by Martin Limon
I explained the situation as best I could, letting the Nurse translate my English into Korean to give her good face. The headmaster nodded respectfully, checking us out all the while, wondering what two GI’s and a business girl were doing in this part of Seoul. Finally, he asked me a question.
“Did you see this woman’s calluses?”
I nodded.
“Which fingers?”
I pointed to all the fingers on the left hand and the forefinger and the middle finger on the right.
He nodded. Miss Ku was a kayagum player, all right.
He held out his hand. “Were the calluses as big as mine?”
I shook my head. Not nearly. Enormous welts rose off of his skin, almost as if he had two fingertips instead of one.
“Then they were smaller?”
“Yes.”
“How small?”
Through the Nurse, I tried to describe the size of Miss Ku’s calluses but I wasn’t communicating very well. In frustration, the headmaster called for one of his students. A girl of about thirteen trotted over and bowed.
“Myong-chun,” the headmaster told her, “hold out your hands.”
Obediently, she did. The soft skin was distorted by hard lumps at the tips of her fingers.
“Myong-chun is one of our best students,” the headmaster said. “She has been studying the kayagum for six years. How did this woman’s hands compare?”
I studied Myong-chun’s calluses carefully, trying to remember every detail of Miss Ku’s hands. I had seen them in dim light, in the teahouse in Itaewon. Still, I remembered because the ugliness of the calluses had contrasted sharply with the general softness and beauty of her skin.
“The woman we are looking for,” I said, “had calluses on her fingers about twice as big as those of Myong-chun.”
The Nurse translated. The headmaster told Myong-chun to return to her studies. The girl bowed and scurried off.
“Then the woman you are looking for,” the headmaster told us, “is a serious student of the kayagum. Ten years, at least. If she studied that hard, and if she’s as beautiful as you say, she shouldn’t have difficulty finding employment.”
“Where?” I asked.
The headmaster rubbed his chin. “It is difficult to say, but most young women employ the same method to find a job.”
“What’s that?”
He answered using a Korean term that I was unfamiliar with. The Nurse, also, had trouble translating it. After a little discussion, we figured it out.
Miss Ku, like most young female musicians in Seoul, would’ve used a talent agency. An agency organized for the purpose of finding jobs for kisaeng. Kisaeng are the Korean equivalent of Japanese geisha girls, but theirs is an even more ancient art. They play the kayagum, sing, dance, and beat drums, and they have been entertaining royalty for uncounted centuries. Now, of course, they’re reduced to performing for tourists. And Japanese businessmen here on sex tours.
Without prompting from me, the Nurse asked the headmaster for a list of agencies. He said there were only three major ones. He didn’t have their addresses but he gave her the names. The Nurse produced a small notebook from her purse and, her face crinkled in concentration, scribbled down the name of each agency.
We bowed to the headmaster and thanked him.
Ernie complained about being hungry, so we stopped in a noodle shop with a picture of three frolicking eels over the door. I don’t like seafood much, especially if it looks like a snake, so I ordered plain rice with bean curd soup. Ernie and the Nurse both asked for noodles with eel flesh. When the steaming bowls were delivered, they dug in with zest.
Halfway through the meal, the Nurse pointed with her chopsticks into Ernie’s bowl. “Your fish not done.”
“No sweat,” he said.
“No. I send back. Make them cook more.”
She started to call for the waitress but Ernie stopped her. “It’s okay,” he said.
A lot of people stared at us, checking out the Nurse carefully. I didn’t want to ruin her good mood but I couldn’t resist asking, “Aren’t you embarrassed to be seen downtown with two foreigners?”
“No,” she said. “Not at all.”
“But all the women are looking at you,” I said.
“They’re looking at Ernie, too,” she said.
“Yes. They are.”
“That’s because they’re jealous.”
Ernie kept eating.
“They’re jealous because you have an American boyfriend?”
“Sure. American man good. Have money. Most don’t beat up wife.” She waved her chopsticks in a circle above her head. “They’re all very very jealous.”
She smiled and grabbed Ernie’s hand. He jerked it away and reached across the table for more soy sauce.
The first talent agency we visited had closed down. The second allowed us to look through their files, but there was no hint of anyone who matched the description of Miss Ku.
We only had one left.
It was already late afternoon by the time we found it, in the Myongdong District of Seoul, not too far from the huge Cosmos Department Store. Finding the address was not easy, even when we knew we had the right block, because all the buildings were high-rise and there were so many shops and neon signs and barkers with megaphones on the streets that it was difficult to locate the little bronze plaques that gave the names and numbers of the various office buildings.
Finally we climbed a narrow stairway into a foyer with an ancient elevator. The Nurse scanned the directory and pointed.
Heing Song Ki Huik.
The Shooting Star Talent Agency, I told Ernie.
“Rising or falling?”
“We’ll see.”
Upstairs, in the receptionist’s office, the Nurse did all the talking, explaining who we were, what we were after.
Ernie strolled around the small room, studying the publicity photographs of beautiful Korean women in the traditional chima-chogori, embroidered silk dresses. A row of celadon vases sat on pedestals spaced every few feet.
The receptionist was a good-looking young woman and seemed amazed to see foreigners in her office. Soon, she disappeared into a back office and returned with a middle-aged woman in a neatly tailored business suit. She smiled and shook all our hands.
I explained again what we were after and, once again, the Nurse translated. The woman in the business suit shook her head.
“The personal histories of our clients are confidential.”
“We don’t want a personal history,” I said. “We only want to find out where she’s working now.”
“What’s her name?”
“Miss Ku. But it’s probably an alias. If you allow me to look at your booklet of publicity photos, I’m sure I can identify her.”
“I’m so sorry. That’s for client use only.”
The Nurse started to argue with her but the agency owner cut her off.
“You must understand, our ladies are very beautiful, and sometimes people of low education bother them. Old boyfriends. Or Japanese tourists, or-”
Something smashed. Green bits of porcelain exploded into the air. We all swiveled.
It was Ernie. He stood serenely in front of the publicity photos and reached for another frame. With a deft flick of the wrist he hurled it at the next vase in the row.
“Yoboseiyo!” the woman screamed. “Weikurei?” You! What are you doing?
She rushed toward him. The receptionist stood up, eyes frightened, curled fists in front of her mouth.
As calmly as if he were playing Frisbee in a park, Ernie grabbed another picture frame off the wall and hurled it at the lacquered vases. More pottery smashed to the floor. The agency owner grabbed him by the arm and jerked back.
“Tangsin weikurei?” What are you doing?
That was all it took for the Nurse. Someone attacking her Ernie. Her calm face flickered into a mask of rage. She charged forward and belted the elder woman in the ribs. The owner screamed, clutched
her side, and stared at the Nurse in amazement. Before she could react, the Nurse belted her once again, this time in the jaw.
The receptionist ran out from behind her desk and grabbed the Nurse by the shoulders, but she was a frail woman. The Nurse swiveled, elbowing her in the gut, and the receptionist went down.
By now the agency owner was back up, claws bared. She charged the Nurse and grabbed a good handful of her hair. They wrestled back and forth, a match for each other, screaming and shouting curses.
Ernie stood back, arms crossed, grinning. His work done. He loved it when people went crazy. Maybe it was his two tours in Vietnam that did it to him. I don’t know.
I wanted to help the Nurse, but instead I took advantage of the situation and stepped into the back office. Behind a polished mahogany desk was a tinted plate glass window with a magnificent view of downtown Seoul. I didn’t have time to admire it. Instead, I checked through the bookshelves until I found what I was after. Four leather-bound volumes with mug shots of the talented ladies represented by the agency.
I thumbed through the pages quickly, listening to the crashes and shrieks outside. There were men’s voices now. Apparently the front door of the office was open and people from down the hallway had come to find out what was going on.
It seemed to take forever. I flipped through the faces until they became a blur and suddenly I stopped and turned back three pages.
There she was. Her hair piled up and longer than it had been when I’d seen her. Wearing a traditional Korean dress embroidered with white cranes. But it was her, all right. Miss Ku. No one could ever mistake that beautiful smile.
I checked her real name: Choi Yong-ran. Miss Ku must be her stage name. And the name she uses when duping unsuspecting CID agents in Itaewon. Many Koreans change names when they change professions. Especially when the profession is somewhat unsavory. Like being a kisaeng.
It was easier finding her folder in the steel filing cabinet because everything was in order according to the hangul alphabet. Rather than jotting anything down, I just stuck the folder under my coat next to the little snub-nosed. 38.
By now, pandemonium reigned in the front room. Some of the Korean men were arguing with one another, and the Nurse and the agency owner were still locked in a hair-pulling embrace. Ernie stood back out of the way. I nodded to him.
Stepping forward, I whipped out my CID badge. I held it high in the air.
“Nobody move!” I said. “You’re all under arrest!” I pointed at one of the men who seemed to be in the thick of things.
“What’s your name?” I demanded.
He seemed intimidated by the show of authority and pointed with his forefinger to his nose.
“Yes, you,” I said, still using English, figuring it would keep them off-balance. “What’s your name?”
“Hong,” he said.
“Good.” I stepped forward and patted him on the shoulder.
By now Ernie had somehow extricated the Nurse from the agency owner’s grasp. She charged again but Ernie straight-armed her and held her back.
“Mr. Hong, I’m putting you in charge.”
Ernie knew what to do. He thrust the writhing and screaming agency owner into Mr. Hong’s arms.
“Hold her, now,” I said.
He nodded. The enraged woman almost wriggled out of his grasp but another man stepped forward to assist.
Ernie dragged the screaming Nurse out the doorway and down the hallway. Following them, I stopped and turned to the stunned crowd.
“The police will be here any minute. No one move.”
Ernie didn’t bother with the elevator but found the doorway to the stairs and pushed through it. I was right behind him. The Nurse started to calm down, realizing now that disappearing was the wisest course of action. She moved quickly down the cement steps.
“Good thinking, pal,” Ernie said.
“Koreans respect authority,” I answered. “Someone taking charge. And when you spout it out in English, they’re confused. Backs them off for a minute.”
Boots pounded on cement. Coming up toward us. Running.
“The police,” Ernie said.
The Nurse clung to him. The KNP’s would arrest her without questions if they found out what happened.
I shoved past them. “Let me go first.”
When the footsteps were two flights below me, I shouted.
“Kyongchal!” Police.
I rushed down the stairs, holding up my badge. Two young troopers in khaki uniforms stopped when they saw me, both panting heavily.
This time I spoke Korean. “Mipalkun Honbyong,” I said. Eighth Army Military Police. “There’s a crazy woman upstairs on the twelfth floor. Already one person has been attacked. We’re escorting the victim to the hospital now.”
They nodded.
“Hurry! Up to the twelfth floor. What are you waiting for?”
The policemen shoved past me and Ernie and the Nurse.
We trotted downstairs, out the front door, and after sprinting through a couple of alleys, waved down a taxi.
21
Her silk shirt swirled like whirring jade. The beautiful young woman banged away at a circle of suspended drums as if she were trying to disturb the slumber of long-dead kings. As the rhythm increased she twirled ever faster. I thought she’d go mad with dizziness.
Ernie snapped his gum beside me.
“Does she take off her clothes?”
The Nurse elbowed him.
“No, Ernie,” I said. “This is classical Korean kisaeng. The real thing. Ancient arts. These girls are dancers and musicians and poets. Not strippers.”
“So what’s the difference?”
“Jesus. There’s no talking to you.”
We stood in a carpeted hallway. Beyond us spread a ballroom dotted with linen-draped cocktail tables. Leather-upholstered booths lined the walls. A small stage shoved into a corner supported the spinning kisaeng.
The joint was in the brightly lit downtown district of Mukyo-dong. Outside, a hand-carved sign in elegant Chinese script told it all: The House of the Tiger Lady. A kisaeng house. Reserved for the rich.
“This place sucks,” Ernie said.
He despises opulence.
You’re just suspicious of any place that doesn’t have sawdust on the floors,” I said.
No one had noticed us yet. Elegant young women, wearing the traditional Korean chima-chogori-long, billowing skirts and short, loose-sleeved tunics-paraded across the room like brightly colored flowers of pink and red and sky blue, bowing and serving the men in the audience. All the customers were Korean businessmen in expensive suits. Not a foreigner in the crowd. Not even a Japanese.
The folder I had pilfered from the Shooting Star Talent Agency confirmed my suspicion that Choi Yong-ran- alias, Miss Ku-wasn’t what she’d claimed to be. She had graduated from middle school but after that, instead of her continuing on to high school, her family had enrolled her in a music training conservatory. Forget college. Despite what she’d told us in the teahouse in Itaewon, she was no more a graduate of Ewha University than I was an Ivy Leaguer with a trust fund.
After finishing up at the music conservatory, she landed a few jobs as a kisaeng and most recently the gig at the House of the Tiger Lady.
The folder didn’t tell me much about her personal life. Just the names of her parents-her father deceased-and the fact that she had been born and raised in Kyong-sang Province, outside the city of Miryang, a predominantly rural area 180 miles southeast of Seoul.
Now she was here, playing the kayagum in front of wealthy men. A long way from the rice paddies of home.
A tall woman on the other side of the ballroom caught my eye. A magnificent lavender gown embroidered with white cranes flowed down her body. She stared right at us and barked a couple of orders to two girls who also looked at us but quickly turned away. The woman, smiling and bowing to one of the customers, excused herself and made her way around the back of the crowd, heading toward us.
“Good.”
The Nurse clung tighter to Ernie. Despite her protestations about not feeling self-conscious when accompanied by two foreigners, I could tell she felt out of place in Mukyo-dong. This was the most elegant district of Seoul. Here, upscale shops and lavishly dressed women and boutiques sported the latest in Paris fashions. The Nurse’s plain dress and straight hairstyle made her stand out, especially in the Tiger Lady’s kisaeng house.
I turned to Ernie. “Any of these girls look like Miss Ku?”
“Not so far.”
The young woman finished her drum solo to thunderous applause. Stage curtains closed. The serving kisaeng poured the men more scotch, and while they conversed we backed deeper into the shadows. Ernie gazed down the hallway.
“Plenty of rooms. Convenient.”
“Cost you an arm and a leg, though.”
“Hey, what’s money?”
I knew it. Once he gave the place a chance, he started to like it. Ernie was a sawdust kind of guy but if he ever inherited a million dollars, he’d develop expensive tastes fast enough.
When the woman in lavender appeared at the mouth of the hallway she spread her long red nails and looked as if she longed to scratch our eyes out.
“Weikurei?” she demanded. “What you do here?”
A little English. She hasn’t always catered to Koreans, I thought.
I pulled out my badge and flashed it in front of her face.
“I’m looking for a young woman,” I said. “Police business.”
She examined the badge and then me, trying to decide whether to listen or kick our butts out. Ernie crossed his arms, leaned forward, and peeked out at the crowd, letting her know she’d have trouble if she didn’t deal.
She looked the Nurse up and down, the beginnings of a sneer visible on her lips. The Nurse stood up straighter and held her head up. Defiant.
“You must be the Tiger Lady,” I said.
“What you want?”
“Like I said. A young lady.” I strummed on an imaginary flat surface with wriggling fingers. “She plays the kayagum.”
Before she could answer, the curtains reopened. Three women, dressed in flowing Korean dresses, sat on an elevated platform with stringed instruments in front of their crossed knees. They bowed their heads. Hair as black as raven feathers was tied back tightly by large jade pins. Behind them wavered a painted scene on a canvas backdrop of gently rolling hills, gurgling springs, and groves of blossoming plum trees. The women raised their heads and in perfect unison began to pluck the taut strings of the three flat wooden kayagum. A high-pitched wail rose from their crimson mouths.