Jeanne, maintaining the point of view of a young child, recalls the riot peripherally because she is too young to take part. Her game of hopscotch, a universal pastime, symbolizes her need to keep moving in incremental steps toward an attainable goal. As demonstrated later by her interest in dancing, singing, and baton twirling, Jeanne has a need to act out her frustrations with vigorous physical play, which relieves her of the stress of thinking too much about mature political and ideological debate, which she is too young to understand.
The adult conflict, an ideological debate between extremist males, results in confrontations with armed military police, tear gas, and gunfire. Although two men die in the fray, Jeanne recalls her sensory impressions of ringing bells and searchlights, "making shadows ebb and flow among the barracks like dark, square waves." Chapter 10, an interpolated episode, shifts point of view to Kaz, Jeanne's brother-in-law, who, along with other reservoir crewmen, encounters wild-eyed MPs swinging tommy guns and shouting "Japs" at men whom they assume to be saboteurs. The scene stresses an axiom of imprison-ment—guards are drawn into the violence and paranoia that they create and thus become victims themselves.
The loyalty oath evolves into a crucible in which the true mettle of citizenship is determined. As Jeanne describes it, the dilemma for Japanese Americans is a circle with three exits: "The first led into the infantry, the second back across the Pacific. The third, called relocation . . ." The latter choice would result in transport to the Tule Lake repatriation camp, from which the disloyal were to be sent back to Japan. Any of the choices threatens cataclysm for Japanese families, who have come to think of Manzanar as a refuge, despite its inconveniences and barbaric amenities.
The catharsis wrought during the sandstorm allows Jeanne to accept Ko as a beleaguered adult. In her view, he is unable to resolve the political forces that buffet him and therefore takes temporary refuge in a childhood credo and in tears. The line of the Japanese national anthem which refers to the flowering lichen that coats the rock foreshadows Ko's eventual refuge in gardening, a traditional outlet which absorbs his energies and restores beauty to his fragmented life.
