As the lights of Sinuiju came into view, I tried to think what to do about the letters. I said, “Byong-woo, I need your help. I can give my letters directly to you and you can give me Hisashi’s letters. No one needs to know.”
The chauffeur shook his head. “I will not take that risk. Anyway, they will be suspicious when you no longer give Haru your letters.”
“I will write two letters! I will give one to Haru and the other to you.”
“What about the letters from Hisashi?” Byong-woo replied. “They will become suspicious when they see no more letters from him.”
“No, they will not,” I countered. “Since he has not gotten any letters from me, they will think he has stopped writing. Please, Byong-woo. It will work. They will not catch you.”
Byong-woo again shook his head. “No,” he said simply. “Haru is far too shrewd for that.”
I was angry at him, frustrated, and desperate. It was as if the news about my parents, the invasion of Manchuria, and Hisashi’s letters had turned my entire world upside down. I needed Byong-woo’s help, but he was refusing. Finally, I burst out, “You refuse to help another Korean so that you can keep your easy job. I am not a chinilpa, you are, Byong-woo. Or should I call you ‘Isamu’?”
“Say what you will about me,” Byong-woo replied. “But listen to me carefully, Suk-bo. You must not tell anyone you know about the letters or what I have told you about Japan and China. It will be dangerous for me and for you, too.”
As we drove into Sinuiju, I started sobbing, heaving full-bodied sobs like I’d never sobbed before. “Please, Byong-woo,” I sobbed. “Please deliver the letters.”
Byong-woo did not answer. He snuffed out his cigarette, put on his chauffeur’s hat, and drove the car to the Saito house.
FOURTEEN
The morning sickness came two days after I visited my aunt. When I awoke, my stomach churned. I thought I had caught an illness, but I didn’t feel feverish. When I sat up and swung my legs over the side of the low bed, foul-tasting bile rose from my stomach into my throat. I thought I was going to vomit. I lay down and closed my eyes. My chest burned and my stomach roiled as if something inside was squeezing it. And then I was sure I was going to vomit. I quickly rolled onto the floor and vomited a watery, stringy mass onto the mat.
I stayed on my hands and knees for some time, and eventually the nausea went away. I got up and slid open the door. “Kiyo!” I called. “Fumiko!” I went back to the bed and sat. I clutched my blankets tight around me.
A few seconds later, both women came to the door. “What is it, Miyoko?” Kiyo asked.
“I am sick,” I said. “I vomited on the floor.”
Kiyo spotted the mess. “I will get Yoshiko while Fumiko cleans up.”
A few minutes later, Fumiko was back with a pail and rag cleaning up my mess when Yoshiko came in with Kiyo behind her. Yoshiko’s hair was up as usual. “You are sick?” she asked, sitting on the bed alongside me.
“I feel fine now,” I said. “It lasted for only a few minutes.”
“I see,” Yoshiko said. Her face was emotionless. “Do you have a fever?”
“No,” I answered.
“Are you dizzy?”
“No,” I answered again.
“Kiyo,” Yoshiko said, “make some ginseng tea, strong and hot, and bring it at once.”
“Yes, ma’am,” Kiyo said.
“Fumiko,” Yoshiko said, “finish cleaning and leave us.”
“Yes, ma’am,” Fumiko said with a bow. She took one more swipe on the mat with her rag and followed Kiyo out of the room.
Yoshiko addressed me squarely. “Tell me, Miyoko,” she said, “when was the last time you had your monthly bleed?”
I paused a minute to think. Then, I said, “It has been over two months.”
“Two months,” Yoshiko said. “You stay here in bed. Haru will call the doctor on the telephone. I think you are pregnant.”
I sipped the ginseng tea Kiyo had brought me and waited for the doctor to arrive. At first, I thought Yoshiko must be wrong. I hadn’t thought anything was unusual about missing my monthly bleeds. It sometimes happened when I had to work long hours in the fields or when Father, Mother, and I went a week or more with not enough to eat. But here I had plenty to eat and I didn’t have to work at all. I knew that women sometimes got sick in the morning when they were pregnant. Mother had told me about it and hinted that morning sickness had afflicted her when she was pregnant with my brother and me. I concluded that Yoshiko’s diagnosis was probably right.
My head spun with a million questions and worries. I wouldn’t have Hisashi’s support during my pregnancy. My husband was hundreds of miles away, and it would be months before he’d return. And Mother and Father were in Manchuria trying to escape from the Japanese army, or perhaps they were prisoners . . . or dead. I felt so alone without the ones I loved to help me. I only had Yoshiko, Kiyo, and Fumiko. I didn’t know how any of them would feel about me having Hisashi’s baby. Yoshiko would probably be all business as usual. She would see to it that the household staff took good care of me and my baby. Haru would be all business, too, although I remembered Byong-woo said I shouldn’t trust him. Kiyo would probably disapprove of the baby as much as she disapproved of me. I wasn’t sure how Fumiko would feel.
And then there was Mr. and Mrs. Saito. I presumed that Mr. Saito would be pleased that a Korean woman was having his son’s baby and that he was fulfilling his duty to the emperor. Mrs. Saito, on the other hand, would not be pleased at all. Having a child—Hisashi’s child—would make it more difficult for her to drive me out of her family. She would hate me for it and hate my baby, too.
Even so, I was delighted that I was pregnant. Hisashi would love our child, I was sure of it, and he would love me for giving him one. He would be a good father and we would grow closer through our child. I so wanted to tell him about the baby growing inside me. But how? They weren’t delivering my letters. So though I was thrilled, I was also terribly frustrated and alone, and all I wanted to do was cry.
The doctor came midmorning wearing a black suit and carrying a black leather bag. As Yoshiko stood by, he took my pulse, listened to my heart with his stethoscope, and felt around my neck. He pressed his hands on my belly. He asked about the timing of my monthly bleeds. He asked if my breasts were tender, and I told him that I’d noticed they were.
He stood from the bed and addressed Yoshiko. “As you suspected, she is pregnant,” he declared. “It has been two months, or thereabouts. The baby will come in the summer.”
As the doctor packed the stethoscope in his leather bag, he gave Yoshiko instructions on what I should and should not eat, and how much rest I should get. He said he’d return in two weeks to check on me. Yoshiko said she understood. She thanked the doctor with a slight bow, and he took his bag and left.
“I will have Kiyo bring more ginseng tea and plain rice,” Yoshiko said. “Rest now, as the doctor said.”
“But I feel fine,” I protested. “The sickness is gone.”
“Do as I say,” Yoshiko said.
“Yes, ma’am,” I replied and lay down on the bed.
Before Yoshiko left, I said, “How will we tell Hisashi?”
“After you have rested, you can write a letter to him.”
“But the letter . . . ,” I said. I hesitated. I remembered that Byong-woo said I shouldn’t reveal what I’d learned about the letters.
“Yes?” Yoshiko said. “What about the letter?”
“It will take so long to get to him,” I said.
Yoshiko nodded. “Perhaps Haru can send a telegram. Now rest. I will be back in an hour to see how you are feeling.”
“I do not believe Haru will send a telegram,” I said.
“He will if Mr. Saito asks him to. I will make a suggestion.”
“Thank you, Yoshiko,” I said. I was truly grateful. As she left, I knew that Yoshiko, in her firm, demanding way, was going to take care of me.
That morning I
wrote a long letter to Hisashi about the baby. Tears fell onto the paper as I wrote because I knew my letter wouldn’t reach him.
The next day, I asked Yoshiko if Haru had sent Hisashi a telegram about the baby. “No, he did not,” she said. “I told him about your pregnancy and suggested he send Hisashi a telegram. He said he would only send a telegram if Mr. Saito instructed him to, and Mr. Saito is traveling again. Anyway, he said it was not necessary because you had given him a letter that presumably told your husband about the baby.”
“What if the letter gets lost?” I asked, trying to hide my anguish.
“You write to him every day,” Yoshiko replied evenly. “I do not think they will all get lost. Now, stop worrying. You need to relax or your sickness will get worse.”
I was not able to relax as Yoshiko said I should, and over the next several days and weeks, the morning sickness got worse. It came every day. Yoshiko had Fumiko place a clean bowl next to my bed every night, and every morning I filled it with my sickness. One day when the vomiting was so bad that I thought I might turn inside out, a vision came to me. It was the two-headed dragon from my aunt’s comb, and it was in my belly where the baby was supposed to be. It thrashed its head and whipped its tail inside me. When I finished vomiting and the nausea went away, I lay on the bed, but the dragon was still with me, calmer now, but there waiting for another chance to torment me. It felt like when the time came, I would give birth to the two-headed dragon. I wondered what it was trying to tell me. I worried that it would cause the baby to be grotesque or born with two heads. I worried that the dragon was trying to kill my baby.
As time went by, I didn’t gain weight like I was supposed to, and Yoshiko called for the doctor. When he came, he had me step on a spring scale and wrote down my weight. He pressed his hands on my stomach. When he had finished, he prescribed a combination of traditional herbs and modern medicines to combat the morning sickness and calm my nerves. Every morning, I took the medicines, and they helped a little with the morning sickness, although I always felt the two-headed dragon inside me.
The herbs and medicines eventually worked well enough that I could attend the morning prayer and meal. Mr. Saito had returned, and when he, Mrs. Saito, and I entered the main room, we washed our hands and bowed all the way to the floor at the kami dana altar. Mr. Saito said a prayer and thanked the emperor for his blessings. Then, we went to the table, and Kiyo and Fumiko brought our morning meal.
I had not talked to Mr. and Mrs. Saito about my pregnancy. For the past several weeks while I had been sick, I had stayed in my room. And they hadn’t come to visit me, either. I assumed Mr. Saito hadn’t visited because he just returned from Seoul and Pyongyang and was very busy. I assumed Mrs. Saito didn’t visit me because she disapproved of me having Hisashi’s baby.
The meal went as it had before my morning sickness had come. Mr. and Mrs. Saito talked about the household and Mr. Saito’s busy schedule. Eventually, Mr. Saito said, “How are you feeling, Miyoko? I hear you have had the morning sickness.”
“I feel better, sir, with the medicine the doctor prescribed.”
“Are you getting enough to eat?”
“Yes, sir,” I replied.
Mr. Saito nodded. “You are in most capable hands with Yoshiko.”
Then I said, “Does Hisashi know about my pregnancy?”
Mr. Saito raised his eyebrows. “I would hope he does. You wrote to him, did you not?”
I looked at Mrs. Saito, who was staring at me with narrow eyes and a firm chin. I remembered that I could not tell anyone I knew they weren’t delivering the letters. But I was desperate. I looked away from Mrs. Saito and said, “Yes, sir. I write to him every day. But I have not heard from him. I have not received a single letter from him since he left.”
Mr. Saito cocked his head and looked surprised. “Is that true? Well, that is indeed strange. I have received several letters from him. Yours must have gotten lost. I will have Haru investigate.”
I shot a quick glance at Mrs. Saito, who was facing the table. We finished our meal in silence and then, Mr. Saito announced he was going to Seoul again and would be gone for several weeks. We all stood together, bowed to the table, and Mr. and Mrs. Saito left through the sliding door.
Even with Mr. Saito’s help, I still did not get any letters from my husband. I asked Haru if he had learned anything about letters to me from Hisashi. He replied that he was investigating as Mr. Saito had directed him to. I wanted to tell him that I knew he was not delivering them, but I bit my tongue.
On one of those late winter days when the sky is clear but the air is not cold, I went to the Zen garden. The gardener had raked the expanse of white pebbles into neat concentric circles around three islands of boulders, meticulously sculpted plants, and closely trimmed moss. A short stucco wall topped with gray-green tile ran along the back of the garden. Hisashi had told me once that the pebbles represented the sea, the boulders the land, and that they had sculpted the plants to look like clouds. The garden was sublimely beautiful. Mr. Saito spent hours here, and I often came here to sit and think.
My stomach had settled for the day and I was starting to gain weight. I missed Hisashi terribly. I wondered what he was doing at that moment, if he was thinking about me as I was thinking about him. I looked at one of the Zen garden boulders and pretended it was the island of Honshu. I picked a place on the boulder where Tokyo would be. I set my eyes on that place and sent my husband my love.
I heard steps behind me. It was Byong-woo wearing a coat and his chauffeur’s hat. He rarely came to the garden, so I was surprised to see him. As he approached, he snuck a look over his shoulder at the house. When he was next to me, he gave me an envelope. “Hide this in your coat,” he said. “Do not let anyone see it.” Then, he walked on as if he hadn’t even noticed me.
I slipped the envelope inside my coat. I looked around the grounds and then at the house. Through an opening in one of the sliding walls, I saw Haru staring at me. I quickly turned back to the Zen garden. I pressed my arm against the envelope inside my coat. Could it be a letter from Hisashi? My heart raced. I sat for a few more minutes before going in to my room.
FIFTEEN
My heart sank when I tore open the envelope only to see that the letter inside was not in Hisashi’s handwriting. The first page was a note from Byong-woo that he had written in Hangul. I sat on my mat and read it.
Suk-bo,
Enclosed is a copy of Hisashi’s latest letter to you. I cannot give you the actual letter because I had to give it to Haru. You must destroy this note and letter immediately after you read it. If someone finds it, they will arrest me.
I had to copy it quickly but I did my best. Remember to destroy this letter and note. Do not let anyone know about it. Beware of Haru.
Byong-woo
I flipped to the next pages. It was, in fact, hastily done. He’d left off a hash mark here or a curl there on the characters and I couldn’t decipher some of it. But there was enough to see that it was a letter from Hisashi. I started to cry. I had a letter from my husband, from Hisashi! And though it was not the actual letter he had written, though it wasn’t in his handwriting and he hadn’t touched the paper, the words were his.
I pushed through my tears and read the letter. Hisashi said that he’d heard I was pregnant, but he didn’t say how he’d found out. He said he was thrilled and that he couldn’t wait to be at my side to support me. He hoped the baby would be strong and healthy and he was excited to be a father. He said he’d do everything he could to return before the baby came.
The letter went on to talk about his work, but this part was cryptic and didn’t sound at all like Hisashi. Usually, when he was excited about something, he went on and on about it. But there was no excitement in his words. There were only a few short sentences and that was all. I decided that Byong-woo must have left some parts out.
Hisashi’s letter went on to say that he still had not received a letter from me and that he didn’t understand why.
He wondered if his letters were reaching me. The letter ended by saying that he missed me and hoped that he would hear from me soon. He said he’d continue to write. He signed off, With deepest love, your husband, Hisashi.
I clutched the letter to my chest and started to cry again. They were tears of relief to know that my husband still loved me. I hadn’t needed to worry all this time. He wasn’t looking for a Japanese wife in Tokyo. He loved me, he said—with deepest love!—and his words set me free from my fears.
But my tears were from frustration, too. I was frustrated and angry that my husband wasn’t getting my letters. I was terrified that he would think I didn’t care. I wanted to march up to Mrs. Saito and tell her I knew she was destroying my letters and insist that she stop. But I thought better of it. If I said anything, they would arrest Byong-woo and I would be in trouble with Mrs. Saito.
I read Hisashi’s letter again and again. I tried to decipher the characters that Byong-woo had copied incorrectly. I wanted to meet with Byong-woo in secret to ask him more about the original letter, but I knew I shouldn’t. Finally, after I’d memorized each character and each sentence, I took the letter and Byong-woo’s note to Hisashi’s desk and burned them in an incense bowl.
My morning sickness never went away, but with the medicines, it was at least bearable. I continued to gain weight, and soon my belly grew large.
I still wrote a letter to Hisashi every day and gave it to Haru. I never got one from Hisashi, and I received no more copies from Byong-woo. I wanted to ask Byong-woo if he would make a copy of Hisashi’s letter again, but I knew that Haru was watching me, so I never did.
Gradually, winter lost its grip on Sinuiju and gave itself over to spring. And as spring grew into summer, my belly grew heavy, making it difficult to walk. I had constant heartburn, sometimes so bad that I had to lie down until it went away. The baby kicked my ribs. I had expected that it would have come by now, but it seemed content to stay put and kick me. I remembered sitting with my parents in our house after dinner when my mother told me that I was late coming out of her when she was pregnant with me. She said I kicked constantly and then I came a month late. “You did not cry for the first month and we thought something was wrong with you,” she’d said.
The Spirit of the Dragon Page 12