"May we come in?" Farrel pleaded. "I have some Eastern people with me
and I wanted to show them the sort of Americans you are hired to teach."
She smiled ruefully. "I am just about to let them out for recess," she
replied. "Your friends may remain in their car and draw their own
conclusions."
"Thank you." Don Mike returned to the car. "They're coming out for
recess," he confided. "Future American citizens and citizenesses.
Count 'em."
Thirty-two little Japanese boys and girls, three Mexican or Indian
children and four of undoubted white parentage trooped out into the
yard and gathered around the car, gazing curiously. The school-teacher
bade them run away and play and, in her role of hostess, approached the
car. "I am Miss Owens," she announced, "and I teach this school
because I have to earn a living. It is scarcely a task over which one
can enthuse, although I must admit that Japanese children are not
unintelligent and their parents dress them nicely and keep them clean."
"I suppose, Miss Owens," Farrel prompted her, having introduced himself
and the Parkers, "that you have to contend with the native Japanese
schools."
She pointed to a brown house half a mile away. Over it flew the flag
of Japan. "They learn ancestor worship and how to kow-tow to the
Emperor's picture down there, after they have attended school here,"
she volunteered. "Poor little tots! Their heads must ache with the
amount of instruction they receive.
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