The Spirit of the Dragon

by William Andrews

  He stood outside the gate, looking at his feet. “I’m sorry,” he said.

  “Let me help you,” I said, as I’d done a thousand times before.

  He shook his head. “I will not poison you any more than I already have.”

  “Then let me put you someplace where they won’t arrest you anymore. When your father died, he left me money and said I should use it to help you.”

  “I dishonored my father,” Hisashi said, shaking his head. “I cannot take his charity.”

  “I do not agree,” I replied. “Your father believed that he failed you. That’s why he left money for you.”

  Hisashi took a while to think about what I’d told him. Then he said, “I am very tired.”

  “Let me take you someplace where you can rest, somewhere off the street where you will be safe.”

  He looked from the lake to his hands. “Okay,” he said.

  I caught a cab and had the driver take us to the Angels of Mercy nursing home in a nice neighborhood north of Koreatown. I led Hisashi inside to a lobby with thick carpeting and leather chairs. When I told the receptionist why we were there, she looked at Hisashi and told us to wait. We sat in the chairs as she picked up the phone and made a call. A few minutes later, a woman in a business suit came and introduced herself as Mrs. Dahl. She glanced at Hisashi and pulled me aside.

  “This is an exclusive private facility,” she whispered. “I think your friend would be better served in a public home.”

  “No,” I said. “I want him here.”

  “Ma’am,” she said, “do you know what this place costs per month?”

  “I know exactly what it costs,” I answered. “I have researched it.”

  “Well then, you know that—”

  “I will pay for ten years in advance,” I said, interrupting her. “And I want him in a private room.”

  Mrs. Dahl cocked her head. “A private room for ten years? With all due respect, that kind of money . . .”

  Before she could finish telling me that I couldn’t afford it, I took out my checkbook and wrote a check for ten years for a private room. I gave it to Mrs. Dahl. “Call my bank and verify that the funds are there,” I said. “We will wait.”

  As I sat next to Hisashi, Mrs. Dahl took the check and went to her office. A few minutes later, she came back and gave me a professional smile. “We would be delighted to take your friend,” she said. “I can do the intake right away.”

  And so, Hisashi became a resident of the Angels of Mercy nursing home. Since he had no identification, I registered him as George Adams so no one looking into Japanese war crimes would find him. And since we had no proof that he and I were married, I told Mrs. Dahl that I was only a friend, but I would assume legal custody. Hisashi didn’t say a word as they took him in and cleaned him up. They put him in a private room facing downtown Los Angeles.

  When the nurses left, Hisashi sat in his room in an upholstered chair and stared out the window. I sat next to him and said, “I love you, Hisashi.”

  He continued to look out the window. “I’m sorry,” he said.

  THIRTY-FIVE

  It was over a mile from my apartment to the Angels of Mercy nursing home, and every day I put my hair up with the silver hairpin and walked that mile to see my husband. It became more difficult when I reached my nineties and eventually, I had to take a cab.

  Over the years, Hisashi grew even more withdrawn. His back was bent and his face was blotched with age spots. The skin on his hands was so thin the veins showed through. He sat all day in his chair, staring out his window as if he was trying to think of a way for salvation. I would take him for a walk in the hall or, on a nice day, outside in the garden. I would talk to him about Korea and Japan and his father and his sister, Yoshiko. I told him about Young-chul, what a sweet boy our son was and how Yoshiko and I had raised him into a fine young man. I would tell him how handsome he was when I first saw him in the forest behind my house. I would say how silly he looked in the mask at the Dano festival at my aunt and uncle’s house. I would remind him of our wedding night. Sometimes, he would say, “I remember,” or “That was a good time in my life.” I had assumed that old age and decades of living on the street would diminish his mind, but it never did. He just didn’t seem to want to talk.

  Then one day, not long ago, he said, “You have been a good wife. I wish I could have been a good husband.”

  Surprised, I took his hand. “It is not your fault,” I said.

  “Yes, it is,” he replied. “And I must atone for my sins.”

  “Atone for your sins . . . ,” I said.

  “Before I die,” he said.

  I took a full minute to think about what he was saying. Then I said, “I understand.”

  This morning when I came in, he was sitting on a chair in his room. Normally, he wore a sweatshirt and sweatpants. Today, he’d dressed in a white shirt and black slacks. His back was straighter than it had been in years.

  “You look nice today,” I said. “Why are you sitting there? Are you getting ready to go somewhere?”

  “Yes,” he answered. He went to his dresser and pulled a drawer all the way out. He reached inside the dresser and took out a tanto knife that was hidden in the back. And then, he took out the red scarf he’d bought for me in Sinuiju.

  I was stunned. I thought he’d abandoned the scarf eighty years earlier when he abandoned me. Now, he held it out to me. “I tried for so long to make you forget me,” he said, “but I could never forget you.”

  I began to cry. Since the day he told me we couldn’t love each other anymore, I’d wondered how he truly felt about me. He’d said then that he’d always loved me, but it seemed that his guilt had crushed his love. I’d come to accept that he would never love me again.

  I took the scarf and held it to my cheek as tears ran down my face. “I didn’t know,” I said.

  “I’m sorry,” Hisashi replied. “I hoped that if you thought I didn’t love you, you would give me up someday and I wouldn’t pull you down with me. But all these years you never did, and I never stopped loving you.”

  I went to him and we embraced. “Oh, Hisashi,” I said, “I love you.”

  “I love you, too,” he said.

  He stepped back. “You have given me so much. I am sorry, but I need one last thing.” He held up the tanto knife. “You are Korean. Before I die of old age, I must atone for my crimes against your people. It is the only way to set my spirit free. I wanted to do it long ago but I couldn’t. Help me now do it the right way.” He sat again. He held the knife in front of him with both hands. I stared at him for several minutes, not knowing what to do. I had tried so long to save him, but I had failed. Now, he was going to save himself and I knew I shouldn’t stop him.

  “I am ready,” he said.

  I wiped the tears from my face. “Okay,” I said, “I am ready, too.”

  I went outside the room and asked an aide for tea and paper and a pen. A few minutes later, she came with a pad of paper, a pen, and a teapot with two teacups. I took them into the room.

  I pushed a chair in front of Hisashi, who’d laid the tanto knife across his legs. I set the tea on a table between us. We both bowed to the tea. I took the teapot in both hands and raised it high above our heads. I asked the kami for their blessings. I set the teapot down and bowed to it. Then, I poured tea into a single cup and gave it to Hisashi. He bowed to me and took a sip. Then he gave me the cup. I bowed to him and took a sip. I set the teacup aside.

  I gave Hisashi the pen and paper. “Your elegy,” I said.

  “Yes,” he replied. “As they did in the old days.”

  “As the warriors did,” I said.

  He nodded, and as I watched, he started writing. He took his time, carefully thinking through each word and phrase. He filled one page, and then two. He stopped and read what he’d written. He scribbled a few changes. Then, he signed it and presented it to me. I accepted it with a nod and folded it inside my dress.

  He looked
at me and said, “It is time.”

  I picked up the red scarf and stood behind him. He sat perfectly still as I tied the scarf around his head and let the ends fall down his back. “The scarf will keep us together on your journey to the spirit world,” I said.

  “Yes, that is good,” he replied.

  I sat in front of him again. He took the tanto knife from his lap and held it out in front of him. I started to cry again.

  His face grew soft and he closed his eyes. “I pray to the spirits of all those I hurt that they accept my humble apology.” He opened his eyes and thrust the knife into his stomach.

  “Hisashi!” I cried. I desperately wanted to take the knife from him. But then, for the first time in eighty years, he smiled at me, and I saw the young man who I’d first seen in the forest so long ago.

  He whispered, “Honor at last.” And then he closed his eyes and died.

  THIRTY-SIX

  We sit in silence for a long time. Ms. Yi wipes tears from her face. I do, too. Finally, Detective Jackson reaches over and shuts off the recorder.

  “What did your husband write in those papers?” Jackson finally asks.

  Ms. Yi takes the papers out of her dress and gives them to me.

  “I should see those,” Jackson says with a hand out.

  “You will find out what they say soon enough, Detective,” Ms. Yi says. I put the papers inside my briefcase without reading them.

  Jackson sighs and faces me. “Got anything to say, Counselor?” he asks.

  “She’s innocent,” I answer. “You have to let her go.”

  “Tell you what,” Jackson says. “The prints on the knife should be back from the lab. If hers aren’t on it, I’ll tell the DA it was a suicide.”

  I tap on the table. “If her prints are on the knife, it doesn’t prove she killed him.”

  “It is okay, Anna,” Ms. Yi interjects. “I never touched the tanto knife.”

  Jackson leaves and I’m alone with Ms. Yi. She gives me a tired smile. “You must read what Hisashi wrote,” she says.

  I take Hisashi’s papers out of my briefcase. They are in Japanese, but I know Japanese and I read it through twice. It is his confession of his war crimes and a hope that his final act of contrition—his seppuku—will save his soul. It is a plea for an end to racism.

  “This proves your innocence,” I say.

  “Yes, but I believe Hisashi wanted to make it public. People should know about Unit 731. Do you think you can have it published?”

  I nod to myself and say, “There are reporters outside who’d love to get their hands on this. I’ll take care of it.” I put the papers back inside my briefcase.

  “Thank you,” Ms. Yi says. “That is why I needed you here. Also, I wanted to see the comb one last time.”

  I take the comb out of my briefcase, unwrap it from the brown cloth, and place it on the table in front of Ms. Yi. She picks it up. “For so long I thought I was cursed by the two-headed dragon,” she says, gazing at it. “Then I came to believe that my love for Hisashi conquered the curse. Now, I do not believe there was ever a curse from the dragon. A dragon doesn’t curse people. The thing that curses us is ourselves.”

  Ms. Yi continues to stare at the comb. “Your grandmother, Jae-hee, told me something. She said this comb was made for Queen Min, the last queen of Korea. Is it true?”

  “Yes, it is, ma’am,” I say. “Your cousin and I are direct descendants of the queen.”

  She smiles. “That would make me the queen’s relative, too.”

  “Yes, it would,” I reply.

  She gives me the comb. She reaches behind her head and takes out the silver hairpin. She sets it on the table and gazes at it sadly. I notice she hasn’t drunk her tea. “Would you like your tea warmed up while we wait?” I ask.

  “No,” she replies. She takes the teacup in both hands and looks at it. “Since our wedding night when Hisashi was so gentle and kind, I have committed myself to loving him. For more than eighty years I dreamed of being with him, the way we were back then. But he was not the same man after he went to Tokyo. Now, today, he has atoned for his sins and his spirit is free. I knew this day would come. He is my Hisashi again and I don’t want to wait to be with him.”

  She gives me a sad smile and then drinks all her tea. She sets the cup on the table and I notice a small vial next to it. Gradually, I realize what’s happening, but don’t move to stop it. She smiles at me, perfectly content. Her eyes cloud over and her head nods. She closes her eyes and gently lays her head on the table.

  After Ms. Yi draws her last breath, I see her spirit soar high. It flies over the Pacific Ocean and on to Korea. It goes to her village outside of Sinuiju. She sees Hisashi waiting for her behind her house. He is a young man, handsome in his loose white shirt and black slacks. His hair glistens, and his liquid eyes sparkle. She is a young woman, pretty and petite, dressed in a blue-and-yellow hanbok. She goes to him. He takes her hand and they run into the forest. They pick strawberries and put them in her bamboo basket. When the basket is full, they find a sunny place in the forest and lie on the cool grass. There, they make tender love.

  After, he lies on his back with his hands behind his head, gazing at the sky. She lies facing him, running a finger over his chest. A flock of red-crowned cranes glides overhead. A water deer steps lightly in the forest beyond. Time stands still. They are at peace, and joy fills their hearts.

  “I love you, Hisashi,” she says.

  “I love you, too, Suk-bo,” he replies.

  AUTHOR’S NOTE

  On January 27, 1945, the 322nd Rifle Division of the Soviet Red Army liberated the Nazi concentration camp at Auschwitz. There, they discovered that along with a mass extermination program, the Nazis had conducted experiments on prisoners. The experiments included radiation exposure, forced diseases, freezing, drowning, and biological weapons testing. Thousands died horrifying deaths. Thousands more suffered painful, permanent disabilities and mental distress. The program was led by Dr. Josef Mengele, the “Angel of Death,” who after the war, escaped to Argentina and lived in hiding for thirty-five years before he died in 1979. He never paid for his crimes.

  In 1939 near the city of Harbin, Manchuria, the Japanese Imperial Army set up Unit 731, a camp used to conduct human experimentation exactly like what the Nazis did in Auschwitz. The Japanese called their subjects maruta, Japanese for “logs” because they told outsiders that Unit 731 was a sawmill. And like Auschwitz, thousands of innocent people died horrible deaths, and thousands more were scarred for life. The program was led by Dr. Shiro Ishii, who escaped to Japan after the war and died in Tokyo in 1979. Like Dr. Mengele, he never paid for his crimes.

  Most Americans know about Dr. Mengele and his horrifying experiments at Auschwitz. On the other hand, most Americans—like me before I did the research for this book—have never heard of Dr. Ishii and Unit 731.

  There’s a reason. The Russians captured the research from Auschwitz, which gave them valuable information for waging war. The Americans were worried about what the Russians had in Mengele’s research, so much so that when they arrested Dr. Ishii after the war in US-occupied Japan, they struck a deal with him. They gave him immunity for his war crimes in exchange for his research. And to prevent moral outrage in the age of McCarthyism, the Americans withheld from the public information about Unit 731 and the agreement with Dr. Ishii.

  The three books in this series—Daughters of the Dragon, Jae-hee’s story about sexual slavery; The Dragon Queen, the story of Queen Min and imperial exploitation; and this book about wartime atrocities—expose atrocities committed by the Japanese. Lest we, the victors in World War II, assume righteous indignation against the Japanese (and Nazis), consider this from historian Richard Drayton:

  After 1945, we borrowed many fascist methods. Nuremberg only punished a handful of the guilty; most walked free with our help. In 1946, Project Paperclip secretly brought more than 1,000 Nazi scientists to the US . . . Other experiments at mind control via dr
ugs and surgery were folded into the CIA’s Project Bluebird. Japan’s Dr Shiro Ishii, who had experimented with prisoners in Manchuria, came to Maryland to advise on bio-weapons. Within a decade of British troops liberating Bergen-Belsen, they were running their own concentration camps in Kenya to crush the Mau Mau. The Gestapo’s torture techniques were borrowed by the French in Algeria, and then disseminated by the Americans to Latin American dictatorships in the 60s and 70s.1

  Human experimentation, sexual slavery, oppression, political murder, and other atrocities occur when one race, religion, or nation feels they are superior—in other words, when they practice bigotry. I hope that the books in the Dragon trilogy have helped readers think about how we treat each other. I know for certain that writing them has given me a lot to think about.

  William Andrews

  * * *

  1 The Guardian, May 9, 2005

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  A book like this is never a solo effort. I owe a debt of gratitude to my friends and family who have supported me over the years. A special shout-out to the extraordinary people at Lake Union Publishing who have helped make this book all it could be. And, of course, an extra special thank-you to my researcher, first editor, sounding board, encourager, and love of my life, my wife, Nancy.

  SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY

  This is a work of fiction. As such, I took some liberties with history for dramatic purposes. Nevertheless, I did my best to portray the lives and times of Koreans during the twentieth century.

  If you want to learn more about Korea, the fascinating and often tragic history of the Land of the Morning Calm, below is a bibliography of books I found useful.

  On Korean History

  Breen, Michael. The Koreans: Who They Are, What They Want, Where Their Future Lies. New York: Thomas Dunne Books, 2004.