Snow Falling on Cedars Chapter 15

Fujiko and her daughters are taken to a train on its slow way to California. They are packed in with other Japanese people, given disgusting food and typhoid shots that make them sick. They are forced to use filthy bathrooms and sleep in dust-covered rooms There is misery all around them--one man even shoots his wife and himself. After a few days, a letter from Ishmael comes, and Hatsue's sister Sumiko reads it, then gives it to their mother. The letter makes clear that Ishmael and Hatsue have been intimate. Fujiko thinks about her own life with Hisao: she does not feel passionate about him, but she cares for him and trusts him. She is furious with her daughter. She writes a letter to Ishmael's parents, telling them that she respected them but that she wanted her daughter to have no more communication with Ishmael. Hatsue, who begs for her mother's forgiveness, tells her that she does not need to send the letter: she was not going to write back to Ishmael anyway. She does not love him anymore. She will send her own letter. Still, she feels grief about the end of their relationship, and so does not respond when Kabuo, who is (of course) in the camp with them, asks for her company. Only after a few months does she warm up to him and find that they have a lot in common.

Topic Tracking: Racism 6