They paused outside Roosevelt High School, before the lawns, the bell tower, the entrance, the big, neatly printed sign HOME OF THE ROUGH RIDERS, and under the portrait of a Hawaiian with an upraised shark-tooth club the words E KOMO MAI—WELCOME. The carved sign and gateway made it seem dignified—the equal of Punahou. But inside—the doggy smell of bare feet, of hair stiff with dirt, of unwashed clothes, of disinfectant and cheap perfume—the stink hung like a threat. Three heavy Hawaiian girls, bigger than Sharkey, lingered in a corridor, staring at him, and when his mother asked the way to the office, one of the girls pointed with her face to a doorway.

A woman, announcing herself as a secretary, greeted them from behind a high counter as though they were shopping at an old-fashioned store. A wide gilded cuff, engraved ALOHA, on the secretary’s wrist dinged the counter as she shuffled papers. After signing them and handing over Sharkey’s transcript, Sharkey’s mother fretted and said, “My husband’s in the military, serving his country. Is there anything more?”

“You pau,” the secretary said. “He gonna come with me.”

She led him—that smell again—to a small classroom, where the smell was stronger. Interrupted in her lesson, the teacher, a young Japanese woman, grinned in frantic annoyance, and when the secretary gave her Sharkey’s papers she tossed them onto her desk and said, “Take a seat—over there.”

He sensed like a flare-up of heat the heightened attention, all eyes on him, as he walked to the empty desk and sat; but more than anything he was aware of the size of the students—bigger, darker, slouched and sitting sideways. And when the teacher resumed, turning her back to write on the board, Sharkey felt something hit his arm—the bitten stub of a pencil, like a chewed bone.

“Haole,” came a growl from behind him. He knew the word from Punahou—howlie, whitey—but never spoken with such contempt. He heard it again like a harsh echo from another throat. He turned aside; a Hawaiian girl in a red dress pursed her lips as though mimicking a kiss. She was lovely, with yellowish glinting eyes, thick black hair to her shoulders, and a flower behind her ear. When Sharkey smiled, she spat at him, then wiped her chin.

“Four x,” the teacher was saying, scraping with her chalk, “equals sixteen.”