Bamboo and blood

2

"Sit down, Inspector, we're not finished." Pak looked painfully grim. "You're getting paranoid. You think your brother is behind everything that happens?"

"Do we have something more to discuss?" I wasn't going to talk about a brother that I no longer had. "This whole place is on the verge of a nervous breakdown. No one is giving orders, and no one is following them. Have you seen the reports on internal travel from the countryside? None of the posts are even trying to enforce regulations anymore. They say it's hopeless, and not worth the effort. Besides, people need to eat. Our job isn't to enforce starvation, or did I miss something in the latest memo while I was away?"

"You're not focusing, Inspector. You're hip deep in someone else's business. I don't give a damn about internal travel regulations. I don't care if everyone in Yanggang skips all the way to the East Sea." He saw the expression on my face. "Alright, the question is survival-who will survive and who won't. Yes, this year is crucial. If we make it through this year, things will get better. Satisfied?"

"Says who? And more to the point, so what? I don't want to play in that arena anymore, Pak. Survival, collapse-big words, big concepts, very big. Once you warned me against reducing things to their essence. Now I'm warning you, don't stretch ideas past the point of meaning."

"Is there more to that thought, or was it just something you had to get off your chest?"

"You have something else for me. What is it?"

"Your friend Jeno. He's coming back."

I shook my head. "I don't believe it. I don't. Is he arriving on the cloak of the princess of the moon?"

"No, Inspector, everything is believable, and that will become clear when you find yourself at the airport Saturday morning, greet him, load his luggage into your car, help him check into the hotel, and sit across from him in the dining room of the Koryo."

"How did he get another visa? Three times. How? Doesn't anybody check those forms any more? What if someone tries to snatch him when he gets off the plane? He doesn't have many friends left. Without Sohn, who is protecting him?"

"Someone must be, or he wouldn't have a visa."

"So when the big burly men come up and tell him that he is supposed to go with them, what happens?"

"Simple. You will interpose your body between him and them."

"And say what?"

"That you are officially escorting a guest of the party and government of the People's Republic, that as a ranking member of the Ministry of Public Security, you will not be detained, and that there will be hell to pay if anyone interferes."

"What if they're from the army?"

"Go down shooting, Inspector! Don't worry, the army won't show its hand on this. Anyway, the army may not be opposed to his being here for all you know."

"For all I know. Nothing is all I know. What does he want to talk about?"

"I have no idea." Not likely, but I let it pass. "If he wants a meeting with someone, he won't be shy in asking. As I recall, he isn't shy. Maybe he has a message; maybe he'll give it to you. A word of advice this time-if he wants you to work for him, take the money and run."

"If I had wanted to work with foreigners, I would have been measured for a suit. Is this really our job?"

"In this situation, Inspector, there is nothing that is not our job. You are our official greeter for the next few days. Only one thing."

"I knew it."

"You're right. Not everyone is happy to see our guest."

"I'm to put my body in between, you said."

"I'm not talking about symbolic intervention. I'm being literal. I mean your body."

"Not everyone wants him back." Pak must have a clue who was in the opposition. "Anybody we know?"

"Your brother, for one, I'd guess."

"That's funny." Now who was being paranoid?

"Is there a punch line?"

"I told him to stay out of my way or I'd do something." This wasn't something I wanted to discuss with Pak.

"And he nodded agreeably."

"He said he wasn't sure I would live that long."

"In most countries, that would pass as a threat. Was it, or was it just a brotherly exchange?"

"Alright, I lost my temper with him. It wasn't the first time, but this was the worst. I told him we weren't brothers anymore. I meant it. I don't want to speak to him, or see him again."

"That isn't what I meant."

"Yes, it might have been a threat. It's hard to be sure with him. Everything he utters is nasty. I don't remember if he said it before or after I mentioned I'd shoot him if I had to."

"You said you'd shoot your own brother?" Incredulity is not in Pak's normal range, but we were getting close. "He's all the family you have left."

"I told you, I lost my temper. Not lost, actually. More like I folded it up and calmly put it in my pocket."

"Calmly," Pak said. "That's one interpretation. How about thoughtlessly? Or maybe stupidly? Your brother has plenty of ways to get at us, Inspector. He has a thousand arrows and a thousand archers. Did you think about that before crumpling up your temper and stuffing it in your pocket?"

"I didn't crumple it. Anyway, it's done, that's all I can tell you. My brother doesn't scare me."

"Wonderful! And in which pocket did you put your fear, can you tell me that? I hope it is easily retrievable, mixed with your wood chips, because it may be that fear is the only thing that will save us." Pak was building up a good head of steam. "I've heard that your brother tried very hard to block this visit. Just before I left his office, the Minister took a phone call, after which he suggested to me that you needed to do something to fix a family problem. Actually, he roared at me that if you didn't fix this, he'd skin you alive. Apologize, out of fear if nothing else. If you can still locate it."

I threw down the pencil. "This country is falling apart, and they're worrying about whether or not my brother and I are speaking?"

"You really are Korean after all, aren't you?"

"What the hell is that supposed to mean?"

"It means you can't put your temper in your pocket, because there isn't a pocket big enough to hold it. No one gives a damn whether you and your brother bash in each other's heads. Except for one thing. Your brother has influence, baleful though it is." Pak stopped and took a breath. He was furious, but I knew it wasn't just at me. It was everything, everything that was wrong, everything that was weighing on him, everything we all saw, or tried not to see, every day.

"Don't worry," I said, "nothing you could say about my brother would offend me."

"Offend! I'm not worried about offending you, Inspector. I'm trying to explain how dangerous a spot you've put us in. Us, you know? The two of us here; you and me, followed at a short distance by the Minister. One more thing. Stay away from the school."

"I thought you wanted me to check in there once in a while to take the pulse. I was going over today, to see that girl. I have a feeling she might know the woman who was killed in Pakistan. I think they were in a Rachmaninoff club together at one point. They never got it approved, but I don't think that's a problem. Music is still an acceptable form of entertainment as far as I know, as long it doesn't involve lewdness. I don't suppose Rachmaninoff is a problem in that regard." I thought about where I had been taken by the music that night in the jazz club in Geneva. I didn't know how to describe it to Pak; I couldn't describe it to myself. "It's a compass for a heart," I said. "How else is anyone supposed to find a way through all of this?"

Pak started to say something, but then he stopped. He sat quietly for a moment. "Listen to me. We're done with the dead woman, done with Sohn. We're past it. Let someone else worry about the schools. To tell you the truth, it's making some people nervous, the idea of you among the students."

"What?"

"Stay away from the campus."

"They think I'm going to fool around with one of the students? I don't need this crap anymore. I'm taking a day off. If the Ministry objects, tell them to climb a tree." I turned to go, but then I turned back. I shouldn't have. "You know what? The Swiss asked me if I wanted to stay. Don't make me wish I had taken them up on the offer." I saw Pak recoil slightly, but there was nothing I could do about it now. M. Beret was right. Nothing would ever look the same.