Yom Sang-seop - Three Generations

The detectives called Geumcheon to report the incident and searched for the business card, but it was nowhere to be found. They had brought Deok-gi home so they could examine his grandfather’s will. If it checked out the suspects would be released, but this turn of events made that impossible now. After asking a few more questions, the officers went away with Deok-gi in tow.

Deok-gi’s mother soon returned, despondent, followed by the servant with the bundle on his back. At the police station, she had been told that they knew nothing about her husband. Then she was shunted to the Jongno Police Station, where she was directed back to the Judiciary Department of the Police Division. But she got nowhere. The family couldn’t bear to see her disappointment when she learned what had happened.

Hasty footsteps could be heard amid whispers in the deserted corridor under the dim electric light. Doors burst open here and there, as heads poked out, asking, “What’s going on here?” Bloodshot eyes glinted in the dark. The answers didn’t seem to shock them, but every eye grew colder and each face sterner. Each day around this time, an interrogation began in every room and stretched through the night.

Geumcheon heard what had happened from his subordinates. He directed one of them to call a doctor immediately. Outside, he had a policeman stationed before each interrogation room to bar people from going in and out. A bit later, several policemen without swords brought in what looked like a corpse, covered with a black overcoat.

Slippered feet crossed the corridor solemnly. No one uttered a word. They were trying to keep this latest development sub rosa. When the policeman posted in Geumcheon’s room opened the door, light streamed into the corridor. The body disappeared into the room without a sound, and the policeman pushed the door shut. The policemen standing guard at other doors stepped away in a wave, resembling the wake of a motorcade.

In Geumcheon’s room, the policemen dropped the body they were carrying onto the dirty wooden floor. The body began to squirm and moan in agony. As Geumcheon drew near, an underling pulled aside the overcoat covering the body. The man’s chest heaved and bloody foam gathered on his lips. He looked awful even to the untrained eye, and Geumcheon feared that he’d die before the doctor arrived.

The man’s face didn’t resemble a face — it was a dark mass of blood. Nose, mouth, eyes — everything was a bloody mess, like a lump of fermented beans molded during a moonless night. It was unclear where his mouth was, but one could see that his eyes were open and gleaming.

“What a pointless thing you’ve done. How can a man with such great ambition die this way — a coward? Who would have thought that Jang Hun would be so feeble.” Geumcheon frowned as he stared down at the bloodied face. His words could be construed as mockery: “A patriot lives by the spirit of a warrior. And a warrior must end his life gracefully. What ugliness is this? If you have to die, it would have been more dignified if you had killed yourself with that pistol.” He nodded to the gun on his desk. “Take it, Jang Hun. End your life in a manly manner. You must know that it’s over for you. You couldn’t accomplish what you set out to do in this era of impossible conditions, but before you die, you’d better tell the whole world what you intended to do. For the sake of your honor, and as a way to recruit comrades to your cause so they might carry on what you set out to do. Answer just three questions: Was that pistol left behind by Pi-hyeok or did it come from someone else? What did you plan to do with it? What orders did you receive from Pi-hyeok? Just tell me these things. Share this with us for Kim Byeong-hwa’s sake. If you refuse to take responsibility, thinking everything will be finished once you’re gone, remember that the people you leave behind will have an even harder time.”

Geumcheon hoped he could get the man to spill something in his vulnerable state. Yet, if he had been willing to answer their questions, he wouldn’t have swallowed the drugs and severed his tongue with his own teeth in the first place. Jang Hun had uttered nothing but “I don’t know” during the past three days. The detectives shook their heads, saying they’d never seen such a stubborn devil since the foundation of the Police Division. Even if he hadn’t drugged himself, Jang Hun wouldn’t have gotten out of there in one piece. He looked so broken that it seemed as if his bones were hanging loose in the sack of his body.

On the verge of losing consciousness, Jang Hun blinked while listening to Geumcheon. When he heard the word pistol, he opened his eyes and stared at the detective, as if he had come to, and then spat something out. Blood sprayed from his mouth, and although Geumcheon leapt away, blood spattered his face and chest, like stray bullets.

The underling standing beside him shouted, “You bastard!” and kicked Jang Hun in the side. Jang Hun closed his eyes and let out several painful moans, which sounded as though they emanated from the bottom of a deep barrel.

The doctor arrived. Geumcheon had had hot water brought in and had taken off his shirt to wash it. In his undershirt, he wiped his face and greeted the doctor. “Take a look at him. We must revive him, no matter what.” There was a sense of urgency in Geumcheon’s voice. The doctor was used to such cases. He presumed the prisoner had been pummeled to the brink of death by Judo experts. He felt for a pulse and was stunned to learn that the man had taken poison.

“How long ago was that? Has he been spitting blood because of the poison?”

“No, he bit his own tongue.”

Ignoring the prisoner’s muffled moans, the doctor cradled the man’s blood-drenched head as if it were the head of a cow that had just been slaughtered and forced his mouth open. He pulled out his tongue. Jang Hun merely groaned, having no energy left to scream.

The doctor muttered, “It’s been torn in three or four places, but it’s not totally severed.”

The police had obtained a clue from Gyeong-ae’s cousin. When they learned that Pi-hyeok had come to see him, and that he had helped shave Pi-hyeok’s head before his departure, they began to torture Gyeong-ae and Byeong-hwa, who blamed everything on Jang Hun. Gyeong-ae insisted that she had introduced Pi-hyeok to Byeong-hwa only because he’d threatened her. She didn’t like the idea of Byeong-hwa getting involved with him because they were falling in love, and Byeong-hwa was about to distance himself from the movement anyway. She asserted that after consulting with Byeong-hwa, she also introduced Pi-hyeok to Jang Hun. Byeong-hwa in turn claimed that he and Pil-sun’s father had been beaten because Jang Hun had been angry that Byeong-hwa and Gyeong-ae had backed off from the movement. He insisted that the beating had also been a warning against revealing Pi-hyeok’s secret. Gyeong-ae and Byeong-hwa knew their story would not contradict Jang Hun’s. After Jang Hun beat up Byeong-hwa, the two had become close again. At one point, Jang Hun had said, “If anything happens, just say whatever is best for you. I’ll keep silent no matter what, and if it gets really bad, I’ll — ” He gestured with his hand that he would cut his throat. Byeong-hwa and Gyeong-ae had worked out their story in advance and had full confidence in Jang Hun.

Jang Hun did as he said he would. However, he had no idea that it would be a dose of cocaine — which he had obtained on a lark from a friend visiting from Manchuria — that would end his life. He had put the cocaine in his vest pocket. It had slipped through a hole in the seam and had lodged at the bottom of his vest.