by James Church
“You have to ask me? Don’t you buy food, or do they just give it away in this city?”
“I’ll take that as a yes. And you reportedly said that prices are high because farmers can’t plant what they want.”
“There isn’t a farmer doesn’t know that, and half of them would tell you if you asked.”
“I’m just going down the list, Grandfather. Why should I trust the farmers to plant the right thing? Why wouldn’t they plant what is easiest to grow?”
“Country people ain’t lazy.” He held up his hands. “This is how we live, with these. Not a bunch of merchants reselling the sweat of someone else’s labor.”
“So that’s it. A communist, are you?”
“Is that against the law nowadays?”
I folded up the list of complaints and put it in my pocket. “You’re in the capital, my old friend. What farmers say in the fields among themselves can get taken the wrong way by people in a restaurant.”
“That’s not my concern.”
“Well, it better become your concern, because the next time your name gets on a list, it won’t be a pleasant conversation. Do I make myself clear?”
“Is that a threat? Maybe the last person you bullied crawled away, but you won’t get that from me. I’m a simple man. I tell a simple truth.”
“Listen to me, the truth is too far away for either of us. Don’t go looking for it. I’m just giving you some advice. If you can’t follow it, then keep your mouth shut.”
“And if I don’t?”
“Where are you from?”
“Close by Kyonghung. Over that way.” He waved vaguely in the direction of the East Sea, a few hundred kilometers away.
“Who gave you permission to leave North Hamgyong and come all the way across the country?”
“I did.”
I stared at him. “You? You gave yourself permission? You can’t do that.”
“And why can’t I? General Yi did. Have you forgotten, or did you never know?”
“Six hundred years ago, they didn’t have the same rules we do.”
“And maybe there is a lesson in that.” He looked at me calmly. It was a simple observation.
“Yi Song Gye was at the head of an army when he marched into town. I expect he had someone along to advise him on what to say in restaurants. Well, I’m looking, and I’m not seeing anyone but you. You can’t do these things; you just can’t give yourself permission to travel across the country. That much I know.”
“But I did. I’m standing here, ain’t I?” He gestured broadly at the scene around him. “Who fought for this during the war? Somewhere near this place, there were hardly any streets left, no buildings, trees all broken, the bombing was so bad you couldn’t breathe the air. Dust and bones all mixed together. You wouldn’t know that to look at things now. Did I or didn’t I nearly die for this place?”
I said nothing.
“Well, did I or didn’t I? How can anyone keep me from coming back here? Do I need permission to visit the place where I nearly died a hundred times? Do you think country people are simple? Do you think we don’t understand?”
“We’re going in circles, Grandfather. Someone is going to notice you are missing at home; some nosy neighbor will wonder where you have gone off to. Let’s get you back where you belong.”
“When I’m ready, if I’m ready, I’ll say so. I’ll go back the same way I came, and if anyone doesn’t like it, they can kiss my hind end.”
“Here’s what I’m going to do.” I took out my wallet and peeled off a few bills, euros and dollars. “This is money for the train back home. There’s enough for a few overpriced meals, and since I’m paying, you don’t get to comment on the cost of food. Frankly, I don’t think you’ll make it to Hoeryong without running into someone who has no tolerance for people without papers. But that is your business, not mine. Get out of town. And try to remember, you’re not General Yi.” I studied the old dragon’s eyes. “Though I’m sure he would have wanted you on his side.”
Chapter Three
The office was deserted when I returned a few days later. My shoulder still bothered me, and I couldn’t sit very well because of my hip. Min had left a note on my chair: Do not answer the phone, no matter how many times it rings. I glanced at the file on the bank robbery case. No one had touched it in my absence. We were bumping against the deadline the Ministry had set, but I didn’t see any notes attached complaining about the lack of progress. I looked for reports on the disappearance of the nightclub owner, rumors picked up on the street, anything. Nothing. No one was willing to talk about it. Or rather, no one was willing to talk to us.
On the top of my cabinet was another note from Min, saying I was to look at a new file in his absence. He didn’t bother to say what it was about or, more important, where it was. I looked in my file drawers, but there was nothing that hadn’t been there for a long time. I walked down to Min’s office and checked on his desk. The phone rang, and I nearly picked it up without thinking. It rang six times, went halfway through a seventh, and then stopped. I don’t like not answering the phone. It seems untidy, vaguely impolite, even if it obviously isn’t for me. The phone started ringing again but this time only rang twice. This was easier to deal with. If someone hangs up that quickly, they might not be so serious about the call. A quick check of Min’s desk drawers didn’t uncover anything. His file cabinet was locked, and though I knew where the key was, I decided to leave well enough alone.
I went back to my office and retrieved my copy of the Criminal Code from the pile of books on the floor. When I stood up again to stretch, I glanced out the window. A man was standing across the street, gazing up at our building. People rarely hang around Ministry offices; they usually think it bad luck even to walk nearby. The man pretended he was simply gawking, but he wasn’t doing a good job. It was definitely surveillance; whether it was hamhanded or provocative I couldn’t tell. Well, if he wasn’t going to pretend he was just standing around, neither was I. When he saw me wave from the window, the man threw his cigarette into the gutter and walked slowly away. His face was hidden by the brim of a cloth cap, but he had a strange gait that was as good as a photograph. The heel on each of his shoes was worn so much that his ankles stuck out. It made his white socks look like small dogs nipping at his feet the whole way down the street. I made a mental note to check the logs. If the guards had seen him standing around before, they would have made an entry.
Min’s car drove up. It stopped for an overly long time as the guard poked his head in the driver’s side window. I could hear an angry exchange before the guard finally backed away and waved the car through without much enthusiasm. Min emerged from the driver’s side. He never drove if he could help it, but the duty driver had gone missing a week ago; no one knew where he was, and we couldn’t get a replacement until he was accounted for. From the passenger’s side unfolded a tall, solid-looking Westerner with sandy hair. Min looked up to my window and nodded, before saying something to the Westerner. Then the two of them disappeared.
I contemplated going out the back way, but Min had already seen me. There was nothing to do but wait. I sat down and rearranged the piles of paper on my desk. A piece of chestnut wood fell out of one of the stacks. I like chestnut, though there isn’t enough of it around. Very self-possessed wood, knows exactly what it is doing all the time. Besides which, when I have it in my hand, it reminds me of the smell of roasting chestnuts in autumn. Finally, something good, I was thinking, when my phone rang. It stopped. It rang. It stopped. It rang again. Then I heard footsteps, and Min landed heavily at my door. “Dammit, Inspector,” he said in an angry whisper, “don’t you answer your phone?”
“You told me not to.”
“Never mind that. Come to my office. Let me do the talking.”
The Westerner was examining a security patrol map of Pyongyang that was hanging on the wall next to Min’s desk. This is not a map foreigners are supposed to see. Min blanched and coughed. The foreigner tu
rned around. He looked even taller and more broad-shouldered up close. “Detective, er, Boswell, was it?” Min said. “This is Inspector O.”
“Superintendent James Boswell, Inspector, delighted to meet you.” This was in fair Korean, though he sounded much like the Scotsman I’d met at the Koryo, with an accent that made some of the words sound like they were wrapped in fog. The man held out his hand, which was huge. We shook. I was relieved he did not feel obliged to demonstrate his strength by crushing my fingers. “I understand we will be working together.” The visitor sized me up solemnly as he spoke and, despite his greeting, did not seem delighted to meet me. Even pleased would have been stretching the point.
I glanced at Min, who frowned at having used the wrong title for Boswell. Min thought protocol was important—it was one of those rituals that helped make the world turn more smoothly—and he did not like to make protocol mistakes. He moved behind his desk, and for a moment, I was afraid he was going to sit down and lean back in his chair. “Detective, er, Superintendent James has been sent by London to work with us on the security for next week’s visit. Actually”—Min turned to the foreigner—“we thought the visit was going to take place this week, but I was just informed it has been postponed—scheduling, aircraft clearances, something. The usual reasons. This was all only recently decided at high levels.” Min was lamely trying to defend the Ministry’s sloppiness in not informing us sooner. “In fact, I only learned of the superintendent’s arrival this morning when I was instructed to meet him at the airport. No arrangements have been made for his accommodations, I’m afraid.” He laughed at this, as if it were an amusing oversight on the Ministry’s part. “Inspector, you’ll see to that detail, I’m sure.”
“I’m sure.”
Boswell gave me a look that suggested he could detect barely disguised sarcasm as well as the next man, no matter the language. I smiled at him. This broke no ice.
Min supplied a few more details of why an English—Scottish, I thought to myself—policeman had been dumped on our doorstep, and then he sent the two of us out to establish our own working hierarchy. Min indicated that Boswell was the visitor and thus was expected to follow my lead. This seemed unlikely to me. The visitor was twice my size. I imagined if an oak tree could walk, it would have his tread. We didn’t speak until we were down at the duty car, which had been sitting unused since I returned from Beijing. Besides being dirty, it wasn’t very reliable.
“It’s not new, but it runs and it gets us around,” I said when we were both inside. I had to hope it would start. The seats were worn, the dashboard was cracked, and the knobs were covered with a film of nicotine, so, no, it was not new. Normally I didn’t care what people thought of the duty car, but if we had known we were going to entertain a visitor, I might have cleaned the knobs. I turned the ignition key. There was a click, then nothing. We sat in silence as I turned the key twice more and got two more clicks, the second somewhat fainter than the first.
Boswell put his paws on the dashboard and looked out the window on his side. “It won’t dewwww,” he said in something that resembled English.
“I’m sorry?” I said. “What won’t?”
“So, you understand English, Inspector. Good.” He switched to his accented Korean. “You’ve no gas. Or your battery’s gone. Or your starter motor is shot. We’ll have to walk, wherever it is we’re going.”
“Could be,” I said. “Wait for a minute. I’ll check something.” Car engines I don’t understand, but I opened the hood and looked inside. I jiggled a few wires, thumped a dirty piece of machinery. I spat on what I knew was the air filter, which looked clogged, probably with that damned Chinese dust. I slammed the hood, got back in, and turned the key. A wheeze, then the motor caught.
The visitor sat back in his seat and crossed his arms. “We’re off,” he said.
Damned right we’re off, I thought. “First, we’ll stop at the hotel and get you a room. After that, we’ll review the procedures.”
“Forget the hotel. I need a drive around the city, get the feel of the place, look at the roads, gauge the shadows.”
“You must be tired after your flight.” I didn’t have a single approval to go with this fellow anywhere but to the hotel and then back to the office. I certainly wasn’t going to drive him around the city without filing the paperwork. The last thing I wanted was another session with the man in the brown suit, asking me about the time a foreign police official spied on the city as I motored him around. “We can take a drive later, perhaps.”
“Sorry, we don’t have time for later, Inspector. I have my orders, and my orders are to make sure the permanent undersecretary gets in and out of here in one piece, the same piece.”
“You’re not suggesting there is anything wrong with security in my capital, surely.” It sometimes puts foreigners off balance to use the possessive—“my” capital.
“I wouldn’t be here if the porridge didn’t smell bad.” Maybe Scots didn’t respond to the possessive. He put his hand up to his mouth and yawned, a particularly delicate gesture for a tree, I thought. He stretched his legs as best he could. “Incidentally, Molloy sends his regards.” He pretended it was an afterthought.
My shoulder screamed; I swerved slightly and shook my head. He waited until I looked over to flash me a sardonic grin. Then he leaned against the side window and closed his eyes. The only sound the rest of the way to the Koryo Hotel was the engine coughing, from the dust.
2
When we got to the Koryo, Boswell said he wanted to see the hotel store, maybe buy some gifts. That was fine with me. I wanted some distance between us. Sitting down and having a drink by myself would have been even better, but there was nowhere to get a drink, so I just sat. Prague. Molloy. I took a deep breath and looked around. No one was interested, no one was paying attention; no one except the man in the brown suit and his friend with the ash club. They were somewhere else, going over what I’d told them and whatever else they knew, or thought they knew. The question was, what did they know? What had they heard about me from the British and, equally important, how? Of course my meeting with Molloy had gone into the files in London; that wasn’t a surprise. And anything that is put in a file runs a risk of coming out again. A file gets pulled on a slow day, and someone gets a bright idea. Alright, it had happened; a slow day and my file had fallen onto someone’s desk. I’d been waiting for the British to make a move; sometimes I forgot about it, but mostly it was just below the surface. I thought it would be something subtle; I hadn’t expected it like this. Not so directly, not in Pyongyang. There was no reason to do it here; it was not only dangerous, it was incredibly inept. If they had wafted word of my meeting with Molloy onto the winds that blew over Pyongyang, why send someone so soon afterward? Or had Pyongyang known about this for a long time? Had they been waiting, too? I imagined what the report looked like in the file that the man in brown had on his desk. Probably neatly typed. Maybe with a photo taken of me as I walked out the door that night in Prague.
I stood up and strolled around the lobby. If Boswell had any other moves, he’d have to make them soon. I wasn’t going to give him any encouragement; in fact, I was going to get as far away as I could from him. Anything I did in his presence would be misinterpreted, by both him and the man in brown. Tonight I’d tell Min to assign someone else to this escort duty, that I couldn’t do it. Then I’d go home and wait for a knock on the door.
I walked over to the front desk. “I need a room for a visitor.” I showed the clerk my ID.
“I’m sure you do. But we don’t have any.”
“All I need is a simple room for that man.” I pointed at Boswell, who was examining the lobby. “I’m not asking for the royal suite.” I showed the clerk my ID again. “Someone must have a record of the reservation.” I knew there wasn’t one, Min had already made clear the Ministry had botched this, but I might as well put the clerk on the defensive. “If you have misplaced it, just assign a room. I don’t have all day to stand and
argue with you. The hotel isn’t full.”
“I saw your ID the first time, Inspector. And tonight, I’d suggest the roving patrols should be doubled on the river between midnight and 5:00 A.M.”
“What?”
“You an expert on hotel occupancy? Let’s make a deal. I’ll stick to my business, you stick to yours. I happen to know there was never a reservation, nothing was misplaced. But we’ll let that pass, alright? How long does your big friend intend to stay?”
I lowered my voice. “The man is a guest of our government, and he happens to speak Korean.”
The clerk didn’t seem to care. “I asked how long he intends to stay.”
“What difference does it make? The room will be paid for.”
“You bet it will be paid for. We have a big group arriving tomorrow, two big groups, actually, who will be here all week. I’m not about to give away rooms to strays who wander in and then discover we need the space for people with reservations.”
I looked around for Boswell, but he was walking down the steps into the hotel store. There was no sense indicating to the clerk that I didn’t know how long he was staying. “He’ll be here until Saturday. Stop wasting my time.”
“Passport.”
“I just showed you my ID.”
“Yeah, but I need the tall man’s passport. He can’t check in without it, even the police know that, Inspector.”
“Give me a room key, would you? The man is tired and he needs to rest. I’ll get you his passport before we leave.”
“Not possible. You want me to read you the regulations?”
When I told Boswell that he would have to give his passport to the clerk, he shrugged. “As long as I have it back in order to leave this happy land,” he said. In the elevator going up to the room, I worried he would say something stupid, but he was quiet. When we stepped into his room, he suddenly found his voice. In big, booming English, he said, “I assume, Inspector, that all unnecessary devices have been disconnected or removed. I hope so. If not, I’ll do it myself.”
