The Living Reed: A Novel of Korea (40 page)

It was morning when Yul-han read the story of the trial. He sat at his breakfast table alone, as head of the house. Question by the Court, answer by Baron Yun, he read on, forgetting that he had classes at the school.

“What were your feelings when you were compelled to retire from the Foreign Service?”

“I was overwhelmed with grief.”

“Are you not the head of the New Peoples Society?”

“I am, but I told the members that I would not perform violent acts.”

“Yet you must have been indignant at the annexation of your country.”

“I would never have found myself in this court if I had possessed the power at that time to prevent Japan from becoming lord over my country.”

“Would it not be reasonable, nevertheless, for you to have formed a plan to change the situation?”

“I was rather too old to do more than I did, but it is true that I felt bitterly indignant at the position of my country.”

Yul-han, reading these brave words, could see before his eyes the gallant old gentleman in his white Korean robes, his long white beard streaming over his breast, his staff in his hand, his wrinkled face, his steadfast dark eyes. The warmth of fresh courage, fresh hope, new faith, reached Yul-han’s heart. If young and old among his people could be so fearless, should he be afraid?

Induk came to the door at this moment. “Do you forget that you must go to your class?”

“I do not forget,” Yul-han said, “but I have another duty. First I must go to my father.”

Induk’s hands flew to her cheeks. “What is wrong? Has something happened?”

“Baron Yun was tried yesterday,” Yul-han said. “He is in prison and he is my father’s old friend. I must tell him—and I must tell him that I am Christian now. I trust it is not too much for one day.”

… He found his father watering a young apple tree in the east garden. His mother held a hoe with which she loosened the earth so that the roots could drink.

“You two, my parents,” Yul-han said when he had given greeting. “Do you expect to get fruit from this little tree?”

“You will get it,” Il-han said, “you and your children. And I am glad you have come. I have a matter to discuss with you.”

He put down the watering pot and led the way into the house and to his accustomed place. Then he waited, as though he did not know how to begin.

“Speak, Father,” Yul-han said, when they had sat down.

“You speak first,” Il-han directed. “What I have to say may have some connection with you.”

Yul-han took a breath. “Father,” he said. “I have become a Christian.”

Rain had begun to fall, a slow autumnal rain. It dripped from the eaves and trickled in rills over the stones of the footpath in the garden. Sunia was running toward the kitchen, her apron over her head. Meanwhile Yul-han waited for his father’s anger and with such foreboding that he was almost frightened when he heard his father’s voice come not angrily but with unusual mildness.

“Had you told me this a short time ago, I would have reproached you for bringing our family into danger. But I have seen such sights and heard such words—”

And he told of the trials of the Christians, of their wit and courage. Each one he described, young and old, until Yul-han interrupted.

“Add to the noble list one more name, Father,” he said. “Add the name of Baron Yun.”

Il-han’s jaw hung ajar. “Not my old friend!”

“Even he.”

Il-han hesitated, inquiring of himself whether he should not tell Yul-han of his older brother.

“That man they call the Living Reed,” Yul-han said, as though he read his father’s mind.”

Il-han did not move or lift his eyes. “What of him?”

“Do any guess who he is?”

“Do you?”

“I was not there. I did not see his face.”

Ah, Yul-han did not know! Let him remain unknowing and safe.

“Why should I know when you do not?” Il-han said. “And for the rest,” he added with pretended impatience, “if you wish to be Christian, then be one.”

This was all that was left of his anger against his second son.

The winter of that year passed in dire deep cold. Cold was to be expected but this cold was the chill of death. Each morning the gendarmes collected the bodies of those who had frozen during the night, men, women, and children, and threw them into trucks and carried them away. The earth was too solid to bury them and they were stored in empty barracks or piled and covered with mats until the spring came. Nor were those who lived better off, for a long drought in the autumn had dried the mountain slopes, the grass was scanty and the rulers would not allow trees to be cut. The mountains, they said, must be covered with trees again as they had been in past centuries, and if a man were caught cutting a tree in the night he was flogged and put in jail. In every house the ondul floors were cold, except for the two brief times, morning and afternoon, when food must be cooked, and since in the past the people had depended upon warm floors upon which they could spread their mattresses and therefore needed no heavy quilts, they were cold as they had never been before.

The long winter passed into a scanty spring and the time drew near for Induk to give birth to the child, and her mother begged Yul-han to allow her to come to her family home for this event. Yul-han did not know how to reply. If he refused Induk’s mother, that one would be wounded. If he agreed, then Sunia would be displeased. Indeed she was already displeased, for somehow she had wind of the request, and she laid hold of Yul-han one day when he was on his way to school.

“What!” Sunia exclaimed. “I suppose you think I cannot help my grandchild to be born? I suppose only a Christian will serve?”

“Mother, I pray you,” Yul-han exclaimed. “Is it a matter for me to decide? Let it be as Induk wishes.”

This Induk heard from an open window and she came hurrying out.

“Good Mother,” she said, coaxing Sunia. “The birth is not so important as the hundred-day feast. Will you let us celebrate the feast with you and the grandfather?”

Sunia, having made protest, was willing to be mollified, and so it was decided. On a stormy night in early spring, Induk went into labor, her mother and her sisters about her. Outside in the main room Yul-han awaited the birth with eagerness and also with mild amusement for Induk had said she wished the first child to be a girl.

“I am praying God for a daughter,” she told Yul-han one night as they lay side by side in bed in married talk.

He gave a shout of laughter.

“Now here is confusion,” he exclaimed. “I am praying for a son!”

Induk did not know what to say. At first she was inclined to be somewhat peevish. Then she thought better of it and smiled.

“Let us both stop praying and accept what God sends,” she said.

The birth was not easy for Induk. The hours were many and Yul-han was about to be fearful when, as the early sun climbed over the eastern mountain, his mother-in-law came to the door and beckoned him with her forefinger. He went to her at once and she gave him a sly look, for Induk had told her of their conflicting prayers.

“You have prevailed,” she said. “God has given you a son.”

He went to Induk then and knelt on the floor beside her bed. There, resting on her arm, he saw a sturdy child whose eyes were already open. It was his son! He felt a strange new pride in himself, a conviction of achievement, an upsurge of life and hope. Then he looked at Induk.

“Next time, since I am so strong in prayer, I shall pray for you a daughter,” he said, and weary as she was, she laughed.

… At first Yul-han thought of the child only as his son, a part of himself, a third with Induk. As time passed, however, a most strange prescience took hold of his mind and spirit. Babe though he was, he perceived that the child possessed an old soul. It was not to be put into words, this meaning of an old soul. Yul-han, observing the child, saw in his behavior a reasonableness, a patience, a comprehension, that was totally unchildlike. He did not scream when his food was delayed, as other infants do. Instead, his eyes calm and contemplative, he seemed to understand and was able to wait. These eyes, quietly alive, moved from Yul-han’s face to Induk’s when they talked, as though he knew what his parents said. He was a large child, strong and healthy, and he had presence. Yul-han, watching, felt a certain awe, a hesitancy in calling him “my son,” as though the claim were presumption.

“If I were Buddhist,” he told Induk one day, “I would say that this child is an incarnation of some former great soul.”

They were together of an evening, and Induk was preparing for the child’s hundredth day after birth, which was to be celebrated the next day. She was baking small cakes and while they were in the oven, she arranged upon a low table the objects for the child’s choosing tomorrow. According to tradition whatever the child chose was a prophecy of his future.

She paused when Yul-han spoke. “I feel it, too,” she replied quietly. “What it means I cannot say. I only know that this child will lead and we must follow. We must not try to shape him, though we are his parents. He will know what he is, and we must wait until he tells us.”

She came to Yul-han’s side then, and they knelt together before the child, who lay on a pillow on the ondul floor. He had been moving his hands as babies do, kicking his feet and making soft burbles as he discovered his voice. Now he turned his head to look at his parents, and he gazed at them with such intelligence, such awareness, that it was as if he spoke their names, not as his parents, but as persons whom he recognized.

“Oh, what is this—” Induk murmured in amazement.

The child smiled as though with inner joy.

… “Let no one speak,” Il-han said.

They were gathered together for this celebration, the two families, Yul-han’s and Induk’s, in Il-han’s house. For the first time Il-han and Sunia met with Christians, a meeting not possible if Il-han had not seen with his own eyes the steadfast courage of the Christians at the trials. Today, therefore, he greeted Induk’s parents with courtesy and they sat in the seats of honor, the father in his white robes, and the mother, short and plain of face, in her best gray satin skirt and bodice. On the outskirts in lower seats were Induk’s sisters and young brother, and Sunia’s sisters, a family crowd such as there had not been since the funeral of Il-han’s father.

All were intent upon the child. He, too, was in his new garments of red silk that Induk had made for the occasion. He was propped against a cushion, and he lay in calm content, smiling when he was spoken to.

“Let no one speak,” Il-han said again.

All voices were hushed then, as they watched the child. Upon the floor around him Induk had placed the usual objects, a brush for writing, a small dagger, a piece of money, a bundle of thread. The child looked at Induk inquiringly, and she nodded and smiled. Then as though he understood what he must do, the child examined the objects carefully and after a moment he put out his right hand and chose the bundle of thread. All burst into joyful cries and exclamations. The child had chosen the symbol for long life.

Thereafter they ate the cakes which Induk had prepared and drank tea and made talk happily. And when this was done, they presented their gifts to the child. Some gave garments of gaily colored silks, some gave money, and some bowls heaped with rice to signify wealth. The grandparents gave the essential gifts of bundles of thread, a rice bowl of fine lacquer with a cover of polished brass, a set of silver chopsticks and spoon. Each gift the child received with such calm and seeming comprehension that all guests went away awed.

When they were gone Sunia took the child in her arms. “I am glad he chose the thread,” she told Yul-han. “Else I might have my fears. He is too wise, this child.”

“Wisdom is what we need in times like this,” he told her.

“I raise a name for him,” Il-han said. “I raise a Chinese name. Let him be called Liang. Later he may add another name of his own choosing, but let us call him Liang, which means Light—the light of day, the light of enlightenment.”

They considered, looking at each other and at the child.

“It is a good name,” Yul-han said.

Sunia nodded. “A name big enough for him to grow in.”

But Induk snatched the child away from her. “He is only a baby,” she cried. “He is only a little baby. You make him too soon a man!” And she hugged him to her breast.

Beyond the despair in Yul-han’s own country, a turmoil appeared in the West. Out of the West, so long committed to peace, a war arose. At first no one could understand such a war, beginning, it seemed, in the single assassination of a nobleman in a country whose name the people here did not know. Suddenly like fire upon mountain grass, the single death was spread into multitudes. Europe was divided by war, and Germany, the nation most admired by Japan and where many Japanese had been sent by their Emperor for education in soldiery, Germany was the first to move to battle. By command of their ruler, a proud man with a withered arm, the German army moved swiftly across the nations.

“What is to happen to us?” Induk asked, in fear.

“We are helpless,” Yul-han replied.

“But which side will these who rule us take in this war?”

“They will take what profits them best,” Yul-han replied.

He longed to stay and comfort her, but the day’s work waited and he went to it as he did on all days. Yet in his classes he could scarcely compel the usual tasks. His pupils were restless, afraid, excited, guessing and wondering how the new war would change their lives and hopeful that in the turmoil their country could find its independence again.

“Have no hope,” Yul-han told them.

“How can a Christian say we are to have no hope?” a young man demanded.

Yul-han could not answer. He felt himself rebuked. “Attend to your books,” he said sternly.

But the young could not attend to their books. They were distracted and rebellious and they broke rules and reproached their teachers. When Japan declared herself against Germany many were surprised, but Yul-han understood what the declaration meant. Korea was only the stepping-stone toward all Asia for that small strong island nation. Germany had taken territories from China, and Japan would claim them as booty of war.