The Living Reed: A Novel of Korea (22 page)

On a certain day in late spring of that same year, sixteen days after the King had told him that he must go abroad, Il-han was again on his way to the palace by command. He wore his court robes, on his breast the square of silver brocade embroidered with three cranes to signify his high rank. The day was fine and he had commanded the front curtain of his palanquin to be raised so that he could enjoy the mild air and the light of the sun. The occasion of the royal summons was the ratification of the treaty with the United States, a solemn ceremony. True, ratification had been long delayed, but preparation had begun even before the revolt of the Regent and all the sad events that had taken place until he was safely exiled. The important first steps were taken when Shufeldt, an American officer whose rank was Commodore, had negotiated the treaty under the approval of the Chinese statesman Li Hung-chang who, wishing at that time to remain in his own country, had sent his representative, Yuan Shih-k’ai, to live in Seoul and uphold China as suzerain over Korea, and this although the treaty asserted that Korea was a sovereign nation and needed no conference with Chinese before it was ratified. Thus far affairs had proceeded until the Regent routed the Queen from the palace and disturbed the nation. Now that the King was again in power he commanded ratification on this day.

For Il-han the day was the beginning of his long journey abroad. He had not yet told Sunia, knowing that her woman’s heart would immediately set up a clamor concerning his health, the strange foods he must eat, the foreign waters he must drink, the wild winds he must breathe, all different from those in his native land. Yet today, after the treaty had been ratified, he would have to tell her, for there could be no delay in the journey.

Two hours after noon, then, on this nineteenth day of the fifth month of the solar year of 1883, and the sixth month of the lunar year, Il-han stood in the great hall of the Royal Office of Foreign Affairs. With him were Min Yong-wok, president of this office, and the chiefs of the four royal Departments, each with his retinue. Il-han was present at the King’s command as special representative.

The day was mild with approaching summer, the wall screens were drawn, and the gardens lay in full view in the clear sunlight. At the appointed hour all were ready and ten Americans entered the hall. Il-han had never seen them close and he could not forbear staring at them. They were all tall men and they wore naval uniforms of red and gold jackets over black trousers. One man wore gold wings on his shoulders, the sign of highest rank. The ten came forward and the court crier announced in a loud voice the name of the leader.

“General Lucius H. Foote, Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary of the United States of America to the Kingdom of Korea!”

The name Foote, translated, astonished the Koreans, and for a moment Il-han himself was confounded. Was this a mischievous trick of the announcer, a design to embarrass the foreigners? Foot? Could a man of high rank be so absurdly named? He caught the eye of Min Yong-wok, and they exchanged a questioning look. But no, the Americans were not angry, since they understood no Korean, and they presented the treaty in English to President Min, and the president presented, in return, the Korean copy. The ratified treaties were exchanged between the two men and thus a bridge was raised between two countries on opposite sides of the seas. The ceremony took no more than a few moments. The Americans then withdrew and Il-han returned to his house, marveling that in so short a time two nations could enter into friendship, their millions of people tied together by a piece of paper and written words.

“I shall die while you are away,” Sunia said.

“You will not,” Il-han said.

It was the middle of the night. They were in their own room and the house was silent about them. Outside in the garden pools the young frogs piped their early song of love and summer. He had told Sunia that he was going to America at the King’s command. She had listened without a word, and now she said simply that she would die.

She did not answer his denial. There beside him she lay, her hands locked under her head. He looked down into her face, pale in the moonlight.

“You will not have time to die,” he went on. “While I am gone, you must take my place with the Queen. You must visit her, hear her complaints, advise her, watch over her, consider her.”

“I will not,” Sunia said.

“You will, for I command you to do it,” Il-han replied. “Moreover, you are to become acquainted with the wife of the new American ambassador. You are to know her, you are to present her to the Queen as your friend.”

“I do not know even her name,” Sunia said, not moving.

“She is Madame Foote,” Il-han said.

Sunia heard this and suddenly she laughed. “You are making jokes! Foot? No—no—”

He let her laugh, glad of the change in her mood, and she sat up and wound her long hair around her head. “How can I call her Madame Foot? I shall laugh every time I see her. The female Foot! How did the man Foot look?”

“Like any man,” Il-han said, “except that he had a short red beard and red hair and red eyebrows over blue eyes.”

He was glad that Sunia was diverted, and he went on to describe the Americans, their height, their high noses, their great hands and long feet, their trousered legs and clipped hair.

“Were they savage?” Sunia asked.

“No,” Il-han said, “only strange. But they understand courtesy and they seem civilized in their own fashion.”

In such ways he led her to accept the matter of his crossing the sea and entering into foreign countries. It was no easy task, nevertheless, and all through the summer months, while preparation was made, she busy with his garments both for heat and cold, with sundry packets of dried foods and ginseng roots and other medicinal herbs, there came dark hours in the night when she clung to him, weeping. She insisted that at least his coffin must be chosen before he went, lest he die while he was abroad and his body be sent home with no place to rest. So to humor her he chose a good coffin of pinewood, and had it placed in the gatehouse, while he laughed at her and told her he would come back healthy and fat and far from dead.

The day of departure drew near, in spite of everything, and Il-han made his last visit to the palace, appearing before the Queen and then the King. To the Queen he commended his wife Sunia.

“Let my humble one take my place, Majesty,” he said. “Accept her service, and let her do your bidding. Tell her what you would tell me, for she is loyal and has a faithful heart. I have only one request to make for myself, before I leave.”

“I shall not promise to grant it,” the Queen said. She was in no good mood on this last day, for she did not favor friendship with the Americans and had mightily opposed the journey.

Il-han ignored her petulance. He proceeded as though she had not spoken.

“I ask, Majesty, that you invite the wife of the American ambassador to visit you here in your palace.”

At this the Queen rose up from her throne. “What,” she cried. “I? You forget yourself!”

“The time will come when it must be done, Majesty,” he said with patience. “Better that you act now with grace and of your own accord than later by compulsion.”

She walked back and forth twice and thrice, her full skirts flowing behind her. On the fourth time she drew near to the end door of the audience hall which led into her own private rooms. There, without looking back at him, or pausing to speak one word, she disappeared.

For a long time he waited and she did not return. Then a palace woman came out and bowed to him and folded her hands at her waist and spoke like a parrot.

“Her Majesty bids you farewell and wishes you a safe journey.”

She bowed again and turning went back from whence she had come. Il-han left the palace then, amazed that in his breast he felt a strange sore pain of an unexpected wound struck by one he loved. He hid it deep inside himself, and refused to allow himself to examine his own heart. He had no time, he told himself, to fret about a woman’s ways, queen though she was. He bore the monstrous burden of his people and carrying this burden always with him, he bade his household farewell, accepting the anxious hopes for his safe return. The last moments he spent alone with Sunia and their sons and to comfort her he stood before the ancestral tablets and together they lit incense and she prayed, her voice a yearning whisper.

“Guard him all the way,” she besought those dead. “Keep him safe in health and bring him home again living and with success.”

The second son, whom Il-han held in his arms, began suddenly to cry, but the elder stood as stiff as any soldier and said nothing. There was no time left for child or wife. Il-han held Sunia to him for a long instant and tore himself away. He stepped into his palanquin while a crowd stood by to watch and cry farewell. Then he felt himself lifted from the ground and borne swiftly on his way.

On the fifteenth day of the ninth month of that solar year, Il-han and his fellow compatriots arrived at the capital city of the United States. During the long sea journey he had studied the language of these new people, the only one so to learn, for the others saw no need to know a language they would never use. But he, with the help of a young Catholic interpreter, shaped his lips to the unusual syllables, and when he reached Washington, a city named for the first President of these people, he was able to read signs and the large print of newspapers and even to understand a few words spoken.

Already Il-han knew that his own people had much to learn from the Americans. Even the ship in which they traveled had been dazzling in marvels and he had made friends with the captain, a bearded man whose life had been upon the seas. With this man he had climbed upon the bridge and watched the turning of the wheel that steered the ship, and he descended into the bowels of the ship and saw the great furnaces where naked men threw coal into the monstrous maws to make steam that drove the ship with power. The train in which they had crossed the continent had provided further marvels, the engine powered by the same steam, and at such speed that even he was dizzied, though not vomiting as his fellows did. Five days they sped across mountain and plain, and he was overwhelmed by the vastness of the country, and astonished at the fewness of its people.

Here in the American capital he met the greatest marvels, especially the water, hot and cold, that gushed from the wall, and lamps whose fuel was an invisible gas. Much discomfort there was too. He could not sleep well in a bed high from the floor, and twice he fell out as though he were a child and braised his shoulders, and after such misadventure he pulled the mattress to the floor. The food was unpalatable and tasteless and he missed Sunia’s kimchee, and the spices and the richness of his own foods. Moreover, there were those eating implements, a pronged fork, a sharp knife, and he could not cut the slabs of meat, nor down it running red with blood. He chose a spoon and such foods as he could sup.

These were small matters, and soon he learned his way about the city, though only with the help of a young naval officer who had been appointed to stay with the delegation from Korea, an ensign named George C. Foulk. Seeing the name printed, Il-han spoke it complete until the young man had laughed.

“Call me George,” he said.

This George Foulk had lived four years in China and Japan and once had even spent a few months in Korea, so that he spoke Chinese and Japanese and some Korean. Il-han was fortunate that he himself was not official in rank and could go or not go on official calls. While the others waited here and there, he walked about the city with George and listened with lively interest to what the young man explained of history and science and art in the streets and museums and buildings. All that he, Il-han, saw and heard he stored in his mind, to be used for his own country when the time came.

Nevertheless, the formal meeting with the President of the country, whose name was Chester A. Arthur, Il-han must attend as special representative of the King of Korea. It took place not in the capital but in the city of New York in a great hotel where the President was staying, for what reason Il-han did not know. Thither they went and were installed in palatial rooms, where they waited for the appointed time. The day arrived and the hour, and Il-han prepared himself. He wore his richest robes of state, a loose coat of flowered plum-colored silk over a white silk undertunic. Over these he put his ancestral belt of broad gold plates. Upon his breast he hung his apron of purple satin embroidered with three cranes in white silk thread, surrounded with a border of many colors. On his head he wore the tall hat traditional for yangban noblemen, made of horsehair woven upon a bamboo frame and tied beneath his chin. Besides himself only Min Yong-ik, the head of the delegation, wore such robes. Two others could wear aprons with one crane embroidered on them. The rest wore no breast aprons but the coats of plum-colored silk and the white silk tunics in blue or green with tall hats.

Shortly before noon, word came that the President was ready to receive them. He stood in the center of the parlor of his private suite, and Il-han, entering first, saw a thick-bodied man wearing tight gray trousers and a long dark coat cut back from the waist. On his right was his Secretary of State, a man surnamed Frelinghuysen, who stood quiet and apart. On his left was his Assistant Secretary, surnamed Davis, and several others, among them George Foulk. Il-han and his fellow Koreans entered in single file and formed themselves in a line before the American dignitary. Then at a signal from Min Yong-ik they knelt at the same moment, and raising their hands high above their heads, they bent their bodies forward slowly in unison until their foreheads touched the carpeted floor. They remained in this position for moments, and then rose and went toward the President, who, with his suite, had bowed deeply as they entered and so remained until the Koreans had risen.

Now Frelinghuysen came forward and he led Prince Min to the President and introduced him. The two clasped their hands together, Prince and President, and they looked deeply into each other’s eyes, murmuring compliments, each in his own tongue. One after the other the Koreans were introduced to the Americans, and then the Prince and the President exchanged formal greetings, each in his own tongue, translated in turn.