The Calligrapher's Daughter (5 page)

“Amen. Goodnight,” he said.

“Goodnight. Thank you.”

She passed the folding screen and put her hand behind its edge to beckon the child who most certainly hid there. Najin appeared, shamefaced but with eyes that matched her mother’s in excitement. Najin scampered behind until Haejung gestured “hush.” When they reached the kitchen they clasped hands, smiling broadly at each other.

“Lucky blessed child! Thank God for your generous father!” The brilliance of realized hope filled Haejung’s eyes with laughing tears. Though it wasn’t their family’s custom to give birthday presents, she said, “Your father has given you the best birthday gift a child could ever have.” Najin hopped and spun, asking if she’d have books and paper and pencils and new clothes. And Cook, beaming at the stove, banged a wooden paddle on an iron pot in congratulations.

A few days later, Haejung’s husband asked her to join him after supper. This request was his way of obliging her, and it gave her contentment. The evening’s early coolness hushed summer’s singing night insects, leaving only occasional owls’ hoots and frogs’ croaks to break the companionable silence in his sitting room. She listened to the night and wistfully recalled the hourly clang of the ancient iron bell in the South Gate, whose clarion toll had for centuries pealed across the valley. She thought the Japanese had proscribed this useful tradition in order to sell more Seikosha timepieces, and after the family was late for church twice, she had indeed purchased a small windup clock. A high wind swept through the pines and bamboo, sounding like waves on a distant shore, and a draft refreshed the room and made the lamp flicker.

“Yuhbo,” said her husband. “I saw Magistrate Watanabe,” meaning he had officially registered Najin for private school.

Her eyes, raised from her sewing, showed her thanks.

He said irritably, “Yah, much more than I expected—almost as much as the tuition! That bastard will undoubtedly keep it himself.”

She questioned him with a look.

“He said private school is for the privileged, that obviously this family had enough privilege to take advantage of it, and with my background it would be a simple matter to revoke this privilege and any such privileges in the future. Greedy son of a pig.”

Fearing that their daughter’s registration might have exposed her husband to the Thought Police, she asked, “Is this trouble?”

“Perhaps not. I believe this may ultimately benefit us. Now I know he’s willing to be paid—a weakness that may prove useful one day.”

She nodded and, remembering the nanny, worried that it could also prove to be their downfall. She would trust God. This thought reassured her, and with that reassurance she felt his living presence within her. “Amen,” she said aloud.

He raised an eyebrow. “Speaking of that, I also visited the mission director.” He harrumphed and drank his wine. “He said to me, ‘Praise the Lord for your progressive example, Brother Han, and may others see the same light!’ Yah, all that church talk and what else could I say but ‘Amen!’”

Her eyes crinkled, and as she stood and bowed goodnight, she said with a heavy American accent, “Amen!” leaving him with an uncharacteristic mirthful grin.

Over the next few days she made two new
hanbok
—dark skirts and white blouses with fresh paper collars—and her daughter hemmed and embroidered a large muslin square to carry lunches and homework to and from school. Haejung was gratified when Najin asked to serve the evening pipe and wine the night before school began, and even more pleased when her daughter took the initiative to comb her hair anew, scrub her face and hands, and after seeing how much she’d splashed herself, change into her best blouse, tying the bow with perfection.

In her husband’s sitting room, Haejung looked on approvingly as her daughter used both hands with closed fingers to carefully offer his cup. Holding one hand within the other, Najin decorously lit a strand of straw at the flame of the oil lamp to fire his pipe. She stood before her father, hands at her sides, her head bent and turned slightly, and with her back straight, folded her legs gracefully to the floor, bowing formally and
saying thanks in the flowery language of the high court that he loved. Haejung saw a glimmer of satisfaction on his sharp but even features.

Long after Najin fell asleep, the servants retired in their quarters and the house secured for nighttime, Haejung prepared for bed. As she unraveled and combed her hair, her jade hairpin slipped from her fingers and bounced on the lacquer table, leaving two small scratches just so—the Chinese character for human. She smiled, reminded of evenings sewing with Najin, and how she’d scratched a needle on stiff fabric to teach her daughter Chinese characters. She snuffed the lamp, slid between her quilts and breathed deeply, happily, for behind her closed eyes she envisioned the blackboard of her daughter’s new classroom written with the joyous code of learning.

ALTHOUGH I KNEW THE ROUTE, MOTHER INSISTED ON ACCOMPANYING me to school the first day. I was, after all, the first girl from either side of the family to attend a real school. Cook had made breakfast special by drizzling honey on my rice porridge, and Kira and Byungjo had waved goodbye from the gate. At the bottom of our hill, we walked on the rutted main street beside the whitewashed wall that circled the wealthy neighborhood where Japanese officials and businessmen now lived with their families. The early fall morning filled my lungs with an invigorating crispness that called me to run or skip in my new rubber shoes, but Mother was instructing me on proper school behavior. I dutifully harnessed my footsteps to match hers. A new linen blouse chafed my elbows,
and the heavy silk of my dark blue skirt swung deliciously against my shins, like the church bell ringing its Sunday welcome.

“You mustn’t speak unless your teacher asks you something. Then lift your chin and speak clearly, but not loudly, and truthfully. If you don’t know the answer, you should say so. There’s no shame in not having the answer. Besides, with the lessons you’ve had at home, you’ll know more than most girls your age. Remember to give your teacher the utmost respect. Call her
Sunsaeng-nim.
”

“Yes, Umma-nim.” I repeated the instructions in my head in cheerful singsong.

“Treat your classmates courteously, especially if they know less than you, and most especially if they are peasant children. Some students’ families won’t eat for days to pay the tuition. They may be poor and have strange habits or mean ways, but you are yangban and more is expected of you. Never forget that you’ll be treated as well as you treat others.”

“How many students are there?” I trailed my hand along the iron bars that fenced the back lot of the Japanese police station, my fingers bouncing happily across the cold metal.

“Najin-ah! Look how dirty you’re getting! Keep your hands closed.”

I did so, smiling. Even her scolding couldn’t dampen my excitement.

“The school is small, four grades, but they aren’t all full. Since you’re just of age, you might be among the youngest. Maybe you’ll find an older girl who can be an
unnee
, an elder sister to you. You’re a very lucky girl. I dreamed of going to school, but it wasn’t considered proper.”

“But then how did your brothers teach you?”

She gave me a look and recited under her breath, “What one says isn’t only heard by mice in the night, but by birds in the day.” In the silence that followed, I tried to walk modestly, ladylike, invisible. “I didn’t say anything last week about finding you hiding outside of Father’s room, and I don’t think I need to speak of it again.”

I nodded apologetically and resolved to stop eavesdropping. I wouldn’t have time! Mother’s lips were set, but her eyes—wide apart and curved upward at the outer edges as if always smiling—were soft.

“Najin-ah, be cautious with the things you overhear. The days are unpredictable— Well, you must promise to always ask me about anything you don’t understand. It’s wrong to be secretive, and there’s no need to
worry about things that confuse you or seem strange. Asking questions is sometimes the best way to learn. And be careful with what you say to others, as these are difficult times. Will you remember this?”

I promised, and tried to think humble so I would appear humble. After a contrite while, I cautiously asked, “Umma-nim, can you please tell me how you were educated?”

I sensed her smiling. “In those days, a girl of our class never set foot outside her family’s gate until her wedding day, and then she’d go by palanquin to her husband’s family’s house.”

“That’s awful!”

“Daughter, you must learn to control your emotions. Such expressiveness isn’t becoming for a young lady.” My mother sighed. “Decorum, quietude, acceptance. Keep these things in your mind always.”

“Yes, Umma-nim.” Unfairness rumbled in my belly—I couldn’t help it!—but I squelched it by silently chanting the triple mantra of her admonition.

“And it wasn’t awful at all. My mother taught me all there was to know to become a woman, and anything I needed, and much that I merely wanted, was brought to me. Your grandfather’s house was the largest in the province, and I had the entire enclosure to roam. You’ve heard Cook talk about how our gardens were famous for beauty and variety. I kept quite busy, especially as I grew older and took care of my brothers.”

We reached a field stippled with hilly brush between our neighborhood and downtown. Habitually, on this route to and from church, neither of us spoke when we passed the checkpoint, where two silhouettes of policemen were now framed in the guardhouse’s cloudy window. Once the checkpoint was well behind us, Mother continued. “Still, like you, I was curious about the world outside, so your grandfather gave my brothers permission to pass their lessons on to me, as long as it didn’t interfere with their examinations or disrupt the household. When they told me what they’d learned, I drank from their lessons like a thirsty fish! Eventually, since your grandfather was the kindest of men, I was allowed to sit outside their studio when the tutors came.” Her voice grew lighter, as if lifted by an inner breeze. “This is also how we learned about Jesus. A teacher brought news of foreigners and gave your grandfather a Bible. Then, after we became Christians, everything changed.”

“Is that when you were allowed to go out?” I’d heard this part of the story before.

“Not only did I go out, but your grandmother also, the two of us, like commoners! We walked to church, you see, and actually sat in the same building as the men, since that’s how the foreigners did things. People were shocked at first, but your grandfather was the governor and highly regarded, and soon, others did the same.”

Whenever she talked about her family, her changed voice made me want to take her hand.

“Now that I think about it, I was older than you are now, but that first walk to church must have been like today is for you, except we veiled our faces with our coats. Thankfully it wasn’t a hot summer day. In fact,” she said, looking skyward at the treetops’ changing colors, “it might have been this time of year. I can’t remember. What I do remember is keeping an eye out for my mother’s feet in front of me, and the dust from the road on our skirts and coats when we came home.”

“Were you afraid?”

“Don’t be afraid of new things, Najin-ah.”

“I’m not!” I said before remembering my mantra. “Excuse me. I’m excited, Umma-nim, not afraid. It must be strange to walk with your coat over your head.”

“That was for modesty. Something you should try to have a bit more of.”

I knew to bow my head and close my lips. Straightening my shoulders, I focused on my mother’s footsteps, imagining a veil of modesty covering me from head to toe.

We neared the market where the cool air held odors of decomposing scraps and trash. Anticipation had heightened my senses, making colors and smells more intense, shapes sharper, details bright and bold. A few star maple leaves, deeply red and yellow, scuttled along the ruts eroded in the dirt roadside. Passing narrow alleyways, I glimpsed heaps of rubbish, a dog rooting, a cluster of empty chicken cages, a man spitting tobacco between brown-stained teeth. The sounds of the market distracted me— cries of bartering, a rooster crowing, an underwhir of chatter and clamor.

“I was excited, like you,” said Mother. “And yes, with excitement there’s often fear. But I had little to fear since my brothers watched me as closely
as a tiger her cubs. Also, I knew by then that I would be married soon.” She smiled, her eyes crescents. “So I had many other fears to consider for the future.”

In the market square she pointed out a bakery and a small restaurant. “If you do well with your lessons, I’ll give you a few
jeon.
The owners of those two shops are church members. You could buy treats there occasionally.”

My mouth watered at the prospect of taffy, or kelp chips dusted with sugar. We wove through the crowded market. Vendors shouted out the merits of their wares, or “Best price! Best price!” while customers haggled. Farmers and peddlers spread their goods on a swept parcel of ground: piles of straw sandals and rubber shoes in muted hues, open bags of rice and grains, stacked heads of cabbage, strings of pepper and ropes of garlic, green-flowering bunches of beets, radishes and carrots. One of my favorite chores was to accompany my mother to the fish market and produce sellers to help carry tofu, cucumbers, salted cod, and to other shops for cotton to spin, needles, medicinal herbs, dishes and pots.

“Umma-nim, who will help make all that gimchi?” I was stricken with the realization that for the first time in my life I’d be apart from her nearly all day, and it was gimchi-making season.

“Don’t worry. After your studies, you can help me as always, especially with your sewing. You’re doing well with embroidery and you mustn’t get behind. Perhaps you’ll learn new stitches at school.” She slowed to inspect a display of fresh-picked greens of many varieties, and I smelled apples before I saw the bent-over peddler trudge past, his A-frame basket loaded with the crisp fruit. When my mother sliced apples, they looked like lotuses in bloom, each piece cupped in a starburst of peel, and even though Cook said my skill in wielding the bamboo parer was impressive for my age, my apple petals were still uneven.