In town, they parked the wagon and the vehicle behind the general store. Thousands of people had already lined the streets. Flags waved, children cried, the band was too loud. They had arrived just before the parade. Harry and Amarjeet dropped their bags off at the army office, then rejoined the families, but did not stand too close. They were already separate in some unarticulated way.

The Fredonia High School band paraded before the Four Minute Men. The County Guard followed on horseback, then a long trail of Model T’s and Model A’s, with tooting horns and young women leaning out the windows, waving. Last came the winner of the year’s desert road race, a garland draped around its grille. The mayor appeared. There was a great uproar from the crowd, and no one could hear his speech. Then a second band began to play a rollicking and cheerful song, and young people flooded the street and began to dance, faces gleaming, arms waving, legs kicking. Even their parents laughed.

Harry ran off as soon as the dancing started, but Amarjeet stayed with his uncle, taking in the scene with glistening eyes. He turned to Ram and said, “It is a good send-off, isn’t it, Ram-ji?” His face was flushed. Sweat dripped from his temples. Ram could not disagree with him.

The evening brought fireworks, and afterward Harry came back grinning, his shirt damp and his hair mussed. Ram watched as he returned to his parents; Harry’s father placed his hand on his son’s shoulder. As the crowd thinned, the two young men set off to report to the Army Tent Grounds. They were slim-hipped and athletic and beautiful. In Punjab, where such things are allowed, they might have had arms around each other, in boyhood friendship and nothing more—two of them against the world. They turned and gave a last wave and Ram saw their faces, Japanese and Punjabi, in the midst of real Americans.

That night Ram could not sleep. The moon was full and luminous and at last he rose from his cot and walked to the edge of the cotton field and looked across to the Eggenberger house. Karak was barely visible, sitting on the bench by the front porch. A shadow among shadows.

Ram thought of joining him, but something prevented him. It was easier to remain two solitary figures together under a black sky. He thought of the expression on the Japanese boy’s face when he turned to his father. He thought of the father’s smile in return. A lifetime was conveyed in that glance. His own son was already three years old.