Then a phalanx of Seven Dragon punks rushed down the stairs. Another group attacked through the side door that led into the kitchen. The crowd fought back on both fronts but that’s exactly what the Seven Dragons wanted. Upon a shouted order, the two groups of Seven Dragon fighters pulled back. Small groups of enraged men fighting for their families last possessions followed in small groups, pushed forward by the mob. They found themselves outnumbered by the Seven Dragon minions. One by one, the rioters were ground into mush.
The main body of rioters realized things were not going their way. More and more people had crumpled to their knees, victims of the vicious rain of bricks that had never relented. The bravest men, the ones who had taken the lead, had been knocked back down the stairs or had entered the double door of the kitchen never to return. Panicked, the crowd started surging back toward the front door.
A third squad of Seven Dragon lackeys, all holding sharpened broom handles, were waiting for them. The first rioters out the door tried to stop but they were pushed forward by the rushing mob and fell down the steep cement stairs. Many were impaled on the sharply pointed tips of the waiting broom handles. More screams. More blood. More panic. And then the Seven Dragons ordered their men on the stairs and in the kitchen to charge into the main room. They did and now the rioters were set upon from all sides.
Once the mob had been totally routed, the Seven Dragons and their vicious auxiliaries waded through the blood and the bodies. Some of the women, especially those with children, had not charged into the building but had waited outside. Now, the Seven Dragons’ lackeys turned on them. The women screamed and attempted to run away, children clinging to their skirts. The women were attacked from behind, clubbed, stabbed, and knocked down. Some of them were murdered immediately. Others were dragged into side alleys and gang-raped. Children wandered through the gore and the screaming crowd, crying and calling for their mothers.
The Seven Dragons laid out the unconscious and bloodied attackers in a huge pile in the street. Then the Seven Dragons ordered gasoline poured atop the bodies. Amidst the screams of the few relatives cowering in the distance, one of the men struck a wooden match, watched it sizzle, and then tossed it onto the pile. As the bodies began to smolder and then burn, some of the rioters actually roused themselves and stumbled away from the growing conflagration. Children dragged their fathers out of the pile. The bravest bystanders pulled bodies away from the flames but they were quickly beaten back. In the end, the children and the few still-conscious women managed to save only a handful of men from the fire.
Not a single Korean National Policeman appeared.
7
Cort was appalled. He’d been monitoring blotter reports every day since he’d been in country and he’d never heard of any such incident. He asked a question to make sure he understood correctly what the nuns told him.
“The Korean police did nothing?”
The nuns nodded their bald heads. Yes. Nothing.
How many people died?
More than a dozen. Many others were wounded and scarred for life.
Did anyone retrieve their valuables?
No one.
Does anyone know what the Seven Dragons did with those valuables?
Shrugs all around. But the nuns did know that soon after, Itaewon began to explode in a riot of bright lights and fancy nightclubs.
Cort spent the night with the nuns because there was too much snow outside to drive home safely. In the morning he fastened chains to the back tires of his jeep, ate a warming breakfast of hot rice gruel and dried turnip, thanked the nuns, and left.
Upon his return to 8th Army, he checked with the MPs who’d been on duty during the day of the bonfire. There were only two of them. One of the MPs, a guy name Smith, told Cort that he and his partner had been aware of the fire.
“The KNPs told us they were taking care of it,” he said. “Only Korean nationals were involved and they didn’t want us there.”
“You weren’t curious?” Cort asked.
“I’ve seen fires before.”
“Did the KNPs tell you that there’d been a fight before the fire and that during the fire people were injured?”
“They said something about it. Told us it was Reds agitating.”
That would explain 8th Army’s indifference. Any action taken against Communists would have been condoned. If there had been violence, the honchos of 8th Army would just as soon not know.
Cort thanked the MP named Smith and asked him to write out a report. The young man agreed, according to Cort, but something must’ve gone wrong. A copy of Smith’s statement was never included in the SIR.
Tonight the Grand Ole Opry was jumping.
The Kimchee Kowboys, the most popular band on the G.I. circuit, was performing. Only two days had passed since the end-of-month military payday and so, by the time Ernie and I arrived that evening, the place was packed. And noisy. It was the noise I was counting on.
We entered the club at different times. I melted into the crowd for a while but instead of joining in the frivolities, as soon as I figured no one was watching, I made my way to the back steps behind the latrines. While I waited, I checked the tools I’d stuffed inside my winter coat: a wooden mallet and a chisel. All I figured I’d need. As soon as Ernie joined me, he started mumbling. “You’re nuts, Sueno. Really nuts.”
I ignored him. Together, we sneaked down the back stairs.
A faint green glow from fluorescent bulbs followed us down the cement steps. At the bottom, the door leading to the storeroom was padlocked. While I shone the beam from my flashlight on the lock, Ernie stepped forward and, using the small crowbar he had stuffed under his jacket, he popped open the lock. I picked up the broken lock and dropped it in my pocket. I closed the storeroom door behind us and switched on the overhead bulb.
Pallets of OB Beer, product of the Oriental Brewery, in brown bottles and wooden crates, Korean-made, met our eyes. The days of pilfering American beer from the PX supply lines were over. But judging from the crowd upstairs, and their general state of inebriation, the Grand Ole Opry was still selling plenty of suds. And making a hell of a profit.
The Kimchee Kowboys clanged determinedly into a new song, the heels of their boots pounding on the wooden stage. The bass player and the drummer set up a driving rhythm. They were a hell of a sight, five Korean musicians wearing sequined cowboy outfits and broad-brimmed hats. I wished I could go upstairs and drink beer and enjoy the show but no time for that now.
“Come on,” I told Ernie. “Over here.”
We took off our jackets and started heaving crates of beer away from under the delivery ramp. It was cold down here, though not refrigerated. The howling wind outside kept the temperature close to freezing. Clouds of our breath billowed in front of us yet within minutes we’d both worked up a sweat.
“How much beer do these lifers drink?” Ernie asked.
“Enough to float the Seventh Fleet,” I replied.
Finally, the brick wall of the angle-roofed room was revealed. We stood back and looked at it.
“Maybe nothing’s in there,” Ernie said.
“Maybe.”
But there was only one way to find out. I knelt in front of the wall and poked the tip of the iron chisel into the mortar between bricks. I pulled the wooden mallet out of my pocket and, keeping time with the rhythm of the Kimchee Kowboys’ latest, I started to pound. Dust flew. The chisel slid, held, and then gradually started to edge deeper into the crusted mortar.