The hairs on Choi’s forearm stood on end. He thought of each Korean who’d gone into solitary to dig that tunnel.
Sugiyama continued, ‘If you don’t like my terms, keep digging that tunnel and get out of prison. If you win, you’re free. If I win, you’re right back here. Wouldn’t you say it’s a fair fight?’ Sugiyama looked at Choi with dark, brooding eyes.
Sugiyama continued to watch him over the next three months; the tunnel wasn’t complete and escape seemed impossible. Killing Sugiyama was the only way. If he disappeared, the only person who knew about the tunnel would be gone. It wasn’t an easy choice for a cornered mouse to bite the cat, but it wasn’t impossible, either. Choi started to dig a new tunnel towards the cemetery, branching off the original tunnel to make it look as though he were simply digging to get enough dirt to fill up the first tunnel. Choi carefully observed Sugiyama’s rounds. Finally the tunnel to the cemetery was complete. The night Sugiyama was assigned to make the overnight rounds, Choi crawled to the cemetery. He came up to ground level, uprooted a stake that marked a grave and waited, hiding around the corner from the solitary wing. Sugiyama’s route was precise. Choi smashed the stake into the guard’s shoulder as he rounded the corner. He heard bone breaking. Choi then held a spoon that he had filed down to Sugiyama’s neck, prodding him towards the administrative wing. It was completely dark that night, without even a strand of moonlight. Sugiyama must have thought the heavens were on Choi’s side. They went through the doors of the administrative wing and through to the inspection office. Sugiyama took out his bundle of keys and opened the small door; he was pushed along the corridor, past the inspection office, towards the central facilities. The block was deserted and silent. In the central building Choi led Sugiyama up the stairs to the banister. Sticky blood trickled down Sugiyama’s neck.
‘I’m sorry. But there wasn’t any other way, was there?’ Choi whispered.
Suigyama nodded. He knew there weren’t any rules in war, just that you’d be killed if you didn’t strike first. Choi snapped Sugiyama’s neck, then tied him to the banister with the rope that he undid from Sugiyama’s belt and stabbed him with his weapon. He was as skilled as a butcher handling a side of beef. He retraced his steps back to the cemetery, avoiding the blue searchlight that intermittently lit the darkness. Choi then calmly disappeared back into the tunnel.
Choi seemed spent. I put the pen down and blew on my hands. I was chilled, and not because of the sub-zero temperature in the interrogation room. ‘It would have been easier to kill him in the cemetery or near the solitary wing. Why did you take him to the central facilities?’
One side of his mouth turned up in a cold smile. He spoke slowly, as if enjoying my terror. ‘My purpose wasn’t to kill him, but to escape. If I killed him near the cemetery or the solitary wing, the whole area would have been torn apart. The farthest place from the tunnel was the lobby between the administrative wing and the wards, the centre of the prison.’
‘Where did you get the surgical needle and thread that you used to sew up his mouth?’
‘I can get my hands on anything in this prison. I have skilled men: the craftiest, deftest pickpocket, an irresistible charmer, a con man who can seduce a nurse. And how convenient is it that the fancy infirmary is right here in the prison? It’s child’s play to steal a suture set.’
‘So the intricate suturing is your work, too?’
‘Remember, I grew up on the battlefield. I had to learn how to do many things. That was the only way I could survive.’
I put my pen down. What he was confessing would lead to his hanging. Why was he telling me this? What was he plotting? I summarized Choi’s statement into a four-page report. I included everything he had confessed to me, but my report wasn’t the entire truth. Even if everything I wrote down was accurate, it couldn’t be truthful if anything was missing. I didn’t record Choi’s life as a fugitive or the emotional stand-off he’d had with the man he killed. I didn’t write down the exact point in time when Sugiyama discovered the tunnel, or the fight over it. My report concluded with a simple cause and effect: Sugiyama Dozan found the tunnel and Prisoner 331 killed him to keep it a secret.
Things happened quickly after I submitted my report. Choi was thrown into a cell on death-row and a group of selected prisoners was ordered to fill up the tunnel. But unanswered questions continued to run through my head. Why, when he knew he would fail, when he knew what awaited him, did he put his life on the line, trying to escape in the most hopeless ways? And why did the warden let him live?
Three days later, I was called into the warden’s office. I was given a promotion for my role in the discovery of the tunnel and the investigation of the murder. All the prison executives were there, including Maeda, the head of security, the head investigator, the head administrator and the head surgeon. The warden personally pinned a corporal badge on my cap. One man had been murdered, another was sentenced to death, while I was rewarded with a promotion. I felt hopelessly confused.
A PIANO’S ENEMIES
The auditorium, bathed in light from the setting sun, looked like a painting. Midori was a priestess in prayer behind the piano. The piano laughed and wept beneath her touch. I realized I’d heard the beautiful notes she was now playing the first time I went to the warden’s office. She turned to look at me. I averted my eyes and lowered my head; I’d been humming along.
‘Schubert’s “Der Lindenbaum”,’ she said. ‘It’s a movement in Die Winterreise and part of Professor Marui’s repertoire.’ She played on.
I wondered what the bleak title, the subtle, sorrowful allusion to melody and all the terse German words meant. ‘I’ve heard it before, but I couldn’t understand the lyrics.’
‘Schubert devotees usually prefer the original lyrics. German is rough and turbid, so it goes well with the masculine tone and heavy atmosphere. Die Winterreise is a song cycle based on a serial poem by the German poet Wilhelm Müller. You can really understand the piece if you pay attention to the sound of the original language.’
She played another tune, low and sorrowful. I stole a glance at the neat parting in her hair. The sunset caressed her rhythmically moving shoulders.
‘This is “Gute Nacht”, the first lied in Die Winterreise.’ She spoke without turning around.
That was when it came to me. ‘Good Night.’ It was the mysterious poem I had found in Sugiyama’s pocket. I recited it aloud. ‘As a stranger I arrived, as a stranger again I leave. Now the world is bleak, the path covered by snow.’
She froze like a salt pillar. Fear pooled in her eyes. Why was she so frightened? She must know something.
My face betrayed no emotions. I told her, ‘I found that poem in the dead guard’s pocket. He was a violent guard they called the “Angel of Death”.’
She curled her white fingers into a fist. ‘Don’t talk about him like that,’ she said warily, shooting me a hostile glance. ‘You don’t know anything about him.’
My mouth went dry. ‘What do you know about him?’ I asked, and turned around to hide my upset expression.
I heard the piano then, as mournful and majestic as a large collapsing building. I looked back. She had stood up, slamming both hands on the keyboard. Through her tangled hair that cascaded in front of her face I could see her wet eyelashes and the tip of her reddening nose.
‘He wasn’t violent!’
The heavy notes reverberated in my head. I thought about my promise to Choi that I would record the truth about Sugiyama’s death. He had confessed everything, but I still didn’t feel that I knew the truth. Really, I didn’t know a thing.