The Iron Sickle

by Martin Limon

  “Startled by what?”

  “Working in Itaewon, this man sees many Americans walking back and forth on their way to the military compound. Occasionally one of them even stops at his stall and purchases some vegetables or fruit. But the communication is always accomplished by pointing and hand gestures. This American, the one who asked him questions this morning, could speak the language of our illustrious forebears. And speak it well.”

  “So you knew it was my partner, Sueño, here.”

  “Do any other Americans in Eighth Army law enforcement speak Korean?”

  “Hell no. Why bother? On compound everybody speaks English.”

  “Exactly. So I knew it was you two, already investigating, already on the case.”

  “That vendor,” I said, “did he give you any information that he didn’t give us?”

  “He said he felt startled, as if he was staring into the face of a great ape who could talk.”

  Ernie guffawed. “Damn, Sueño, I told you to shave before you went out to the ville.”

  While Ernie enjoyed his laugh, Mr. Kill sat silently. Officer Oh’s narrow shoulders rose as she swerved through traffic. She said, “I don’t think he looks like an ape.”

  Ernie stopped laughing and stared at the back of her head, surprised she could speak English.

  Mr. Kill had made a number of changes at the murder site.

  First, the pochang macha had been roped off, as had the area up the walkway where Corporal Collingsworth had been murdered. Technicians in blue smocks with the word kyongchal—police—stenciled on their backs were working both crime scenes: dusting for fingerprints, scraping samples of blood, searching under strobe lights for hair or loose strands of material. The KNP sergeant who’d been on duty last night stood off to the side, explaining to the technicians why he hadn’t secured the area earlier and called in forensics: the victim was an American, and therefore he didn’t fall under the jurisdiction of the Itaewon Police station. The KNP was red-faced and embarrassed, knowing it was a flimsy excuse and an inaccurate one, technically. Anything that happened off compound did in fact fall under the jurisdiction of the KNPs as the Provost Marshal had previously informed us. However, out here in Itaewon, the local KNPs often let the American MP patrols handle issues involving American GIs. Less paperwork.

  Mrs. Lee, the owner of the pochang macha, sat forlornly on a wooden crate. I walked over to her.

  “Did he come back last night?” I asked.

  She looked up at me. “What? The killer?”

  I nodded.

  She hugged herself and shivered. “No.”

  “Did you sleep in the cart?”

  “Where else? But I couldn’t sleep much.”

  I already knew many of the pochang macha owners were virtual mendicants. Their cart was their livelihood and their home. Without it, they had nothing.

  She looked up at me, her eyes crinkled. “Will they be done before the evening rush starts?”

  “We’ll see,” I said. I returned to Mr. Kill.

  “We’ll send what we have to the lab,” he said, “and it will be given top priority.”

  “I don’t expect much,” I said.

  “Why not?”

  “This man seems very cautious. Everything is well thought out and he spends as little time as possible at the crime scene.”

  “Like a trained agent.”

  “Maybe,” I said.

  Ernie was wandering around on the far side of the cart. Behind him, an American MP jeep rolled up. I recognized the driver, Staff Sergeant Moe Dexter. Moe leaned out of the window, the usual broad smile on his face. He was one of the shift leaders and he and his men rotated between day, swing, and midnight shifts. Ernie and Moe traded barbs. Laughter echoed across the roadway.

  “At the fruit stand in the Itaewon Market,” Mr. Kill said, “what was it you were looking for?”

  I told him about the totem with the grill of twisted wire and the dead rat.

  “You think this might’ve had something to do with the crime?”

  “The dark passageway through the Itaewon Market was the logical escape route. This contraption was set up directly in our path. Anyone walking that way with a flashlight was intended to see it. Then, before dawn, it was taken away.”

  “What do you think it means?”

  “I think there was a message in it. Possibly from the killer.”

  Mr. Kill asked me to describe it to him in more detail. I did. He listened intently, not taking notes.

  The forensic technicians were about done with their work, and Mr. Kill left to have a final chat with them. The MP jeep zoomed off. Ernie walked toward me.

  “They find anything?”

  “Nothing yet. What did Dexter want?”

  “You know him. Just wants to poke his pug nose into everything.”

  “How are the MPs taking the death of Corporal Collingsworth?”

  “They want us to catch the guy.”

  “Is that what Dexter just said?”

  “Not exactly.” Ernie stared after the now disappeared jeep.

  “Well, what did he say?”

  “He said the gooks better not screw this up.”

  “Does he know Mr. Kill is on the case?”

  “Sure he does. Word spread fast.”

  “And he’s the best the KNPs have.”

  “That cuts no ice with Dexter. He knows what the KNPs are like. If it’s not convenient for them, they’ll cover it up.”

  “Not with us around.”

  “You know that, I know that, but Dexter and most of the MPs don’t know that. They believe when push comes to shove, we’ll do whatever Eighth Army tells us to do.”

  “Just like them.”

  “Just like most of them.”

  After we finished at the crime scene, Mr. Kill hustled us back into his sedan and Officer Oh drove west on the MSR, past 8th Army Compound and past the ROK Army headquarters. At the Samgak-ji circle, she turned north.

  “Where are we going?” Ernie asked.

  “I have a lead,” Mr. Kill said. “My colleagues have been questioning Korean Eighth Army employees who have recently applied for replacement identification badges. Most of them were innocuous.” I started at the word, remembering again that Mr. Kill had polished his English at an Ivy League school. He continued. “The badges were worn or damaged in some way. One man, however, applied for a replacement badge only one day before the murder of Mr. Barretsford.”

  “You talked to him?”

  “Not me, but one of my investigators talked with him at length, and with his wife. It appears that when he came home from a bout of drinking, not only had the badge disappeared from the clip on his lapel but also long blonde hairs were clinging to the material and the jacket reeked of perfume.”

  “Uh oh.”

  “The employee admitted that he’d stopped for drinks at an establishment called Yo Chonsa Gong.”

  “What’s that mean?” Ernie asked.

  I answered. “The Palace of Angels.”

  “Very good,” Mr. Kill said, nodding. “We interviewed the man and his wife last night, so this will be our first visit to the Palace of Angels.”

  “Do you think he’s clean?”

  “Yes. He’s just a befuddled office worker who drank too much soju.”

  “His wife must be pissed,” Ernie said.

  “Very,” Mr. Kill answered. When the Korean National Police showed up at a respectable person’s home, everyone in the neighborhood learns about it. Much face is lost.

  Officer Oh wound her way through the heavy Seoul traffic. Near the district of Namyong-dong she pulled right off the main road into a narrow lane. She cruised slowly past bicycle repair shops and cheap eateries and open-fronted warehouses containing electrical parts and used hardware. At a small circle with a huge elm tree in the middle, she pulled the sedan over to the side of the road. Next to a store selling discs of puffed rice sat an establishment with green double doors shut tightly and windows barred with
iron grates. A hand-painted sign above said Yo Chonsa Gong. The Palace of Angels.

  Mr. Kill motioned for Ernie not to try the front door. Officer Oh stayed with the sedan while we slipped down a crack between buildings that led to a filthy alleyway out back. Empty soju bottles in wooden crates leaned against dirty brick.

  Mr. Kill pounded on the back door. No answer. He pounded again. Finally, we heard a door slam and then a voice from within. “Nomu iljiki!” Too early! Apparently, they thought we were making a delivery.

  Mr. Kill leaned close to the door. “Bali!” he said. Hurry.

  The door creaked open. Mr. Kill slid his foot in and gently shoved the door open with his left hand. A woman wearing a cloth robe, grey-streaked hair sticking madly skyward, stared up at him open-mouthed. He flashed his badge at her.

  “Kyongchal,” he said. Police.

  We pushed through the door.

  The woman stumbled in front of us down a narrow hallway until we reached a carpeted lounge that reeked of spilled liquor and ancient layers of fossilized tobacco fumes.

  “Bul kyo,” Mr. Kill said. Turn on the light.

  The woman wandered over to a bar about six stools long, slid behind it, and switched on overhead neon. The light flickered and then shone red, softly but bright enough to see through gloom. The far wall was lined with vinyl-covered booths with small rectangular tables. Mr. Kill, his hands in the pockets of his overcoat, paced around the room. Finally, he turned to the woman and spoke in Korean. “How many hostesses work here?”

  “Three, most nights,” the woman replied, “more on the weekends.”

  “Does one of them have blonde hair?”

  The woman, still holding her robe shut tight in front of her, thought about this. “You mean now?”

  “I mean three nights ago. A Mr. Choi who works for Eighth Army was here. Apparently, he had contact with a woman with blonde hair.”

  “Mr. Choi. Yes, I know him.” The woman bowed slightly, which meant that Mr. Choi must be a good customer. As a clerk at 8th Army headquarters he wasn’t getting rich, so if he was spending freely at the Palace of Angels, that would go a long way toward explaining why his wife was so pissed.

  “Who served him?” Mr. Kill asked.

  “Na,” the woman replied.

  “She’s a blonde?”

  “Yes. She dyed her hair blonde a couple of weeks ago.”

  Mr. Kill glanced up the carpeted stairs. “Is she up there?”

  “Yes, but still asleep.”

  Mr. Kill glared at her. The Korean National Police have the power to make any bar owner’s life more than miserable. All they have to do is claim that their establishment is a threat to national morals and then they have the legal authority to shut them down. The hard lines on Mr. Kill’s face showed that he was in no mood to wait for Miss Na to get her beauty rest.

  The woman clutched her silk robe more closely. “I’ll fetch her,” she said.

  “Never mind,” Mr. Kill told her, holding his hand out to stop her. “I’ll do it.”

  He crossed the soggy carpet of the barroom and trotted upstairs. Ernie and I followed.

  The accommodations up here weren’t nearly as luxurious as downstairs. There was a tiny bathroom with mold-smeared tile and cracked metal plumbing. At the opposite end of the hallway, Mr. Kill slid open an oil-paper covered door.

  Thick vinyl flooring lay hidden beneath sweat-stained sleeping mats and thick cotton comforters. The room reeked of perfume and flatulence. One of the tufts of curled hair sticking out of the comforters was blonde. Mr. Kill pulled back the blanket. The woman beneath wore brown wool long johns. She pulled her legs up and hugged herself. Then her eyes popped open. Instantly, she sat up, her cute figure showing itself even through the thick material.

  “Wei kurei?” she said in a childlike, whining voice, rubbing her eyes. Why this way?

  Mr. Kill spoke to her in soothing Korean. “Miss Na, I’m sorry to bother you.” He showed her his badge. “I just have a few questions.” The girl continued to rub her eyes and started to rise. “No need to get up,” Kill said, holding out his palm. “Two nights ago, you sat with Mr. Choi. I think he drank quite a bit.”

  “Yes,” she said. “Can I go to the bathroom?” Miss Na didn’t seem at all surprised to see Mr. Kill in her boudoir. Probably other men barged their way in here at odd hours. The other girls were starting to rouse themselves.

  “Of course you can go to the bathroom,” Mr. Kill said, “in a moment. Did Mr. Choi take off his jacket or did he wear it?”

  “He wore it,” she said. “It’s cold down there. Ajjima won’t pay for heat.” She hugged herself again and started to rise. “I have to go to the bathroom.”

  Mr. Kill held her shoulder. “In a moment,” he said, “after you’ve answered my questions.”

  She hammered a small fist against the wall and spoke once again in her small, whining voice. “But I have to go.”

  “What happened to Mr. Choi’s badge, the one that was clipped to his lapel?”

  Miss Choi closed her eyes and stomped her foot. “I have to go.”

  “As soon as you answer my question.”

  She shook her head in frustration. Silky blonde strands swayed beneath brown roots. “I didn’t want to do that,” she said.

  “Do what?”

  “I didn’t want to take the badge.” She stared up at him as if he were stupid. “But ajjima said I had to.”

  “Why?”

  “Why? Some man, a strange man, was offering her money. She took it.”

  “This man asked her to steal Mr. Choi’s badge?”

  “That’s what she said.”

  “Did you see this man?”

  “No-oo. Can I go to the bathroom now?”

  She pushed past Mr. Kill. He let her go. After poking her feet into plastic sandals, she stomped down the hallway. The door to the bathroom only closed partially so we all stood there and listened to her tinkle. As we did so, the other women scooted away from us, various expressions of suspicion and alarm on their faces. Mr. Kill slid the door shut.

  When Miss Na returned, he said, “So while this Mr. Choi was drinking, you slipped the badge off his lapel?”

  Miss Na stomped her foot again. “I didn’t want to tell you.”

  “You had no choice,” Mr. Kill said soothingly. “You had to go to the bathroom.”

  The girl pouted.

  “How did you get the badge?” Mr. Kill asked.

  “It was easy,” Miss Na told. “Choi ajjosi gets so drunk.” Her button nose crinkled.

  We left the bedroom and hurried downstairs. The older woman had changed into a long velvet house dress, combed her hair back and sat at the bar smoking. When Mr. Kill walked up to her she said, “He didn’t tell me his name.” Kill stood next to her, his hands in his pockets, glaring at her. As if discussing the weather, she continued. “He offered me twenty thousand won if I would get Mr. Choi’s badge for him.”

  “How did he know Choi would be here?”

  “He followed him. But we didn’t steal it.”

  “How did you get it then?”

  “We waited until Choi Sonseingnim was very drunk and then I had Miss Na ask him if he would give it to us. He did.”

  “And you sold the badge for twenty thousand won?”

  “You think I’m a fool?” She puffed her cigarette, blew out the smoke and said, “I sold it to him for forty thousand.”

  -6-

  When we returned to the CID Detachment, Miss Kim handed me a pink phone message printed in her precise hand. The caller was Captain Prevault. As she handed it to me she gazed at me inquiringly, a slight smile on her lips, wondering, I imagined, who this cultured woman was who called. I thanked her but didn’t answer her unspoken question.

  I found a phone in the back of the detachment that wasn’t being used. I dialed. No answer. As the phone was ringing, Riley shouted at me.

  “Sueño! Bascom! About time you got your butts back here. You have ten minutes to get
over to the ROK MND.” The Ministry of National Defense. “They’re having a briefing on what they know so far about this North Korean agent.”

  I set the phone down and walked toward his desk. “What North Korean agent?”

  Riley put his hands on his narrow hips, staring at me, letting his eyes cross. “The man with the iron sickle, for Christ’s sake. The guy you’re looking for.”

  “They’ve got him?”

  “I don’t know about all that. All I know is that the Provost Marshal will be there and the Commander of the Five-Oh-First Counter Intelligence unit and your sorry presence is mandatory.”

  “Mandatory” was a word Riley dearly loved. He caressed the word, filtering it through his yellow, crooked teeth.

  “Better belay that, Bascom,” Riley said to Ernie, who was lazily pouring himself a cup of coffee. “If you’re not there by fourteen thirty hours your ass is grass.”

  Ernie stirred sugar into his coffee. Ten minutes later we sauntered toward his jeep. I glanced once again at the message from Captain Prevault and stuffed it in my pocket.

  A ton of brass sat in the first few rows of the auditorium, the Korean officers looking relaxed, the American officers less so, out of their element in this oddly proportioned building reeking of kimchi. The seats were too small for Caucasian bodies. On the stage was a female ROK Army officer wearing a tight green skirt and a matching tunic, a woman so statuesque and beautiful that not one man in the room could tear his eyes from her. Her name was Major Rhee Mi-sook. I’d met her, if that was the right word, during my one and only sojourn into the Communist state of North Korea. There, she’d worn the brown uniform with red epaulettes of the North Korean People’s Army and her rank was Senior Captain, a rank that didn’t even exist in the South Korean army. As beautiful as she was, she repelled me viscerally. My stomach knotted just looking at her. She’d been pursuing me—or pretending to pursue me—in her capacity as a North Korean counter-intelligence operative. When I managed to escape back to South Korea where I’d been debriefed, she showed up again, this time in Seoul, this time wearing her South Korean army uniform.

  I’d reported what I knew about her but I was told to keep quiet. I protested. How could we allow a North Korean intelligence officer to operate in our midst? She was a double agent, I was told, working for the South Korean government, our allies, and only pretending to work for the North Koreans. I was ordered to let it go at that.