by Martin Limon
The pot he had been puttering with must’ve been done. He poured some of the potion into a thick cup. He leaned forward and inhaled, testing it, pleased. Sloshing it around to rinse the cup, he tossed the rest of it on the ground and poured a new cup to the brim. He held it out to me.
“You have been through a lot tonight, Agent Sueño. For that I apologize. Here, drink this. And sit down. You will find a bench over there.”
He motioned into the darkness. I took the cup from him, walked over to the bench, and sat.
Ernie followed, keeping a few feet away from me, heavy tongs still at the ready.
“What is it?” I asked Herbalist So, indicating my cup.
“A concoction of herbs. Designed to restore the harmony of the yin and the yang.”
I held the cup to my nose and breathed deeply. The liquid smelled of ancient things decayed and rotting in the earth.
Herbalist So walked out from behind his pots and sat down on another bench opposite me, ignoring Ernie. Ernie didn’t mind. He kept his eyes moving, studying the darkness, expecting more slicky boys to spring out at us at any moment.
At first, Herbalist So kept his back ramrod straight. Then he leaned forward.
“Balance is the key to everything we do. To our health and to our ‘slicky boy’ operation, as you call it.”
“What does ‘balance’ have to do with thievery?”
He sat back up. “You are bold, Agent Sueño. They told me that you were but now I see for myself.”
“A man named Cecil Whitcomb,” I said, “a soldier in the British Army, was killed in Namdaemun. Slaughtered by a man expert in the use of the knife. Were you, or any of the men who work for you, involved in his murder?”
Herbalist So seemed amused by the question. “And if I said no, would you believe me?”
I shrugged. “I will believe the facts.”
“Wisely said.”
I looked into his big eyes. Half-moon lids slid lazily over them, as if he were a lizard with a full belly, about to fall asleep. The steam from the cup drifted into my nostrils. I held the cup away.
“Then tell me the facts,” I said.
He set his elbows on his knees and clasped his hands.
“After the war everyone was desperate. People, especially children, were starving in the streets. You Americans did some charitable things, I’ll grant you that—much more than the Japanese would’ve done—but still your compounds were loaded with wealth. Food, heating fuel, clothing, medical supplies. All the things we desperately lacked. It was a matter of balance, you see. You had too much and we had too little.”
“So you took the partisan organization that your father left you and started raiding the American bases?”
“It wasn’t quite that simple. Like everyone else, our little band had been ravaged by the war. But we had some expertise and, above all, daring. We found likely young boys and put them through a conditioning and training program. Fed them well. Outfitted them with the proper clothing and tools, and sent them forth.”
“But you also sent them armed with information,” I said.
Herbalist So laughed softly. “Quite. Help from the inside is the only way to keep an operation such as ours productive in the long term.”
“And you didn’t become greedy. You only took as much as you figured the Americans could afford to lose.”
“Exactly. Greed, of course, would have destroyed the balance.”
“But occasionally someone did get greedy and had to be disciplined.”
“It was sometimes necessary. Unfortunate, but necessary.”
“Was the murder of Cecil Whitcomb part of your disciplining process?”
Herbalist So stared directly into my eyes. I felt it then. The intelligence, the determination, the power that was in them. And the ruthlessness. I fought back a wave of fear.
“No,” he said.
He stood and walked back to his simmering pots. Ernie paced nervously. Herbalist So adjusted some of the earthen jars over the small flames and shoved fuel beneath others. Smoke from the dry twigs watered my eyes.
“You should drink your tea,” Herbalist So said. “It restores balance.”
“Fuck your tea,” Ernie said.
Herbalist So stared at him. “Yes. Quite.” He nodded. Keeping his eyes on Ernie, he spoke to me.
“We did know Cecil Whitcomb,” he said. “When he started his amateurish campaign, we were informed about it immediately. I hoped, at first, that he’d stop on his own. His methods were crude. They attracted too much attention. When he didn’t stop, we had a . . . talk with him.”
“You brought him down here?”
“Heavens, no. He did not rate such a thing. We talked to him on the compound. One of your own contract security guards had a little chat with him. No.” Mr. So shook his head. “We didn’t bring Mr. Whitcomb down here. You are the first foreigners to have such an honor.”
And the last, I thought, but I didn’t say it. Now that we knew the secret, how could they let us go?
Herbalist So glanced over at me, a wry smile raising the edge of his mouth. I was afraid to ask him what was so funny. I knew it must be my fear.
“We thought reason would work with Mr Whitcomb. But apparently he had little regard for the warnings of us Koreans. When he continued, we were obliged to use more forceful methods.”
He walked back over to the bench, carrying another cup of tea, and sat down opposite me again.
“The British bruise easily,” he said.
I didn’t answer. He shook his head.
“Still, Mr. Whitcomb persisted. An obstinate little devil. Tough. Almost as poor as us when he was growing up. In a way, I admired him. If he’d been Korean I might have given him some training and turned him loose. But I could not do that. So we were in quite a quandary. What to do?”
He spread his hands.
I wanted to ask where in the hell he learned all this English. He was a scholar, certainly. A man who remembered things. But still, he would’ve needed to practice. I thought of the Korean magazines I thumbed through occasionally, the ones with businessmen in photos with American and European wheelers and dealers. I tried to imagine Herbalist So in a suit, his hair properly brushed. He’d fit right in. All the years he’d been making money off of the U.S. compounds, he must have accumulated a fortune. He would’ve had to invest it, take on a second life. Above ground. For years his organization was one of the top producers of income in the country. His money had helped rebuild the devastated Korean economy. Helped the Koreans climb back into international markets. I was tempted to ask about all this but I fought the urge. My survival, I knew, depended on not knowing any more than I had to.
“When we heard about Mr. Whitcomb’s death,” Herbalist So said, “we were saddened. Yes, it is true. And quite concerned. Our operation has always run on an unwritten contract of mutual trust. The tenets of that contract are simple. We do not take too much and no one gets hurt. Now, someone had been hurt. We knew you Americans would be upset. And rightfully so.”
“And so you started your own investigation?”
“Yes. Of course your name was brought up immediately. And that of your partner, Agent Bascom.” He shook his head. ‘Tour violent behavior at the Kayagum Teahouse was the real clue. You really frightened the owner. She did remember you mentioning the name of a woman who works at the United Nations Club. That led us to that charming young lady, Eun-hi.”
“You talked to Eun-hi?”
“Not me personally. One of my representatives spoke to her.”
“What did she tell him?”
“About fingers.”
“What?”
“Attractive young ladies notice things about one another. When Eun-hi was approached by this ‘Miss Ku,’ they chatted for a while and Eun-hi saw’ that Miss Ku’s manicure was in poor repair. The nails too short. Unsightly lumps of hardened skin at the tips of her fingers.”
“Calluses.”
“Yes. Eun-hi, not being very
diplomatic, mentioned it, and Miss Ku explained that she played the kayagum professionally.”
I thought I heard the sharp twang of the strings of the kayagum, an ancient Korean instrument similar to a zither. But other than the sputter of the bubbling pots, the chamber was silent. The sound must’ve been generated by my overheated imagination. Or by my taut nerves.
“Well, that’s all the information one needs really,” Herbalist So said. “An attractive young lady, on an unsavory mission, who is also a professional musician. Seoul is a huge city, over eight million souls, but that narrows down the search considerably. Investigators as talented as you and Agent Bascom here should have had no trouble finding her.” Herbalist So shook his head again. “Too bad you decided instead to Waste your time disrupting our operation.”
“It got your attention, didn’t it?” Ernie said.
Herbalist So nodded, surprised that Ernie had said something to him without using a cuss word. “It most certainly did.” He pointed to the cup in my hand. “You must drink, Agent Sueño. It will help.”
“Help what?” I asked.
“You will go to sleep. Everything will be quite painless.”
Ernie inched closer to Herbalist So. The shadows behind the flickering pots shifted.
“We drink that shit you brewed,” Ernie said, “it knocks us out, and we never wake up. Is that the idea?”
“Not exactly. You will wake up. Wake up somewhere other than here.”
Ernie stepped back. “You ain’t putting me back in that canvas.”
Herbalist So shrugged. “You brought it upon yourselves.”
I felt the same way Ernie did. There was no way I was going to drink this foul potion and there was no way they were going to put me back in the canvas. Besides, how could we be sure that Herbalist So was telling the truth? How could we be sure that we’d wake up at all?
While I was working this out, Ernie surprised me. He let out a slow puff of air. “Okay,” he said. “Where’s my cup?
Using a polite Korean gesture, Herbalist So held the tea out to him with both hands. Ernie reached for the hot potion but instead of grabbing it, his fingers flicked forward.
He slapped the burning liquid into the face of the King of the Slicky Boys.
18
HERBALIST SO SPUTTERED AND BELLOWED IN RAGE, wiping the steaming broth from his eyes.
“Sikkya!” Born of a beast!
Shadows emerged from the far wall. Bodyguards. I expected that. Herbalist So wouldn’t be here with us alone, although he wanted to give that appearance.
Ernie kicked over a few of the bubbling vats, grabbed an earthen jar, and flung it at the approaching slicky boys. They jumped back from the boiling spray.
“Come on, you bastards!” Ernie yelled. “I’m ready for you.”
I grabbed him by the arm and pulled. He jerked away.
“Why not fight ‘em here? There’s no escape from this place.”
“There might be,” I said. “Come on.”
We burst through the beaded curtain and, instead of heading back to the chamber where we had encountered the Chinese woman, followed the drifting smoke toward the tunnel with the rusty railroad tracks.
Behind us there was much commotion and cursing. Apparently the bodyguards were helping Herbalist So to his feet, figuring they had plenty of time to deal with us.
Herbalist So, still enraged, hollered orders. All of which amounted to the Korean version of “After them!”
I slowed and grabbed one of the oil lamps. I motioned for Ernie to do the same.
I had a hunch about this particular tunnel. Smoke drifted into it and the smoke had to go somewhere. Apparently the tunnel hadn’t been used for a’ while; that might be a good sign. The slicky boys wouldn’t think about it as a possible escape route.
There had to be some way out of this dungeon. Whether we could find it before the slicky boys caught us, that was another question.
The old mining cart was enormous, made of cast iron. I would’ve liked to have examined it, see if it was smelted here in Korea or in Japan, but there wasn’t time.
The tunnel itself was pitch black and just big enough to accommodate the cart. Holding the lamp in front of me, I stepped up on the old tracks and stood forward.
Ernie didn’t. “I’m not going in there,” he said.
I turned. “We have no choice. You pissed them off now.” I motioned at the smoke wafting past us. “If there’s a way out of this joint, this is it.”
Footsteps clattered in the outer passageway. The slicky boys had already discovered that we hadn’t returned to the Chinese woman’s sitting room, but had foolishly delved deeper into the catacombs. Their voices grew louder.
Ernie asked, “Are there any rats in there?”
“No way,” I said.
He swallowed, then followed me into the darkness.
The lamps helped at first. The ceiling was so low that we had to bend at the waist to avoid clunking our heads into low-hanging clumps of granite. A trickle of water seeped from the rock walls. Darting through the air toward us, a bat veered off at the last second. Ernie covered his face with his forearm but kept moving forward.
Was I frightened? You’re damn right I was. But now that Ernie had insulted Herbalist So, and they had us down here in this dungeon, and nobody else in the world knew we were here, and we’d already proven that we were going to be the worst thorn in their side they’d ever experienced, their decision about what to do with Ernie and me would be easy. Do away with the troublemakers.
And if nobody ever found our bodies, what would the honchos at 8th Army think? That we’d deserted? That we’d finally given vent to our real desires and become part of the underground scene in Itaewon?
Probably. They’d believe whatever was convenient. Anything would be better than dealing with the embarrassing proposition that we might have been murdered by the slicky boys, whose existence they didn’t even acknowledge. And we were officially off the Whitcomb case. That would be the water they’d use to wash their hands of us.
The voices at the mouth of the tunnel grew nearer. They’d realized where we were. Probably from the flickering light of our oil lamps. A Korean word was bandied about. Hyuu-juh. Fuse.
The tunnel was dropping slightly downhill. This surprised me. I had expected it to rise, to reach the surface. How else had a draft been created that drew the smoke?
No sense worrying about it now. We kept moving.
Sweat dripped from my face. Although it was cold as hell in the tunnel, the exertion and the tension were causing me to overheat. Ernie was in good shape, I knew, but behind me he too breathed heavily.
Something rumbled. The cavern trembled.
At first I thought it was an earthquake. Metal creaked. The rumbling returned, steady now, like low rolling thunder. Then I realized what it was.
The mining cart.
Ernie stumbled and cursed. “Jesus H. Christ! They’re rolling the fucking cart down here.”
I searched the shadowy walls. No openings. There hadn’t been any since we entered this tunnel. The cart took up every inch of space. There’d be no way to avoid it when it reached us, which it would do in seconds. We’d be run over. Crushed. “Keep moving forward,” I told Ernie. “It’s our only chance.”
And although I was bending at the knees, hobbling like Quasimodo tending his bells, I started to run. I felt Ernie’s hot breath on my neck.
My right foot slammed into something. Pain shot up my leg. I stumbled forward, arms out, dropping the lamp, and splashed face-first into slime. My lamp sizzled, then sputtered out.
Ernie tripped over my feet and crashed down on top of me. Wriggling free of him, I raised my head out of the scum-filled water, gasping for breath. At first I thought my eyes were covered with mud, but when I reached up and rubbed them I found that my face was clear. Now that both lamps had been snuffed out, we were in almost total darkness.
I stared back down toward the mouth of the tunnel. Nothing. Only t
he huge silhouette of the ancient mining cart, rumbling relentlessly toward us.
Flesh thudded into flesh. I reached for Ernie, felt his hands flailing wildly. He was slapping himself.-
“Rats!” he yelled. “Fucking rats!”
“They won’t hurt you.” I stood and pulled him. forward. “Come on. We have to move! The cart.”
He came to his senses and followed me forward.
The tunnel was rising now. The pool of scum had been its low point, moisture and filth accumulated from decades of stagnation.
The darkness was maddening. Since I couldn’t see the overhanging rocks, I leaned forward as I ran, grasping the track rails with my slimy hands, pulling myself ever onward.
But no matter how fast we moved the rumbling of the mining cart kept growing nearer. And faster.
A blade slashed into my eyes. I dropped to the ground and rolled, covering my face with my arms, trying to escape the pain.
Within seconds I was moving forward again. So was Ernie. And when I uncovered my eyes I realized what had happened.
Somebody’d found the fuse box they were talking about and a long string of lightbulbs, stretching in front of and behind us, had been switched on.
Ahead about twenty yards, loomed a wall of stone. Dead end.
I willed my eyes to focus, searching for a means of escape. Two-by-fours were bolted up against the end of the tunnel. Bumpers:
I figured it out. The mining cart had been designed to be rolled down the tunnel and carried by its own momentum up the incline, where it slammed into the splintered lumber.
Not good.
The mining cart was moving so fast now that even the rising tracks wouldn’t slow it down. There were no hollowed spaces in the wall, no escape hatches.
Ernie and I were about to be crushed by two tons of rolling metal.
When we were about ten yards from the end of the tunnel, the cart splashed into the pond of scum behind us. By now, my eyes had adjusted to the harsh light and I was able to make out the outlines of a ladder against the far wall. Maybe there was some hope after all.
Reaching for the ladder, I scrambled up and saw the square outlines of a trapdoor in the roof. I shoved upward. The door groaned but wouldn’t budge.