The shadowy figure of Mr. Ma guided me through the cellar and slid back the door to the hooch he shared with his son. A stained yellow light filtered out. The boy lay facedown on a sleeping mat, a silk comforter pulled up to his shoulders, sound asleep.
Mr. Ma whispered to me. “Take off your jacket.”
I did as I was told. He inspected me.
I wore blue jeans, black combat boots, and a black turtleneck pullover. The. 38 formed a lump below my left armpit. Beneath the outer layer of clothing I had on underwear and thermal long johns. Mr. Ma tugged on the tight material of the pullover, letting it spring back into place, and motioned for me to tuck it into my pants.
When I finished he nodded approvingly.
“Good,” he said. “But no jacket.”
It would be cold as a son of a bitch out there.
There was still some time before curfew so we sat on the narrow wooden porch. I asked him how Herbalist So had maneuvered Shipton and his North Korean handlers into making their move tonight.
He didn’t have all the details but claimed that one of the workmen on compound, the man who changed the glass bottles of drinking water, had managed to obtain copies of the keys to the inner security rooms of the Geographical Survey building. At Herbalist So’s instructions, this man had approached certain brokers in clandestine information and put the keys on the underground auction block. Someone had snatched up the offer right away. Discreet inquiry indicated the buyers were the same agents who were handling Shipton.
“Why wouldn’t Shipton have gone in earlier?”
“The keys were just sold today.”
Talk about cutting it close.
“How can we be sure he knows the information he seeks will be gone tomorrow?”
“We can’t. We’re hoping he obtained that information from other sources. If we offer him too much knowledge, he will become suspicious. Besides,” Mr. Ma said, “the Communist habit is to act immediately. Before they are betrayed.”
Ma slapped me on the knee.
“Kapshida,” he said. Let’s go.
The snow hadn’t let up. It was past curfew now so everyone was off the street. Occasionally, in the dark alleys, we saw another set of footprints, silently erased by the falling flakes.
We wound through pathways that were new to me, and after a few minutes I was completely lost. Without my jacket the cold bit into the bones beneath my flesh and held on, gnawing at the marrow with a fierce pleasure.
Finally, we emerged on the MSR. Mr. Ma peeked out onto the main road, looking for the white jeeps of the curfew police. When he saw that all was clear, he waved me forward. Ahead loomed the stone wall, topped with a chain-link fence and barbed wire, that surrounded the south post of Yongsan Compound.
Without hesitation, Ma picked up speed, running as if he were going to smash face-first into the wall ahead. Instead, he bounded forward, caught a toehold, and kept his momentum, moving his body up the wall like a crab scuttling over a sand bank.
Why hadn’t he told me about this? Probably because he didn’t want me to think about it. I didn’t. I hit the wall running, moved easily up the craggy rocks about halfway, until my trailing foot slipped and I plummeted down to the ground, tumbling backward on my ass into the snow.
My head snapped against the soft pack.
I lay dazed for a time, I’m not really sure how long. Finally, I heard Mr. Ma hissing at me. I raised myself on my elbow and fingered the back of my skull. No blood. I’d live. 1 looked up.
Ma sat atop the wall like a cat, motioning for me to move forward. Shaking my head to clear it, I rose unsteadily to my feet.
I took it more slowly this time, checking my handholds and testing my foot placements before entrusting my entire weight. After what must’ve been five minutes of struggle I finally made it. Ma grabbed my arm and, with surprising strength for a man of his size, yanked me up to the top of the wall.
No congratulations, no words of encouragement. We just moved forward.
We still had the chain-link fence to get over-the metal posts of which were imbedded in the stone-and the barbed wire coiled atop it.
Prongs at the summit stuck out at wicked angles. The thought of trying to climb over that, with almost a twenty-foot fall below, caused a spasm of fear in my stomach.
But Ma didn’t make any moves to climb up. Instead, he slid along the top of the wall toward a juncture where the cliff rose even higher. When he reached it he paused and grabbed two loose stones, about the size of bricks. I wondered if he’d planted them there. Working quickly, he shoved the flat side of one of the stones beneath the taut chain-link fence. The muscles on his neck strained as he twisted it up. Miraculously, despite all the tension in the fence, he pried the linked wire up about three inches from the stone wall.
I glanced down at the road. No pedestrians. No traffic. But it wouldn’t last long. The curfew police would be along soon.
He grabbed the other stone and, about a yard away from where he had set the first one, he twisted it skyward. Now, there was about four inches of space between the chain-link fence and the stone wall. Twisting his neck at a painful angle he forced his head beneath the fence. I thought for sure he’d be trapped that way: his head on one side of the fence, his rib cage on the other. But he kept wriggling forward, pushing up as much as he could with his hands, and slowly the razor-sharp bottom of the chain link dragged itself over his chest. Once he had wriggled in up to his waist, the rest was easy. He kicked forward, twisted his ankles until his feet popped through, and he was in.
I almost applauded. I’d never seen anything like it, even in a circus.
Mr. Ma squatted in front of the fence, checking over his shoulder for guards. He jabbed his finger forward, pointing for me to crawl through the same opening he’d just squeezed through.
He had to be insane. No way I’d ever fit. I was twice his size. But he kept pointing and he grabbed the fence with his fingers, showing me that he’d be lifting up on it.
In the distance I heard the purring motor of a jeep, heading our way. I lay down on my back along the cold stone fence, twisted my head, and started pushing with my feet. It scratched and it hurt and every inch forward was accompanied by pain. Ma squatted above, jerking with all his strength on the thick wire. I must’ve sliced half my nose off pushing my head through but finally it was in and when the fence scraped along my chest I thought for sure my shirt would be shredded. Ma kept lifting and tugging until I wriggled through to my waist and kicked forward and scraped my pelvis bones and finally my thighs and my knees and my feet.
I was in! I gazed down at the fence, now pressed firmly against the stone, and couldn’t believe I’d squeezed through the tiny opening.
Ma slapped me on the shoulder but suddenly twisted his head. Footsteps. We ran toward the tree line.
Squatting behind a row of snow-covered birch trees, we watched as a guard in heavy gloves and fur-lined parka sauntered by, an MI rifle slung carelessly over his shoulder. He was Korean. One of the contract hires who guard the compound at night.
When the guard’s footsteps faded, Mr. Ma turned and stalked off through the trees. I followed.
Many of the redbrick buildings on military compounds in Korea-and all throughout Asia-had been built by the Japanese Imperial Army prior to World War II. After Emperor Hirohito’s surrender ending the war, the U.S. Army had moved right in.
Mr. Ma and I stood amongst a grove of trees on a small hill overlooking a cluster of brick buildings surrounded by a high wall. The old Japanese stockade.
We moved down the hill.
Nowadays, the U.S. Army used the buildings for storage only, but I’d heard stories about this place. About how the Korean partisans had been imprisoned here by the Japanese, and how they’d been tortured and killed.