The Calligrapher's Daughter (9 page)

“Where are they going?” I waved my flag at the empty street.

“Father will tell us about it when he returns. Oh! It’s a historic day for Korea!”

I was too eager for Father’s return to sit and study in my stuffy room. I asked Cook how I could help prepare the celebration meal, and she sent me to gather fiddlehead ferns by the north wall.

In the cool shade of tall pines, shafts of sun warmed the patch of neck between my braids, my hair absorbing the heat like a woolen scarf. I tied the front of my skirt to prevent it from dragging on the ground and stooped to pinch tender shoots, collecting them neatly in a basket, and carefully harvesting every other fern to reserve a crop for the following year. The ferns smelled dark and loamy. I roamed beyond the woods to the meadow by the brook where we did laundry in the summer, and found wild leeks and new dandelion greens. I plucked them and savored their green sharp smell on my fingertips, my cheeks sucking in as I anticipated the tangy salad Cook would make.

When I returned to the house, the fruit trees in the courtyard cast long clawlike shadows at my feet. “Look what I found!” The basket thudded on the kitchen table.

“Where have you been?” said Cook, her tone unnaturally sharp. “Your mother’s looking for you. Quick! Wash hands and go.”

“Is Father back yet?”

“Go on!”

I dipped my hands in the washbowl and rushed to the women’s quarters, dripping water, my worried steps shaking the walls.

“Najin-ah!” Mother called from her room. I helped untie the baby from her back, and he started to cry. Mother pointed to a pile of clothes, brown and yellow with road dirt. “Take the baby and give those to Kira to wash right away. She’s to lay them out in Joong’s room to dry. Ask Cook to bring more hot water and clean rags to Father’s room.”

“What happened?”

“Do as I say!” She went out the porch to the courtyard, and I was alarmed to see her cut through the garden to reach Father’s rooms, where the lamps burned brightly.

I cuddled Dongsaeng, humming until he quieted. I bent and held him on my back with one hand, and clumsily wound the binding cloth around my torso, tying it tightly until he felt snug against my spine. I gathered the dirty clothes and saw dark stains on the collar. Unbunching what I recognized was my father’s shirt, I smelled earth and metal before I saw that the garment was soaked with blood. I hugged the clothes and ran to the kitchen.

“Is Father all right?” I showed Cook the bloodied shirt. “What happened?”

“What did your mother say?” Cook stoked coals beneath a cauldron of steaming water.

“Nothing!” I almost stamped my foot, impatient for information, and afraid. I remembered my mother’s instructions and took a breath. “She said to bring hot water and clean rags.”

Cook shoved a block of wood into the stove and fetched a large ceramic bowl. Moving with speed, she rolled her sleeves down her wiry arms. “And what else?” She kicked a stool over to a cabinet, climbed up and grabbed a handful of folded cloths from a high shelf.

“That Kira should wash these clothes. There’s blood—”

“I see that. Do as your mother says. Kira’s out back.”

“But is Father—”

Cook carefully ladled boiling water into the crock. “Your father is hurt. Just above his eye, thank God. It’s messy but not deep. Joong went for the surgeon, who’s in with him now.” The spry woman tucked the rags
beneath her arm and cradled the steaming crock in a towel. “Maybe you can help Kira wash those clothes.”

I hurried outside. When she saw Father’s shirt Kira said,
“Aigu!”
and clucked her tongue. Frightened childish tears wet my cheeks.

“Now then, Ahsee. You’ll wake the baby. See how nicely he’s sleeping? He must like riding on your back the best. Don’t worry. We can get the blood out. Look, I’ll show you how.”

I wiped my nose and followed Kira, who plunked a tub on the washing platform near the drain ditch. The youthful water girl energetically filled the tub with a bucket from the cisterns. She crouched beside the tub, threw in a handful of salt and splashed cold water on the bloody clothes. “Ahsee, sit here.” She patted a dry spot beside her on the planks. “I’ll tell you what I saw and heard.”

I squatted next to her, rocking from one foot to the other to keep the baby asleep. While Kira swished water through the clothes and patiently rubbed the stain with a worn bar of ashy soap, she spoke. She’d been filling the cisterns on Father’s side of the house when he came through the gate. “He walked normally, but he was holding this very sleeve against his head. I could see something was wrong and I said, ‘Master, how can I help?’ He told me to get Madam and Joong, and some towels. I did that, and when I brought the towels in, he was sitting on the porch saying he didn’t want to bloody the mats. He sent Joong for the doctor, and Madam tried to clean his wound. A lot of blood came from his head still.” Kira wrung the shirt and changed buckets.

“I saw tears in your mother’s eyes,” she said with a kindly look to me. “But her hands were steady and calm. She said Cook should boil water and I should get fresh water and some clean clothes for the master. When I got back, I heard him talking. I waited a little apart before I went in. See how it’s almost gone?” She plunged the shirt in a second bucket and soaped it again. “Your father said that when they got to the police station no one knew what to do. They decided to go back to the church, but some of the young men disagreed. Then your mother saw me and said to put the clothes down and take the baby, but he was sleeping so peacefully, she changed her mind and told me to go.”

Kira tipped the washtub and poured bloodied water into the ditch.
“Cook said to bring them drinking water and take the soiled rags and wash them right away. This time the master was in his sitting room. I waited a little before I went in, so I heard him telling more.” She looked sideways at me. “Except I don’t think your mother would want you to hear.”

“You must!” I stood to shift the baby higher on my back. “I promise I won’t say anything.”

“Come closer.” Kira lowered her voice. “Somebody named Kim was shot, and your father tried to help another man who got stabbed in the shoulder clean through. Then he said something about a soldier and a spear. The master stopped talking then—maybe they heard me. When I went in, he was sitting calmly in clean trousers. Madam had tied a towel around his head and was washing his back. She pointed to the bloodied towels I should take, and as I left, the doctor came.

“So you see, the master is perfectly alive and talking as usual. And now the doctor is taking care of him, and soon I’m sure he’ll be wanting to see you and the little master too.” Kira laid her heavy hand on my shoulder. Icy from the wash, her palm delivered a chill through my light cotton jacket that cooled my rapid heartbeats.

“Oh, Kira.”

The baby fussed. Kira said to take him to Cook and perhaps Madam would feed him soon.

“I forgot to tell you that Mother said to dry the clothes in Joong’s room. Are they his now? It’s still a good shirt.”

Kira shrugged.

“She wants to hide them?”

“Some things I don’t want to know. Never mind. Now you know how to take out bloodstains, and next time I’ll show you how to make soap.” The gold edging on her front tooth flashed, and I thought I’d never seen such a generous smile.

I found Mother saying goodbye to Dr. Mun. The doctor’s dark Western suit passed like a night spirit through the gate. The baby started to cry, fully awake and hungry. Back in our rooms, Mother breastfed him, her brow deeply creased.

I folded the binding cloth and sat quietly in front of her, waiting until the questions stopped spinning in my head and I could speak calmly. “Umma-nim, may I ask if Abbuh-nim is badly hurt?”

The baby’s soft feeding noises, his miniature chubby hand resting on Mother’s breast, the creamy smell of milk and the twilit room worked to smooth her lines of worry, her cheeks blushed pink from breastfeeding. Her voice, a low singsong, kept rhythm with the baby’s sucking. “Your father’s doing fine. Resting now. No need to worry.”

“May I ask what happened?”

Mother nodded, her eyes half shut and bright from lactation. “After we saw them on the road, your father and the crowd marched all the way to the police station. Everyone had sworn a pledge of nonviolence and understood it was to be a peaceful demonstration.” She stroked the baby’s head, gazing at him, and said, “‘Be not afraid!’ was the motto for nonviolence that everyone swore to.”

I hugged my knees and waited while she shifted the baby. “But what happened at the police station?”

“There was confusion. Some said they should return to the church to wait for news from Seoul. Others said they should wait there and hear the Declaration read once more. But armed policemen came out with a firehose, and a truck drove up behind the marchers. Your father thinks it was a traitor’s work since they were organized and well prepared. An officer said to disperse or be arrested, and they turned the hose on with such force that people were thrown against each other. Those who tried to run were met with blows from the soldiers. This made some of the young men angry and they threw stones and dirt. Just dirt and pebbles from the road!”

Mother straightened her back and the baby made little noises, waving his hands to find a nipple. I squeezed his foot. “But still, it was wrong, and dangerous,” she continued. “Your father said someone fired a shot then. The soldiers drew sabers and people screamed. They shot into the crowd. Everyone panicked and the soldiers charged. They beat people with clubs and bayonets. Animals! Many were hurt and arrested. Saegong’s father was shot. Poor man! You know him, the baritone soloist.” She bowed her head, praying he would be spared and his family protected. “Your father stopped to help another badly wounded man, and that’s when he was hurt.”

“Is it bad?” I twisted the ties on my blouse, the ends wrinkled and increasingly damp. I felt suddenly and irrationally responsible. I did not
love my father enough, did not respect him or honor him enough, was not well behaved enough.

“No, his hat protected him somewhat. He was brave and foolish, but now I’m afraid they—” Mother hugged the baby and hid her eyes, but I saw tear tracks and was struck with new fear that he would be arrested again.

“Don’t worry,” she said. “He’s home. He’ll be fine. The surgeon cleaned his wound with iodine and sewed it together as easily as a torn sleeve. The bleeding’s stopped and he says there’s little pain. He’ll have to sleep sitting up for a few days. I must remember to ask Joong to bring more pillows.” She closed her blouse and held the baby out by his armpits. “Here, learn how to burp your brother. Hold him close, that’s right. Support his head and rub his back.”

I brushed my nose against my brother’s feathery hair, inhaled his delicious scent and rubbed a little circle on the small of his back as my mother instructed. He released a loud gassy burst and we laughed.

“A good one! Watch me change his diaper, then you’ll know everything about taking care of your brother.”

“Except I haven’t any milk.” I cupped the baby’s head as I returned him.

She demonstrated her diapering method, her hands skillful, automatic. “It’s simple to learn how to clean and dress a baby. Even to have a baby is a simple earthly thing. Understanding the physical world is nothing. Your father said the man he tried to help was stabbed in the shoulder through to his back. His ribs were caved in on one side as if he’d been kicked or trampled. Two other men helped your father carry the wounded man into a courtyard. They dropped him once because soldiers were beating everyone in sight. He saw a woman being hit with the butt of a rifle. Her skull was crushed, but the soldier didn’t stop. Aigu! What of her family? What will become of her children?” Mother kissed the baby’s forehead, murmuring a prayer for the woman, the dead and wounded. I remembered the smell of my father’s shirt, and the heavy perfume of lilacs.

“A Chinese man came out of the house and said he’d hide him and call their doctor. Those are good Christian people, even if they’re Buddhist.” This impressed me as an odd and curious thing to say. She swaddled the baby. “Najin-ah, alongside such goodness are those who know only evil. It’s something you’ll need to understand sooner than I’d hoped. I’m sure
you’ll want to know how such evil can exist, as do I.” She spoke tightly with an anger I’d rarely seen. I crushed a diaper, both wanting and not wanting to hear more. Mostly, though, I badly wanted everything to be like before. “We can’t know God’s will,” she said, “it’s not for us to ask. But how can it not be when it’s we who suffer?”

“Is it the Devil? Are the ancestors angry?”

Her eyes refocused toward me and her voice quieted. “Yes, certainly the work of Satan in all his evilness, but we can fully trust that Jesus will keep you and your brother safe. You needn’t worry. You need only pray with all your heart and behave well. Be respectful and thoughtful of others, especially those less fortunate than us. Take care of your brother and father. Pray for our leaders. Pray for Korea.”

“Yes, Umma-nim.”

“You must give thanks that Father made it home. The Chinese man also wanted to hide your father, but that wouldn’t be right. Your father stayed off the main road and saw nothing else. He said the streets were full of wailing.”

Mother cuddled the baby and spontaneously returned his smile. “But here’s a happy little boy. Your father can’t wait to see you.”

“Umma-nim, may I see him too?”

“A little later.”

“I picked
gosari
. He might like that tonight.”

“I’ll be sure to tell him you picked it just for him. Now see to your studies. I’ll bring your father his food, then you and I can have a late supper.”

I bowed and reluctantly left. Instead of studying in my lonely room, I took my writing pad to the kitchen, pretending to do homework while I watched to ensure that Cook dressed and sautéed the greens I’d picked for Father to perfection.

NIGHT FELL. AFTER the day’s violence the dark seemed thick and ominous, the moon and stars buried in baleful clouds. Brittle winds from the mountains gusted through the house, shaking the windows and leaving behind a hostile chill. I was snuggled deeply in winter quilts when thunder woke me. Not thunder—pounding, metal on wood. Japanese shouts. Distant doors and shutters slammed and I heard quick footfalls outside.