“How can I meet this Herbalist So?”
Mr. Ma shook his head. “You can’t.”
“Why not?”
“You are a foreigner.”
“Why should that make a difference?”
“It makes all the difference. No foreigner has ever set eyes on So Boncho-ga. No foreigner ever will. That is how he survived so long.” Mr. Ma raised his forefinger. “Caution.”
“I can appreciate caution,” I said. “Maybe there is someone who can tell him of my concerns.”
“None that I know of.”
“Maybe you.”
Mr. Ma laughed. “I am long retired,” he said. “And nothing more than a poor custodian and a collector of bottles and cans. Such an important man as Herbalist So would never listen to the likes of me.”
“Then where can I find someone who he will listen to?”
“That I cannot answer.”
The paper-paneled door slid back. Kuang-sok stepped into the room and sat down next to his father. He hadn’t brought the newspaper, I noticed, but that wasn’t my problem. Disciplining children was beyond the purview of the Criminal Investigation Division.
I downed the last of my barley tea. Ernie did the same. A waste of time, I thought. Another waste.
I thanked Mr. Ma and stood up. He rose and slipped on his shoes and followed Ernie and me to the door:
When I looked back, the last thing I saw was Kuang-sok peering at us with great relief, his arms clutched tightly around his father’s waist.
Outside, stars glimmered. The moon was rising slowly above peaked tile roofs.
We turned down an alley. In it, two men stood with their backs to us. As we approached, they swiveled. In the growing moonlight, I could see they were young, hair long, disheveled. Both wore brightly colored workout outfits. The emblem of a martial arts training dojang was emblazoned on the chest.
They stared at us.
Had I been alone, I would’ve ignored their hard looks. Routine survival procedure in East L.A. But I was with Ernie. I knew he would never ignore them. I was right.
He jerked his thumb in their direction. “What do these dorks want?”
“I don-'t know, Ernie. Don’t pay any attention to them. They’ll go away.”
Ernie’s walk took on more bounce and he thrust out his chest. What a study he would make for some scientist. Dominant male in a pack of baboons.
Something landed heavily behind us. I looked back. More men. Dropping from a tiled roof. Three of them. Four. Five. In front of us, six more figures appeared.
Slicky boys. At long last. Somehow I wasn’t filled with joy.
They closed in on us. Clubs appeared from coats.
I stood loose. Trying to make it seem as if I were ready for them.
Ernie backed up against a wall, found a large stone, and knocked it against cement to check its firmness.
“Time for some ass-kicking,” he said happily.
“Who’s going to be doing the kicking?”
“We are!” He tossed the rock at the first guy coming in and charged. Errol Flynn couldn’t have done it better.
No time to think now. I did the same, leaping forward with a solid side-kick, catching a slicky boy in the ribs. Swinging fists crunched skull and jaw.
All in all, I’d say Ernie and I made a pretty good account of ourselves. I remember two, maybe three guys going down. I dodged a couple of bat swings and most of their karate kicks slid off of me like bullets ricocheting off armor. But it didn’t last long. The flesh is weak. Especially when you’re outnumbered six to one.
Somewhere along the line, I plowed headfirst into the snow. Before I could rise, hands grabbed my arms and punches and kicks rained down on my legs and my spine.
I struggled upward beneath the thudding onslaught, making progress, until something clunked on my head. I felt myself falling. As the world faded into blackness, I wondered what had hit me.
Looking back now, I think it was a brick.
16
Rough wooden slats jolted me skyward. For a moment I hung suspended in air until slowly, gravity tightened its grip, jerked me earthward, and slammed me back onto the hard splintered boards.
Churning wheels rolled me forward, gliding over a smooth surface until they hit another eruption of stone or brick. My body was jarred once again.
Musty canvas enveloped my face. I couldn’t move. The air was hot and close and laced with dirt and the cadavers of dead fleas.
I started to kick and thrash but when I did the thick shroud around me only tightened its unholy grip. I willed myself to relax. Remain still. Ease my breathing. That helped a little. Not much. I wanted to get that thing off my face.
My palms were numb, pinned beneath my body. Tingling spears of agony shot up my spine.
Someone mumbled above. Men cursed, laughed. Koreans.
We came to a halt for a moment. Whispered conversation. Some sort of go-ahead was given: We rolled forward.
Now the quaking started in earnest.
We were on jagged steps and as we progressed into the bowels of the earth, my spine slapped against the hard wooden boards again and again.
I was in some kind of cart. A wooden cart on wheels. Someone was pushing me, someone else was ahead guiding the cart, and other voices hovered around, fading in and out. Escorts of some kind.
Just another parcel being wheeled through Itaewon. Not anything anyone would notice.
I wasn’t sure, but I thought there was another cart behind us. Ernie.
I was wrapped so tightly in canvas I couldn’t sit up. If I shouted, I not only wouldn’t be heard but I’d waste what precious oxygen was left to me. Already I felt light-headed. I fought back waves of nausea.
What to do now? I tried to remember what I’d learned in training classes out of the CID manual. Mentally, I thumbed through the table of contents. What had the authors advised if you’re wrapped in canvas and being transported in a wooden cart through an ancient Oriental city? Nothing came to mind. I must’ve skipped that chapter.
I decided to improvise. I’d wait, though, until they unwrapped me.
Things got quieter-no more street noises-and a deep chill filled my bones. More whispers.
Suddenly, the cart was in the air. Men had grabbed hold of it all around and were grunting and snorting through their noses. We descended down what must’ve been a steep flight of stairs. Finally, we reached bottom and with a loud bang, the men dropped the cart.
Now there was more talking. More joviality. I was wheeled along what seemed to be a smooth stone surface. Doors opened and shut. Finally we stopped. The cart behind me rolled up and bumped into mine. Footsteps faded away. All was quiet.
I lay perfectly still.
It was cold, colder than it had been. A vicious thought crept into my mind. Had they deposited me in a tomb?
Maybe they didn’t have the courage to kill me, but instead had wrapped me in this canvas and brought me down into some ungodly dark pit and left me here to die. To die of suffocation and starvation and cold.
I rolled slightly in the canvas, feeling with my legs and my arms. No folds. No place to grab onto an edge and pull. I lay still again and listened. No sound.
And then it overcame me, like some drooling monster bounding out of the dark. A horrendous, screaming surge of panic. I rolled and kicked and thrashed against the canvas and then I screamed, hollering out as loud as I could. But the more I struggled the tighter the canvas embraced me. I wiggled and pushed and clawed but nothing seemed to help. Finally, I was exhausted and I could hardly breathe. I lay in the canvas, sweat drenching my body, gasping for air like some enormous landlocked tuna fish.
I closed my eyes. Hoping for oblivion. It didn’t come. I realized that somehow, just enough oxygen was seeping into my tight shroud to keep me alive. I wouldn’t die and I wouldn’t be able to get out. Torture. I could stay here suffering for days.