Bamboo and Blood

by James Church

  I didn’t hear them at first, maybe because I wasn’t paying attention. The footsteps behind me stopped and resumed, which told me whoever was on my tail was using sound, not sight, to keep close. There were lamps at either end of the block, but their light hung around the base of the posts. I got on tiptoe and pranced into the darkest spot I could find. From there, I sidled into a dark doorway. The door opened; I backed into a dark room. A waitress appeared, blond, in a long dress that was slit where it shouldn’t have been. As soon as she said hello I knew she was Russian. “Jazz,” she said. “You have ticket?”

  I wasn’t sure where this was going. “Ticket for what?”

  “Jazz,” she said. “Drink, jazz, and me. All included. Pay now.”

  “Thanks, I’ll sit at the bar.”

  She shrugged. “Up to you.”

  There was only one person at the bar, a black man, older than I would have expected at a place like this. “Shakin’ babe,” he said.

  “Yeah.”

  The lights went up slightly on the stage, and a group of four musicians began to play. It wasn’t music you’d want to march to on Army Day, but it was interesting.

  “Shakin’ babe,” the old man said. “That’s shakin’ stuff.”

  I nodded.

  “You from here?” he asked.

  “Nah.” I’d never used “nah” before. I’d heard tourists use it, seen it in movies. It seemed like the right time. “Nah. I’m Mexican.”

  He lowered his head. “Cool.” He lifted his glass. “Got to get me some freeholays one of these days.”

  “Later,” I said and took my glass of beer to an empty table. The Russian girl appeared.

  “Jazz,” she said.

  “That’s cool,” I said and finished my beer. The music became louder, faster, tearing apart. I reached, but it got away from me. I couldn’t follow. I was lost, completely lost. Everything was moving in its own direction, the piano this way, the saxophone somewhere else, the drummer as lost as I was. How could it work? How did it happen? When did it take me to somewhere I’d never been?

  I left the club a few hours later and found the way back to my hotel without much trouble. When I got to my room, I didn’t even turn on the light. There wasn’t anything there I needed to see.

  PART IV

  Chapter One

  “You don’t seem to be on the ambassador’s good side.” The Man with Three Fingers had come up behind me across the grass. I hadn’t heard a thing. “You don’t seem to be on anyone’s good side, actually. Not that I’m surprised.”

  “I’m enjoying the view and the air at the moment.” I resisted the urge to turn to face him. Better to act nonchalant, as if I had known the whole time he was there. “If you want to sit down, feel free. Otherwise, go get yourself a cup of espresso or something.”

  He walked around and stood directly in front of me. “Admit it, O, you didn’t hear me creeping up behind you. I could have taken your head off and you wouldn’t have known it was happening until you saw your eyes staring up from the ground.” He flexed what remained of his hand. “I don’t want to sit down.”

  “Then don’t.” I settled back on the bench. “Excuse me if I don’t get up.”

  “You disappeared, but I know where you were.”

  “That’s good, because I don’t have any idea.” I thought he meant the jazz club, or maybe even the place the music had taken me.

  “You were chasing a delicious piece of Turkish taffy named Dilara.”

  “I don’t know anything about Turkish taffy.”

  “Delicious Dilara, that’s what people say. That sort of thing can get you in a lot of trouble.”

  “You are blocking my view, which is beginning to irritate me.”

  “Is that so? I don’t want to irritate you. I want to grill your kidneys and feed them to the fish. Do you actually think you are walking around this city on your own, Inspector? There is a caravan behind you, everywhere you move. Swiss, Americans, South Koreans, even Chinese.”

  “And you. Don’t forget about you.”

  “No, I don’t follow people anymore. I just wait for them to break circuits.”

  I thought it over. “Is that what the trigger was, an electric eye? It could just as easily have been me that night.”

  “Could have been, but wasn’t. I wouldn’t have left you lying there.”

  “Maybe not. We’ll never know, will we? And you’re still blocking my view.”

  “That disappearing trick the other night was unwise. It has some people thinking you are getting ready to jump ship. It’s what your brother said—that you are planning a defection. And the word is out that ship-jumpers should be stopped ahead of time, in any way necessary. Everyone’s nervous because of what happened in Beijing. The Center doesn’t want any more incidents.”

  “I seem to remember they considered the man in Beijing a traitor and his leaving good riddance. That’s what they said on the radio, isn’t it?”

  “They don’t want the garbage to blow away. They want to bury it first.”

  “Bury?” I moved to stand up, but he put a hand on my arm and held me in place. He might have lost a couple of fingers, but he was still plenty strong. Starting a fight on the shores of Lake Geneva had drawbacks, so I gave him a long stare.

  “You seem agitated, Inspector. Something the matter?”

  “Maybe it’s just me, but I’m averse to being threatened. It bothers me somehow. Makes my blood boil, causes me to see white streaks and hear nasty voices. That sort of thing.”

  “Then don’t consider anything I say as a threat.”

  “Friendly advice, I suppose.”

  “Here’s the problem, Inspector. You’re in someone’s way, and you refuse to get out of the way. So naturally that someone thinks the only thing to do is to move you.”

  “That’s where stories of defection come in? And deep mountain lakes?”

  The Man with Three Fingers didn’t answer. He stared at something behind me for a moment, then turned abruptly and walked away in the direction of town. As he passed by the last bench before the path turned away from the lake, a nondescript man in a brown coat stood up and followed him from a comfortable distance. It was so obvious it could only have been intentional. That seemed to be the Swiss style. No sense being subtle when you have so much of other people’s money in your vaults.

  “You must think us painfully obvious, Inspector, but your friend is way too cocky in someone else’s city. I’ve got to do something about all these bees, don’t I?” M. Beret was standing about a meter behind me, addressing the back of my head. The Man with Three Fingers must have seen him striding across the lawn.

  “Is it always necessary to come up from behind? Is there a rule against approaching someone in normal fashion?”

  “Well, I suppose I might emerge next time from the lake in a frogman’s suit, but then we will startle the swans, don’t you think?”

  His hand was on my shoulder. “Still sore? I can get you a nice Indonesian masseuse if you like.” He moved around the bench and sat down beside me.

  The Portuguese must be fully employed. “You seem obsessed with Indonesian girls.”

  “No, but I was hoping you might be.”

  “These days my only obsession is for some time to think. Can’t a man ruminate in peace? I suppose I would also like a few answers, but that is probably too much to ask. Just time to speculate will do.”

  “An airplane ride will give you the opportunity to sit and think, Inspector. Why don’t we drive you to the airport and put you on a plane? Anywhere you want to go, just tell me, as long as it’s away from here. Your ambassador also wants you to leave, I hear. Maybe I should let him pay for the ticket.”

  “How can it be that I thought things were simple in Switzerland? I pictured cows wearing bells, and girls on hillsides waving at the wild-flowers.”

  “Fantasy. It’s a very complex place, especially because people from the outside won’t leave us alone.”

  “Al
one? You don’t even begin to know what it’s like not to be left alone. When was the last time your country was destroyed, M. Beret?”

  He sat pondering this. “Destroyed? Let me think. The Romans were here and chased the Helvetii; Napoleon stuck his nose in briefly; we’ve fought some battles with this duke and that one, but, no, I’d have to say we’ve largely avoided destruction. This city”—he swept his hand toward the buildings across the lake—“is a monument of stability. It’s been here for over two thousand years, did you know?” I didn’t know.

  At that moment, with M. Beret pointing at a city whose only skyline was the oversized signs of jewelers, it became clear to me. This was the one chance I was going to get to pass on what Sohn had sent me to say. I might not have as good an opportunity to talk to anyone else who would be sure to understand. M. Beret was a man who listened carefully; he’d yet to ask me about lost socks or to comment on my ties. He would write down what I told him, and make sure it filtered out to the right places. He’d get it to liaison officers, and they would pass it around, if they knew what they were doing. It would end up in faraway in-boxes, just as Sohn planned.

  “Good fortune shines on you,” I said. “Be grateful. My land is not so lucky.” As I heard myself say the words, I could barely believe my ears. This was exactly what my grandfather would say. His lectures on the sad history of Korea—overrun, bullied, forced to kneel—always filled me with rage at his self-pity. Now I was saying exactly the same thing. “We were destroyed, but don’t imagine we intend for it ever to happen again.”

  “The Swiss are, as you know, Inspector, neutral. There is no reason to think of me as your enemy.”

  “Neutral? That is for the rich and fortunate. We have no time for neutrality. We are weak and poor.”

  M. Beret said nothing.

  “That’s what you think, I know, even if you won’t say it. Don’t worry. It’s alright, we know how the world sees us. But we are not as weak as people think—or hope. What’s more, we have no room left to retreat, not a millimeter. Do people want us to starve? Then they will see how desperate we can be. We will not go quietly, let me assure you. We will not starve in the shadows and die quietly out of sight.”

  “You are hardly in position to threaten anyone, I would think.”

  “Don’t be too sure.” That did it. That registered with him. I could see that he was already composing the memo in his head. I added an extra line for him to use. “No one should be too sure about us in this situation.”

  “There are people who say your country is on the verge of collapse.”

  “There are people who don’t know their backsides from a hole in the ground.”

  M. Beret took a small appointment calendar from his pocket. He had one. The delegation leader had one. The entire world but me seemed to have a little appointment book. It was some sort of mark of sophistication. If you needed an appointment calendar, it meant you had appointments, which meant you were important, called upon, connected, in charge of your life. I needed to get several, one for each pocket, at least.

  “This is my appointment book, Inspector. For the past two weeks or so it has been mostly blank. Do you know why? Because I have been solely focused, obsessively focused, on watching you. No luncheon dates, no dinner invitations, nothing but you. My friends think I am having an affair. Can you believe it? My entire existence is consumed. Not counting our brief stroll in Coppet, the only break I have had was the drive to Cha-monix, and that was at night when there was nothing to see. Nothing! I couldn’t even stop for dinner.” Ah, M. Beret, I thought, you lying bastard. You had dinner with Jenö that night, whereas I had nothing to eat. “Why don’t you take a trip to Montreux tomorrow? It will do us both good. You can visit the castle, ponder the dungeon, maybe. We can have lunch in a nice restaurant, separate tables for the sake of propriety, but it will be pleasant nonetheless.”

  “Castles? You struck me as someone interested solely in bulldozer parts.”

  “Of course, that’s what this is all about, don’t misunderstand. I know it, and so do you.” He sighed and put away the notebook. “And so, we can be sure, does our mutual friend Jenö.”

  “I may be busy and thus difficult to follow for the next several days. I’ve been making it easy for you, but I do know how to slip a tail. Why don’t you take time off? Go have dinner, clear your mind, read a book.”

  “A tempting proposition, Inspector. But I must decline. Do your best. I’ll see you when I see you. Incidentally, if you like jazz, there are some good clubs around. Just ask.”

  2

  On arriving in Geneva, Sohn had gone directly to the mission. Then, when it was still early, he came to see me. He was waiting across the street from my hotel when I stepped outside. I made a mental note to tell M. Beret to put a bench there. I don’t like guests having to stand around. As soon as Sohn was sure I’d seen him, he started walking up the street, which according to the simple code we’d agreed on at our last meeting in Pyongyang meant he wanted me to walk in the other direction. The “other direction” in this case was down the hill toward town. If things went according to plan, he would double back and find me, assuming I could remember the prearranged pattern I was supposed to follow. Yesterday had been the third of March; that meant this was a morning for threes. Three blocks, then a right turn. Another three blocks, then a left turn. Three more blocks, then another right. It didn’t seem to me to be the best technique for a foreign city, since we could just as easily end up in the lake with the swans, but it would have to do under the circumstances. I didn’t know where all the turns would put us exactly; wherever it was, once he was there, it was up to Sohn to decide whether he wanted to go ahead with a meeting. If he saw something he didn’t like, he would call it off. At some point, M. Beret would get a report that I had been out walking, but I doubted his people would know for sure who Sohn was for a couple of days at least. The Israelis, who were keeping tabs on me even though I couldn’t figure out how, might imagine that I had sent their message and that Sohn had come running. If they wanted to meet with him, it was up to them to arrange the contact. I was through playing messenger boy.

  My three-block dance led finally to a street with small shops, a playground, and a bar called Sunflower. The door was propped open with a box, so I went in and waited. The man behind the bar told me in French, then in German, and finally in English that they didn’t open until 5:00 P.M. I shrugged. He shrugged back. I sat down on one of the barstools to wait. Five minutes later Sohn popped in. The man behind the bar started to explain again that the bar was not open, but Sohn ignored him and walked to a table in the back.

  “Too bad,” I said. “You just missed my brother.”

  “Is that so?” Sohn turned around and pantomimed drinking something to the man behind the bar.

  “The place is closed,” I said. “We’re lucky if he doesn’t kick us out.”

  The man walked over with two glasses of beer and set them down, not very gently, on the table. “That will be all,” Sohn said, in French. I kept most of my composure.

  “You speak French?” I asked when we were alone again.

  “Of course I know French, Inspector, doesn’t everyone in the civilized world?” He held up his glass and studied it closely. “This beer is very Swiss, I’m afraid. Don’t drink it unless you have to.” He took a sip and grimaced. “Now, about your brother. You saw him off?”

  “No. He told me he was leaving.”

  “Well, he didn’t go anywhere. He doesn’t have tickets, and he doesn’t have reservations. I think he still has shirts at the laundry, you know, those blue shirts he likes. Surprised? He lied to you.”

  “You want me to get his shirts for you?”

  “No. Stay away from him and anything he has touched. He has things to do, and apparently he hasn’t done them yet. I’m pretty sure he has an appointment to meet someone. That needs to go ahead. You’ve done your job.”

  “What job is that?”

  “You rattled him. T
hat can be fatal for someone like your brother. He can’t afford that sort of emotion. He has too many enemies.”

  “We argued, if that’s what you mean. That’s what we usually do when we bump into each other. I don’t think it rattled him at all.”

  “I think it did. I think he’s off stride. At this point, it’s a question of waiting to see how much. I’m almost sure he’s operating on his own right now. When things are still small like this, I might be able to stop them. After that, the decisions are out of reach. People take sides, they draw big pictures. They get budgets.”