The Ville Rat

– 8-

The elderly woman knocked and breezed into the room. Briskly, she replaced the cold pot of tea with a new one, dumped the cold tea in our cups into the old pot, and poured us steaming cups of fresh tea. I figured this was her way of letting us know that we’d been here too long. Already, male voices talked and laughed down the hall. After a few drinks, they’d be clapping their hands in rhythm and singing ancient Korean songs and, eventually, after even more cups of soju, they’d be dancing, with the girls or with each other.

Being a kisaeng was a legitimate occupation, like being a barmaid or a hostess in the States. As long as, that is, the girls weren’t required to sleep with the customers. Apparently, the Bright Cloud was on the up-and-up.

After the oil-papered door was slid closed, Mr. Kill turned to the young woman and said, “Tell us about Miss Hwang.”

She clenched her hands, staring straight ahead, and started talking.

“Of all the girls, she was the most beautiful. All the men wanted her to sit next to them. She was sweet and kind, and even though we had to do those things, sometimes the men would give her extra money. Later, the men in charge took the money away from her but they beat her less.”

“Less than the other girls?”

“Yes.”

“By the time you escaped,” Mr. Kill said, “Miss Hwang was already gone.”

“Yes. Gone.” We waited while she composed herself. “One night they took us to a warehouse.”

“Do you know where?”

“Not exactly . . . They kept the shades drawn on the van, but somewhere in Seoul.”

“You told me before there was much traffic and even though you moved very slowly, there was no honking.”

In downtown Seoul, in order to cut down on noise pollution, using a car horn is strictly prohibited. KNP traffic patrols enforce the rule with stiff fines. Hundreds of cabs and other vehicles jostle ruthlessly for position, but as odd as it might seem to the Westerner, none of them honk their horn. Try that in Manhattan.

“So you were downtown?”

“I believe so. We were led through the back door of a small warehouse. There were many boxes with printing I couldn’t understand. Finally, we reached a side room. There were foreign men there.”

“How many?”

“Six, maybe seven.”

“What were they doing?”

“Playing cards. Not huatu, foreign cards.”

“What did they look like?”

“Big. Ugly. Big noses.” She glanced at me, suddenly shy. “Their eyes were so enormous, I was afraid to look at them.”

“But you had to.”

“I kept my eyes down.”

“So you served them. Beer? Liquor?”

“Yes. Some of the girls were bold. They started to teach them to sing and after they had drunk much whiskey, they danced.”

“With the girls?”

“Yes.”

“Korean dances?”

“Yes. They taught them.”

“And you?”

“I sat still, hoping they wouldn’t notice me.”

“Did they?”

Her face was very red now. She swallowed hard. “Yes, one of them. He took me behind the boxes.”

Mr. Kill was silent for a moment. “And what happened to Miss Hwang?”

“One of the men wanted her.”

“Yes?”

She realized that her meaning wasn’t clear. “He wanted to keep her.”

“Keep her?”

“Yes. Later the girls told me that he offered much money. Or maybe he traded for her, I’m not sure.”

“Traded what?”

She shook her head violently. “Oh, I don’t know. They told us nothing. All I know is that after the party, Miss Hwang left with one of the foreign men. We never saw her again.”

Mr. Kill said very softly and very patiently, “Do you know what this man looked like?”

“Like a foreigner,” she said.

“Yes, but . . .”

“He had a big nose and big eyes.” She glanced our way. “Like them. I don’t know. I was afraid to look.”

Mr. Kill reached inside his coat pocket and pulled out a black-and-white picture. It was the official police photo of the dead woman lying beside the Sonyu River, damp dress spread around her, eyes staring lifelessly at the grey sky. He slid it across the table. “Is this Miss Hwang?”

The girl glanced at it, nodded violently, and then she was crying. Mr. Kill glanced toward me.

I took a deep breath, looked at Ernie. He shook his head. I turned back to the girl, speaking in Korean. “Do you have any idea why this foreign man singled out Miss Hwang?”

“She was pretty.”

“Any other reason?”

“Her writing.”

“Writing?”

“She often did that at parties. She would pull out a writing brush and paper and either write Chinese characters, for good luck or happiness, or sometimes she would sketch faces. Make people laugh.”

This wasn’t unusual. The kisaeng were expected to use one talent or another to entertain their guest. Sometimes dancing, sometimes playing a musical instrument, sometimes other things.

“Did she do this at this party?”

“Yes. I didn’t see most of it.” She blushed again. Apparently, while Miss Hwang was putting on her show, this young woman was otherwise occupied in another part of the warehouse.

When I had no further questions, Mr. Kill policed up the photograph and slid it back into his pocket. As we were leaving, I slipped a ten thousand won note, about twenty bucks, onto the table. The small kisaeng didn’t even look at it. Her face was down, flushed red, her eyes moist.

Second Lieutenant Bob Conroy sat on a black vinyl divan in the dayroom of his BOQ, Bachelor Officer Quarters, while a couple of other young officers played pool on the table nearby. Stacks of legal documents were spread over the cigarette-burned coffee table in front of him. He looked up from his work when Ernie and I walked in.

We introduced ourselves and shook hands all around.

“When were you assigned to the Threets case?” I asked.

“Last night. After chow. Peggy Mendelson found me and handed me my orders.” He pointed at a sheet of paper stuck beneath a larger stack.

“The trial’s in two days,” Ernie said. “Do you think you’ll have time to prepare?”

Conroy stared at the paperwork wistfully. “There’s a lot to absorb.”

“Which is why you’re working so late,” Ernie said.

“Yes.”

“Any chance of a continuance?” I asked.

“Peggy told me to forget it. We go to trial in two days, by order of the commanding general.”

“All right then,” I said. We pulled up two straight-backed chairs and sat down opposite Second Lieutenant Conroy and explained to him everything we knew about the case. He didn’t seem too comfortable with the allegations of homosexual coercion.

“If you call a couple of witnesses from Charley Battery up at Camp Pelham,” Ernie said, “they could corroborate Sergeant Orgwell’s sexual preferences.” Ernie wrote two names on a sheet of paper and handed it to Conroy. They were amongst the young black troops Ernie had smoked reefer with behind the Charley Battery motor pool.

“I’ll try,” Conroy said.

“If they don’t let you call them, at least get it on record during the trial that you tried to call them. It might be useful in an appeal.”

“So you already think Threets is going to have to appeal this thing,” Conroy said glumly.

“No offense, Lieutenant,” I said, “but you’re inexperienced and they’re giving you virtually no time to prepare a defense. That makes it clear that Eighth Army has decided to wrap this thing up as quickly as possible, and that they’ve already chosen a side.”

“Well,” he said, “Threets did shoot a superior NCO.”

“Yes, but there were extenuating circumstances.”

“Circumstances Eighth Army doesn’t want to talk about.”

Ernie thumbed through the paperwork idly. “Congratulations, L.T. You just summed up the entire case.”

In the jeep on the way back to the barracks, I said to Ernie, “Where do you figure this warehouse is the little kisaeng was talking about?”

“The Far East Compound. Gotta be.”

The only US military base in downtown Seoul was the Far East Materiel and Support Command. Most of the people who worked there were civilians, either Koreans or DACs. It was a small base geographically, but much of the logistics planning that supported the 50,000-plus US troops in Korea and their 50-plus military compounds was conducted at the Far East Materiel and Support Command. That they might have an occasional poker game wasn’t surprising. That they would bring in girls wasn’t too surprising either. All civilians were generously paid, drawing not only with their government paychecks but also the overseas differential and a generous housing allowance. Compared to a GI humping the line along the DMZ, they had money to burn.

“We need to pay a visit to the Far East Compound,” Ernie said.

“Everything’s shut down right now,” I said, “and word will spread too fast if we start asking questions during regular business hours. Whoever’s responsible will cover their tracks.”

“If they haven’t already,” Ernie said. “So when?”

“Tomorrow’s Friday night, the perfect time for a poker game.”

Ernie tightened his grip on the steering wheel. “And the perfect time for me to bust some fat-ass civilians for gambling on compound.”

By noon the next day, Ernie and I were back in Samgakji. There weren’t many GIs out this time of day, and we didn’t expect there to be. Most of them were either working on compound or eating chow at the big 8th Army Dining Facility-better known as the mess hall. But Samgakji was nonetheless bustling at this time of day: housewives carrying plastic baskets on their way to and from the open-air market; old women balancing bundled laundry atop their heads; business girls with dented pans propped against their hips, dressed in T-shirts and shorts, on their way to the bathhouse. In front of the Kit Kat Club, a three-wheeled flatbed truck blocked our way. Bare-chested workmen flipped back dirty canvas, revealing huge one-yard-square blocks of shimmering ice. Resting a towel on his back, one of the workmen pinched a block of ice with huge metal tongs, hoisted it onto his shoulder, and bending forward, lugged it into the Kit Kat Club. After plopping the ice into a stainless-steel sink behind the bar, the workman left and the truck drove off.

Ernie and I approached the barmaid, a young woman we hadn’t seen last night. There were no other customers in the club and she was surprised to see us, but she recovered quickly when I plopped three one-thousand-won notes on the bar. “Colt 45,” I said. “Tu-gei.” Two.

She rummaged around for a set of keys, opened one of the coolers, and pulled two sixteen-ounce cans of Colt 45 out and set them on the bar. Before she opened them, Ernie cupped his hands atop the cans. He crooked his finger, to bring her closer. While he kept her occupied, I ran around behind the bar. Peering into the beer cooler, I noticed two things: the supply of Colt 45 hadn’t been replenished, and there was a strong smell of garlic I hadn’t noticed before lingering inside the stainless-steel compartment. Using my flashlight, I searched for a jar full of kimchi that might explain the aroma, but I didn’t find any. I straightened up and peered at the barmaid. “The Ville Rat hasn’t come yet?”

“Who?” she asked.

“Maeul ui jwi,” I said.

“Moolah,” she said-I don’t know-slightly frightened by our behavior, and by me having the temerity to barge behind the bar.

Ernie slid the two cans back toward her and said, “Ahn mogo.” We don’t want.

I snatched up my three thousand won. As we walked out, the barmaid stared after us, puzzled, but placed the two cans of Colt 45 back into the cooler.

We found places to wait that we hoped would be inconspicuous. Although it was difficult for two American GIs, both of us over six feet tall, to find a way to appear inconspicuous in a Korean neighborhood that, at least for the moment, was bereft of foreigners.

Most of the lanes in Samgakji were narrow affairs, just wide enough for one or two pedestrians to walk abreast. The main drag, the one road navigable by taxicabs or delivery trucks, cut a dogleg through the maze of wooden hooches and one- or two-story brick buildings. It was along this road that the nightclubs and the bars and the chophouses were located, and that’s where we waited. Ernie at the bent knee of the dogleg, beneath an awning in front of a small, open-fronted store selling cigarettes, soft drinks, packaged noodles, wheels of puffed rice, and strings of dried cuttlefish. They also sold ginseng gum, with which he quickly reprovisioned himself.

I decided to keep moving. I was pretty lousy at making myself unnoticeable, so I wandered into and out of the various tailor shops, brassware emporiums, and photography shops that catered to American GIs frequenting Samgakji nights and weekends. Most of the shop owners were friendly to me but disappointed when they discovered I wasn’t there to buy anything.

I pretended to be conducting a verbal survey on the general impact of American soldiers’ presence on locals in the area. Did they feel that they and their families were safe? Did they think that law enforcement, particularly the American MPs, were doing a good enough job? To my surprise, they were more than willing to talk about it; enthusiastic, in fact. Yes, they thought that the MPs and the KNP patrols were doing an adequate job, but they also thought that some of the problems were caused by the MPs themselves. The black GIs were boisterous but generally well-behaved; it was when a patrol of white MPs came around that there seemed to be a thickening of tension. A few of the shop owners asked me why the American army didn’t have more black MPs.

I didn’t respond, mainly because I didn’t know what to tell them. I’d wondered that too. The military claimed that to be an MP, you had to meet certain qualifications that were more stringent than in other parts of the army, and it just so happened that more white soldiers met those conditions than black ones. Maybe. My own theory was that some black soldiers were reluctant to become MPs-it was like siding with the enemy. And some white soldiers couldn’t wait to become MPs-to have the authority to lord it over others. Still, most MPs, in my experience, were honest and even sometimes heroic.

Korea specializes in three-wheeled trucks. There’s a small cabin up front, just wide enough for a driver and one passenger, and a long, narrow bed in back enclosed by a short wall that can be loaded with enormous mounds of agricultural produce. Already, I’d seen a few trucks heading toward the open-air market piled high with fat daikon radishes, mounds of Napa cabbage, and canvas-covered bundles of fresh garlic cloves.

I’d hit virtually every mom-and-pop retail establishment in Samgakji. It was more than an hour past lunchtime and I was hungry. I strolled down the road. Ernie was still there sitting on a wooden stool, leaning against a splintered wooden plank, his eyes half-closed and his fingers laced across his belly.

One eye popped open. “Anything?” he asked.

“Not yet. Maybe the Ville Rat’s not coming today.”

“Maybe he heard we were asking questions about him.”

“Maybe.”

Ernie stood up. “Anyway, tonight we’ll find that poker game the little kisaeng told us about.”

“Yeah,” I agreed.

“So let’s go get some chow. We can always stop by here tonight, see if a delivery was made.”

I agreed and we started to walk down the lane back toward the compound. From behind us, I heard the low growl of an engine. Probably another produce truck, I thought, but the engine noise grew louder and started to scream. Or it might’ve been a woman screaming. Either way, Ernie said, “Watch out!” and, startled, I leapt toward the far side of the road.

It was the wrong choice. I turned in time to see a three-wheeled garlic truck heading right for me. People up the road were shouting and cursing and leaping out of the way. Inside the cab sat two men with dark hair who, from this distance, appeared to be Korean. The truck was piled high with garlic. Behind me in either direction, a brick wall ran for more than ten yards. The truck was too close and moving too fast for me to make it to the end. The driver was hunched over the wheel, staring right at me. He wasn’t stopping. And he was already bouncing the side of his truck against the wall. Within seconds, if I didn’t do something, he could crush me, leaving my blood and guts smeared against the brick like a giant squashed bug.

Ernie shouted something I didn’t quite catch, then stepped out into his side of the road, about five yards closer to the truck, and waved both arms in the air. The truck jogged toward him momentarily, but Ernie leapt back into the safety of one of the pedestrian lanes and the driver swerved back in my direction. I started to run but realized I couldn’t make it past the wall in time. I was vaguely aware of the roar of the engine and the shouts of bystanders and the screams of high-pitched voices, but I was also resigned to the fact that I wasn’t going to make it. Either this truck was completely out of control or, more likely, this guy driving the garlic truck was out to get me. Either way, I was about to be roadkill on the side of a dirty brick wall.

Ahead, a low-hanging tile jutted from a roof. Someone had left a few wooden crates, still strewn with wilted green leaves, shoved against the brick wall. I had an idea. Building up all the strength I could muster, I charged toward the crates. The truck was only a few yards behind me now. Using my left foot, I stepped up onto them, feeling them give way and shift beneath my weight, but their support was just enough to help me leap upward toward the curved edge of the overhanging tile. I grabbed hold with both hands and ran up the side of the wall, catching a foothold on some jutting brick and pulling myself up as I did so. The truck was just below me now and crashed wildly along the edge of the brick, grinding metal and emitting a hideous screech. I kept pulling myself up, trying to arch my stomach skyward to get myself out of the way, but I couldn’t pull myself high enough, and something slammed into my spine. I realized it was the top of the cab of the truck, and the shock of the impact was enough to make me lose my grip. I tumbled backward, the truck still moving forward and scraping crazily along the brick, and then the piled garlic was beneath me, but the truck kept moving forward and I was rolling toward the rear, tumbling through mounds of flaking garlic as I did so. The engine roared louder than ever, and the next thing I knew I was falling. Ernie ran past me toward the truck, but just as I glimpsed him I hit the ground with a thump, hundreds of solid little garlic bulbs cushioning my fall. I watched the rear of the truck speeding away, crushed crates careening in front of it, Ernie lunging madly after it, and then something flew through the air and cracked into my skull. I passed out.

When my eyes popped open, Ernie was grinning down at me.

“Didn’t know you could climb so fast,” he said.

I shook my head. “Neither did I.” I tried to sit up.

Ernie placed his hand on my chest. “Lie down. The medics are on their way.”

I lay back down.

“What about the truck?” I asked.

“It’s gone. Don’t worry, you’re safe.”

Suddenly, I realized I was angry. I wanted to find and prosecute the guy who tried to kill me. “Did you get the license plate number?” I asked.

“I did better than that,” Ernie said. He grinned again and reached to the ground and lifted something up, twisting it to show it to me. It took a second for my eyes to focus, then I realized what it was. A dented and rusty piece of metal with numbering on it. Ernie’d done better than jot down the license plate number. He’d ripped the whole thing clean off the back of the truck.

“You guys smell like shit!” Riley screamed. “Get the hell out of my admin office.”

“Go plow a minefield,” Ernie told him.

The medics had checked me out at the scene, given me some vision tests, and asked me a few questions like who’d won the World Series last year and things like that. The specialist four in charge said he thought I was okay, but standard operating procedure said I should go to the 121 Evac Hospital. But by then I felt okay. Ernie’d helped me dust off most of the garlic leaves and I sat on a stool in the open-fronted store with a can of guava juice that the owner insisted I drink. When I tried to pay, he waved off the money.

Ernie didn’t seem enthusiastic about driving me over to the 121 Evac emergency room and sitting around all day waiting for the results of a bunch of damn tests, so I told the medics that I’d go on sick call tomorrow, which seemed to satisfy them. On our walk through Samgakji my legs were a little wobbly, but I believe that was more from fear than from the lingering effect of a concussion. We climbed in Ernie’s jeep and drove back to the 8th Army CID office, where we were greeted so warmly by Staff Sergeant Riley.

Miss Kim held a lace-edged handkerchief to her nose and studied me with a worried expression. “Byongwon ei kaya-ji,” she said. You should go to the hospital. By speaking Korean, she was purposely excluding Riley and Ernie from our conversation.

“Nei-il,” I told her. Tomorrow.

She accepted my decision but still seemed worried about it.

Colonel Brace entered the admin office, something he rarely did. Riley shouted “Ten-hut!” and stood at rigid attention. Ernie and I were already standing.

“At ease,” Colonel Brace said. Then he approached me. “You all right, Sueno?”

“Fine, sir,” I replied.

He sniffed the air. “You smell like garlic.”

“So Sergeant Riley was just pointing out.”

“According to the MPs, you were hit by a truck full of the stuff?”

“I wasn’t actually hit. I managed to get out of the way.”

“Good. What were you two doing in Samgakji anyway?”

Ernie told him about our lead on a guy who had apparently witnessed the murder of the woman found dead near the Sonyu River. He left out all the stuff about black marketeering. No need to confuse him.

“That’s the one up by Camp Pelham?” Colonel Brace said.

Ernie nodded.

“Good. Keep working that. And this Threets thing-stay close to Lieutenant Mendelson. I don’t want you two bogarting out on your own.”

“We’re just reporting the facts as we find them, sir.”

“But we’re much too close to game time to be changing our strategy now. The court-martial’s the day after tomorrow. Better to concentrate on the Sonyu River murder case. Do you have any suspects?”

“Not yet, sir.”

He gazed at the top of my head. “Have someone take a look at that knot, Sueno.”

“Yes, sir.”

He nodded, turned, and strode out of the room.

Riley sat back down behind his desk. “You heard the man. Get your butts in gear on that Sonyu River murder.”

“You plowed that minefield yet?” Ernie asked him tauntingly.

Miss Kim gazed at me one last time, then hurried out into the hallway toward the ladies’ room. When she came back, she held a clean towel with which she wiped the bruise on my head, then applied a couple of adhesive bandages and what the Koreans call mycin, antibiotic ointment. I thanked her and asked if she could call Inspector Gil’s office for me. She did. I heard her talking to Officer Oh, explaining what had happened and giving her the license number off the plate that Ernie had snagged. When she was done, she made me sit down on the best chair in the office and fixed me some Black Dragon tea.

After she returned to her typing, Ernie pulled up a straight-backed chair next to me. “How much you figure this Ville Rat makes?”

I thought about it. There were just over fifty US compounds in Korea, each with a GI village outside its gates. Most had at least one bar that catered exclusively or mostly to black GIs. Some places had more than that, like Camp Casey, the 2nd Infantry Division headquarters, which had both Samgakji and Tongduchon. That was at least fifty bars or nightclubs that might want to order Colt 45. If the Ville Rat made 500 won profit, or one dollar, on each can and sold only one case per month to each bar, that was twenty-four dollars times fifty, which was over a thousand a month. And that wasn’t counting the cognac. Still, maybe I was being overgenerous in my estimate.

I told Ernie, “If he hustles, five hundred US dollars a month.”

“Maybe three or four times that,” Ernie said.

“Maybe.”

Rent for a Western-style apartment in Seoul ran the equivalent of $250 per month. If he lived in a Korean hooch, with no central heating, with an outdoor toilet and only enough electricity to support a single bulb, rent would be half that. Food was cheap in Korea, and besides, the Ville Rat was skinny. He wouldn’t eat much.

“So he’s making a good living,” Ernie said.

“Seems like it.”

“Enough to pay two garlic truck drivers to commit murder?”

“I doubt those two guys drive a garlic truck full-time.”

“No. The truck was probably stolen just so they could use it to splat you against the wall.”

“Why not you?”

“I’m sure they would’ve taken us both out if they could, but figured that killing one of us’d be enough to warn the other one off.”

“Off of what?”

“The Sonyu River killing.”

“Why?”

“I’m not sure,” Ernie said. “Apparently, somewhere along the line, we struck a nerve.”

But where, exactly? That’s what we weren’t sure of.