The Plotters

by Un-su Kim

  ‘I need Hanja’s ledgers. I know they’re here, and I know you know how to open the safe. So open it. If you drag your feet, you’ll spend the rest of your life in a wheelchair. If you don’t open it, you’re dead.’

  The lawyer looked up at him. ‘What do you need the ledgers for?’

  ‘I’m planning to retire, but no one’s offering me a pension.’

  ‘There’s money in that suitcase. Around three hundred million. You can have it.’

  Under the desk was a black, wheeled suitcase. Reseng walked over, cigarette in mouth, and opened it. It was filled with cash.

  ‘Three hundred million?’

  The lawyer nodded.

  ‘Three hundred…That’s an awful lot of cash. I guess because it’s election time? Anyway, thanks.’

  Reseng picked up the suitcase and walked back to the lawyer. He stared down at him. The lawyer raised his head and stared back. Reseng raised his gun and shot the lawyer in the right thigh. The lawyer stifled a shriek.

  ‘The next bullet’s going in your knee. So out with it: where are Hanja’s ledgers?’

  The lawyer’s face twisted in pain. ‘If I give them to you, I’m dead anyway.’

  ‘I hate lawyers. You guys are always so sharply dressed, so calculating, so smooth with your logic and so slippery, you think you can worm your way out of anything. But how’re you going to get out of this one? I think today is the day you’re going to have to apply the same impeccable logic as when you waltzed into the library with Jeongan’s body. Do you prefer to die at my hands, after I’ve run out of bullets shooting you in every single one of your joints? Or at Hanja’s hands? Think fast, now. I don’t have a lot of time.’

  Reseng aimed the gun again.

  ‘The safe is under the desk.’

  Reseng grabbed him by the back of the collar and dragged him over. The lawyer baulked. Reseng pressed the gun to his head. The lawyer pulled back the carpet underneath the desk, took a remote control out of his pocket and keyed in a number. The floor opened to reveal a safe. The lawyer keyed in another number and the safe opened. Inside were several ledgers and CDs. Reseng stuffed them all into his backpack. The lawyer stared at him dumbly.

  ‘This is what you tell Hanja: all I need is money. Two billion in bearer bonds, one billion in cash. Split the cash evenly into two leather bags.’

  The lawyer nodded. He looked relieved. Just then, there was an urgent knocking at the door. Reseng turned to the lawyer, who looked panicked.

  ‘What’d you push?’ Reseng asked.

  ‘I forgot to cancel the alarm when I opened the safe…’

  A lame excuse. Reseng zipped the backpack shut and looked at the lawyer, who was now shaking uncontrollably. Reseng frowned and shot him in the right knee. This time the lawyer screamed at the top of his voice.

  The knocking changed to pounding, and then someone started kicking the door. Reseng pressed himself to the wall next to it. He slowed his breathing and cracked the door open just as the man outside was mid-kick. The man fell into the room. It was the driver. Reseng shot him in both legs. Then he shot at the slender man standing in the hallway. The slender man did a front somersault, dodging the muzzle of the gun, and grabbed Reseng by the arm into a shoulder throw. It was a smooth, skilful move. Reseng dropped his gun as he was hurled to the hallway floor, and the slender man grabbed it. Reseng stood, massaging his shoulder. The man pointed the gun at him. He looked at ease with the weapon. From his shoulder holster, Reseng took a brand-new Henckels that he’d bought at a department store on the way there. The man sneered.

  ‘What’re you, stupid? I’ve got a gun,’ the slender man said.

  ‘You’re out of bullets. Your boss wasn’t very cooperative.’

  The man pointed the gun at the wall and pulled the trigger. It clicked. He tossed the gun to the floor. There was another in his jacket, but it looked like a tear-gas gun. He pulled a knife from his belt. A military knife used in the special forces.

  ‘You don’t look like an assassin, so I’m guessing you’re a soldier?’ Reseng said.

  ‘I was for a long time.’

  ‘Then keep being one. Defend your country and your family—with honour.’

  ‘Honour doesn’t put food on the table,’ the slender man said, raising his knife.

  Reseng lowered his knife and walked closer. His stride was easy, as if he was out on a stroll. The man lunged at Reseng’s face. Reseng pivoted left to dodge the blade, and slashed the other man from shoulder to armpit. The man dropped his knife. Reseng moved to the right and slipped his knife gently into the man’s side. The man fell to his knees. He lowered his head but didn’t groan. Reseng pulled the knife out. Then he picked up the fallen gun, put it back in the holster, took out a handkerchief and wiped the blood from his knife. When he went back into the room, the lawyer was flailing in a pool of blood and talking on his mobile phone.

  ‘It’s that arsehole from the library. He took the ledgers. Yes. Yes. They’re right next to me. I’ve been shot…No, not bought, shot.’

  Reseng looked down at the lawyer in amusement. The lawyer glanced up at him and put the phone down, terrified.

  ‘You work too hard,’ Reseng said.

  He took his backpack off the desk, picked up the suitcase full of cash and headed downstairs. Halfway down, the fat man appeared with a baseball bat. Despite his size, the man’s hands were trembling violently. Reseng looked more closely. It was the same security guard from Hanja’s office, the packet of hot dogs. Reseng sneered as he glanced up at the bat.

  ‘You counting on hitting me with that?’

  The packet of hot dogs looked up at the bat too, fear spelled out clearly on his face. Reseng shook his head.

  ‘C’mon, don’t use that on people,’ he said.

  The packet of hot dogs collapsed on the floor.

  Reseng opened the front door and walked outside. When he reached the lane, he saw Mito’s car. He tapped on the window. She rolled it down. He took his backpack off and handed it to her.

  ‘This should settle my debt,’ he said.

  Mito unzipped the bag, pulled out one of the ledgers and checked the contents. Reseng held up the suitcase he’d taken from the lawyer.

  ‘I’ll give you this if you promise to stop now and leave the country with Misa. There’s three hundred million in here.’

  ‘You think you can buy me?’

  ‘Maybe.’

  ‘Get in.’

  He shook his head. She stared at him.

  ‘Get out of here,’ he said. ‘Hanja’s people will be all over this place any minute now.’

  Mito reluctantly started the engine.

  ‘We’ll meet again. Stay safe until then. And remember,’ she said with a smile, ‘the only person who can save you is Mito.’

  Reseng watched as she drove away. An absurd sense of loneliness washed over him. He lit a cigarette. Although he’d only been away for a month, the city lights felt strange, dizzying. Soon, Hanja would be releasing his trackers and assassins. Reseng suddenly had no idea which way he should go.

  He headed down the street. The suitcase was heavy. The tiny wheels crunched loudly over the asphalt. He could leave the country. He had a bag filled with three hundred million won. It wasn’t a huge amount, but it was nothing to sneeze at, either. He could get a fake passport, board a smuggling ship in Incheon or Busan, sail around the world to Mexico, swig tequila and grow old peacefully. He could go somewhere far, far away, where no one knew him and his past could not follow him, where he would stutter his way through learning the language, come up with a new name, marry an exotic woman, make babies with her and a new life for himself doing honest physical labour.

  ‘Could I really?’ he asked out loud, his voice weak. When he looked up, the city lights were like knives slashing at his pupils. Fatigue descended over him all at once, and his legs grew weak. The black suitcase dragging behind him and the gun and knife hanging from his shoulders all felt so heavy. But maybe the weight he felt wasn’t
actually from the suitcase or the gun or the knife. He hailed a taxi. The grey-haired driver asked where he was headed. ‘Seoul Station,’ said Reseng.

  At the station, Reseng perused the endless list of city names posted above the ticket booth. He spent close to an hour staring at the timetable with its unfamiliar destinations, but he could not for the life of him decide where to go or why he was standing there in the first place. He walked outside. People running for trains rushed across the station plaza. Christmas carols were playing on a loop through loudspeakers. Reseng went down the stairs into the underground passageway and put the suitcase in a coin locker.

  At the other end of the passageway, two drunk homeless men were shoving each other and swearing. Others were asleep behind windbreaks they’d fashioned out of cardboard, while a few were eating dried ramen noodle crumbs and drinking soju. Reseng sat down on the cardboard next to the sleeping bodies. One of the men who’d been drinking glanced at him and sidled over. He poured soju into a paper cup and offered it to Reseng. Reseng read the expression on the man’s face: Fuck my life. Bleary-eyed from alcohol, Fuck-My-Life kept holding out the paper cup. Reseng took it and drank, then handed the cup back. The man offered him another, but Reseng waved his hand. Fuck-My-Life stumbled back to his seat. The alcohol spread quickly from Reseng’s empty stomach to warm the rest of his body. He lay down on an empty sheet of cardboard. A cold wind blew in through the entrance. In the distance he heard the faint ringing of a Salvation Army bell. Neatly dressed women walked past, giggling. I like the sound of women’s laughter… Women’s laughter all sounds the same, he thought. Those women, Mito, that cross-eyed librarian—I bet even women in Swaziland and Sweden laugh the same. Reseng laughed too. He pulled his knees up to his chest, rested his head on the inside of his arm and fell asleep alongside the homeless men.

  In the morning, Reseng took the first train to D, the town where the Barber lived. He’d assumed the barbershop would be locked, but the door swung right open when he turned the knob. He stepped inside. The Barber was sitting there with the lights off. Reseng sat next to him. The Barber looked at him in the mirror. His eyes were vacant. No surprise or anger. Just the tired face of an elderly barber overcome with loss.

  ‘Oh, good, you’re in one piece,’ the Barber said quietly.

  Reseng nodded. An urn wrapped in white cloth sat on the shelf. ‘Is that your daughter?’ he asked politely.

  ‘My wife. Funeral was yesterday.’ The Barber’s voice was flat.

  Reseng nodded again. They sat side by side for a while without speaking. The Barber’s eyes were fixed on his hands folded in his lap, while Reseng stared back at his own reflection in the mirror. He took a pack of cigarettes from his pocket and offered one to the Barber. Reseng lit it for him and then lit his own.

  ‘Mind if I ask what brings you here?’ the Barber asked. ‘I’m assuming you’re not just looking to avenge your friend.’

  Reseng took a long drag before speaking.

  ‘If your daughter hadn’t been sick, would you still have worked as a cleaner?’

  In turn, the Barber took a drag and slowly exhaled.

  ‘Hard to say.’ His voice was calm. ‘What would you have done if you were me?’ He turned to look at Reseng.

  ‘I made a huge mistake when I was twenty-two,’ Reseng said. ‘I was just a kid, young and awkward and full of fear. But that’s no excuse in this line of work. As you know, assassins who mess up have to die. Otherwise someone else dies in their place. Just like that kid Dalja who died instead of you.’

  The Barber’s lip twitched.

  ‘In my case, Trainer died instead of me. He was a million times better than me. And you know what I did? I ran away. To a factory. Something inside me just died.’ Reseng let out a bitter laugh. ‘I’ve been running ever since. From my mistakes, from Trainer’s death, from an opportunity to live a normal, honest life, from the woman I loved. Trainer told me once, “The second you close your eyes, you never open them again.” Well, I closed my eyes. I’ve been terrified of going up against the brutal Barber, whom not even Trainer or Chu could beat.’

  ‘That’s why you came looking for me?’ the Barber asked, a mocking edge to his voice.

  Reseng nodded. The Barber looked up at the ceiling. Ash fell from the cigarette dangling between his fingers.

  ‘Did that woman kill my daughter?’ he asked.

  ‘She’s a doctor, so it would’ve been painless.’

  The Barber stubbed his cigarette out in an ashtray and got up from the chair.

  ‘Wait here a second.’

  He went into the inner room and came out with a bag. He opened it, took out Chu’s knife and offered it to Reseng. Reseng took it. The blade had been cleaned. The Barber pulled out the same Mad Dog knife as before.

  ‘Have you ever killed someone without being paid to?’ the Barber asked.

  ‘Nope, never. I shot and stabbed a few people last night, but they should still be alive.’

  ‘You’re the last assassin I’ll ever kill. And the first one I’m killing for free.’

  Reseng took off his jacket and leather holster and hung them on the coat rack. The Barber looked at the gun in Reseng’s holster and ran his forefinger along the tip of the Mad Dog. Reseng moved first to the middle of the barbershop. The Barber walked slowly over and stood in front of him. Reseng raised his knife. The Barber nodded once, then lunged at Reseng’s face. Reseng pivoted to avoid the blade. The Barber swung again for Reseng’s throat. Reseng blocked the incoming knife and nicked the Barber’s forearm with his own knife. The Barber’s blade twisted around and cut Reseng’s right cheek. They each took a step back from each other. Blood dripped from the Barber’s forearm. Reseng felt his right cheek with his left hand. Blood came away on his fingers.

  ‘You’ve got much better,’ the Barber said, wiping away the blood dripping down his forearm to his wrist.

  ‘I lay in bed and thought about you thousands of times a day.’

  ‘In bed, huh?’

  Reseng resumed his fighting stance. Just like the last time, the Barber hid his knife behind him and stood at ease. The old grandfather clock ticked off the seconds. The soles of Reseng’s shoes squeaked against the tiled floor. He thought he could hear running water. Cool water flowing over gravel. It occurred to him that he didn’t care anymore whether he ended up lying next to that stream. The Barber’s body swayed slowly from left to right and right to left again, like a tree stirring in a breeze, saying, Come on, come on over.

  Reseng lunged hard at the Barber’s throat. As if he’d been waiting for exactly that, the Barber stepped back, whipped the knife around in his left hand and stuck it in Reseng’s side. Reseng grabbed the Barber’s hand and pulled the knife even deeper into his own body. The Barber stared at him in shock and confusion. With one strong slash of Chu’s knife, Reseng sliced the Barber’s throat open. The Barber stood there, stunned. Reseng leaned against the chair next to him. The Barber lifted his hand to feel his throat. Blood gushed from the wound. He gazed at his wife’s urn for a moment, then smiled at Reseng and sank to the floor, his head dropping to his chest.

  Reseng sat in the barber’s chair and leaned back. The pain had finally hit him. He looked down at the knife buried deep in his side. Blood was seeping out along the blade and soaking his shirt. Pulling the knife out would only speed up the blood loss. He lit a cigarette and exhaled a cloud of smoke at the mirror. The Barber was reflected in the glass, still on his knees with his head down, as if repenting his sins. The clock on the wall pointed to 8:40. Reseng smoked half his cigarette, then took his phone out of his pocket and made a call. After about ten rings, Bear answered in a sleepy voice.

  ‘Eight a.m. is the middle of the night for Bear,’ Bear grumbled.

  ‘You’re going to have to make a pick-up. The barbershop across from the post office in D. It’s a small town, so you can’t miss it. You’ll find one dead body and one urn. After you cremate the body, please mix the ashes with the ones in the urn and scatter th
em together. With great care, please.’

  ‘Who is it?’ Bear still sounded a little groggy.

  ‘The Barber.’

  Bear swallowed hard—Reseng could hear it over the phone.

  ‘Will you be there?’ Bear asked.

  ‘No, I have to go. The door will be locked, so you’ll have to find a way in.’

  Reseng hung up and checked his face in the mirror. Blood dripped from the cut on his right cheek. He wiped it away with his palm. ‘There’s something different about you,’ he said to his reflection. The face in the mirror smirked and the head shook slowly. He gave his reflection a half-hearted grin, then took another drag on his cigarette. When he stood up, blood ran along the back of the knife and dripped onto the floor. He crushed his cigarette out in the ashtray and grabbed two towels from the shelf. He wet one of the towels in the sink and used it to wipe the blood from his side, then rolled up the dry towel and stuck it inside his shirt to staunch the bleeding. He tilted his head back, a grimace on his face, and let out a deep groan. Then he sat down again, took Hanja’s business card out of his wallet and dialed.

  ‘I assume your lawyer gave you my message. Three billion. Better start counting those bills,’ Reseng said.

  Hanja was quiet for a moment before responding. ‘Ever seen an anaconda swallow an alligator? It can’t digest it. Ends up dead of a ruptured stomach.’ He sounded furious.

  ‘Don’t worry, I won’t get a stomach ache. I’ll give you three days. After that, I’m selling the ledgers to someone else for less. So be a good boy and get that cash ready. Don’t get over-zealous and release the hounds too soon.’

  Reseng hung up. The Barber’s blood had pooled on the floor and was spreading towards the sink. He went to the coat rack and put the gun holster and jacket back on. But the jacket wouldn’t close around the knife sticking out of his side. The Barber’s old winter coat was hanging on the rack. He hesitated and then put on the coat as well.

  Reseng locked the barbershop door behind him. He took five steps and glanced back to see whether he was leaving drops of blood. There were none. With one hand pressed firmly on the towel inside his shirt, Reseng slowly headed out of D. But before he could reach the town limits, he was hit by a wave of dizziness. His side was screaming with each step. What was worse, each time he flinched from the pain, blood dripped from the knife onto the dirt road. He hurriedly scuffed the dirt to erase the blood. He wouldn’t get far at this rate. He stopped and looked around. An old two-storey building on the edge of town had a medical clinic. Reseng headed towards it.