Bamboo and blood

4

At the Beijing airport, Jeno smiled and followed me onto the plane. Considering the run-in we'd had in Pak's office with the special section, the man seemed unnaturally calm, even for him. There wasn't a drop of tension evident in his bearing, no cloud of concern on his brow, no spark of apprehension in his eyes. Someone watching us-and for sure there was someone watching us-would have thought I was more nervous than he was. Neither of us spoke for a while after takeoff. Finally, he looked out the window as the plane banked and the view opened up in a break in the clouds. "More snow than before, a lot more. January must be a bad month here, and it's not even half over." He pointed and his finger tapped the oblong window. "See that?" I leaned over his shoulder. "That's the plane's shadow playing across the ground. The snow is an odd color, isn't it? Looks like butterscotch pudding spilled from the hills."

"I wouldn't know," I said and moved back in my seat. "To me, it looks like pumpkin porridge dripping from the rim of a pot." No one made pumpkin porridge like that anymore. My grandfather made it in the autumn, from pumpkins we gathered off the vines that grew on the fence behind his house. He said he learned to make porridge from his father, and that I should learn it from him. After I moved to Pyongyang, I couldn't get pumpkins. Or when I did, I couldn't find the time.

"Sounds delicious, pumpkin porridge. Can you make it?" Just then the pitch of the engines changed. Jeno glanced around nervously, straining to hear what might come next. The engines dropped back to normal, and he relaxed. "I am very sensitive to sound, Inspector. Some people respond to visual cues. I am hypersensitive to sounds of all types."

"I'll keep that in mind."

"The people behind us, incidentally, are Israeli." This he said in Korean, accented, but perfectly understandable. In fact, too good; it was as if the sound were coming from a machine. It nearly knocked me off my seat.

"You speak Korean? Why didn't you let on before?" I had meant that to come out as complimentary, but the annoyance was quicker on its feet.

"Surprised? Your language isn't so difficult, no worse than Hungarian. Besides, they're related. Come to think of it, maybe we're related. Wouldn't that be something? Ancient brothers from tribes that wandered apart in the misty past."

"I don't think so. I don't like paprika."

The trolley with drinks stopped beside us. The stewardess looked down at me. Why don't these good-looking girls work in my office, even near my office? I thought. Why are they confined to this ancient Russian tube ten thousand meters above the earth? Jeno nudged my arm. "Don't pant. Just tell her what you want."

"Nothing." I nodded to the stewardess. "Nothing for me. Perhaps our guest would like something, though. Go ahead, ask him in Korean. Or Hungarian. No, wait, try Hebrew."

"You really shouldn't refuse me, Inspector," the girl tossed her head back, just a little, just enough to notice, then she smiled at the foreigner. "Drink?" she asked in English.

He took a cup of tea; the trolley moved on. I looked around the cabin and then settled back. I closed my eyes, pretending I was somewhere pleasant. An elbow nudged me.

"I'd rather not be poked," I said. "Please, don't poke me like that, I don't care whether we are tribesmen or not."

He paid no attention. "You might get up and stroll into the first class cabin. There are some interesting passengers beyond the curtain. You'll find three more, just like that group behind us. Say 'shalom' to them and watch their eyes pop out." I didn't move. "Go ahead, have some fun, what can it hurt?" He poked me. "Eh?"

I sat up. All of a sudden, existence was awash in Israelis. A few weeks ago, I'd never met one in my life. Now they had me surrounded on, of all places, an airplane. I wondered if they were planning to hijack the plane. These were the people who had carried off Entebbe. They were larger than life, tougher than nails. I didn't like traveling by air in the first place; I hadn't wanted to go on this assignment to Beijing; and now I was being poked relentlessly, surrounded by a commando flying squad. "I'm not going up to first class," I said. "I never walk on an airplane when it's aloft. It's not right. Movement could disturb the balance, or the trim-whatever it is."

"You don't go to the toilet?"

"I make it a point to take short flights."

"How about standing? Can you at least stand?"

"Standing is possible, as long as it is done gently," I said. I stood up carefully and looked back at the trio seated three rows behind us. Business suits, European, but slightly off. They were reading papers in an alphabet I'd never seen.

Jeno reached over and tugged at my jacket. "The papers are in Hebrew. They think no one can understand. Classified documents, I'll bet."

I sat down again. "You know these people, I take it. And the ones up front, too?"

"Not personally, I don't know them." His eyebrows went into the first few steps of a gavotte and then stopped, as if the orchestra had abruptly gone out for a smoke. "I heard them talking while we were in line at the check-in counter. They're from the Foreign Ministry, apparently. Chatting away, making snide comments, convinced no one could possibly understand Hebrew. Can you believe it? What are they coming for, do you think?"

"How should I know? And if I were you, that would be the least of my concerns. You're in enough trouble. The real question is not why they are on the airplane." Actually, that was a real question, it just didn't bear on my immediate problem. "The real question is, why are you coming back? And why the hell didn't you let on before that you knew Korean? It would have saved me having to translate through frozen lips when we were in that hut in the mountains." I shut my eyes again. There were two questions that loomed, and I had no doubt that if I ever found the answers, they would be intertwined. First, exactly what I asked him-why was he coming back? And second, which was my problem more than his-who approved the visa after the trouble we had keeping him safe from the special section last time? A normal person wouldn't want to come back. A normal visa request after what had happened would have been turned down instantly. It would have provoked gales of laughter before being stamped: DENIED. This return trip wasn't normal in any respect. It even went beyond abnormal. So where did that leave me, other than accompanying a foreigner on the wrong side of unfathomable?

Jeno unleashed the familiar smile. "No games, Inspector. I appreciate your coming to get me, but it was unnecessary. I don't need an escort; no one is going to touch a hair on my head." The pitch of the engines changed abruptly again, too abruptly for him, because he paled and gripped the armrest. Apparently, he hadn't been at Entebbe.

"Don't let it worry you," I said. What happened to his hair would get sorted out after we landed. "Probably just some dirt in the fuel line. It usually clears." I watched him pale a little more before poking his shoulder. "Look, would I be here if I thought there was any danger? Don't worry. This plane is indestructible. If it hasn't crashed by now, it never will-that's what you have to keep telling yourself. Don't pay so much attention to sounds. You have to train yourself not to hear things sometimes. Like the thudding of Cossack hoofs."

"Very stoic." His voice was a little strained; maybe he was low on those silk pills he took every morning, or whatever it was that kept his voice so damned smooth. He craned his neck to look out the window.

"Do you want to switch seats?" I said. "You'll feel better if you don't have to look at the earth. It confuses the horizon, makes you dizzy when we bank or go bump."

"Not at all. I just hate landings. Do you mind if I shut my eyes and sweat for the next twenty minutes until we're on the ground?"

"Suit yourself." The landing gear made a loud thump, and the pilot pushed the plane into attack mode. I checked to make sure the wings were attached, and spent the rest of the way down wondering how big a crowd from the special section was already assembled on the tarmac.