by Rishi Reddi
“I am,” he agreed.
“And you missed being a youth in Punjab.”
“What do you mean?”
“A gang of friends. Mischief. You did not have what I had at fifteen, sixteen, seventeen.”
Amarjeet was quiet. Ram was too close to the truth.
“When you are bored, the only thing you can do is visit Harry.”
How did Ram know this so clearly? Sometimes Amarjeet thought the mile between their homes seemed too long, whether by foot or bicycle. “I like Harry. He’s swell.”
They began to hear the commotion from the brass band. The hum of people and the mayor’s voice over the loudspeaker were carried by the dust-wind a quarter mile before they arrived.
“I know, Jeetu. I’m only telling you what I see.”
They left the buckboard and horse on the outskirts and walked down to Main Street. The streets were filled with vendors of popcorn, candy, peanuts, and balloons. Many businesses had shut down for the day. A large tent was placed at the intersection of Main and Church Streets. Underneath it, the band played a happy tune that the orchestra had played at his high school.
“I always liked that song,” Amarjeet said.
“What?” Ram asked.
Suddenly, Amarjeet was irritated. Of course Ram would not know the tune. “Look, the line is there,” Amarjeet said, pointing to the post office.
Young men queued in front of the doors for the length of two blocks. Ram and Amarjeet joined them. At 8:59, church bells rang all over town. The post office doors swung open and the first young men stepped in.
“They will think badly of us, because of the Ghadar arrests,” Amarjeet said.
“It doesn’t matter,” Ram said.
Amarjeet disagreed, but said nothing.
They stood for two more hours in the summer heat before the line advanced into the cool of the building. Five tables were set up as desks, operating simultaneously, each staffed by a Valley resident. Amarjeet and Ram stepped forward to the same table; Ram did not feel confident facing the interviewer alone. Nick Amsler, whose father ran the Swiss dairy down the road from their farm, stood at the table next to theirs. Amarjeet had gone to high school with Nick.
“Name?” the man asked. In front of him was a neat stack of blanks, a box to file them in, and two rows of fountain pens. He was near forty years old, his face bronzed from the spring harvest. Everybody was volunteering to contribute to the war effort.
“Amarjeet Singh Gill.”
“Whoa, son,” the man said. “You’re gonna spell that for me nice and slow.” Amarjeet did so, and the man noted the letters on a blank. He peered at them through his thick glasses. “That ain’t so bad, when you look at it on paper. Date of birth?”
“April first, 1896.”
“Birthplace?”
“Ludhiana District, Punjab, India,” Amarjeet said, spelling that too.
Now the man took out another card from his file, placed it beside him, and read carefully. “Of what country are you a citizen or subject?” he said, as if seeing the words for the first time.
“India,” said Amarjeet.
“Great Britain.” The man peered at him.
“I mean it to be India,” insisted Amarjeet.
“Amarjeet—” Ram said.
“I’ll mark both,” the man said, writing carefully. He did not seem to notice Amarjeet’s irritation.
“By whom are you employed?”
“I work on my uncle’s farm,” Amarjeet said, then, after a pause, “What are you marking now?”
“You’re not married, are you?”
“No.”
“Okay. Another hard question here. What race do you boys call yourselves?”
“Caucasian,” said Amarjeet.
“Oriental,” said Ram.
“I’ll mark both,” said the man.
“We are not both,” said Amarjeet. Suddenly he felt an arm on his shoulder, a man’s face hovering beside his.
“How’s it going here, Howard?” the sheriff said in a friendly drawl. “Good to see foreigners register—even when they don’t have to fight—why, we want them to know how much we Americans appreciate that.” His voice was friendly, but Amarjeet could see the message being conveyed to the clerk.
“No sir, sheriff. Everybody’s getting along.”
“Exactly what President Wilson’s askin’ of us.”
“Don’t I know it!” The clerk looked at Amarjeet again. “I’ll put Hindu next to Oriental, so the men in Washington know what to do.” He nodded at them. “Those men in Washington know everything.”
Amarjeet and Ram exchanged a glance. In the next line, Nick Amsler had finished and stepped away.
“Oh. I forgot one up here,” the man said, peering through his reading glasses. “These blanks are hard to read. Alien status?”
“Yes,” answered Amarjeet.
The man marked it, then he read more off a booklet lying near him, then turned back to the blank: “But have you men”—he cleared his throat—“declared your intention to become a citizen?”
“No,” Ram said.
Amarjeet paused. “Does it make a difference?”
The man shrugged. “I think so.”
“No,” Amarjeet said, finally.
“That’s it,” the man said, turning the card toward Amarjeet. “Make your mark or sign your name—right here.”
Ram’s turn was faster. He added that he was married. He added that he was father to a son. “It’s a lot easier with the second one of you folks,” the man said. Ram signed quickly. “The medical examinations are at the Masonic Hall. You all have a good day now.”
“It does not matter if you were married or not,” Amarjeet said as they stepped outside. The sunlight hurt his eyes. “You are exempt because you never declared.”
“Never declared what?” asked Ram.
“You never filed any papers with the U.S. government to become a citizen. If you never do that, you don’t have to go fight in the war.”
“Ah,” said Ram. “Good.”
Amarjeet didn’t answer.
“Did you file such papers, Amarjeet?” Ram asked.
“No,” Amarjeet said. He did not add that, sometimes, he had wanted to.
THERE WAS A LINE at the Masonic Hall too; examinations occurred in the banquet hall and the lodge room upstairs. Ram and Amarjeet climbed these steps together, but at the top, they were taken to opposite sides of a cavernous room. Ram gave Amarjeet a look of impatience as they separated.
Curtains partitioned each exam stall. Ceiling fans spun overhead. Amarjeet’s stall was positioned next to a window, and bright sunlight slanted across the space. He could see Mount Signal in the distance. Three men in white lab coats stood waiting for him. As soon as he entered, their eyes rested on his dastar. “I suppose you’ll be claiming an exemption?” one of the men said.
Amarjeet broke out in a sweat. A wave of heat swept through him.
“I don’t know,” he managed to say.
“You don’t know?” another one of them said, raising his eyebrows, a tall man with a beautiful face. Amarjeet felt the pull of him. He had broad shoulders, fine hands.
“I’m an alien,” Amarjeet said.
“So—exemption claimed by reason of alien status,” the beautiful man said patiently. He was about to make a notation on a clipboard.
The third man, older than the others, spoke up. “You aliens aren’t really interested in serving, are you?” He laughed lightly. “All the benefit of living here without all the work. Well, our army needs brave men with spirit. We’ll mark your exemption request.”
“You don’t need to,” Amarjeet said. The moment was running away from him. “I’m volunteering.”
The men exchanged glances. Their surprise satisfied him.
The beautiful man stepped toward him. They were almost the same height. In the small space, they could look each other in the eye. “You speak English very well, Singh.”
“I have lived here
since I was fourteen.”
“You must take off your turban,” said the man who appeared to be the senior doctor. Amarjeet unwound the dastar and lay the cloth neatly on the table. His hair fell to the middle of his back. He hoped they would not ridicule. He did not know what he would say in response. They asked him to read letters posted on a chart. They looked in his ears. They looked down his throat. They inspected his face, his nose and teeth and mouth. They examined his scalp with a magnifying glass.
“You won’t need this hair in the army,” the beautiful man said gently. He was about thirty. For a moment, Amarjeet forgot he was a physician.
They asked him to remove his clothes, and he did. The ceiling fan swept the air across his chest, his buttocks, between his thighs. He thought they could have killed him then—the three of them protected by their lab coats, while his hair hung loose—and no one would report it. They asked him to stand up straight with his arms out to the sides, and he did that too. The first doctor stepped forward and inspected every bit of Amarjeet’s skin. They felt his abdomen, they squeezed his testicles, and, after asking him to bend forward and pull apart his buttock cheeks, they looked at his anus. They made notations on the pad. Amarjeet remained quiet. The senior doctor asked him to squat, flap his arms, and shake his legs, arms, and neck. Finally, they told him to put on his clothes.
More notations were made on the pad. More papers were added to his file. One doctor pulled out a tape and measured him and called out, “Five feet, eleven inches.” The beautiful one marked it in the file. Another asked him to step on the scale. “One hundred seventy-three pounds,” then “Black hair.”
“Brown eyes.”
“No birthmarks.”
“What should we put for complexion?” someone said.
“Black Caucasian.”
“There is no such thing.”
“He is almost white.”
“Medium,” said the beautiful one.
The notes were made. Amarjeet signed a document.
The senior man spoke. “Welcome to the United States Army.” He did not extend a hand.
Amarjeet picked up the cloth of his dastar. He gathered his hair, wound the fabric with nimble fingers, reclaimed his dignity. He made them wait until he was finished. “Please note it,” he said. “I don’t have to serve, but I am.”
The senior doctor, twice his age, looked at him. Amarjeet looked straight back.
“Consider it noted,” the beautiful one said.
THE STREETS WERE STILL CROWDED, although the band was silent. Amarjeet could barely believe what he had done. He felt elated. They watched the parade march down Main Street, drums beating time, tuba blaring. The Rifle Club came first on horseback, wearing chaps and Stetsons; the Imperial County Council of Defense, riding in a Model T, followed them. They had traveled that morning from Brawley to Niland to Fredonia, marching in each town’s parade as they passed. Then came Fredonia’s volunteers for the Red Cross, the Young Women’s Christian Association, and the Women’s County Food Conservation Committee. The brass band played on after the marching had stopped. Flags waved, ribbons were thrown, and still the men lined up to register, standing in a long snaking queue that began at the post office and ended at Charlie’s Horse and Mule Rental.
They ran into Harry Moriyama, who had registered before them. He was cheerful, and to Amarjeet, always seemed unburdened. Together, they walked through the covered promenade. Flags hung from every storefront. The town’s banks had set up tents and each had a young and pretty girl standing alongside the banker men, wooing the passersby for the sale of Liberty bonds. At the intersection of Main and Central, under the cover of a large ramada, a crowd gathered to eat ice cream and watch the square dancers, to hear the mayor speak about how Fredonia would contribute to the war effort: not only with fighting men, not only with war heroes, but also by planting castor beans for motor oil, growing hemp for airplane cloth, and bringing food, food, and more food for the region’s cantonments. “Sign the Hoover pledge cards! Meatless Tuesdays! Wheatless Wednesdays! Porkless Saturdays!” The mayor’s voice had grown harsh and dry. “Nobody will deny that the Imperial Valley did its share and more!”
“Will the local people really do that, Amarjeet?” Ram asked.
“Look at them, bhai-ji,” Amarjeet said. “They will.” A group of middle-aged women had huddled near the mayor and were listening intently. “We should too.”
“My parents won’t do it,” Harry said. “I wish they would.” Amarjeet felt vindicated. They walked around for a bit longer, then Harry left for home in his wagon. Without him, Amarjeet began to feel nervous. The weight of what he had done began to settle on him, heavy and stifling.
He and Ram walked behind the general store and untied the mare from the rail. “The medical exam was demeaning,” Ram said, when they had started for home.
“They must check everything,” said Amarjeet.
“Why must they check everything if we are exempt?”
“They must have a record of us all.” The frame of the buckboard creaked underneath them. “Ram-ji?”
“Yes.”
“I need your support.”
“For what?”
“I have volunteered for the U.S. Army.”
He saw Ram blink as the knowledge settled. “You volunteered.”
“Yes.” He thought Ram would be more surprised.
“I thought that you might, Jeetu.”
“Why?”
“Sometimes when I see you, I think, what is there for you here?”
“There is the farm,” Amarjeet said bitterly.
“Yes, there is the farm,” Ram repeated, as if to say, For some men, that is enough.
“We will never be a part of them,” Amarjeet said, “but maybe if I fight, they will accept us.”
He saw confusion on Ram’s face. Perhaps he did not know what Amarjeet meant.
“You must tell Karak Chacha first,” Ram said. “Only after that, tell your uncle. Karak Chacha can speak for you as an intermediary.” This was the proper way to do things. It was out of respect to the older man—the concession that the younger had been fearful of telling him.
“I am already part of the army now,” Amarjeet said. Did Ram not understand? “Even if he insists that I remain, I cannot stay.”
“I know,” Ram said.
THEY RETURNED HOME after the heat of the afternoon. Jivan stepped out to the porch immediately, as if he had been watching for them. “You took long,” he said.
Amarjeet felt a surge of resentment, but said nothing.
They found Karak alone in the barn, adjusting the plow. When Amarjeet told him, he laid his head against the steel of the implement and said darkly, “Are you mad? How will we manage?” He threw his hammer to the dirt. “How will your uncle manage?”
“What you say is true, Karak Chacha.” Amarjeet’s heart raced. He had always been intimidated by Karak. “I was not thinking of him.”
Ram leaned against the wall, watching. Amarjeet had hoped for his help, but perhaps he felt it was not his place to say anything.
“My service will bring some income,” Amarjeet said.
“Your damn service will bring your death!”
Amarjeet stepped back.
“Look—when your uncle and I went to war, it was because the money was needed. Here, the cotton and cantaloupe are doing well.” Karak rubbed his forehead. “There is so much money to make, Amarjeet.”
“I will come back soon, Chacha-ji, and—”
“Not if you are dead.”
“Hear what—” Ram said.
“This is not your concern,” Karak said sharply.
Amarjeet swallowed. “I will be back to help here again. In the meantime, the wages will come. Please, will you talk to him for me?”
As soon as he said it, Amarjeet knew it was a mistake.
“I won’t.”
Amarjeet felt a pit in his stomach.
“Are you more concerned with Amarjeet’s death,” Ram said,
“or with his labor around the farm?”
“What do you know about it?” Karak snapped. “You never went to war.”
RAM SAID HE WOULD SPEAK to Jivan for him. Amarjeet saw Ram approach his uncle while he was sitting at the table on the porch, looking at the accounts. Amarjeet had positioned himself inside the door to the animal shed. He could see them clearly. The mare nuzzled him and he reached out to pet her. He could not hear what was said. He thought that his uncle did not know he was there, but after they had been talking awhile, Jivan looked directly at him across the distance. Amarjeet felt as if he had been slapped.
Ram came to meet him. His face was serious, and Amarjeet could not tell if he was still sympathetic to him. “Jivan Singh wants to speak with you,” Ram said.
When he approached his uncle, he did not look up, he did not know if his uncle was even looking at him.
“What have I heard from Ram? That you have gone and committed yourself to the U.S. Army?”
“Chacha-ji,” he said in a small voice. He was twenty-one years old, a full adult, being treated like this. Amarjeet looked down at the crusted earth, the dust mixed with sand. He had never seen his uncle angry before. All through the Valley, Jivan Singh was known for his patience, for being a soft-spoken man.
“I brought you here so that you would not have to fight in another country’s war. I wanted you to study. I promised your father.”
Amarjeet stood with his hands clasped in front of him, looking at the ground.
“I forbid you to go, Amarjeet.”
For a moment, he could not breathe. “Chacha-ji, they will send me to jail if I don’t go.” Easier to blame the U.S. government than to say the truth: Amarjeet did not want to stay.
“Go and ask them. Into town. Go now.”
Amarjeet did not move.
“Go!”
“They will say no, Chacha-ji. And I will not ask. I gave my word. Just as you did. Just as my father did.”
THAT EVENING, his aunt told him to come to the kitchen to eat his supper before the others arrived, so his uncle would not have to see him. From the tone of her voice, the gentle way that she spooned the food onto his plate, he knew her sympathy was with him.
For several days, he and Jivan did not speak. Even so, Amarjeet silently helped him cover the cantaloupe, cultivate the field of peas. He knew the work and there was little reason for any talk. At least in his labor, he could be blameless. While the others ate, he often went to the shed and sat with the mare and mules. He found the animals comforting.
