The Japanese Lover(41)

“That’s true, sir. And at the moment, I have nowhere to put it. Could I leave it here? It won’t be for much longer, I hope.”

“That sword honors this house, Ichimei. What’s the hurry to remove it?”

“Its place is on my ancestors’ altar, but for now we have no house or altar. My mother, sister, and I live in lodgings.”

“How old are you, Ichimei?”

“Twenty-two.”

“Then you are an adult, and head of your family. It is for you to take on the business I started with your father.”

So Isaac Belasco explained to the astonished Ichimei that in 1941 he had set up a partnership with Takao Fukuda for a flower and decorative plant nursery. The war had prevented the business from going ahead, but neither of them had ended their verbal agreement, and so it still existed. There was a suitable plot of land in Martinez, to the east of San Francisco Bay, which he had bought at a very good price. It was five acres of level, fertile, and well-watered soil, and there was a modest but decent house on the property that the Fukudas could live in until they found something better. Ichimei would have to work very hard to make the business a success, as had been the agreement with Takao.

“We already own the land, Ichimei. I’ll put in the initial capital to prepare the soil and plant; the rest is up to you. As you make sales you can pay off your part as best you can, without having to hurry or pay interest. When the time is ripe, we’ll put the business in your name. For now the land is in the name of Belasco, Fukuda, and Sons.”

What he did not say was that this company and the land purchase had gone through less than a week earlier. Ichimei only discovered this four years later, when he went to transfer the business to his own name.



* * *



The Fukudas returned to California and established themselves in Martinez, forty-five minutes from San Francisco. By working side by side from dawn till dusk, Ichimei, Megumi, and Heideko succeeded in producing a first crop of flowers. They found that the soil and the climate were among the best they could have hoped for; all that was needed was to place their product on the market. Heideko had shown she had more guts and muscle than anyone else in the family. At Topaz she had developed her fighting spirit and her talent for organization; in Arizona she kept the family going when Takao could scarcely breathe for all his cigarettes and coughing fits. She had loved her husband with the fierce loyalty of someone who does not question her destiny as a wife, but becoming a widow was a liberation for her. When she returned to California and discovered five acres full of possibilities, she took charge of the business without hesitation. At first, Megumi had to obey her mother and wield the spade and rake on the land, but her mind was set on a future far from agriculture. Ichimei loved botany and had an iron will for heavy work, and yet he was not good at practicalities and had no eye for money. He was an idealist, a dreamer, with a taste for drawing and poetry, more inclined toward meditation than commerce. He did not go to sell his spectacular crop of flowers in San Francisco until his mother told him to go and wash the dirt from under his nails and put on a suit, a white shirt, and a colored tie (no hint of mourning); load up the van; and drive it into the city.

Megumi had made a list of all the most elegant florists, and Heideko visited them one by one, list in hand. However, she would wait in the van, because she realized she looked like a Japanese peasant and spoke dreadful English, while Ichimei, his ears red with embarrassment, went in to sell their wares. Anything that involved money made him uncomfortable. Megumi thought her brother was not made to live in America: he was discreet, austere, passive, and humble; if it were up to him, he would go around dressed in a loincloth begging for food with a bowl, just like the holy men and prophets in India.

That night, Heideko and Ichimei returned from San Francisco with an empty van. “That’s the first and last time I’m going with you, son. You’re responsible for this family. We can’t eat flowers, you’ll have to learn how to sell them,” Heideko told him. Ichimei tried to delegate this role to his sister, but Megumi was already halfway out the door. They realized how easy it was to get a good price for their flowers and calculated they would be able to pay for the land in four or five years, providing they lived frugally and did not meet up with any disasters. In addition, when he saw what they had produced, Isaac promised he could get a contract with the Fairmont Hotel for them to maintain the spectacular floral arrangements in the reception hall and lounges that gave the place its fame.

After thirteen years of bad luck, the Fukuda family was finally taking off. It was then that Megumi announced that she was thirty years old and thought it was time she set off on her own. In the intervening years Boyd had married and divorced; he was the father of two children and had yet again asked Megumi to join him in Hawaii, where he was doing well with his garage and a fleet of trucks. “Forget Hawaii, if you want to be with me, it will have to be in San Francisco,” she told him. She had decided to study nursing. At Topaz she had attended several births, and each time she held a newborn baby she experienced the same ecstatic feeling, the closest thing to a divine revelation she could imagine. This area of obstetrics, until then dominated by male doctors and surgeons, was just beginning to open up to midwives, and she wanted to be in the vanguard of the profession. She was accepted in a nursing program specializing in female health, which had the advantage of being free. Over the following three years, Boyd went on wooing her discreetly from afar, convinced that once she had her diploma she would marry him and come to Hawaii.