Buddha's Money (3 page)

"For Christ's sake, Herman," Ernie said. "What the hell are
you
doing here?"

Herman's moist eyes scanned our faces. His face was splotched, with large, blubbery lips and a pug nose. The broad brown belt and the creased slacks and the pullover golf shirt he wore were strictly PX. No Paris fashions for Herman the German.

Out front, the cops kept pushing back at the mob.

Crimson rivulets streamed down Herman's ears. He rolled glistening blue eyes up at me and started to open his mouth, but instead of speaking he just gurgled and sputtered bubbles across wet lips.

Ernie realized first that something was wrong. He reached for Herman. Before I could move, Herman crashed to the floor in front of us. He lay there, moaning and gripping the mountainous bulge of his stomach. That's when I noticed that the entire side of his skull was puffed into a nasty bruise.

I knelt down, rolled him over, and lifted his head up. Ernie squatted and slapped his loose jowls.

"Evening, Herman," Ernie said. "Nasty bump. You have to stop walking into walls."

"It wasn't a wall," Herman moaned.

"What was it?" I asked.

Herman turned his sad blue eyes toward me. His throat convulsed and air rushed out in a croak.
"Doduk-nom,"
he said.

Herman had lived in Korea so long that certain words— the important ones—he remembered only in Korean, the English completely forgotten.
Doduk-nom
meant thieves.

"Where, Herman?" I asked.

"At my hooch."

I started to rise. Herman clutched my forearm with an ironlike grip. "Wait. I'll go with you. Help me up."

Ernie and I hoisted him to his feet. When he finally reached the standing position, Herman tottered like a round-bottomed clown. Ernie towered over him. So did I, being a couple of inches taller than Ernie.

"I don't know," Ernie said, gauging Herman's steadiness. "A simple burglary. The Korean National Police can handle it. What'd the thieves take? All your black market shit?"

"No." Herman was still woozy. Even when he was clearheaded, Herman the German wasn't the most articulate guy in town.

"No?" Ernie asked.

"No. They weren't those kind of thieves."

Ernie's face darkened like the monsoon sky. He was suspicious now. Smelling a rat in the rice wine jar. "If they don't want stereo equipment and liquor and cigarettes, then what the hell kind of thieves are they?"

"The kind who want people."

"People?"

I thought of Herman's wife. Slicky Girl Nam was one of the oldest hags who had ever worked the streets of Itaewon. Nobody wanted her. It was even doubtful that Herman wanted her.

Ernie lost his patience. He shoved Herman's haunch of a shoulder. "What the hell did they steal, Herman?"

Herman stood perfectly still, his thick arms hanging at his sides. Somewhere in the short gap between his chin and his shoulders, he swallowed.

"Mi-ja," he said.

Mi-ja.
A name that in translation is simple and direct: Beautiful Child. The little Korean girl whom Herman's wife had adopted. The girl with the topknot tied by a pink ribbon and the sparkling smile and the bright eyes like black diamonds.

Every day Mi-ja could be seen flitting to and from the Itaewon market. Snatching candy from the business girls, making them laugh. Bantering with the playful GIs. Mi-ja was the mascot of Itaewon. The one fine thing that prompted everyone—no matter how debauched—to remember where they came from. Remember that they were once part of a loving family. Remember that they once had brothers and sisters and wives and parents and children.

Taking in Mi-ja was the only good thing two lowlifes like Herman the German and Slicky Girl Nam had ever done.

No one doubted that Mi-ja was adopted. Slicky Girl Nam had probably had venereal disease so many times that her reproductive tubes were nothing more than a burnt-out memory.

"How old is Mi-ja?" I asked.

"Nine," Herman answered.

Ernie chomped on his gum. "Why would anyone want her?"

Herman wasn't surprised by the question. In Korea, after the devastation of the Korean War, children were an economic burden, not a prize. Especially girls. Not something to be fought over. Even now, more than twenty years later, things hadn't changed much.

Saliva bubbled on Herman's lips. "I don't know," he told Ernie. "But you've got to help me get her back."

"It's a matter for the Korean National Police," Ernie said. "It happened off-post. A Korean was kidnapped so it falls under their jurisdiction. You're here now. Report it." Ernie glanced around at the shoving and hollering and screaming going on outside. "After things calm down a bit."

"I can't," Herman insisted.

"Why not?"

"The guys who took her already told me. They'll kill her ifltelltheKNPs."

Ernie scowled. "Don't worry about threats from a bunch of crooks. Kidnappers always say that kind of shit. Doesn't mean nothing."

"No KNPs," Herman said. His round body was frozen like a rock. "This time they mean it."

"How do you know?"

"Because the kidnappers are not Koreans, they're foreigners. Some sort of brown guys, I don't know which kind. And they're after something. Something valuable."

"What? Your new stereo?"

"No." Herman's big moist eyes searched Ernie's soul. "I've seen you guys let people off after busting them. Maybe they gave you a little money, maybe something else. I don't know. But if you don't help me, I'll turn you in. I'll say I saw you taking bribes."

Ernie leapt forward and shoved Herman's shoulders with all his might. The former First Sergeant barely budged.

"I ought to pop you for that remark." Ernie cocked his fist.

Herman stared at the naked knuckles. "If you don't help me now, they'll kill her. And you know as well as me that the KNPs will only be interested in keeping the ransom for themselves."

Herman was right. Kidnapping, especially of female children, is not seen as being the most serious offense in the country. Tragic but not serious. The KNPs would go through the motions but if they didn't solve the case easily, they'd move on to more pressing matters.

When Herman didn't jump at him, Ernie slowly lowered his fist. He turned to me and grinned.

"I've never heard our man Herman here make such a long speech."

The crowd outside was becoming even more unruly. In the back room, Captain Kim shouted into the telephone.

If it had been Herman who was kidnapped, or Slicky Girl Nam, neither Ernie nor I would have bothered. But Mi-ja was an innocent child. She didn't deserve what had happened to her.

Besides, Ernie and I were constantly on the outs with the Eighth Army honchos—for our unorthodox methods, for busting people regardless of their rank. Any formal accusation made against us—even a false one—would make our working life more uncomfortable than it already was.

"It wouldn't hurt to take a look," I said.

"Yeah," Ernie said. "Why not?"

Herman straightened himself and took a deep breath. He stood shakily on his two broad feet, like a bull in the middle of a ring. He snorted in acknowledgment, turned, and stumbled toward the front door.

I grabbed him by his thick forearm. "Hold it, Herman. Let's wait until these folks outside quit discussing religion."

Herman gazed up at me, confused. It was as if he hadn't even noticed the riot going on outside the Itaewon Police Station.

Sirens sounded in the distance. Plaintive wails that grew steadily louder. Headlights converged on the concrete-block walls of the station. Reinforcements unloaded from jeeps. That must've been what Captain Kim ordered on the phone. More troops.

Suddenly, the commander of the Itaewon Police Station stormed out of his office. He pulled a dented metal helmet down low over his eyes and snapped shut the leather chin strap. He gave the pack of policemen at the door a short pep talk and led them out the door. Responding crisply to his orders, they formed up in ranks and unhooked their riot batons. After Captain Kim shouted the command, the policemen charged into the crowd.

People screamed, cursed, and fell back in panic. Over the sea of heads, I glimpsed nightstick-wielding policemen, whaling away. Swiftly, the crowd started to melt into the night.

The policemen surged forward, chasing the retreating foe.

Herman and Ernie and I walked outside. On the wet pavement lay wounded rioters, some in pools of blood.

Ernie surveyed the damage. "These KNPs sure know how to bust up a party," he said.

A battalion of monsoon clouds drifted low, blotting out the gray pallor of the moon. Rain started to pelt down and we hurried through the narrow lanes, swerving always in the direction of Herman's hooch.

My blue jeans and black nylon jacket were soon soaked and clung to my body like bloody sheets on a corpse.

In the distance, far up amongst the jumbled tile roofs that spread like a maze behind the bar district, we heard a shriek. From a shredded voice.

The forlorn wail of a woman in anguish.

4

RUSTY BARBED WIRE COILED ATOP THE STONE-AND-BRICK WALLS that lined the narrow pathway. Rain pattered on upturned tiles. The sound increased in volume when we passed a roof made of tin.

I breathed deeply of the damp air, occasionally inhaling a hint of garlic from cooking pots bubbling in open kitchens. When we passed a
byonso,
I held my breath, hoping to avoid the aroma of lye-encrusted septic tanks festering in soggy ground.

Wooden gates of various colors and thicknesses were stuck in the center of each wall, most of them locked and barred against interlopers.

I held my hand over my head to keep water from dripping into my eyes, but it wasn't working too well.

Ernie strolled along unconcerned, as if the rain drizzling down his round-lensed glasses and his pointed nose concerned him not in the least. Physical surroundings were something Ernie paid attention to only when they interested him. Usually, they didn't.

By now, the shrieks we'd heard earlier had become moans.

Herman ducked through an open gate. When he did, the shrieking started again. I recognized the distinctive bark: Slicky Girl Nam. Mrs. Herman the German.

An address was embossed on a brass plate embedded in the stone wall: 45
bonji,
36
dong.

A short walkway of flat stone led into a courtyard festooned with scraggly shrubs and an ancient iron-handled pump with a plastic bucket beneath it. On a raised wooden platform, hooches with sliding paper doors faced out at us.

The joint didn't look much different from the whorehouses in the area. In fact, from previous visits I'd determined that a couple of the residents next door were freelance business girls working the local clubs. By Itaewon standards, this was a routine place to raise children.

Holes were punched in the paper in the doors of Herman's hooch. Some of the latticework was splintered. Inside, shards of pottery and smashed glassware and ripped pillows lay strewn across the vinyl-covered floor.

Ernie whistled. "A lot of damage, considering it's not typhoon season."

Elderly Korean women squatted along the edge of the wooden platform, like a patient jury of ghosts. We stepped under the large corrugated fiberglass overhang to get out of the rain.

When she saw Herman, Slicky Girl Nam bounded across the courtyard, long nails bared like a tigress.

"Shangnom-ah! Tangsin weikurei?"
Born of a base lout! What have you done?

She wore a flower-print blue dress that clung to her quivering belly and rode high above plump knees. Her hair was dyed raven black and ratted into a headdress that would've startled a New Guinea headhunted

She swiped at Herman's eyes. He stopped, and without moving his neck, leaned his rotund body backward. The claws sliced by his face within inches. The miss threw Slicky Girl Nam off stride; she reeled forward and rammed her shoulder into Herman's stomach. A "whoof" erupted from his blubbery lips and he stumbled backwards. Ernie and I caught him, but just in time for him to open his eyes and see the wild-eyed Slicky Girl Nam charging at him again.

"Kei-sikkya!"
she shrieked. Issue of a dog!

Ernie jumped between them, grabbed Slicky Girl Nam by the wrists, and tried to hold her. For a moment it was touch and go as to who was going to win the wrestling match. But finally she jerked her hands away, stepped back, and pointed at Herman.

"Shangnom-ah!
You let them take Mi-ja. What's a matter you? You
dingy dingy.
You no have brain?"

Herman kept his bull-to-the-slaughterhouse blue eyes on her, his aggrieved expression staying perfectly in place. Slicky Girl Nam pushed past Ernie, reached, and rapped two knuckles atop Herman's round head.

"No have nothing inside?" she demanded. "Why you no stop them? Why you let them mess whole house, break everything, and then take Mi-ja? You no man? You no have nothing down here?"

She thrust a claw toward Herman's crotch, but he jerked back in time and managed to avoid her wicked nails. Again Slicky Girl Nam rapped Herman on the side of the head.

"Where she go? You tell me,
where she go?"

Herman stared at us, ignoring the steady knocking on his head.

"They took her," he said.

"Who took her?" I asked.

He waved his heavy arm towards the hooches. "The guys who searched the rooms."

"What were they looking for?"

"Antiques."

"Antiques?"

"Yes. A special antique. One they thought I have, but I don't."

Slicky Girl Nam let out a low growl, raised her hand, and stepped closer to Herman.

"You
stupid!
You stay black market. Don't need old, what you call it . . . antique. You make enough money. Why you mess with old Korean things?
Pyongsin-a!"

Herman didn't respond to being called a cripple, any more than he had to any of Slicky Girl Nam's attacks, verbal or physical.

I could only figure it was love.

When Herman the German and Slicky Girl Nam were married, it was the biggest social event of the Itaewon season. They rented the patio on the top of the 7 Club, right in the heart of the strip, and hired a band and a go-go girl and dressed Mi-ja up as a little Korean flower girl. The beer and the chop were free, so they had a pretty good turnout. Ernie and I chipped in and bought the newlyweds a gift, two rolls of quarters for the slot machines at the NCO club on post.

The man who performed the ceremony was the owner of the 7 Club, which was okay because the official wedding between a Korean woman and an American man takes place when you receive a bunch of stamps on a pile of paperwork at Seoul City Hall. Neither Herman nor Slicky Girl Nam was very religious anyway. But superstition, that was different.

They hired a
mudang,
a Korean witch, to chase ghosts away with a torch during the wedding ceremony. Later, the witch performed a few chants until she fell into a trance. After a couple of drinks, the trance must've been working pretty well because the
mudang
grabbed Herman and performed a lewd dance with him in the center of the patio until Slicky Girl Nam got pissed off and punched her in the nose.

All in all, it was a successful party. During the last couple of hours, both Ernie and I went into alcoholic blackout, which is the criteria we use to judge any social event.

Now Ernie strode around the courtyard, surveying the damage that had been done to the hooches. Whoever had decided to search had been thorough about it. Drawers and clothes and kitchen utensils were scattered everywhere.

Slicky Girl Nam glared at Herman, occasionally knocking on his bowling ball skull with her gnarled fists, but she wasn't hysterical anymore.

"Why you no change charcoal?"

"I'm sorry, honey," Herman answered. "I'll take care of that right now."

Herman scurried over to a large metal plate canted into the stone foundation of the hooch. He opened it and, using a nearby pair of metal tongs, reached in and pulled out a glowing cylinder of flaming charcoal. He scooped out the orange-tinted ash beneath it and tossed the refuse into a pile of spent fuel. After reinserting the flaming briquette, and placing a fresh charcoal briquette on top of it, Herman slapped his dusty hands together and closed the lid of the stove.

Koreans call it the
ondol
heating system. Flues carry charcoal gas beneath the hooch, which heats the stones above and the wood-slat floors above that. All in all it's very cozy and Koreans love a hot platform to sleep on, even during the warm monsoon season.

Generally, changing the charcoal is considered to be menial work, and most people with any money hire someone to do it for them. Sticky Girl Nam could've afforded a maid. But, apparently, changing the charcoal was another method she used to humiliate her husband.

Three of the old women put on their slippers and surrounded Slicky Girl Nam, rugging on her arms, cajoling her to sit down. Slicky Girl Nam let her face slump, now playing the role of the bereaved mother. The old women sat her down on the raised varnished floor and cooed over her. One brought her a glass of warm barley tea.

When Herman finished with the charcoal, I stood in front of him.

"Spill it, Herman. What the hell were you into this time?"

"Nothing."

Ernie, hands on his hips, strode behind Herman and booted him in the butt. Herman didn't jump as I'd expected him to but turned slowly, tears building until his eyes looked like boiled eggs.

"What'd you do that for?" he asked.

"For not talking to my partner. For not spilling it all." Ernie jabbed his pointed nose into Herman's round one. "Your little girl has been kidnapped. You came to us for help. If you don't start talking there's no way anybody's going to find her. So talk!"

For a moment I thought Herman might slug Ernie, but instead he rotated his torso back toward me.

"A skull. Carved in jade," he said. "From some old king. That's what she told me it was. Worth a lot of money, too."

"Who's 'she'?" I asked.

"The chick," Herman said. "The tall chick. The one with the big
yubangs."

Yubang.
Breast. Another important word.

Ernie raised one eyebrow. "What's this chick's name?"

"Lady Ahn."

"Lady
Ahn?"

"Yeah. That's what she calls herself."

"And these guys were looking for that antique?"

Herman nodded.

"How do you know?"

"They told me." He held up his arm. Fresh round burns had been seared into the flesh above his elbow. I hadn't noticed them before. "They told me they wanted it."

"What'd you tell them?"

"I told them the truth. I don't have it."

"Who does?"

"Lady Ahn. I'm meeting her tomorrow to set up the transfer. So I can get it back to the States for her."

"Hold baggage?"

Herman nodded.

I saw the connection now. An antique dealer with a particularly precious piece she wants to smuggle out of the country. The Korean Ministry of the Interior won't let dealers take some pieces out, especially the ones classified as national treasures. Maybe this jade skull Lady Ahn had was one of them. And even if she received Korean permission to ship it to the States, once it arrived at a U.S. port of entry, a fat customs duty would be slapped on it. Military hold baggage wasn't checked as closely. In fact, it's hardly checked at all. A cursory sniff for drugs and that's about it. The perfect way to ship a prize antique out of the country.

"And once this skull arrived in the States, Lady Ahn was going to buy it back?" I asked Herman.

He nodded. "With a nice markup."

"So you were getting ready to arrange the transfer," I surmised, "but before you received the piece some guys visited you and did this."

Herman nodded again.

"And when you couldn't produce this jade skull, they took Mi-ja."

Herman let his head droop.

"You ought to get a job, Herman," Ernie said. "Earn an honest living. Then this shit wouldn't happen to you."

Herman raised his head and glanced back and forth between us. "We have to get her back."

"No sweat," Ernie said. "We grab this jade bullshit from this chick with the big
yubangs,
hand it over to these tough boys, and they'll give you Mi-ja back."

"But I don't know where the jade is at."

Ernie shrugged. "So we'll find it."

A bell tinkled outside. I heard a kickstand snap open and click against the pavement. A Korean boy in black shorts and a damp T-shirt pushed through the small door in Herman's gate.

"Chunghua yori chapsuseiyo,"
he said in a singsong voice. Please eat Chinese food.

The boy trotted past us, carrying a large tin box slashed with red ideograms. My regular attendance at Korean language night classes allowed me to read it: The Virtuous Dragon Dumpling House. The boy set the box down on the wooden platform in front of the hooches, slid back the metal sides, and pulled out a large plate of steaming dumplings. As he laid out plastic bottles of soy sauce and vinegar and a few paper-wrapped pairs of wooden chopsticks, Slicky Girl Nam roused herself from her grief.

"Uri an sikkyoso,"
she said. We didn't order this.

"Sonmul,"
the boy said. A gift.
"Ohton chingu sikkyosoyo."
A friend ordered it for you.

Slicky Girl Nam nodded. One of the old women squatted near the plate, grabbed a small table, unfolded the legs, and started to arrange the chopsticks.

The boy splashed past us, ducked through the gate, and hopped on his bike. In a few seconds, I heard the swishing rubber of his tires wheeling away. I turned back to Herman.

"Tell me more about the guys who broke in here," I said.

"They were foreigners."

"Foreigners? Not Korean?"

"Right. But not Americans, either."

Ernie was growing impatient with the slow plodding of Herman's thought processes. "Then what the hell were they?"

Herman shrugged. "I don't know."

"What'd they look like?" I asked.

"Sort of like Koreans, but maybe darker. They all smelled funny, too."

"Like what?"

"Like maybe incense."