Ping-Pong Heart

by Martin Limon

  Ernie leaned toward her. “If she came back to Anjong-ri, would you know it?”

  “Course I know. Anybody know Yobo Club mama-san. Anybody tell me.”

  The GI at the bar kept swiveling his head, eyeing us suspiciously, clearly jealous that we were involved in such an intimate conversation with the mama-san of the Yobo Club. He chugged down a huge swig of beer, set the bottle down, and rose to his feet.

  “Here he comes,” I told Ernie.

  We were used to this. In these little GI villages, everyone knows everyone else, and they’re suspicious—and resentful—of strangers. The guy walked up behind the mama-san. I saw that his rank was staff sergeant, and his nametag said Torrelli. He leaned down and put his arm around her shoulder.

  “Are these guys bothering you, Mama?”

  “No. Okay,” she said, waving her cigarette.

  “If they bother you,” he continued, “you let me know, okay, Mama?”

  “Yeah. Yeah. I let you know.”

  Then he stood to his full height. “Nobody,” he said, pointing a grease-stained forefinger at us, “and I mean nobody, messes with our Mama-san. You got that?”

  Ernie rolled his eyes. I was hoping he’d ignore the guy, but instead he said, “What’re you? Her daddy?”

  Torrelli stared at him for a while, letting his eyes go lifeless. “Where I come from,” he said, “we eat guys like you for lunch.”

  “Well then,” Ernie said, “you can bite me right now.”

  Torrelli stepped toward Ernie and Ernie—never one to de-escalate a confrontation—lifted the cocktail table and threw it at him.

  -12-

  Mama-san started screeching about the broken glassware. Torrelli backed up, wide-eyed now, wondering what the hell he’d gotten into.

  Maybe it was the pressure of the Schultz investigation, or maybe it was the humiliation we suffered when we’d taken Miss Jo into custody and then lost her. Whatever the reason, Ernie’d just about reached the end of his rope. He stepped around the tilted table and over flooding beer and started for Torrelli. I jumped up from my chair and reached for Ernie, grabbed him by the shoulders and held him back. The guys at the bar were up now, all of them gathered around Torrelli.

  The Yobo Club mama-san had handled incidents like this before. “Whatsamatta you?” she screamed at Ernie. “You breakey all glass.” Turning to Torrelli she said, “Why you bother mama-san? We talk about something important! We talk about Miss Jo.” Torrelli looked stricken. “You know now,” the mama-san said, wagging her forefinger in Torrelli’s face. “Your old yobo.”

  “Is she all right?” Torrelli asked.

  “Maybe all right. Maybe no.” The mama-san pointed to the bar. “You sit down, mind own business.”

  “Okay, Mama,” Torrelli said, chastened now. Grumbling, he and the other GIs returned to the bar. I helped the mama-san set the table back upright. The first girl we’d encountered hustled out from the behind the bar with a damp cloth and a dustpan, and soon everything was mostly dry, the broken shards were collected and the Yobo Club was once again shipshape.

  We were pretty much done here. The mama-san had no more useful information for us, but we ordered another round of beer simply to save face. We didn’t want to run off too soon. Still, Torrelli kept glaring at us. Ernie glared back.

  Finally, Torrelli came over again. “I just want to show you something.”

  I nodded. He reached into the breast pocket of his fatigue shirt and pulled out a folded envelope wrapped in a thick rubber band. He unwrapped the package and pulled out a short stack of Polaroid snapshots. Leaning over mama-san’s shoulder, he spread them on the table.

  “That’s her,” he said. “And me. I took them last summer.”

  “I go now,” the mama-san said and rose abruptly and left.

  I studied the photos. They were mostly of Miss Jo. She had a different look then. Shorter hair, heavily permed; more makeup, making her look older and more severe. In the photos of her inside the Yobo Club, she crossed her shapely legs and smoked a lot. But there were other photos of Torrelli and his buddies having a barbecue, probably on base. Miss Jo and a few other Korean women were there, dressed more demurely for an outdoor outing. Torrelli was proudest of the photos he had taken by the shores of Namyang Bay. Miss Jo wore a two-piece bathing suit and looked like a knockout, although she spent most of her time in the water, trying to avoid Torrelli’s omnipresent camera lens.

  “Have a seat, Torrelli,” I said.

  He sat. Looking sheepish, he said, “Sorry for interrupting you guys earlier.”

  “That’s okay,” I replied.

  Ernie sipped on his beer.

  Nervous, Torrelli said, “Do you know where she is?”

  “No,” I replied. “Not too long ago she was in Itaewon, but now she’s gone. We were hoping someone down here could tell us how to locate her.”

  Torrelli shook his head sadly. “I wish I could.”

  “She didn’t say goodbye?” I asked.

  “Not a word.”

  Ernie sneered and gurgled some beer between his teeth. Torrelli glanced at him, but I brought the conversation back to the subject at hand.

  “Have you ever gone to Seoul to look for her?”

  “No. She used to talk about it all the time, the big city and all that. But I’ve never really spent time there, and I wouldn’t know where to start looking.”

  “What would you do if you found her?” Ernie asked.

  Torrelli studied Ernie for a moment; deciding, I believe, whether or not to take offense.

  “I don’t know,” he answered. Then he lowered his head. “Maybe that’s why I didn’t go looking for her.”

  “How long did you steady her?” I asked.

  “Almost six months.”

  That was six months of paying her rent and providing her a stipend upon which to live. Many GIs did this. The advantage was that it was safer, from a disease standpoint, to stick with one woman. Also, much of the expense could be defrayed by simply spending all your PX ration on easily black-marketed items and bringing them out to your yobo. The problem was feelings. GIs often fell in love, sometimes to the point of matrimony.

  “Six months,” I said. “Unless you extended your tour, it was too late to put in the marriage paperwork.”

  “Yeah,” Torrelli replied.

  A GI’s tour in Korea is one year. If you decide to put in the paperwork to get permission to marry a Korean woman, it takes anywhere from nine to ten months. Both the 8th United States Army and the Korean government have to sign off on it. To keep the number of marriages down, the paperwork is purposely cumbersome and very slow.

  “Have you put in an extension?” I asked.

  Torrelli nodded. “Yeah.”

  So he had another year in country. Enough time to find her and put in the marriage paperwork. Also enough time to do something else, like maybe track her down and beat the crap out of her.

  “When were you last in Seoul?” Ernie asked.

  “I told you. I’ve never been there. Only during in-processing.”

  “If you hear from her,” I said, “or find out she’s contacted anybody, give me a call.” I slipped him one of my cards.

  Torrelli studied it. “Eighth Army CID,” he said.

  I was hoping Ernie wouldn’t say, “Hey, he can read.” Luckily, he didn’t.

  “Is she in trouble?” Torrelli asked.

  “I’m afraid she is.”

  “For what?”

  “Some people think she murdered someone.”

  “Murder?” he said. “She wouldn’t do that.”

  “I don’t think so either. But unless we talk to her, I won’t be able to get her off the hook.”

  Torrelli policed up the photographs like a stack of cards, rewrapped them, and stuck them carefully back in his pocket. He sli
d my card in there, too.

  “There’s no way she could murder somebody,” he said. And with that he rose and stalked back to the bar. His buddies were talking but mostly ignoring him. Even though he stood amongst them, he was the odd man out.

  “Talk about carrying a torch,” Ernie said.

  “Do you think he’d commit murder for her?” I asked.

  “I think he’d do anything for her.”

  We were back in the jeep, speeding on country roads toward Pyongtaek. The sun lowered in a reddish light, casting long shadows. I was driving because Ernie had somehow jammed his finger when he’d flipped over the cocktail table at the Yobo Club. Amidst straw-thatched homes, a pack of small boys played on the edge of the road. I slowed. Suddenly a ball rolled toward the center white line and a small figure darted after it. Without thinking, I slammed on the brakes.

  The jeep’s front bumper came to a halt just inches from the boy.

  Ernie let out a breath.

  “Good stop,” he said.

  The boy hardly noticed us. He retrieved his ball and returned to his comrades. I watched him for a long while, until I knew he was safe. Then I restarted the engine and we proceeded on our way.

  Ten minutes later, we passed the city limits of Pyongtaek and approached the on-ramp to the Seoul-Pusan expressway. Seoul, north of us, was the way I was supposed to go. Ernie glanced at me.

  “I know what you want to do,” he said. “And why you didn’t want to stay in Anjong-ri. I have you all figured out, Sueño.”

  My hands tightened on the oversized steering wheel.

  “If you feel it,” Ernie said, “do it.”

  At the last second, I jerked the jeep to the right and sped up the ramp with a sign in both Korean and English: south, busan. Busan was the new, government-approved English spelling for the ancient port city of Pusan.

  Ernie leaned back in his seat, preparing for a long ride. “You really think you can find her?”

  “Probably not,” I answered.

  He leaned on his right shoulder, favoring his jammed finger. “At least you’re not delusional,” he said.

  -13-

  I’d met her on a cold case we’d worked: an American soldier who’d been killed right after the end of the Korean War. For almost twenty years, the murder had remained unsolved. Her name was Doctor Yong In-ja, and she was in charge of the Itaewon branch of the Yongsan District Public Health Service. With her help, we’d closed the case.

  She wasn’t a standout beauty, as Ernie had repeatedly mentioned to me, but she smiled often and radiated warmth. One thing led to another and we’d become close. I later discovered that her parents had been murdered by the right-wing reactionary forces who were fighting for control of Korea immediately after the war. They’d been leaders in a trade-unionist movement that sought true democracy, and were resisting the rule of the Koreans that had collaborated with the Japanese colonizers oppressing the country from 1910 through the end of World War II in 1945. She was committed to the same cause her parents had been devoted to, and it was this commitment that put her in danger. The military dictatorship of Pak Chung-hee saw her, and those of a like mind, as a threat to their iron-fisted control.

  She soon escaped to North Korea, but when she ran into problems with the regime there as well, I’d helped her escape. Now she lived as a fugitive in Cholla-Namdo, South Cholla Province, and as far as I knew she lived either in or near the city of Mokpo. We had a son. His name was Il-yong, the First Dragon. I hadn’t seen him for almost a year now, and he’d soon be two years old.

  Since she’d fled Seoul, she hadn’t contacted me. It was too dangerous. The Korean CIA had its tentacles deeply entrenched in all corners of Korean society. I also hadn’t attempted to search for her. If I had, the KNPs would almost certainly have followed me. An American in the southwest of Korea was unusual, and my movements would be reported and tracked. I couldn’t risk leading the extreme right wing of the Korean government to In-ja and our child. So I waited, hoping she’d reach out to me. She never did.

  Ernie told me time and again to forget about her, to move on with my life. For months I couldn’t, but finally I realized that he was right. We’d never married and any further relationship between us was doomed by the forces that would just as soon arrest and interrogate her, torture her and dump her mutilated corpse in a shallow grave.

  “She knows that,” Ernie told me. “That’s why she’s not in touch. She wants you to move on.”

  And so I did. Finally. When I met Leah Prevault.

  But when you have a woman you once considered to be your partner for life, and a son, maybe you never move on. It might not be possible.

  After over an hour of driving we reached a split in the road. The sign to the left said busan, and the one to the right said mokpo. I veered to the right.

  Ernie woke up. “You want me to take over?”

  “I’m okay for now.”

  “All right,” he said, crossing his arms and trying to get comfortable in the big canvas seat. We passed another billboard advertising Choco Pie, with the same cute girl smiling brightly.

  Ernie knew why I was doing this. It was my chance. Miss Jo Kyong-ja’s hometown was Mokpo. Inspector Kill had told us that the KNPs would handle that aspect of the investigation, but he hadn’t told us specifically not to go there. Ernie and I could plausibly claim that we felt it was important for the investigation for us to actually visit Jo Kyong-ja’s home of record. It was a stretch, and we would almost certainly get our butts chewed for doing it, but nobody could accuse us of directly disobeying orders. And, just as importantly, it gave me a reason to go to Mokpo that the Korean National Police wouldn’t flag as suspicious. They wouldn’t wonder why an American investigator was prowling around Mokpo. They’d know. Or at least they’d think they knew.

  How much could I find about the location of Doctor Yong In-ja and my son, Il-yong, under the guise of the Schultz investigation? Probably not much. But I had to try. Something deep down was telling me to go to Mokpo. It wasn’t rational. But this might be the only chance I’d ever have to go there, to see the city, to breathe the same air as In-ja and Il-yong. With no US military installations anywhere near Mokpo, the likelihood was vanishingly small that I’d ever have a reason to come here again. I had to take advantage of this opportunity. It would almost certainly be my last.

  We finally rolled off the expressway and onto the broad road leading to the port city of Mokpo. Even out here, the sharp salty tang of the ocean bit into my nose, bringing me alert like smelling salts. Ernie rubbed his eyes and sat up. “Where the hell are we?”

  “Mokpo,” I said.

  We’d driven all night. The sun had been up for over an hour.

  “Where we going?” Ernie asked.

  “To the KNP headquarters,” I said. “I don’t want anyone to think we’re sneaking around.”

  Ernie nodded.

  We were unfamiliar with the city and didn’t have a map, but I stopped at a traffic circle next to a white-gloved cop on a platform directing traffic. In Korean, I asked him where we could find the KNP headquarters building. He waved and described two or three turns and streets. I thanked him and promptly forgot the instructions, but at least we were headed in the right direction. After a mile or so, I asked another cop who gave similar directions, and after a few minutes of wandering we pulled up to the big cement-block two-story building that housed the Mokpo headquarters of the Korean National Police.

  We parked the jeep out back, Ernie padlocked the steering wheel, and we climbed out.

  To say that we were gawked at like celebrities in the Mokpo police station is an understatement. We attracted so much attention, we were more like aliens who’d just landed in a spaceship. The cops down here, and the city’s general Korean population, saw very few foreigners and even fewer in military law enforcement. When we made it clear why we were here and menti
oned Inspector Kill’s name, a young officer was assigned to us: Lieutenant Taek. He took us to the childhood home of Jo Kyong-ja.

  “It is being watched twenty-four hours a day,” he said in passable English. “Nobody know.” Meaning the stakeout was clandestine.

  We climbed into the back of a cramped Korean-made van and were introduced to two surveillance technicians. They let me look through a telescope that peeked through a hole drilled into the side of the van. Midday sunlight illuminated the scene.

  “Mother live there and work there,” Taek said.

  “And her son?”

  “Yes. Now he in school.”

  “High school?” I asked.

  “Yes.”

  It was a shanty in back of a fish cannery. Skinny dogs frolicked in the mud. A couple of toddlers wearing no diapers were being watched over by an old woman who squatted on a splintered wooden porch. Tin roofs spread over what appeared to be four or five hooches.

  “How many families live there?” I asked.

  “Twelve,” Lieutenant Taek replied.

  “Twelve?”

  He nodded.

  Ernie took a look. The chomping on his ginseng gum sped up, but otherwise he showed no reaction.

  “So the mom’s working in the cannery now?”

  “Yes. And daughter not here.”

  “Do you expect her to show up?”

  He shrugged. “We don’t know. Seoul say watch, we watch.”

  “Tell me about her, the mom. Who is she? What is she like?”

  “She work in cannery,” he said.

  “That’s it? That’s all you know?”

  Lieutenant Taek paused, thinking something over. Apparently he decided that cooperating with us was better than facing the wrath of Gil Kwon-up, whose intimidating reputation reached even the very edges of the country. “She’s troublemaker,” he said.

  Ernie sat back from the telescope, listening now.

  “In what way?” I asked.