He slipped off his shoes, stepped up on a narrow varnished wooden platform, and waved for us to follow. Behind the platform, light shone through a paper-paneled latticework door. A shadow stood, rising only halfway up the door. The panel shuddered and slid back.
“Abboji. Nugu seiyo?” Father. Who is it?
It was a boy.
Kuang-sok, I thought. The boy had a narrow face, not square and sturdy like his father’s, and eyes that were heavily lidded, just slits in a smooth complexion.
“Sonnim woyo,” the man said. “We have guests.”
The man entered the room and Ernie and I slipped off our shoes and followed.
The room we were in was not much bigger than the toolshed out front, but it was a lot more comfortable. The floor was covered with a soft vinyl padding and I felt warmth beneath my feet. The floor was heated by subterranean ducts flooded with charcoal gas. A six-foot-wide varnished wood armoire covered one of the walls and open cabinets took up most of the rest, stuffed with books and clothes and blankets and a few eating utensils. Cooking was conducted outside, on the cement charcoal pit I had seen on the way in. A tiny TV, imported from Japan, flickered in a corner, beaming out the songs of some Korean variety extravaganza filmed at one of the studios on the side of Namsan Mountain.
The boy had the volume down low. More disciplined than most kids I knew.
The man looked at us with his tired brown eyes and stuck out his hand.
“I am Mr. Ma,” he said in English.
We shook. The palms of his hands were as rough as the cement walls of his basement.
Ernie and I sat down cross-legged on the floor. Mr. Ma poured us each a glass of barley tea. The boy sat next to us, his back to the TV, studying us intently. Ernie offered him a stick of gum. The boy glanced at his father, who nodded, and he grabbed the gum with his small fingers.
Mr. Ma waited. I figured it was time to get to the point.
“I’m looking for So Boncho-ga, the King of the Slicky Boys.”
I said it in English but there was no comprehension in Mr. Ma’s eyes. I repeated it in Korean. He blinked and nodded.
“Why?” was all he said.
“There was a man killed. A soldier from England. I think the slicky boys who work Yongsan Compound will know something about it.”
Mr. Ma looked at his son. “Go outside and fetch me a newspaper.”
The boy rose to his feet and bowed. “Yes, Father.”
After Kuang-sok scurried out of the room, Mr. Ma shook his head and sipped on his tea. He spoke once again in Korean.
“If the slicky boys do know something about this man’s death, why should they tell you?”
“Because this murder could cause much trouble on the compound. Much anger amongst the generals who are in charge. Now they sleep. If I give them reason to wake up, they will wake up very angry.”
“And the business of the slicky boys will suffer?”
“Exactly.”
Mr. Ma nodded. “First, I must tell you that I am not a slicky boy. That was long ago, before God gave me Kuang-sok.”
“God gave him to you?”
“Yes. I used to be a slicky boy, on your compound, the Eighth American Army. I was a good slicky boy when I was young. The very best.”
Mr. Ma gazed past the TV screen, seeing an image much more vivid than the black-and-white electronic flickering-
“It was winter. Cold, much colder than tonight, with a blizzard screaming through the streets of the city. The perfect night for me. The perfect night for any slicky boy. The guards who patrol the compound would be less vigilant on their rounds, more anxious to return to the warmth of their guard shacks. An hour after curfew, I left my hooch.”
He waved his hand.
“I had a much bigger room than this one. I was rich in those days. When I reached the remotest part of the Wall, I waited in hiding until the sentry had passed and then I made my run on the wall. Before I got there, I noticed something small, something in a box, and it moved. I knelt down and saw that it was bundled up. I brushed away the snow from the box, unwrapped the covers, and when the cold hit the soft flesh, the child began to wail.”
Mr. Ma smiled at the fond memory.
“Of course, my night’s work was foremost on my mind. In the howling wind the guard would not have heard the child’s cry. I could be over the fence in a few moments, steal what I needed, and be gone. But when I was halfway up the fence, the child began to wail again. It was a forlorn wail. The wail of the lost. The cry of those who will never be found.
“It was up there, while the jagged wire dug into my fingers, that I suddenly knew what I had to do. It didn’t take long to think about it. It flooded my mind like a ray of light. I knew I had to stop being a slicky boy and start taking care of the child lying below me.
“A shot rang out. One of the guards had been more diligent than I thought. I dropped to the ground, breaking my ankle, and just barely managed to pick up the box and shuffle across the street into the alleys before the guard reached the fence and fired again.”
Mr. Ma looked down at his foot. “And now I have two souvenirs of that night. This bad leg, and the strength of my souclass="underline" my son, Kuang-sok.”
“You never went back to the compound after that?” I asked.
“No. It’s been ten years and I never have.”
It was an interesting enough story, I had to admit that, but he’d been out of touch too long. The Nurse had thought she was doing us a great favor by bringing us here. But this guy was just a lonely old man who wanted an audience to listen to him rave about past glories. Still, it was a touching little family, and so poor. I knew how that was.
Ernie swirled the brown barley tea in his glass. It was just a matter of time until he grew antsy and did something stupid.
Mr. Ma didn’t notice our discomfort. After cleansing his throat with more of the barley tea, he continued his dissertation.
“Slicky boys have been taking money from you Americans for many years.”
He smiled at the thought.
“Of course you have plenty. More than you need, and during the war we were starving. Sometimes I think you Americans knew that. That’s why your security was never as good as it could have been. Or as good as it had been on the army compounds when the Japanese were here. The Japanese ruled with an iron hand. In those days, to be a slicky boy you had to be very brave because if you were caught you would be either shot on the spot or executed a few days later.
“Now we go to prison. Not such a terrible fate if you’re starving to death anyway.”
We had to get out of here. Otherwise, this guy was going to chew our ears off all night. But before I could make a move, he was talking again.
“When the war ended there were independent slicky boys outside all the hundreds of U.S. compounds around our country. Many of these compounds you closed up, turned over to the Korean Army, and gradually you consolidated into the fifty or sixty big bases you have now. The slicky boys started squabbling over territory. Many men were killed. This disarray lasted for some months until we had an iron hand again.”
I looked at him and waited.
“So Boncho-ga,” he said.
I spoke in English. “Herbalist So."’
“What’s that?”
I switched back to Korean. “I’ve heard of him,” I said.
His eyes widened. “Then you are also a very diligent guard. Not many foreigners have.”
“Is he still alive?”
“Oh, yes. Very much alive. Some say he might live forever.” Mr. Ma picked up his tea and his eyes smiled over the rim of the cup. “All those herbs, you know.”
“The herbs keep him alive?”
“Yes.”
I didn’t know about that but I did know that the Koreans spend fortunes on hanyak-Chinese medicine- and the exotic herbs and potions that go with it.