Martin Limon: The Door to Bitterness

“And where is she now?” I asked.

“Ambulance take hospital,” Lieutenant Won said.

Back in the casino, the three nervous cashiers remained in their cage, perched on wooden stools like exotic birds with fluttering blue wings. The four of us-me, Ernie, the angry Lieutenant Won, and the obsequious Mr. Bok-walked past the cashiers and crossed the carpeted casino floor toward the front entrance.

We had almost reached it when the backdoor of the cashier’s cage clanged open. The four of us stopped, turned, and stared back at the cage.

Like leopards, three men glided out. Two were young Koreans, tall, muscular, wearing suits and ties, their black hair slicked back. Between them stood an older man, his gray hair streaked with white. His face was pasty, as if he spent a lot of time indoors, and his cheeks sagged. The three-piece suit he wore was made of finely tailored wool. The way he stood, motionless, made me think that he was a mortician, come to escort a body to the nether realms. He stared at me. Not at Ernie, not at Lieutenant Won, not at Mr. Bok, but at me. For what seemed a long moment, his craggy face remained impassive. Something ugly passed between us. Then, as quickly as the mortician and his entourage had appeared, they turned and slipped back through the doorway.

“Who was that?” Ernie asked.

“The owner.”

“Of the entire casino?”

Lieutenant Won nodded.

“We need to talk to him,” Ernie said.

“Not possible,” Lieutenant Won answered.

I started to protest, but Lieutenant Won held up his open palm to silence me.

“Finish,” he said.

Four Korean cops converged on Ernie and me and motioned toward the door. One put his hand on Ernie’s elbow, and Ernie shoved him away. Immediately, the three other cops went for their nightsticks, but before they could move, Lieutenant Won shouted an order. They stopped, glaring at us. Ernie and I glared back.

The small pack of Korean cops watched warily while Ernie straightened his coat. Then he turned and the two of us walked out of the casino and trotted down the steps. Under our own power.

“Shangnom-ah!” Ernie shouted.

Another kimchee cab swerved in front of us, horn blaring, and Ernie slammed on his brakes and cursed again. We were winding our way through the heavy midday downtown Inchon traffic, heading for the Huang Hei Medical Center, the hospital where the young female blackjack dealer had been taken. The one who’d been shot.

Korean curse words Ernie had down pat. “Common lout” is what shangnom means. Rough talk in the Korean lexicon. He turned to me.

“Why the hell do you want to go to the hospital anyway?”

“I want to see,” I said.

“See what? She’s a dealer in a casino. Young, female, twenty-two years old. Her name is Han Ok-hi. She was shot with a bullet that appears to be. 45 caliber, from a gun that is probably yours. What else do you want to know?”

For a moment I thought I’d punch him. For the first time since I’d met Ernie Bascom, in all the months we’d worked together and arrested bad guys together and run the ville together, I had an overwhelming urge to lean across the gear shift and punch him flush upside his Anglo-Saxon head.

But I didn’t. Instead, I held onto my knees and stared straight ahead. It’s a trait, part of Mexican-American culture, I’m told, to become very quiet when confronted or angry. To do nothing but think-or better yet, to let your body decide whether to strike or wait and let it pass.

Ernie glanced at me and then glanced again, quickly returning his attention to the swirling traffic, maybe seeing something in me that he hadn’t seen before.

For the rest of the ride, he kept his mouth shut.

The nurse at the reception desk, with her straight black bangs and her immaculately white uniform, was surprised that I could speak Korean. But when Ernie flashed his badge and I told her what we wanted, she gave us directions to the room of Han Ok-hi. On the first floor, she said, toward the rear of the hospital. Chonghuanja Sil, she said. Critical Care Unit.

We received even more stares as we strode down the long cement corridors of the Huang Hei Medical Center. Nurses and patients swiveled to see; even the doctors looked up from their work. GIs are seldom seen in the City of Inchon. With a total population of about 500,000, only a tiny fraction-maybe two dozen-are GIs assigned to the transportation security unit at the Port of Inchon. Other foreigners, for example the merchant marines who visit the city by the thousands every year, stay mostly near the strip of bars and brothels outside the main gates of the Port of Inchon. Tourists are almost non-existent; except for the Hong Kong and Japanese high-rollers who visit the big Olympos Hotel and Casino overlooking the entrance to the bay.

Two sad-faced Koreans, a man and a woman, sat in a reception area in front of the double-doored entrance to the Critical Care Unit. The nurse at the front desk had already told me they were here: the parents of Han Ok-hi. I was afraid to pause and talk to them. After all, what would I say? I’m the guy who allowed some crazy woman to steal his pistol so your daughter could be shot? Pity welled up in me for this middle-aged couple, but for the moment, I prayed they didn’t know who I was or what I had done. Cowardly, yes. But if they dragged me down into their anguish, I might drown before I finished the job I knew I had to do.

Without acknowledging them, Ernie and I pushed through the double doors and into the ward.

The inner chamber of the Critical Care Unit was bathed in a green glow. As we waited for our eyes to adjust to the dim light, a blue-smocked technician, and then a doctor, confronted us.

The doctor’s name tag said Oh.

Ernie showed his badge.

“Han Ok-hi,” I said. “Where is she?”

Doctor Oh insisted we put on face masks. A pair were found for us, then he ushered us down a corridor. Patients lay on beds surrounded by paraphernalia: tubes, bottles, air bags, beeping respirator machines. Finally, we stopped. The doctor pointed.

Her feet only reached two-thirds of the way down the bed. A loose plastic mask covered most of her face; the mask gently filled, then deflated. Her black hair had been shoved into a translucent blue cap. Tubes were stuck into her arms and down her throat and into other strategic spots around her body.

Doctor Oh tried to stop me, but I couldn’t help myself. I reached out and touched the palm of her hand. It was much colder than it should’ve been.

This was my fault. Sure, I knew rationally that it was the criminals involved who were responsible. Not me. But that couldn’t change my feelings. That couldn’t change the debt I owed to this small young woman whose fingers lay cold and limp in my palm. It was a matter of honor now. I had to find the men who did this. Not for the Korean National Police, nor for the 8th Army Criminal Investigation Division. Not even for Han Ok-hi herself. But for me.

Dr. Oh grabbed my elbow. Even through his mask, I could tell he was frowning.

“Will she live?” I asked.

Doctor Oh shrugged.

On a coat rack near the bed hung a long traditional Korean silk skirt. I let go of Han Ok-hi’s hand and stepped toward it. The silk was hand-embroidered in red on a pale pink background. Flowers. Mugung-hua. The Rose of Sharon. The national flower of Korea. Then I remembered. Reaching into my pocket, I pulled out the strip of silk I’d found under the desk that belonged to the owner of the Olympos Hotel and Casino. The material hung loosely in my hands, and I realized it was the short blouse that matched this long skirt hanging next to the supine body of Miss Han Ok-Hi. As I hung it on the rack next to the skirt, Dr. Oh stared at me curiously.