Chinatowns -- Pacific States -- Fiction; Chinese Americans -- Fiction; Short stories
“Ho ’m ho? Is it good or bad?”
“Ho! ho!” answered the boy, removing several pits from his mouth and
shaking his head to signify that he had had enough. Whereupon the little
girl tasted herself of the fruit.
“Pat! Pan! Pat! Pan!” called a woman’s voice, and a sleek-headed,
kindly-faced matron in dark blue pantalettes and tunic, wearing double
hooped gold earrings, appeared around the corner. Hearing her voice, the
boy jumped up with a merry laugh and ran out into the street. The little
girl more seriously and slowly followed him.
“Him mother!” informed the lichi man.
II
When Anna Harrison, some months later, opened her school for white and
Chinese children in Chinatown, she determined that Pat, the adopted son
of Lum Yook, the Chinese jeweller, should learn to speak his mother
tongue. For a white boy to grow up as a Chinese was unthinkable. The
second time she saw him, it was some kind of a Chinese holiday, and he
was in great glee over a row of red Chinese candles and punk which he
was burning on the curb of the street, in company with a number of
Chinese urchins. Pat’s candle was giving a brighter and bigger flame
than any of the others, and he was jumping up and down with his legs
doubled under him from the knees like an india-rubber ball, while Pan,
from the doorstep of her father’s store, applauded him in vociferous,
infantile Chinese.
Miss Harrison laid her hand upon the boy’s shoulder and spoke to him. It
had not been very difficult for her to pick up a few Chinese phrases.
Would he not like to come to her school and see some pretty pictures?
Pat shook his ruddy curls and looked at Pan. Would Pan come too? Yes,
Pan would. Pan’s memory was good, and so were lichis and shredded
cocoanut candy.
Of course Pan was too young to go to school—a mere baby; but if Pat
could not be got without Pan, why then Pan must come too. Lum Yook and
his wife, upon being interviewed, were quite willing to have Pat learn
English. The foster-father could speak a little of the language himself;
but as he used it only when in business or when speaking to Americans,
Pat had not benefited thereby. However, he was more eager than otherwise
to have Pat learn “the speech of his ancestors,” and promised that he
would encourage the little ones to practise “American” together when at
home.
So Pat and Pan went to the Mission school, and for the first time in
their lives suffered themselves to be divided, for Pat had to sit with
the boys and tiny Pan had a little red chair near Miss Harrison, beside
which were placed a number of baby toys. Pan was not supposed to learn,
only to play.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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