Martin Limon - Jade Lady burning

We didn’t have to worry about guns, but we did have to worry about the men. They were both tall for Koreans, close to six feet, thin but not skinny, with knots of muscle at various strategic points around their bodies. I noticed the callouses on their knuckles and the stances they were in and, by the looks of them, the years of practice that went into such familiarity.

Ernie took a few steps off to the side of the alley and got his back up against the stone wall. An old habit from Vietnam. If they decide to waste you at least you’ll see them coming.

The hoodlums had turned their attention to us but still held Kimiko, who was muttering vile curses through her constricted throat.

I thought of turning around and walking away, pretending we were just innocent bystanders who happened to stumble on this scene and didn’t want to get involved in any trouble. But that wouldn’t do Kimiko much good. And I didn’t want to lose her after all the trouble we’d gone through to find her. Anyway, my guess was that these guys had probably spotted us following her, because they hadn’t seemed too surprised when we rounded the corner.

I decided to go for one of those lines, like you hear in the movies, that gets everybody’s attention and puts the fear of God in your enemies. My brain churned but all I came up with was, “Why don’t you leave the girl alone?”

Ernie tried to strengthen it some. “Yeah,” he said. “Leave her alone.”

The guy with his hands free had a square face, stubbled whiskers, and a short, thick scar along the side of his neck. I don’t think he understood me. Just as well.

Instead, he looked at us for what seemed a long moment, and then he said, slowly and distinctly, as if he’d rehearsed it, “E yoja dala kamyon dangsin ae jamji chaluhkeita.”

Most of the words were familiar to me but I was too nervous to put it all together. Something about what would happen if we continued to follow her. I tried to remember the sentence as a whole, and the noun jamji in particular because that was a new one to me.

Finally the man got impatient and he waved his hand at me. “Ka! Bali ka!”

I didn’t have any trouble with that one. “Go!” he said, as if he were talking to a dog.

He shuffled another step towards us. “Bali ka, sikya!”

Fighting words.

I felt the old fear rise within me. The fear of bullies, the fear of gangs, the fear of the mean, pitiless, sun-seared streets.

The fear made me angry.

I returned the insult-“Yoja manjijima, sikya!”-speaking to him as if he were dirt.

He understood that. Like a scorpion he was on me, stinger raised. The bottom of his foot slammed my chest and I hurtled back against the stone wall.

He was a little too confident about his own expertise and let the foot linger on my chest, knee bent, while he leaned forward to punch me in the head. I twisted left, covered. The punch landed on my arms. He was much quicker than me but the road was slippery and I was now above him, on the incline. I pushed forward and his footing gave. He slid down the hill and landed on his butt. Bounding across the alleyway, I pulled the other guy off Ernie and heaved. Kimiko snarled and missed him with a snap kick as he twisted down the alley. He careened into his buddy and for a second they both lay on the road.

The one with the scar sprang upright, reached out and yanked his comrade to his feet.

We were like three glaring musk-ox-Ernie, Kimiko, and me-rump to rump, defending the herd.

By this time a small crowd had gathered on the main road and was starting to gawk. The scarred guy sneered and said, “Ka ja,” to his friend, and they both walked away, dusting themselves off.

I suppose I could have gone after them and tried to arrest them, but for what? Given her track record, I doubted Kimiko would have testified against them, so it would have been Ernie’s word and mine against theirs. And I’m not so sure Captain Kim would have been enthusiastic about the whole thing. Besides, I was afraid of them and not at all certain that we’d come out as well in the next round. I was happy just to see them go.

Kimiko straightened out what little there was of her dress and tried to dust it off, pulling the hemline down below her soiled panties.

“Why you help me?” she said.

“Lady in distress.”

She stared at me for a moment, her face lined with little creases, the nose rounded and slightly protruding, the lips fleshy, her hair like a snarled black mop. Fifty, at least. But her body was trim and her bosom soft and round. Her stock in trade.

Kimiko squinted. “You CID?”

Cover in Itaewon lasts for about five minutes. We’d been here for months.

“Yeah.”

“So you follow me? Checky, checky.”

“Yeah.”

“Why?”

‘To find out about Miss Pak.”

Kimiko searched my face and then slowly turned away. “Yes. Come on.”

The three of us trudged up the hill, and about halfway up the block Kimiko turned right through the open gate and we followed her into the courtyard with the charred remains of the rented home of Miss Pak Ok-suk.

The landlady stood in the courtyard, arms folded.

The doors to Kimiko’s hooch were open. Ripped open. Splintered wood and tattered strips of white paper lay strewn across the narrow wood-slat porch. Kimiko stood frozen for a moment, then spoke quickly to the landlady.

The men had come here about an hour before curfew, searched the room, and then waited all night. In the morning they tore the room apart, searching everywhere, under the vinyl-covered floors, behind the wallpapered plasterboard. Apparently they had found nothing that satisfied them.

None of this seemed to faze Kimiko. She wasn’t the type of woman to place a lot of value on possessions. She didn’t even carry a purse, at least I’d never seen her with one, and her room was as spare and utilitarian as it was possible to be. Now it was a shambles.

She stepped into the room and I followed. The plastic and wire armoire had been smashed, and the few dresses within were shredded, carefully-with a knife. The bottles on her little makeup table had been crunched, making a sweet reeking smear across the floor. The mirror was splintered into a million shards. She rummaged through the mess, calmly, but found nothing that she wanted to keep.

The landlady brought a short broom and a dustpan and together they set to work cleaning up. In a few minutes everything was out in the trash and the cement floor, splotched with vinyl, started to look like home again.

Kimiko told us to come in. We took off our shoes, crouched to pass through the doorway, and sat down cross-legged on the floor.

“I no have coffee,” she said.

“Yeah. That’s all right,” I said.

“You got cigarette?”

“No. I don’t smoke.”

She looked at Ernie. He shrugged.

Kimiko frowned but let it pass and then started talking, without preamble, about Miss Pak. She talked for maybe twenty minutes and when she was finished she just stared at us.

“That’s it?”

“That’s it.”

“And what about you? What will you do now?”

Kimiko lifted her shoulders and let them drop. “I will do what I always do. Make money from GIs.”

We got up.

“Tonight,” she said, “you see me, you buy me drink.”

“We’ll see. Who were those men who attacked you and did all this?” I waved my arms around the room.

“I don’t know.” Her face showed no more emotion than the bottom of an empty soju bottle.

“What were they looking for?”

Kimiko didn’t bother to answer. She just shook her head.

At the bottom of the hill Ernie pulled out a stick of gum, unwrapped it, and popped it in his mouth.

“Did you believe her?”