Chinatowns -- Pacific States -- Fiction; Chinese Americans -- Fiction; Short stories
For some moments Miss Mason stood uncomprehending. Then the full meaning
of Ten Suie’s words dawned upon her, and she turned to Ku Yum, and
taking the child’s little hand in hers, said:
“Goodbye, Ku Yum. Your father, by passing you off as a girl, thought to
keep an evil spirit away from you; but just by that means he brought
another, and one which nearly took you from him too.”
“Goodbye, teacher,” said Ku Yum, smiling wistfully. “I never be good
girl, but perhaps I be good boy.”
PAT AND PAN
I
They lay there, in the entrance to the joss house, sound asleep in each
other’s arms. Her tiny face was hidden upon his bosom and his white,
upturned chin rested upon her black, rosetted head.
It was that white chin which caused the passing Mission woman to pause
and look again at the little pair. Yes, it was a white boy and a little
Chinese girl; he, about five, she, not more than three years old.
“Whose is that boy?” asked the Mission woman of the peripatetic vender
of Chinese fruits and sweetmeats.
“That boy! Oh, him is boy of Lum Yook that make the China gold ring and
bracelet.”
“But he is white.”
“Yes, him white; but all same, China boy. His mother, she not have any
white flend, and the wife of Lum Yook give her lice and tea, so when she
go to the land of spilit, she give her boy to the wife of Lum Yook.
Lady, you want buy lichi?”
While Anna Harrison was extracting a dime from her purse the black,
rosetted head slowly turned and a tiny fist began rubbing itself into a
tiny face.
“Well, chickabiddy, have you had a nice nap?”
“Tjo ho! tjo ho!”
The black eyes gazed solemnly and disdainfully at the stranger.
“She tell you to be good,” chuckled the old man.
“Oh, you quaint little thing!”
The quaint little thing hearing herself thus apostrophized, turned
herself around upon the bosom of the still sleeping boy and, reaching
her arms up to his neck, buried her face again, under his chin. This, of
course, awakened him. He sat up and stared bewilderedly at the Mission
woman.
“What is the boy’s name?” she asked, noting his gray eyes and rosy skin.
His reply, though audible, was wholly unintelligible to the American
woman.
“He talk only Chinese talk,” said the old man.
Anna Harrison was amazed. A white boy in America talking only Chinese
talk! She placed her bag of lichis beside him and was amused to see the
little girl instantly lean over her companion and possess herself of it.
The boy made no attempt to take it from her, and the little thing opened
the bag and cautiously peeped in. What she saw evoked a chirrup of
delight. Quickly she brought forth one of the browny-red fruit nuts,
crushed and pulled off its soft shell. But to the surprise of the
Mission woman, instead of putting it into her own mouth, she thrust the
sweetish, dried pulp into that of her companion. She repeated this
operation several times, then cocking her little head on one side,
asked:
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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