Buddha's Money (31 page)

"Yeah."

"And the others?"

"Scattered."

"We have to get out of here."

Ernie looked at me as if I were mad. "What about the nun?"

I stopped. "Shit! I completely forgot."

"Come on," Ernie said. "There's still time to save her."

I started to move after him but Lady Ahn held me. "You go. I will stay here."

We were pretty far from the riot police. She'd be fairly safe. "Okay," I told her. "But keep moving toward that line of buildings. Get out of this area."

"Yes," she said. "I can do that."

My fingers lingered on her cheek. Then I ran after Ernie. She worried me. I knew she'd been hurt, and hurt badly, by Ragyapa and his boys. But she was still beautiful. And as soon as she'd gained her freedom, she'd regained that spark of dignity that she always carried with her.

People weren't even paying attention now to the fact that we were Americans. With the riot police on the rampage, everyone was too worried about his own safety to worry about us. The students were tough, well organized, and fighting back valiantly.

It took us two or three minutes to make our way past the ranks of the riot police to the area occupied by the Buddhists.

They still knelt on the blacktop. A sea of tranquility in the violent chaos that raged around them. The little nun sat on a dais garlanded with flowers. A monk stepped forward, holding a can, and gingerly splashed gasoline over her bald skull. The little nun sat utterly still as the fluid soaked her robes.

Pungent fumes billowed in the air as I bounded forward.

"Eighth Army has released your attacker to the Korean police!" I called out in Korean.

The nun opened her eyes. She looked at me, puzzled at first, but then broke into a broad smile when she spotted Ernie. He stepped forward, reached in his pocket, and handed her a stick of ginseng gum. Without thinking, she took it in her small hand.

A disapproving murmur rumbled through the crowd of kneeling monks. The large, officious monk pushed in front of us.

"Miguk salam yogi ei andei!"
he scolded. Americans aren't permitted here.

I bowed and spoke to him calmly in Korean. "Forgive me for intruding, sir. We are representatives from Eighth Army. Our Commander has recently seen the wisdom of your demands. The man who so cruelly attacked this nun has just now been turned over to the Korean National Police for prosecution and punishment."

Prosecution and punishment. I was proud of the vocabulary. Earlier today, I'd found both words in the same chapter of my Korean textbook. In Korean, the words are never split up.

The monk studied me. "It is too late. We do not have confirmation of this." He swiveled his head and spoke to the monk with the gas can. "Proceed."

When the monk raised the can, Ernie hopped forward, grabbed the can, and shoved the man back.

"Not on my watch you're not," he yelled.

As if they were one body, the kneeling monks rose to their feet and began waving their fists and hollering. I leaned into Choi So-lan's face, wiping gasoline out of her eyes.

"You don't have to die! The American who attacked you has been turned over to the Korean police. The man who paid him will be in our custody any minute. You are young. You must live. Buddha would want you to live."

She bowed her head and began to sob.

The head monk was sputtering now, waving his hands, yelling at his men to grab us. A few of the bolder monks pushed forward.

Ernie didn't need to understand any of the language to figure out what was happening. He poured gasoline onto the ground, and tossed the half-empty can at the approaching monks. Then he grabbed the litde nun and jerked her to her feet.

"Come on, goddamn it! Run!"

And to my surprise, she did. Running along beside Ernie, sprinting away from the Buddhists, heading toward the maddening riot of the student demonstrators.

I trotted behind them, covering their retreat. One of the monks grabbed me, but I swiveled and kneed him in the stomach. A rush of air exploded from his mouth and he keeled over.

The other monks kept coming. I pulled out my .38 and waved it in front of them.

"Ha-jima!"
I said. Don't!

The monks stopped in their tracks. I turned and raced off into the melee, following Ernie and the nun.

Around the perimeter, the advance of the riot police had stopped. More students streamed into the intersection in front of Guanghua-mun. The student leadership had probably held them in reserve. Their tactic worked. The tired police were being pushed back on all fronts. Some were down, others ran screaming, the flaming oil of the Molotov cocktails engulfing their heavily padded uniforms.

We searched for what seemed forever, making our way toward the careening jeep in the distance.

I ran next to Ernie. "Herman hasn't caught Ragyapa yet."

"Doesn't look like it."

Even above the noise of the screams surrounding us, we heard a thump. The roof of the jeep shuddered to a stop.

"Maybe he's found him now."

We shoved our way through the thickening, screaming crowd. The riot police behind us were in a panic, breaking ranks. Big armored vehicles, water hoses spraying, inched backward.

By the time we reached the jeep it was engulfed in a sea of people who were rocking it rhythmically back and forth. The nun shouted at one of the bystanders.

"What happened?"

"Some dog-faced American hit one of our demonstrators. A woman."

"Is she hurt badly?"

"They've taken her to a hospital."

People were ripping the canvas off the top of the jeep. Herman was inside, handcuffed to the roll bar, like a fleshy morsel inside a clam. He was screaming.

Ernie pulled out his .45. "They're messing with our prisoner."

I grabbed him. "Damn, Ernie. You're going to get us killed."

He swiveled on me. "They're going to kill
himl"

I had no answer for that.

Choi So-lan shoved between us. "I will talk to them."

Before we could stop her, she plowed forward into the mob, head down, and burrowed her way to the front of the jeep. Holding her gasoline-soaked robes, she clambered up on what was left of the hood and waved her slender arms over her head.

"Listen to me, good people!" she called. The crowd continued to roar.
"Listen
to me!"

Gradually, a few heads turned. People elbowed one another, pointed.

"You all know who I am. I am Choi So-lan!"

A murmur went through the crowd, the name repeated from person to person. As the student demonstrators recognized her they stopped rocking the jeep.

"I am the woman who would be sacrificed today!"

The roar started to subside, the calls for vengeance against the foreign lout died down. Not everyone was paying attention, however. One man called for death to the big noses. Others shouted their approval. But people started to shush them, many wanted to hear what the famous nun had to say. The jeep's rusty springs gave out a final squeak. At last, the crowd quieted.

"The Americans have turned over my attacker to the authorities!"

A cheer went up from the demonstrators.

The nun pointed at the huddled mass of flesh in the jeep. "This born-of-a-dog foreigner must be punished." Another cheer went up. She raised her voice as high as it would go. "But not like this! He must be put in jail and tried for his crimes. Let not the foreigners say that we Koreans are barbaric. Let them not say that we tore a man to pieces without a trial!"

She pointed to the young men nearest the jeep. "You there, stand back! Allow the proper authorities to take this man into custody."

I grabbed the handcuff keys from Ernie and darted for- ward through the crowd. Leaning my body across the jeep, I unlocked Herman's cuffs, keeping my head down, hoping that at least some of the people in the back of the crowd wouldn't realize that I was an American.

"Keep your face down," I whispered to Herman, "and follow me. Don't say anything."

"I didn't mean to hit that girl—"

"Don't say anything, goddamn it, Herman. If they hear English it will just remind them that we're foreigners."

I jerked him out of the seat, threw my arm protectively around his shoulders, and, both of us bending low at the waist, we crouched our way through the crowd.

At just that moment a group of students managed to overcome the crew of one of the armored vehicles. Standing atop it, hollering, they turned the vehicle toward the line of riot police and started spraying them with water from their own hose.

A cheer roared from the crowd. A knot of students hoisted the little nun on their shoulders and swept her toward the site of this momentous victory.

Ernie joined Herman and me as we hurried through the crowd. "These kids think they're tough shit, but they're going to get their butts kicked," Ernie said. "They're just pissing off the man."

"Yeah," Herman said. "They ought to calm down."

Ernie slapped the side of Herman's head. "What about you, moron! Driving that jeep while it was still chained."

"I had to catch Ragyapa."

"But you didn't. Did you?"

"I came close. I clipped him a couple of times. And after I hit that girl he ran over here. Toward that
yoguan."

It was the same
yoguan
where the M-l shooter had hidden and fired on me. While Ernie and Herman were arguing, I'd been scanning the crowd, searching for some sign of Ragyapa. Some sign of Lady Ahn.

It was Ernie who spotted them first. "Over there. Up the alley."

They were under a lamppost. Lady Ahn on Ragyapa's back, clawing him like an enraged lioness.

"She's kicking his butt." Ernie's voice was filled with admiration.

"She ought to," Herman said. "By the time I got through with him, he could barely walk."

I sprinted forward, but my progress was excruciatingly slow. I had to push through tightly packed clumps of shoving students. I felt as if I were running through glue.

Another figure appeared in the light of the lamppost. A man. Holding a rifle.

"I thought you took care of him!" I shouted.

"Shot him in the arm," Ernie replied. "I didn't want to execute him."

"What about the damn rifle?"

"I took the magazine out."

But Lady Ahn didn't know that. The wounded Mongolian thug pointed the muzzle of the M-l rifle into Lady Ahn's face. She stopped clawing and backed off, gasping for breath. Ragyapa hoisted himself to his feet. He started hobbling up the alley, clutching the jade skull. His hired gun covered his retreat.

"They're getting away," Ernie said. "With the jade skull."

"Let 'em go," I said. "Who gives a shit about it?"

Lady Ahn stood motionless, breathing heavily. Then she stepped up the hill into the darkness, after Ragyapa and the man with the M-l rifle. After the skull.

"She's got balls," Herman said.

We finally shoved our way past the last of the demonstrators. The riot police were in total flight now. Their ranks had been broken. Many of them lay wounded and bleeding on the ground, their helmets and shields and batons scattered everywhere.

I felt sorry for them. Sure, they were the symbols of oppression. But in reality they were just a bunch of farmers, beaten up by a bunch of rich students. No one in the government, until now, realized how much rage the assault on the Buddhist nun had released. And no one had been able to predict that the riot police would be outnumbered ten to one.

Ernie once again pulled out his .45. "So we go after her?"

"Of course, we go after her. They'll kill her this time."

"Why the hell is she so crazy about the damn skull? The money?"

"It's more than that to her," I said. "It's the restoration of her family's honor. The restoration of her dignity."

"And she's willing to get
killed
for shit like that?"

Herman nodded vigorously. "Sure she is."

Without hesitation, Ernie slapped him once again on his round skull. "What the hell do
you
know about it, shit-for-brains?"

"Hey, I know a lot about that stuff."

"You guys argue on your own time," I said. We had reached the mouth of the alley. "Ernie, you take the left. I'll take the right." We didn't have any handcuffs—I'd dropped them at the jeep—so all I could count on was Herman's sense of honor as a soldier to stay with us while we were engaged in combat with the enemy.

"Herman," I said, "you protect our rear."

He nodded.

Ernie pointed his forefinger at him. "And remember, you're still our prisoner."

"Don't sweat it," Herman said.

We stepped into the darkness.

36

THE ALLEY WAS COOL AND DAMP AND THE WALLS LOOMED over us like moss-bearded gods. Murky water trickled through an open gutter, stinking of decayed flesh.

Covering one another, Ernie and I rounded one corner and then the next. The sun had almost lowered and dark clouds shrouded the rising monsoon moon.

When we rounded the third corner, we saw them. Ragyapa, Lady Ahn, and the thug with the M-l rifle. The thug aimed the rifle at Lady Ann's temple, cursing softly, his finger on the trigger. Ragyapa slumped on the cobbled lane, moaning, rubbing his lower leg, the jade skull plopped in a puddle in front of him.

Ernie whispered. "She doesn't know it's not loaded."

There was something I remembered vaguely from basic training, about the M-l rifle. Before I could voice my reservations, Ernie was on his feet, brandishing his .45.

"Freeze, assholes! And drop that rifle right now!"

The rifleman whirled. The shot sizzled through the air and exploded in a cloud of dust in the stone wall two inches from Ernie's left ear.

That's what I had been trying to remember. Even though you pull the magazine out, if the bolt is forward, there will still be one round in the chamber. Ernie hadn't remembered. Some combat veteran. But at least the guy had missed. Otherwise, Ernie would be an ex-combat veteran.

No more bullets now. I leapt out of the shadows and charged.

The thug trained his rifle on me, pulled the trigger, but didn't have time to hear the metallic click. I barreled into him going about thirty miles an hour. He collapsed backward and I didn't give him a chance. I landed full force on top of him, my knee jamming into his solar plexus. Air exploded from his puffed cheeks, and I pummeled his face and kept pummeling until he went limp under me.

Then I turned on Ragyapa and kicked him in the leg. He howled. I kicked him again, then started punching, not caring anymore whether any of the monsters lived or died.

Ernie pulled me off of him. "Easy, pal. Easy."

Lady Ahn pressed against the wall, silent and wide-eyed. In the few seconds that the altercation lasted she had managed to grab the jade skull. Now she clutched it like an infant against her bosom.

For some reason the sight of her cradling that skull made me angry. Even now, I'm not sure why.

"Is that all you care about?" I yelled. "That goddamn skull?"

Her eyes widened even more, reflecting moonlight across the smooth flesh of her face. And then I realized that she was looking over my shoulder and I turned. So did Ernie.

Up the alley was a line of dark humps. Without any sound or hint of verbal signal, the humps rose, moved forward a few feet, and froze again. I wasn't sure if I'd imagined the movement. I turned and gazed at Ernie. He was just as confused as I was.

He motioned with his hand for me to wait, and trotted forward to the pedestrian lane that intersected the alley. Seconds later he returned.

"Troops." He whispered in my ear. "Combat soldiers. Not riot police. They're strung out all across the rise."

For the first time, it dawned on me what was happening. "They're moving down toward the demonstrators."

"You got that right," Ernie said. "And as quietly as death itself."

"We've got to get out of here."

"You fucking-A Tweety."

I glanced at Ragyapa and his thug. Both were hurt badly. When this riot was over, the Korean police would pick them up and probably deport them for being involved in the demonstration. I didn't want that to happen. Not until we could have them properly charged.

I searched their bodies hurriedly and found two passports. Both from Hong Kong, but both men had what seemed to be Mongolian names. I tucked the passports in my back pocket. Once I turned them over to the KNP Liaison, along with my report of their crimes, Ragyapa and his man would be locked up—and deported only if they were very lucky.

"Let's move," I told Ernie.

Lady Ahn had been listening to us. "Where?" she asked. "If we go downhill, we'll be with the demonstrators. It will be madness once the soldiers attack. Even being American won't save you."

"She's right," Ernie said. "We have to go uphill and slip past them somehow."

"All right," I said. "Let's do it."

"Where's Herman?" Ernie asked.

"Don't know," I said. "No time now."

Somehow Lady Ahn kept up with us, clutching the jade skull like life itself. When we reached a small pathway, Ernie checked both ways. The dark humps were still up ahead of us about twenty yards. We turned down the pathway, scurrying forward, looking for a place to hide. But there was nothing. Nothing but jagged stone walls and thick wooden gates shoved flush up against them. In the distance I heard movement. Gravel crunching. A long line of sound moving steadily toward us like a slowly cresting wave.

"They're coming down," Ernie said. "Hit it!"

He flattened himself facedown in the gutter against the wall. Lady Ahn and I crouched as best we could behind a wooden crate stuffed with rotting melon rinds. The biting aroma made me think of wine, somehow. Or champagne.

I had it all: a beautiful woman, moonlight, naturally fermented vino.

Soldiers in combat gear, holding bayoneted assault rifles at port arms, filed down toward the big intersection in front of Guanghua-mun. A few broke off from the main line and trotted down our alley.

There was nowhere to go. Nowhere to hide. I wrapped Lady Ahn's face under my arms and bent over her, pressing my lips into the nape of her neck.

The soldiers weren't fooled. I heard the footsteps stop right in front of us. Slowly, I looked up.

His face was a mosaic of rock-hard planes of stone, slashed with camouflage paint. A metal combat helmet shadowed narrow eyes. His body was lean and he wore combat gear that sat on him as comfortably as if he'd worn it all his life. Moonlight glistened off a patch on his left shoulder. A white stallion rising on a blue background. The ROK Army White Horse Division.

Judging from the number of soldiers I saw stretching down the long pathway, they must've pulled a battalion strength—maybe a brigade—off the Demilitarized Zone just to teach these demonstrators a lesson.

The soldier didn't smile. He had only two stripes on his sleeve. A sergeant joined him. Soon an officer was sent for. A captain, upset by the intrusion.

I showed him my identification and started to speak in Korean.

"We are investigators for Eighth Army and—"

The captain slapped the badge out of my hand.
"Sikkuro!"
Shut up!

Ernie stepped forward. "Who the hell do you think you are, Charley?"

A soldier jabbed a bayonet into Ernie's stomach, stopping just before breaking the skin, and backed him up against the wall. Ernie held his hands up and stared cross-eyed at the gleaming blade. Another soldier searched Ernie and took away his .45, holding it in the air, showing it to the officer. They found my .38 and the officer took that, too.

The officer barked a command. "You two stay here. And guard them."

Before I could speak again, the captain swiveled and stomped away to rejoin his troops. Soon, their footsteps faded and we stood alone with the two impassive soldiers.

In Korean, one of them started to speak to Lady Ahn.

"Is it true their dicks are as big as trees?"

She kept her head down. Not answering. The soldier kicked her lightly with his combat boot. "Come on. Stand up. We want to see what a foreign whore looks like."

Both soldiers laughed. Ernie bristled. The soldier pressed the bayonet deeper against his skin.

"Come on. I said stand up!" He pulled Lady Ahn to her feet. She pulled her shoulder away and stared at him, her face a mask of hatred.

"Aiyaa,"
the soldier said. "Prime meat. And you sell yourself for the Yankee dollar?"

I launched myself at him but he had been expecting the move and sidestepped me, ramming the butt of his rifle into my stomach.

Even as I curled over, I was angry at myself for reacting with pure emotion. For lunging at him, for leaving my midsection open. It was the move of an amateur. Now I was useless. I clutched myself and rolled up in a ball on the ground.

The soldier shoved Lady Ahn up against the wall, ripped open her blouse, and fumbled for her breasts.

"I found it!" he said. He pinched Lady Ahn's nipple cruelly, causing her to cry out in pain. "Large and brown from these foreigners sucking on it. It would make a good souvenir of our trip to Seoul, would it not?"

The other soldier laughed and barked his approval.

"Then let us take it with us." He lowered his bayonet and ran the sharp edge along Lady Ahn's pale flesh.

Once troops are turned loose on demonstrators there are no controls. They can do anything. Foreign reporters will know nothing about it. The whole thing will be hushed up by the government. But the students will know what happened. And demonstrations will subside for months—maybe years—afterward.

I tried to stand. Pain shot through my body. As if a two-by-four was sticking into my gut.

Ernie struggled but settled down when the other soldier nudged the bayonet deeper into his belly.

Lady Ahn seemed unafraid. With a sudden move, she twisted her body and raised her hands to scratch at the soldier. He was too fast for her. He shoved a powerful forearm under her throat. Slowly, he brought the tip of the bayonet closer to her bruised brown nipple.

It was as if a cannonball dropped from the sky. I couldn't see anything clearly but somehow I knew, just from the large round shape. Herman the German had leapt off the top of the wall.

The soldier who had been groping Lady Ahn was now nothing but a crumpled, groaning mass beneath Herman's girth. The soldier with the bayonet in Ernie's gut turned at the noise, and Ernie reacted like a pissed-off tomcat. He punched and clawed at the guy, not giving him a chance to jab with his weapon. Lady Ahn pounded on him, too, and soon they had the soldier on the ground, hammering his skull into sawdust.

I crawled over and grabbed Ernie's feet. And Lady Ahn's. "Enough. Enough!"

They stopped pummeling the soldier.

Herman helped me to my feet. The pain was ebbing now. I was starting to breathe normally.

Lady Ahn covered herself as best she could with her tattered blouse. The jade skull was snuggled once again beneath her bosom.

"Let's get the fuck out of here," Herman said.

Herman bent over and snatched up one of the M-16 rifles. As we approached the next alley, I heard a rumbling sound.

"Armored vehicles," Ernie said. "We have to cross the next alley in front of them or the convoy will block our path."

We started to sprint, Herman huffing like a freight train. Before we reached the alley, the black front of the armored vehicle appeared. We were only a few feet away, but we weren't going to make it. Trash lay strewn around the pathway and Lady Ahn stumbled on something, I think the wreckage of a wooden crate. She tripped and sprawled forward, letting go of the jade, and crashed face-first into the mud.

The armored vehicle rolled slowly downhill.

Lady Ahn bounced back up almost immediately, gazing forward, screaming.

The jade skull skittered across the slick pathway like a soccer ball heading for the goal. It rolled in front of the armored vehicle, bounced, hit the metal floorboard, rolled again, and stopped just beneath the clattering treads.

In seconds it would be crushed.

Lady Ahn wailed and charged forward. I tried to stop her, but the smooth flesh of her forearm slipped out of my grip. When she reached the front of the armored vehicle, she dived, scrabbling forward, almost there.

We heard a crunching sound and saw what seemed to be a puff of green dust. And then a scream.

Lightning flashed. Thunder. And then a wall of rain hammered down.

My eyes were momentarily blinded by the lightning but then I focused. The long row of treads ground heavily across Lady Ahn's leg.

Only when the vehicle passed could we pull Lady Ahn out of the path of the next armored vehicle rattling down the lane.

A tiny sea of green gravel swirled in the running rainwater. It began to trickle like the tail of a comet into the dark gutter. I reached forward and grabbed a handful. The remains of the jade skull of Kublai Khan sifted through my fingers like the dust of a giant emerald.

The armored vehicle stopped. The hatch opened. Soldiers started to climb out.

"Pick her up! Carry her!" Herman shouted. "I'll cover you!"

Herman waved the M-16 he'd taken from the soldier he'd squashed.

Ernie and I did as we were told. We started trundling Lady Ahn away from the armored vehicle. Herman let go a burst of fire. The soldiers hopped back into the armored vehicle and slammed the lid shut.

At the top of the hill, I looked back down at the intersection in front of Guanghua-mun. Even up here we could hear the gunfire and the screams. The students were surrounded. The soldiers of the White Horse Division were cutting through them like hot bayonets through lard.

"I told you the government would get pissed off," Herman said.

Ernie slapped his head. "Shut the fuck up, will you?"