Bamboo and Blood

by James Church

  “I’m still listening.”

  “Don’t think you can ignore me on this. The talks will be broken off by the end of this week. You should return home before that. Am I clear?”

  “As always.”

  A car door creaked. It was hard to tell how far away it was.

  “My advice is that you leave immediately. Take a train tomorrow to Berlin. The embassy there will have further instructions for your return. If the Swiss ask any questions, tell them one of your relatives died.”

  “Of what?”

  He paused and then stood up. “Don’t forget what I said. You’re not bamboo. You’ll bleed.”

  “If I don’t starve first, you mean.”

  “No, first you’ll bleed. Someone is out here in this city to make sure of that. I don’t know who, exactly. I can only guess why.” As footsteps came up the hill, my brother crossed the street and disappeared.

  5

  M. Beret looked disappointed when he came close enough for me to see his face. “A pity, I wanted a picture of the two of you together.” He pointed a small flashlight down the street and clicked it on and off once. “Family portraits are always precious when we get older, don’t you think, Inspector?”

  “I’m sorry, but I don’t feel like chatting. I’m soaked to the skin from this damp air. It’s the second time today I’ve been soaked, and there isn’t a lot of heat in my hotel room. Not much soap, either. Do you know they gave me one little bar and want it to last the entire week? I thought the West was supposed to be overflowing with creature comforts.”

  M. Beret’s laughter bounced across the paving stones. A light went on in the closest house; someone opened the window and shouted. M. Beret stood up and shouted back.

  “That sounded rude,” I said.

  “The old man told me to be quiet or he would call the police.”

  “What did you say?”

  “I told him I was the police.” M. Beret reached in his pocket and pulled out a roll. “Hungry?”

  “Yes, actually. I haven’t eaten all day. But then why tell you that? You already know.”

  “Annoying, isn’t it, Inspector? I should think you’d be used to it, where you come from.”

  “Hunger?”

  “No, being watched.”

  “Believe me, we’d never approach anything like what you’re doing. Much too much trouble. Eats up manpower. Not really necessary, anyway. No one could actually get lost for very long where I come from, at least, that’s how it used to be.”

  “Now?”

  “Changing circumstances, you might say. New winds blowing.”

  “True enough, following someone is a lot of work. Easier just to bring them in, I suppose.” He was thoughtful. Then he remembered the roll in his hand; he tore it in half. “Don’t ever let it be said we Swiss are not hospitable, soap notwithstanding. I don’t want you to have a bad impression of my country, Inspector. I just don’t want you ever to come back.” He took a small bite. “I could order you out, but that would cause a diplomatic incident. Besides, then I’d be forced to order the whole pack out. We’d have to rent a bus or something.” He reached into another pocket and pulled out my watch. He thumped the face once, held it up to his ear, and then handed it to me. “You forgot this. It’s waterproof, but it isn’t Swiss. It’s counterfeit.”

  “Surprise,” I said.

  “Why don’t you go across the border into France? Or Italy? Then we could deny you reentry.”

  “I don’t think I want to do that.”

  “No, I didn’t suppose you would. Incidentally, your mission is looking for you.” He watched me put the half of the roll in my pocket. “Saving that for later?”

  “Since when does the mission use you to pass phone messages?”

  “If they don’t start paying their phone bill, they’ll have to use semaphores.” He unzipped a small bag he was carrying over his shoulder and took out a book. “I bought something for you. It’s in English, I hope you don’t mind.”

  I took the book and read the title aloud. “The Great Depression.”

  “These are difficult times in your country, I know. I apologize for waving that fact in front of your face this afternoon in the café. But many countries have gone through tough times. The hope is that they come out better, maybe learn from their mistakes. Do you know what I mean?”

  “This is kind of you. I’ll make sure the younger ones in the office read it.” I was thinking of the girl who liked Rachmaninoff; maybe she would enjoy a book on the America her hero had missed seeing. During the Depression, he had been in Switzerland, of all places.

  “You won’t get in trouble, bringing that back?”

  “Why would I get in trouble?”

  “No reason, I suppose.” He zipped up the bag and put it back over his shoulder.

  “What did the mission want to tell me?”

  “Inspector, I never pass on confidential diplomatic traffic; I would be betraying a sacred trust. You’ll have to call them up and find out. By the way, you wouldn’t have any Latin friends, would you?”

  “Latin?”

  “I’d watch my back if I were you.”

  “If you were me.” I put the book under my shirt so it wouldn’t get wet from the mist, which had deepened. “I’ll read this tonight while I eat dinner. Could you preorder for me? That way I won’t have to wait when I get to the restaurant, the one near the hotel.”

  “It was closed by the public health inspectors this evening. Something about Asian flu.” M. Beret dug around in his pocket. “Oh, and this is for you, too. One of my men picked it up.” He handed me a small piece of wood. “Do you know what it is?”

  It was too dark to see and too wet to have any distinguishing feel. But I could guess. “Sure, it’s beech.”

  M. Beret grunted. “You really are good, aren’t you? Well, sleep soundly, Inspector. Please lock your door.”

  “I always do.”

  “You do? Someone told me that they don’t lock hotel doors in your country.”

  “Really, I am disappointed. You of all people, I would have thought, wouldn’t believe everything you heard. I don’t suppose you have anything else for me.”

  “Such as?”

  “I don’t know. This seems to be your evening to make a pitch. First my watch, then half a roll; then a book; and finally a piece of wood. The going rate these days must be pretty cheap for my category. Please remember, I’m not a whore, not at any price and certainly not for you.”

  “I repeat, Inspector, please lock your door.” M. Beret bowed to me slightly. “Au revoir,” he said and walked briskly in the direction of his wheezing car.

  Chapter Three

  The next morning as I left for the mission, it was hard not to notice the man waiting across the street. I could tell he was waiting for me, because after looking at him from my window for a few seconds, I knew he had genes from generations in the desert. What the hell was he doing here? Yet it didn’t surprise me, somehow, to see him. Everyone was here—my brother, the Man with Three Fingers, M. Beret—and they were all waiting for me. Why shouldn’t he join the crowd? Half of them wanted me to leave. The other half wanted me dead. I didn’t know which half he belonged to yet. Maybe he’d tell me over a cup of coffee and a roll.

  “Good morning, Inspector. How unexpected to find you here.” Jenö put out his hand as I walked across the street.

  “You don’t really think I believe that, do you?” I put my hands in my coat pockets. “If you handed me that hundred-dollar bill right now, Jenö, I wouldn’t give it back.”

  He shook his head. “Business has not been good, I’m sorry to say. I can’t pass out money like I used to. Perhaps we can fix that. Do you have time for a cup of coffee before the talks start? You drink coffee?”

  “You know about the talks? Which tab are they, A or B?”

  “This is the enlightened West, Inspector. We don’t keep secrets. The talks are reported in the papers, which I read every morning over coffee.”
/>
  Around the corner was a café run by a Turk; I’d been there once or twice. It was close, that’s all that recommended it. As we entered, Jenö nodded toward a table in the corner. Several old men were already drinking beer and arguing. The owner, in an undershirt and chewing on a cigar, looked up from his newspaper from time to time, but didn’t seem concerned. It was warmer than my hotel, but that wasn’t saying much.

  “You find Geneva dull, no doubt.” Jenö looked different sitting here in the West. He was more relaxed, perhaps. In Pyongyang, he had been guarded every moment, even though he pretended not to be. His attention had darted around. In the middle of a conversation, he had quickly glanced at someone coming through the door or moving across the lobby. Here, I had the sense that he didn’t have to worry about peripheral movement, with shadows.

  “I haven’t seen enough to make a judgment.”

  “Oh, come now, Inspector. You’ve seen plenty. Don’t tell me you haven’t been walking around, taking in the sights. What is it you said to me? ‘When it rains, you go out for a walk. When it’s freezing, you go out for a drive.’”

  “What I’ve seen is a lot of familiar faces, not all of them welcome.”

  “Surely that doesn’t include me. When I heard you were here, I dropped what I was doing and came right away. I actually owe you a great deal.”

  The owner came up to the table. “Gunaydun, Jenö, my friend. Bon jour.” He looked at me. “Konnichiwa.”

  “The Inspector here is not Japanese, Ahmet. He is Korean.”

  “I was in Korea, in 1950. We murdered the bastards good.”

  “He is from North Korea, Ahmet.”

  Ahmet didn’t seem fazed. He chewed on his cigar, which even unlit smelled bad. “What do you know about that?” he said and rolled the cigar in his mouth.

  “Perhaps you could bring us some coffee,” Jenö said. “Leave the mud out of it if you can, and leave that thing in your mouth with the rest of the dog, would you?”

  “You know him?” I watched the owner disappear behind the bar. He was a big man, big chest, thick forearms, broad hands, and eyes that had an unnatural gleam. He still had a full head of hair. When he was younger, he must have been a tank. If he had been in Korea in 1950, he’d seen a lot, none of it pleasant.

  “Ahmet runs errands for me sometimes. He is dependable.” Jenö said something more, but I didn’t hear him, because just then a young woman stepped into view from the back room, and my heart began thudding loud enough to crowd out all other sound.

  “… daughter,” Jenö hissed at me.

  “What?”

  “I said that’s Ahmet’s daughter.”

  “Not his granddaughter?” I took a breath, and that seemed to help my heartbeat fall back to normal.

  “You look like a man who needs a drink, Inspector. Or a cardiologist.”

  I didn’t want to see a cardiologist. Who needed doctors? There was nothing wrong with my circulation. The woman glanced my way as she moved slowly across the dining room to the kitchen. Before she disappeared, she turned to look at me, a long, caressing, lingering look. It seemed to go on and on. Somehow, I remembered to take another breath. Or maybe I didn’t need one. Oxygen was irrelevant. Those eyes of hers were sustenance enough.

  “You are here on assignment, I suppose.” Jenö rapped the table with his knuckles. “Are you still here, Inspector?”

  “Of course. You asked if I was on assignment. As opposed to what? Sightseeing? Taking a skiing holiday?” I tore my eyes away from the kitchen. Where had this princess been the other times I’d come in? I would have eaten five meals a day here if I’d realized she was in residence. I’d take up washing dishes, waiting tables, sweeping the floors. Sweeping. No, something else, perhaps.

  “Would you like to go skiing?”

  “I prefer your mountains at a distance.” I glanced hopefully back toward the kitchen, but no one emerged.

  “Dinner, then, if you can tear yourself away from that kitchen door.”

  “I don’t think I can have dinner with you.” Was there reason ever again to eat anywhere but Ahmet’s? Was there reason to even go back to my hotel? I could live here, the dining room. Cigars were fine; I had absolutely no trouble with old men who smoked cigars.

  “Why not?”

  “If I have dinner with you, I’ll have to write a report. Actually, I’ll have to ask permission beforehand. It’s impossible to get an answer back from my ministry for several days. Anyway, we may have a dinner as part of the talks this evening. I have to keep my schedule free.”

  Jenö shook his head. “I’ll see you at 8:00 P.M. I assume your heart rate will have returned to normal by then. You can get permission after the fact. I do it all the time.”

  “Isn’t 8:00 P.M. a little late for dinner?”

  “Inspector, eight o’clock is still early around here to dine. Most people are only nibbling on appetizers at that hour. A car will come by to pick you up. Nothing fancy, either the car or the restaurant.”

  “Turkish food?”

  “Forget it. Ahmet will kill you if you fool around with her. The girl’s name is Dilara, if you can believe it.”

  “Why not?”

  “It means ‘lover.’”

  Ahmet appeared with our coffee, an air of menace trailing him. “You would perhaps want something to eat,” said Ahmet. He grinned at me. It was not a pleasant sight. His false teeth gave him a mouth much too full for the rest of his face. No matter, he didn’t smile often; the scowl that regularly rode his features seemed better to keep his teeth in check.

  The cigar had disappeared but was still much in evidence in the air. My mind wandered. Perhaps I could be out of the house whenever Ahmet came to visit us. I would no doubt need to go somewhere restful after a long night with Dilara, night after long night with Dilara… I completely forgot about breathing. Who needed to breathe? The eternal question.

  “Inspector O would like something to nibble on. What do you have, Ahmet?”

  Ahmet took a big knife from his belt and cut a piece of bread from a loaf he was carrying under his arm. “This is good with honey,” he said and frowned at me. I had the feeling he read my mind.

  2

  I was picked up at seven forty-five by a plain car, driven to a plain restaurant away from the lake. That meant, I hoped, we would not be having the lake perch, which I had found after one try unpleasant to eat. No one was leaning against any lampposts on the plain street where the car stopped. I figured they might be starting their appetizers—even M. Beret’s boys had to eat sometime. The driver indicated I was to get out at the only building with light leaking out from its curtained front window. There was a faded sign on the door, but it was in French—LA BELLE. I figured it said ring the bell, but there wasn’t one, so I turned the handle and stepped inside. I found myself in a long hallway, barely lit by a tiny overhead bulb. Off to the right, about two meters away, was a wooden door. There was a grudging feel to the way it opened. Sometimes that can be from bad hinges, but sometimes it’s the wood. “Chestnut doors,” my grandfather would say, “are stubborn.” The door, when it finally gave way, opened onto a dimly lit room. I could make out a few tables with chairs piled on them. A bar ran the length of the far wall, and behind the bar was a small opening, as if for a child or a dwarf, that led into another dimly lit room. I coughed, but that roused no one, so I went back into the hall and pulled the door shut. It pulled back. Definitely chestnut.

  The corridor ended at a steep, narrow stairway with no banister. The stairway went up five or six steps and then disappeared into the dark. This wasn’t a place I needed to hang around, I decided, but as I turned to go, the chestnut door opened and a woman appeared. She had tiny lips; it was something you were bound to notice right away, even in a dark corridor. A regular face, regular eyes, but very tiny lips. If she and Sohn somehow got together and had a baby, it would be quite a collection of miniature parts. The woman said something in a gentle voice. It was pleasant sounding, but I couldn’t und
erstand a word of it. When I didn’t respond, her voice became louder, and she waved her hands. I didn’t think she was explaining the dinner specials. A floorboard creaked, and Jenö came down the stairs. He said something to the woman in a language I didn’t recognize. Her hands dropped to her sides, and her tiny lips gave me a tiny smile.

  “Inspector, this is Margrit. She didn’t know you were coming. That is to say, she didn’t know you were Asian.”

  “What can I say?”

  “Nothing.” Jenö took my coat. “She is deeply apologetic. She is also very well trained, and if you had made the wrong move, you might be bleeding on the floor at this moment.”