by D. B. John
But Mrs. Moon was staring into the flames behind the small glass grille of the stove, watching the flyers blacken and curl.
Something in those words had sent her back through time. A lifetime had passed since she’d heard that name, fifty years at least. Our Lord Jesus Christ … A name erased from history. Suddenly the memory opened like a secret drawer: her mother and a group of grown-ups in a room with the door and window closed, and a verse being read from a big, heavy book, and a candle lit, and words chanted in unison. And singing. Quiet, soft singing.
A lamb goes uncomplaining forth, the guilt of all men bearing …
From long habit she pushed the memory back into the dark, and locked it away with all the others. She turned to her husband, who had covered his face with his hands.
“No one will know,” she said.
She opened the front door and stepped out into the cold. The sky blazed with stars, and there, low in the west above the mountains, was the comet, bright with two tails.
3
Annandale, Virginia
Jenna’s mother still lived in the house where Jenna and her sister had grown up. The row of faded clapboard bungalows was set back from a road lined with mature horse chestnuts. The front lawn was neglected and strewn with leaves, but the flag hung from its pole, the pride of a first-generation American.
Han’s plumpish figure was at the front door as Jenna’s car pulled into the drive. She was wearing her Jeju Island souvenir apron and had on a new fuchsia-pink lipstick, which, with her bubble perm, made her resemble a potted flower. Jenna stooped to kiss her and caught a waft of frangipani.
“You’re as thin as a chopstick,” Han said, cupping Jenna’s face with both hands. She examined her daughter for a moment, as if looking for clues—a new outfit, a greater care taken in the styling of her hair, the application of some makeup—that might signify whether she was happy, or, more to the point, was dating someone.
The house was filled with the complex aromas of grilled beef and something caramelized and gingery.
“Omma, smells wonderful,” Jenna said. She went through to the small dining room. “You shouldn’t have gone to such …”
Suddenly her suspicions were on high alert.
The table was laid for three. The best china and tablecloth were out, and a dozen colorful banchan dishes of bean sprouts, kimchi, spinach, toasted seaweed, and tiny fried fish were arranged in a neat array. When she saw the chilled bottle of soju on the sideboard—alcohol was seldom allowed in the house—she knew she’d walked into a trap.
“Sweetheart … ?” Han had taken off the apron, revealing a stylish blouse and a too-tight skirt. She had hoicked her face into her hostess smile and was looking over her daughter’s shoulder into the living room. Jenna turned.
A man of about forty was standing at the far end of the room next to the cherrywood table with the family photographs. He bowed to her, revealing a bald patch.
“It’s my pleasure to meet you, Jee-min-yang,” he said.
Jenna flinched.
“This is Sung Chung-hee,” Han said in a high, affected voice. “He has a real estate brokerage in Fairfax.” She took Jenna’s hand and led her toward him. “He’s kindly agreed to value the house today.”
“On a Sunday?”
“I’ve told Dr. Sung he’s welcome to stay for lunch.” Han addressed people as “doctor” if she thought they needed buttering up. In a stage whisper she said, “I knew Sung-nim’s aunt in Seoul; his younger brother is an account executive for Samsung Electronics.”
“I’d be delighted,” the man said, “if it is agreeable to Jee-min-yang.” He spoke the Korean of the homeland, not the sloppy second-generation language Jenna habitually spoke at home, peppered with English and slang. No one but her mother called her Jee-min.
A hiss of hot fat came from the direction of the kitchen.
“Do excuse me,” Han said, turning the hostess smile to a higher watt. “I must check on lunch. Jee-min, why don’t you show Dr. Sung the house?”
She’s timed this perfectly, Jenna thought.
In a silence Jenna made no effort to fill, the man’s fingers fidgeted, as if needing to smoke. He occupied them by removing his glasses and wiping them in a handkerchief.
“Your mother tells me you have an English basement apartment in Georgetown. Must be a small place for a high rent.”
“I earn a living, Mr. Sung, and my cat takes up no space.”
She hadn’t used the honorific form required, but he seemed not to notice. Instead he smiled, as if given a cue.
“Soon, maybe, you’ll need a home with plenty of space. Children need more room than cats.”
Jenna felt a real depression settle on her. “Right now I’m kind of focused on my teaching.”
The man’s eyes hardened very slightly and another silence opened between them.
If anyone asked her what her type was, she could never picture or describe the man, but she knew he wasn’t one of the Mr. Sungs of the world—an émigré with all the patriarchal family baggage. She was drawn to very few men, but by some dismal law of inverse proportion, too many men were drawn to her, suitors who evaluated her for damage and desirability, the frigid mixed-race girl who was already thirty years old.
From the table of framed photographs her sister’s gaze met hers, as if flashing her a warning. Around the girl’s neck the silver chain shone against her skin, which was a beautiful ginger-brown cast, the color of waffles and syrup, much darker than the porcelain face of her mother, Han, who stood next to her in the picture.
Mr. Sung followed her gaze. “Your school graduation,” he said, bending to examine the photograph.
She thought of correcting him, but her mouth got ahead of her. “Look, Mr. Sung, my mother means well. She worries about me, and feels it’s her duty to make introductions … The thing is … I don’t want to waste your time.”
A moment of surprise showed on his face, but she could almost see him reminding himself that he was not in Korea now. Instead he nodded, ready to negotiate.
“You speak plainly with me. I value that. I have no patience for ladies who hide their smiles behind their hands and tolerate anything men say. But Jee-min-yang, if I may be plain with you …”
Her phone buzzed in the pocket of her jeans. She knew that to answer it in front of him would be to show grave disrespect. She answered it.
She recognized Charles Fisk’s voice straight away. “Turn on Channel NewsAsia—now!” He hung up.
“I do not wish to be indelicate,” Mr. Sung said, “but in terms of your making a desirable match with a family of good standing, you’ll forgive my saying that there are factors that need to be overlooked …”
She picked up the TV remote and flicked through the channels until she found it.
“You are not a pure-blood Korean …”
On screen an ash-haired Asian lady in a pale-blue suit was giving a press conference. Rows of microphones, camera flashes, no smiles.
An anchorman was saying, “Mrs. Ishido will give evidence tomorrow to the United Nations Humans Rights Council here in Geneva. She is expected to tell investigators that the victims include hundreds of foreign nationals from at least twelve countries, and will urge the Council to increase pressure on the Kim regime to release information to the victims’ families …”
The lady held up a photograph of a boy in school uniform and began giving a statement in Japanese. Now an interpreter was speaking across her in French-accented English.
“My son was fourteen when he vanished from a beach near our hometown … We now know that he was abducted … and taken to North Korea …”
Mrs. Ishido looked up from her statement and faced the cameras.
“… in a submarine.”
The air around Jenna went thin. Suddenly nothing else existed but her and the woman on the screen, whose effort to hold back her tears were setting off another barrage of camera flashes.
Sounds filtered through, but they seemed far awa
y. A tinkling noise as her mother carried in a tray with three small glasses. The front door slamming; a car engine starting.
“Omma …” Jenna whispered, without taking her eyes off the screen. The interpreter continued, in a strangely disconnected voice.
“I believe my son … is alive … in North Korea …”
“What’s happened?” Han said. “Why’s the TV on?”
Han turned to the window to see Mr. Sung’s car driving away.
Jenna heard her mother put the tray down and slump to the sofa. When she spoke her voice was faded, used up. “I’m only trying to help. You’re at an age when most Korean girls are married. I just want you to meet a premium man … I want to give you the kind of wedding I never had …”
Jenna was still staring at the screen, too shocked to move. The news item was finishing. Then the woman, Mrs. Ishido, was gone.
“… A reception at the Shilla Hotel, a banquet in the imperial style, limousine, silk hanbok dress, dry-ice machine, the whole works.”
“Omma.” She turned to her mother. All the strength gone out of her voice. “When Soo-min vanished …”
Han looked up and for the first time Jenna saw how aged she was beneath the makeup.
“Soo-min is hidden by God. Why do you upset me more?”
Later, at home, Jenna removed the old cookie tin from under her bed. She had not opened it in years. She took out the items and laid them on the bed: Soo-min’s purse, containing her library card, loose change in Korean coins, return ferry ticket, and a passport picture of the two of them together, aged sixteen, making faces in a photo booth; Soo-min’s camera case, which had grains of white sand inside; and her camera, from which the two photographs had been recovered by the police.
The one of Soo-min was slightly blurred. Her eyes were closed and she was laughing. Just visible above the neckline of her T-shirt was the silver chain, the one Jenna now wore. In the background the dunes glowed a reddish gold, and in the top right the moon was rising. The second photograph showed the boy, whose name, Jenna had later learned, was Jae-hoon. He was kneeling in the sand, wearing only swimming trunks, glancing up from cutting a fish. His face was half shade, half gilded by the slanting rays of the sun. To the left of the picture the tip of a guitar case was visible, lying on the sand, and behind him was the ocean, calm and dark.
Just a short time after these pictures were taken … how long? An hour? Half an hour? A few minutes? … her sister and this boy had vanished from the face of the earth.
Jenna buried her face in the bedspread. Oh my God. Had she been wrong all these years?
She could not have explained why, but she felt a strong certainty that the choice she made next could be decisive and final, and that there would be no turning back.
Fisk’s voice was raised against the noise of a cocktail reception. She heard the notes of a piano and the hubbub of voices and laughter. She waited a moment while he moved to a quieter spot.
“You watched it?” he said.
“That woman in Geneva, Mrs. Ishido … What made you … ?”
“Out of the hundreds of reported North Korean abductions, only her story mentions a submarine. It would explain why … I thought you should know about it.”
Jenna felt the phone burning next to her ear.
He said cautiously, “After she’s given her testimony to the UN tomorrow, I could show you the case file.”
“No,” Jenna said, absently. Her mind was far away on Baengnyeong Island, on that remote beach facing westward across the thundering surf. In twelve years this was the first whisper of evidence connecting to Soo-min, like a sea breeze blowing through the keyhole of a long-locked door. She was damned if she was going to have it filtered and redacted for her by a spy agency. “I have to meet her in person, Mrs. Ishido …” she said firmly. “I have to hear it with my own ears.”
4
Kim Il-sung Square
Pyongyang, North Korea
Sixty-fifth Anniversary of the Founding of the Workers’ Party
Sunday, October 10, 2010
A fug of Chinese pollution lay over the city, making the light so diffuse that the Tower of the Juche Idea on the far bank of the river, normally the imposing focus of the vista from the square, could be seen only in a beige outline.
Cho Sang-ho surveyed the scene from the seats reserved for his family on the south side. His rank in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs equaled that of a lieutenant colonel, and his stiff dress uniform, seldom worn, was making him itch and sweat uncomfortably. To his left he had a good view of the Grand People’s Study House and the terrace where the leadership took the salute. He could see all the way down Sungri Street, the direction from which the parade would come, now densely hedged with silent crowds. Across the great square itself thousands of troops from the ground forces, navy, air defense, and Red Guards waited in rigid formations, like companies on a battle map. Behind the troops, in fields of red and pink that stretched all the way to the bank of the Taedong River, fifty thousand citizens, standing in perfect straight lines, held up sprigs of paper flowers representing kimilsungia, the flower of the Great Leader, whose spirit endured eternally, and kimjongilia, the flower of his beloved son.
He felt a tap on his shoulder and turned to see the broad face of General Kang, creased into an enormous gold-filling smile. He was seated with his two teenage daughters. In heavily accented English he whispered, “Good morning, Lieutenant Colonel Cho. How are you this day?”
The daughters dissolved into peals of giggling behind their hands. Kang, one of the Ministry’s veteran diplomats, had been practicing his English with Cho in preparation for a high-level mission to the West.
“I am in good health, Comrade General. Thank you for asking.”
Cho’s arm rested around the small shoulders of his nine-year-old son, who was known to everyone, after some joke Cho couldn’t recall, as Books. The boy wore the red neckerchief of the Young Pioneers. He was moving his lips as he counted the formations in the square, until he gave a loud hiccup that caused Cho and his wife to share a silent chuckle. Of all the women present, each in their colorful chima jeogori national dress, Cho thought his wife the most beautiful. Her powdered face was a perfect oval; she’d applied a dark-red lipstick, which took some of the wryness from her smile, and in her hair wore the mother-of-pearl barrette he’d bought for her in Beijing.
“Twenty-four detachments,” Books whispered, turning his face up to him, “but I didn’t count the band. Where’s Uncle Yong-ho?”
Cho glanced at the empty seat to his right. Where indeed was Yong-ho? He’d picked a fine occasion to be late.
The silence was becoming oppressive. A flock of pigeons took sudden flight, clapping wings echoing across the space. Overhead, six great balloons bearing the star of the national flag, tethered at points around the square, swayed gently. On the roof of the Party headquarters, directly above the Great Leader’s portrait, plainclothes Bowibu agents watched the crowds through binoculars.
A commotion sounded to Cho’s right, and there was Yong-ho, apologizing to a uniformed grandmother festooned with medals, the matriarch of a large family that occupied most of the row, each of whose members were standing to let him pass. He crept along toward Cho like a guest late for a wedding, beaming his smile at every individual in the row.
“Forgive me, younger brother,” he said, sitting down. “You’re not going to believe my news …” Cho’s brother was pale and his hands were trembling, which might have alarmed Cho had it not been for the irrepressible good mood on his lips. He leaned in closely and Cho caught a sweet hint of soju on his breath. “They’re giving me the top job.”
“Seriously? First Deputy Director?”
Yong-ho gave a chuckle. “Better than that.” He leaned into Cho’s ear and lowered his voice to a whisper. “You’re looking at the new chief—”
An instant tension ran through the crowds. In the center of the square the bandleader had raised his baton. Two giant LED screens on the riv
er side lit up; the left proclaiming long live the workers’ party of korea! and the right kim jong-il is the guiding star of the 21st century! Bugles were raised; the band played the opening chords of “The General of Korea,” relayed from every building through loudspeakers, and the spectators in the rows stood up. A gradual welling-up of applause that had begun below the eaves of the Grand People’s Study House was now rolling into the square in a crescendoing ovation as men, women, and children began acclaiming with their hands above their heads and yelling with all the strength in their lungs. “MAN-SAE!—MAN-SAE!—MAN-SAE!” The noise was tremendous.
“I can see him!” Books shouted, grabbing Cho’s sleeve. “I can see him!”
The fifty thousand citizens waved their paper flowers rhythmically, creating a shimmering mirage of red and pink. Hundreds of white doves were released and circled above.
The distant figure of the Kim Jong-il was emerging onto the terrace, followed by an entourage of politburo members, senior Party cadres, and generals in sand-colored tunics with gold trim. The noise rose to an electrifying roar. The great man acknowledged the crowds with a gentle wave of his hand, as if blessing them, and Cho felt his power like an arrow from the sun. Dear Leader, Dear General. How humble this man was in his simple worker’s clothes! How frail from the hardships he’d endured for the people’s happiness.
Tears pricked Cho’s eyes, and almost at the same moment everyone around him began to weep. The cheering mixed with wailing. General Kang’s big face was contorted with sobs as he clapped, and his daughters cried hysterically.
Cho crouched down and Books climbed up onto his shoulders. To lift him high above the heads was no effort at all, he was so light. In a choking voice Cho cried, “Who do you thank for your happy childhood?”