sounds of the hundreds of people sleeping or not sleeping, lying in the dark all around me. The darkness was continually disturbed by the sound of coughing. Loud and low, or quiet and high-pitched.

Behind that I could hear the occasional rumble of conversation — too quiet for me to make out any of the words, but loud enough to know words were being spoken. Maybe in the next stall, or the next. Certainly not coming from far away. Three … no, four times, a baby had started to cry, and then, as if answering the call, another baby would join in the chorus and the sound would come over the walls from two directions. I'd been woken up by Yuri when she was a baby, but somehow this was different. Somewhere out there among the stalls, a baby I didn't even know was crying out and waking me, snatching away the few moments of sleep I'd managed to steal. But I wasn't angry. I knew exactly how that baby felt. Exactly.

And then I heard it again. The slow, steady, click, click, click of boots against the cement f loors. I pictured them passing by, maybe one or two rows over.

I knew they'd be going right past us in a few minutes.

They passed right by every fifteen minutes or so. The third time they'd passed I'd gotten out of my bed, pushed back the blanket slightly and peeked out. It was two RCMP officers, walking by, patrolling. The first couple of times they'd passed by I'd wondered why they were there. But, of course, it was obvious.

They weren't there to protect us, but to guard us.

.10.

I sat bolt upright, my eyes wide open, momentarily blinded by the bright light, my heart pounding, unsure where I was. Then I saw my mother and grandmother and sisters, and all our things spread around me in the stall.

“Bad dream?” my mother asked.

“The dream was okay,” I said quietly. It was the waking up that was bad.

“My dolls slept well,” Yuri said, holding them up for me to see.

“That's good,” I answered. I hardly ever saw her now without at least two of them tucked under her arm or in her hands.

I got up and stretched. Everybody else was already dressed. How late had I slept? I looked down at my watch. It was just before eight o'clock in the morning.

Almost the time I'd arranged to meet Sam. I poked my head out of the stall. I half expected him to be there waiting for me. Instead I saw stalls reaching down the aisle, each with some sort of blanket or cover blocking the bars. I climbed up onto the bottom rung of the gate so I could see over the stalls. Of course, all I could see were other stalls in other rows, stretching out in all directions. There had to be hundreds and hundreds of stalls, and in each one was a family — like us. I heard there were over a thousand people, many times more than my entire village, all together under this one big roof, all crammed together in these stalls, like cattle. No, not like cattle. They'd never put this many animals in each stall.

“I've got to go and use the facilities,” I said.

“And you'll soon be ready for breakfast?” my mother asked.

“Sure, I guess. I just have to wash up and get changed and I'll —”

“Do we have to wait for him?” Midori asked.

“I'm hungry,” Yuri added.

“That's okay,” I said. “You should all go ahead. I'll catch up after I'm done.”

My mother looked reluctant to leave, but Yuri grabbed her by the hand and started to drag her away, while Midori took one of my grandmother's hands and did the same.

“Tadashi?” my mother said, asking if it was all right.

“Sure, it's okay, don't worry,” I answered. It wasn't like I was going to get lost — especially with a big fence ringing us in. “My friend Sam is meeting me here soon anyway. I'll come to breakfast with him.”

As they started away my grandmother turned back to me. “Be careful.”

“Be careful of what?” I asked.

Her face took on a thoughtful and serious look.

“Everything.”

Her answer startled me, and I watched as they walked away, weaving between groups of women and children who were standing outside their stalls or milling about along the cement corridor. They stopped to talk to a woman and her small children. I didn't know the woman. In fact, the people from our village, the people I'd lived with my entire life, were scattered. It wasn't just that they weren't occupying the stalls close to ours; they were in different buildings. It was almost as if they had deliberately separated us … no, it probably wasn't deliberate, it was just that they didn't think it mattered.

I looked down at my watch again. It was time I got moving myself. I didn't want to miss meeting Sam. I didn't even know which building he was staying in.

I quickly unbuttoned my shirt, the one I'd worn yesterday and then to sleep, and replaced it with a second. I grabbed the small bag that contained a comb, toothbrush, a piece of soap and a washcloth. I wanted to wash up a little, at least if there wasn't too much of a lineup to use the sink. Last night there'd been lineups just to use the toilets. I'd finally just gone outside and went against the building, partially hidden by some bushes. It wasn't the first time in my life I'd ever gone to the washroom outside, but it was different being in the middle of the park, surrounded by thousands of people, instead of in a forest or out at sea.