Mr. Kill

by Martin Limon

  Inspector Kill’s plan, however, didn’t take into account the possibility that if Parkwood was on this train, he might harm someone—particularly Marnie—before we reached Taejon. Ernie and I felt that we couldn’t wait any longer. We started our search.

  For the moment, we didn’t check the rear baggage compartment. We wanted to check the people in their seats first. Ernie waited at the end of each passenger car, ready to provide cover, while I walked down the center aisle, slowly working my way forward. I took my time, making sure that Parkwood wasn’t lying in between two seats or hadn’t ducked down to avoid us.

  Was he carrying a weapon? I doubted it. Not firearms, at least. In Korea, there’s no such thing as a convenient gun shop to stop in and pick yourself up a Saturday night special. If Parkwood were armed, it would be with a knife or a club or a straight razor. Still, since Parkwood not only kept himself in good shape but had also proven himself to be ruthless, we had to be careful.

  The Korean passengers stared up at me curiously as I passed. Some of the men frowned. Occasionally, a woman smiled. For the most part, I was glanced at and then ignored.

  In the third car forward from the rear, there were a few American passengers. Some of them were reading, some of them trying to catch some shut-eye. None of them was Parkwood. One was a private first class wearing his khaki uniform, munching on the contents of a can of potato sticks. A brown leather briefcase was handcuffed to his wrist. I sat down.

  “You the courier?”

  He nodded to me, mouth open, lips still moist with flakes of pulverized potato. His name tag said Arguello.

  “De donde eres?” I asked him. Where you from?

  He told me. Someplace in Texas.

  I described Parkwood to him. He said he hadn’t seen anyone like that.

  “Were you watching?” I asked.

  He shook his head warily. “No. This is a pretty boring job. I just read.” He glanced at a stack of comic books.

  “Okay, partner,” I said, rising to my feet. “Don’t overdo the potato sticks.”

  Ernie and I continued to search the train.

  We worked our way through the three rear passenger cars until we reached the dining car. I found the head cook and explained the situation to him; he claimed he’d seen no American man who matched the description I gave him. By now, the conductor had gotten wind of what we were up to, and he joined us. I showed him my badge and explained why we were here. He nodded gravely. They’d already been notified by the KNPs that two American detectives would be on the train.

  I asked him if he’d seen anyone who matched Parkwood’s description. He said he couldn’t be sure. There were a number of Americans scattered throughout the train, and he really hadn’t paid much attention. The only Americans who were attracting attention were the tall blonde and the small girl sitting up front in passenger car number two.

  “When did you last see them?” I asked in Korean.

  “Only five minutes ago,” he replied.

  “Are they all right?”

  “Fine. Except the little girl doesn’t like guava juice.”

  “Can’t blame her for that,” Ernie said, understanding what the conductor said.

  * * *

  We continued to search the train. The bathrooms were located at the end of each car, near the door that led to the open-air walkway. We checked each one. If it was occupied, we lingered until it was vacated, just to make sure that Parkwood wasn’t hiding inside. After all, he’d used a Blue Train bathroom as the venue for his first outrage.

  There was no doubt now that we’d passed the summit of the Sobaik Mountains. The train was visibly tilted downward, and at times it swerved to the right and to the left as it navigated treacherous terrain. Rain spattered the windows.

  Oh, great, I thought. Just what we need. Another complication.

  Finally, we entered Marnie’s car. She and Casey were easy to spot. A patch of blonde and a wisp of brown in the midst of monotonous rows of straight black hair. When we reached her row, I knelt and said hello. Casey’s brown locks were puffed into a curly bouffant. She stared at me with bright, amber-tinted eyes.

  “I’ll be damned,” Marnie said. “What are you doing here?”

  I tipped an imaginary cowboy hat. “Just providing service, ma’am.”

  “You think I can’t take care of myself?”

  “I know you can take care of yourself. But the Eighth Army honchos think you’re just a helpless flower of the prairie.”

  “‘Flower of the prairie.’ I like that. Make a good country song.”

  She twisted in her seat. Ernie, standing in the back, grinned and waved at her.

  “Oh God,” Marnie said, rubbing her temples.

  “Who’s that, Mommy?” Casey asked.

  “Never mind, honey. You boys aren’t going to be hanging around us, are you?”

  “No. We’re just walking through the train, doing our routine security check. And when we get to Seoul, we have to escort you to the hotel.”

  “Like hell.”

  “Eighth Army will provide a sedan.”

  “With a driver?”

  “The best.”

  Marnie Orville didn’t like risking her life in a speeding tin-can taxicab any more than anyone else did.

  “In that case,” she said, smiling, “I accept.”

  “If you need anything, you just whistle,” I said.

  Marnie pointed her forefinger at me as if it were a pistol and winked. “You got it.”

  I waved good-bye to Casey. She waved back.

  Ernie and I finished checking the passenger cars. No sign of Parkwood. Up ahead, a locked metal door was marked Chulip Kumji. No Admittance. Even on this side, the big engines vibrated.

  “Parkwood’s not on the train,” Ernie said.

  “Maybe not,” I said. “But we haven’t checked everywhere.”

  “Not up here,” Ernie said.

  I stared at the locked metal door. “No. And we still need to look at the rear storage compartment. And behind that, there’s a caboose.”

  “That’s for the crew, isn’t it? Their break room.”

  “Maybe so. I’m not sure. Let’s find out.”

  We marched steadily back down the aisles, smiling at Marnie and Casey as we passed. On the way, we policed up the conductor and told him what we wanted. He accompanied us to the rear of the train.

  The rain was coming down harder now, and on either side of us rice paddies had started to appear, along with the occasional tile-roofed farmhouse. Taejon wouldn’t be far now.

  The conductor led us to the storage compartment. As we entered, two older men in blue smocked uniforms stood to their feet. They were skinny men but wiry, and the conductor spoke to them respectfully, asking if there’d been any foreigners back here during this run. They shook their heads but were cooperative when Ernie and I asked to search the car anyway. Packages and crates were stacked neatly on rows of wooden shelving. Ernie and I checked under and behind them. Nothing. We asked to be shown the caboose. It was empty except for some communications equipment and what the conductor told me was an emergency generator, to be used if the train were ever stranded in a snowy mountain pass and had to create its own electricity. Again, there was no sign of Parkwood. Just to be sure, Ernie stepped out on the rear platform. Once there, he stared at the track behind us, raised both arms in the air, and said, “My friends and fellow Americans!”

  “What the hell are you doing, Ernie?”

  “Harry Truman started this way, didn’t he?”

  “Come on. Let’s check on Marnie.”

  Before we reached the dining car, we heard screams. Female screams. Then we were running, and the high-pitched woman’s voice became more distinct. I recognized it immediately.

  Marnie Orville.

  19

  “She’s gone!” Marnie screamed when we reached her car. “Casey’s gone!”

  I checked the seat. Marnie was right. No sign of her daughter Casey.

  �
�Calm down,” I said. “Tell me what happened.”

  People were standing, kneeling on their seats or milling in the aisles, keeping a respectful distance from the tall, blonde, hysterical woman.

  “I went to the bathroom,” Marnie said. “Just for a minute. I tried to take Casey with me, but she refused. Said it was too stinky. She can be stubborn when she wants to be, and I didn’t want her to make a scene. So I left her here and told her not to budge an inch from that seat.”

  And then Marnie was crying, her words indecipherable now. I should have warned her that Parkwood might be on the train, but at the time I hadn’t wanted to alarm her. A mistake. But too late now.

  I turned to the Korean passengers staring at us. “Did anyone see anything?” I asked in Korean. “Did you see where the little girl went?”

  People looked at one another. One woman finally spoke up.

  “I think she got out of her seat and went that way.” She pointed toward the front of the train.

  “No!” another passenger said vehemently. “She went that way,” she insisted, pointing toward the rear. “I thought she was going to join her mother.”

  “Yes.” Many people nodded, agreeing with the second woman, maybe because she was older.

  I grabbed Marnie by her shoulders. “Look at me. Was this the first time you’d gone to the bathroom without her?”

  Marnie looked away.

  “Don’t be ashamed. I need facts.”

  “No,” she said. “Casey hated those bathrooms. She didn’t like squatting down over the little toilet in the floor and she didn’t like the fact that they were always out of toilet paper. She wouldn’t go unless she was about to pee in her pants.”

  “So she’d been left alone before at some time during this train ride?”

  Marnie nodded meekly. Then her body shuddered as if she had suddenly remembered something. She straightened her back and knocked my hands off her shoulders.

  “Why are you interrogating me? Accusing me of not being a good mother? You should be searching for Casey. Search, goddamn you! Search!”

  I hadn’t been accusing her of being a poor mother, but this wasn’t the time to argue.

  “Ernie, you go to the front,” I said. “I’ll go to the back.”

  Ernie nodded.

  I started off toward the rear. Without being asked, the conductor followed me.

  By now the train was slowing and we were pulling into Taejon Station. I had already reached the rear. No sign of Casey. We’d checked every bathroom along the way and burst into the baggage compartment and searched once again. I’d even checked the wooden crates, pulling on them quickly, to see if they could be pried open. No luck. The caboose and the back platform were similarly empty.

  I turned and ran back toward the front. Crossing from one car to another, I bumped into Ernie.

  “Nothing up front,” he said.

  “Nor back here. Let’s check on Marnie.”

  We ran down the aisles. The brakes of the big engine were catching now and steam hissed out of the sides of the train. Passengers stood, locating their bags in the overhead compartments.

  “Did you check the overheads?”

  “Yes. She’s not there, unless somebody stuffed her into a freaking suitcase.”

  “Even that we’ll have to check,” I said.

  Inspector Kill and maybe a couple of squads of KNPs would be waiting for us on the platform. I turned to the conductor. “We’ll have to check all luggage,” I said in haste and in a state of near panic. Just then, the train jerked and the brakes hissed louder than ever.

  We entered Marnie’s car. I sprinted forward. When I stopped, Ernie bumped into me. We both stared at an empty seat. I turned to the people around me.

  “Where is she?” I asked.

  In reply, I received a lot of blank looks. I repeated the question in Korean.

  People shook their heads. They hadn’t been watching her. An elderly man stepped forward.

  “I’m not sure where she went,” he told me. “But I noticed after you left that she searched in her daughter’s traveling bag. She pulled out a piece of paper, like a note, and unfolded it and read it. It was pink paper with a drawing on it for children. Shortly after that, she picked up her bag and left.”

  The train shuddered to a halt. People started filing toward the doors. I wiped steam off the window and stared outside. No sign of the KNPs. Inspector Kill was probably farther back, keeping his men hidden, waiting for Parkwood to make a move. And then I saw her, carrying an overnight bag slung over her shoulder. Her head was down, and she moved through the crowd quickly.

  “There she is!” I shouted.

  Ernie peered out the window. “She’s alone.”

  We ran toward the front of the car. A man in greasestained overalls was hurrying down the aisle toward us. He shouted at the conductor. We stopped. Apparently he was one of the engineers who worked up front.

  “We heard about the missing child,” he said to the conductor, speaking rapid Korean. “I’m not sure what it means, but I thought I would tell you. When one of our young assistants came out back, just after we left Taegu, a foreigner slipped in with us up there. He smiled and acted very friendly and used sign language to indicate that he was interested in the engines and how we conducted our business. Occasionally people come up there and if they don’t cause too much trouble we let them watch. And also, he was a foreigner, and who knew how he’d react if we told him to leave. Maybe it was a mistake, but we let him stay.”

  The conductor nodded. I wanted to tell the engineer to get to the point but knew that my interruption would only slow things down. The engineer continued.

  “He stayed up there with us the entire ride. Finally, he came out, back here, and when he returned he pounded on the door and we let him back in. This time, he had a foreign girl with him and he acted like he wanted to show her the engine and the controls and such, but she seemed frightened and just stared at the ground. He laughed and tried to coax her into having fun, but she would have none of it. Finally, just before we pulled into Taejon, he opened the door, peeked outside, and then pulled the girl out with him, almost running.”

  “Where did he go?” I asked.

  “Onto the platform. After that, who knows?”

  Outside, there was no sign of Marnie. And no sign of Parkwood, and no sign of Casey.

  I went to the train station’s KNP office and asked for Inspector Kill; but instead of helping me contact him as I expected, the officers on duty acted strangely reluctant.

  “What’s wrong?” I asked in Korean. “Inspector Kill said he’d be here, waiting, with police officers to help us.”

  “He will be along,” one of them said.

  More entreaties yielded no further information.

  Ernie and I walked toward the center of the open lobby of the huge domed station. “What’s going on?” Ernie asked. “It’s almost as if they’re trying to help him.”

  “Yeah. Parkwood with Casey in tow would’ve been easy to spot. Even by a rookie cop. They should’ve collared him before he took ten steps off the train.”

  “How the hell did he pull it off?” Ernie asked.

  “Parkwood suspected that we, or somebody, would be on the train searching for him. After he made it from Kuangju to Taegu, he bought a ticket; and shortly after boarding the train, he bullied his way into the engineer’s compartment.”

  Americans have a strange power in Korea. People know that we helped them during the war, and they know that their self-defense and economic growth are dependent on American wealth and American military might, so they treat us with great tolerance. G.I.s are like 300-pound gorillas that wander into genteel front parlors. Everyone knows that the burly primate won’t cause too much trouble as long as he’s fed bananas, kept well diapered, and allowed to do whatever the hell he wants to do.

  “So Parkwood waited up front until the train had almost reached Taejon,” Ernie said. “Then he came out, snatched Casey, and left a note of som
e kind for Marnie.”

  “Right. While we were searching the train, she read the note, and it probably told her to meet him someplace and come alone.”

  Ernie looked around. “So why in hell isn’t Inspector Kill here?”

  Just as he said that, a squad of uniformed KNPs entered the front door of the station. Ahead of them, wearing a suit and a long brown raincoat, strode Inspector Gil Kwon-up.

  Ernie crossed his arms and glared sullenly at Kill.

  “Sorry I’m late, gentlemen,” Inspector Kill said when he reached us, but, strangely enough, he was smiling.

  “Parkwood took off,” I told him, “with the little girl Casey and Marnie Orville, the mother, following. We don’t know where they are.”

  “Why are you late?” Ernie asked.

  “Unforeseen circumstances,” Kill said.

  Ernie studied him. “So why are you so happy?”

  “Because,” he said, “the stewardess on the Blue Train is a very observant and astute young woman.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “She found this, she gave it to the conductor, and the conductor gave it to one of our representatives.” Between his thumb and his forefinger, Kill was holding a folded piece of pink paper. “And now,” Kill said ceremoniously, “I present it to you.”

  Ernie snatched the note out of his hand, unfolded it, read it, and handed it to me.

  A fat-cheeked kitten smiled out of one corner. The note was scribbled in English: “Come alone. Casey’s with me. Bathhouse number three on the Gapcheon River.”

  I handed the note back to Kill. “Where’s that?”

  “A resort area, north of the city.”

  “Do you have transportation?”

  “Waiting,” he said, waving his arm toward the front of the station. “At your service.”