The Calligrapher's Daughter (51 page)

“Hello there,” he said with a surprised smile.

I tried again, “Hello,” and pointed to his cross. “I am also Christian!”

“You speak English!”

“A nittle.”

“You’re a Christian?”

“Neh
, yes. I am Methodist.”

“Hey, no kidding! I’m Protestant too. Presbyterian. That’s terrific! I
didn’t know there were any Korean Christians. Where’d you learn English?”

“Missionary teaches, ah, teaching lessons long time past.”

“Well, whaddya know, and you’re the first Korean lady I’ve met. Don’t worry! I’m a happily married man. Ha ha. Hey, excuse my manners. How do you do?” He extinguished his cigarette underfoot and stuck out his hand. “I’m Neil Forbes.” He was tall and skinny, with eyes of an indeterminate hue: gray then blue then brown all at once. His narrow nose cascaded into a slight bump and his transformative smile exposed beautiful teeth that made his face as cute and happy as a squirrel eating acorns.

Attempting to sort through his fast speech, to remember Americanisms I’d learned from the missionaries and my
Guide to English Conversation
, and trying to introduce myself, I bowed and shook his hand awkwardly. “My name is Han Na—, ah, Najin Han.” He wouldn’t understand that Korean women kept their family name, so I said, “I am Najin Cho. Mrs. Calvin Cho. It is a pleasure to meet you.”

“The pleasure’s all mine! Your English is great.”

“No, it is, uh, very young, like baby. My husband, he is same like you. Presbyterian. He is minister. He is living America.” Then it struck me. “I think New York City. Do you know how is New York City?”

“Sure, it’s right across the river. I’m from Fort Lee, New Jersey. You ever heard of Fort Lee?”

I shook my head. “I know Princeton, New Jersey …”

“Of course you wouldn’t know Fort Lee or the Hudson, but Princeton? Ya don’t say! Your husband’s in New York? It’s a small world! He went to Princeton? Must be a smart fella. What’s he doing there? I didn’t know there were any Koreans stateside.”

“Can you talk softer, uh, slower, please?”

“I’m sorry, Mrs. Cho. Right? Mrs. Najin Cho. Sure thing.” He retrieved his shirt from where it hung over a rail and put his long arms through the sleeves, waving me closer to the stone archway and ignoring the odd whistles his fellow soldiers delivered from their posts. “Come on over to the shade. It’s awful hot out.”

I spent twenty minutes by the roadside with Private Neil Forbes, who was greatly impressed that my husband was a Korean pastor, and more, that I hadn’t seen him for eleven years after just one day of marriage. I
complimented the beauty of his wife in the photo he pulled from his wallet and sympathized with missing his newborn daughter—a pale blob of blankets in the picture—he’d left ten months ago. He suggested I write to my husband in care of the New York Presbytery and promised he’d post it through the military mail. He said he was completely charmed to have made my acquaintance, wondered if I’d coach him a tiny bit in the Korean language, and said I should bring the letter tomorrow at the same hour and place. We agreed that our meeting was a blessing, and when we parted, I said, “I shall be delighted to see you tomorrow.”

He shook my hand energetically, saying, “Me too!” I was glad my English was understandable even if it was apparently funny enough to make him laugh so heartily.

That evening, after a plain supper of fishbone soup and millet, I told my family about Pfc. Forbes and the possibility of writing to Calvin. Necessity had erased the habit of separate living quarters, especially on the coldest nights in winter when there was only enough fuel for a single brazier. To preserve fuel, we had also used the braziers to cook in the sitting room. Venting the awful fumes sometimes made it as cold as if there were no embers, but then the wind would die and warmth would glow on our faces. On warm summer and fall days such as this, we reclaimed the kitchen and gathered as usual in the sitting room for meals, all of us by now completely accustomed to eating together. Grandfather sat with Sunok happily ensconced on his lap, her favorite place of late, and his favorite place for her as well. The child had done more for my father’s health than any combination of herbs. Next to Grandfather sat Ilsun, with Meeja a little behind him, and on the other side I sat with Grandmother. We three women picked the few flakes of fish from our bowls and popped them in Sunok’s mouth.

I asked Dongsaeng if he could spare two sheets of paper for me to write a letter and craft an envelope.

He shook his head. “I’ve nothing left.”

“In my study,” said Grandfather, “there’s a history book on the middle shelf. Its end papers would do.”

I looked at him appreciatively. These five years in Seoul, either something in my viewpoint or something in his had changed. I worried at first that he’d given up completely, that time had defeated his personal battle
for the righteous old way. But when I learned that the cause of his refusal to leave the house was to avoid speaking Japanese, I felt reassured. I also guessed that some of his reticence to go out resulted from the catcalls and stares directed at him as he walked the streets wearing yangban hanbok, as threadbare as mine but always clean and pressed.

After my father had turned sixty, without fanfare much to everyone’s regret, I’d noted his steady withdrawal into woodcarving until his tools were sold or “donated” to the cause. I had also assumed that his retirement age and status as grandfather were the roots of his inner calm and steady good health, rather than a submission to Japanese rule. Or perhaps scarcity in material life had accented for us both the richness we shared in family. I also attributed it to Sunok’s blissful presence among us, and how a simple origami frog or a crumpled ball of paper tied to a string could give her joy. This was the cause of Ilsun’s lack of available paper for letter writing and therefore Grandfather’s willingness to deface a precious book of history.

I saved a few grains of millet to use as paste, and after the sun had set and the house was quiet, I composed my letter, writing tightly with a narrow brush, filling every centimeter of the thin paper.

THE DAMP AUTUMN WIND PREDICTED RAIN. IT SEEPED STIFFNESS INTO my hips and knees, hinting at loss of youth and making me worry about my mother’s painful joints. I wrapped an old blanket around my shoulders and slid my feet into Dongsaeng’s torn and battered leather shoes, glad that he sported a decent pair, courtesy of G.I. Forbes, who had visited us several times since that day by the roadside. Everyone in my family adored him, and not just because of his generosity; he was comical and made us all laugh with his antics trying to communicate with horrible Korean, gangly gestures and animated features.

Dongsaeng had gone downtown to meet someone about designing
a logo. He’d gained notoriety when he redesigned into Hangeul the masthead of
Dongah Ilbo
, and was featured in its first Korean-language issue: “Seoul Artist Restores Traditional Korean Calligraphy.” Soon, he was called upon by editors feeding the explosion of new newspapers and magazines in the city, people who fervently expressed their politics and opinions in a wondrously free and open press. Dongsaeng’s earnings went first to rice, then art supplies and a little treat for Sunok, and with outrageously inflated prices, the money evaporated like hot breath on a cold day. Luckily, our diet was supplemented by the generosity of Pfc. Forbes, who brought gifts of military kit rations.

I went to reap the last vegetables from the garden, an empty crock in hand, fretting over the impossibility of repaying Neil Forbes’s kindness. A vehicle passed the house and honked. I thought it odd that a car would drive through this remote neighborhood, but my main concern was if the cabbages had yielded a few more leaves. I slid the door open, the broken soles of Dongsaeng’s ruined shoes flapping on the threshold.

A man said, “Yuhbo.”

The sound of his voice alone made me scream. My hands flew to my face and the crock smashed on the step. It was an apparition, I was sure, grown out of hunger from the depths of my memory. He touched my elbow. I turned and met eyes as serious and calming as I remembered. But how strange! Here was the face of a ghost, a thought, a glimpse in a mirror, and yet here he was—my husband, real, smiling, crying like a child, and handsomely dressed in an olive drab military coat and hat.

“How—?”

He clasped my hands and said, so softly I wasn’t sure if I heard correctly, “Forgive me. Never again. Never.”

Dongsaeng ran from the Jeep parked on the road. “Look who I found! Harabeoji! Halmeonim! Yuhbo! Make coffee! Hyung-nim, Brother-in-law, come in. Nuna, don’t just stand there. Make him welcome!”

I was aware of my faded dress, the tattered shoes, gnarls on my palms and deepened lines on my face. The broken bowl forgotten, I drew him indoors, my heart beating as if for the first time.

Calvin greeted my parents with a bow to the floor. “My deepest
respects,
Jangin-eurun, Jangmo-nim
, Father- and Mother-in-law. Profound regret for the hardships you have suffered.”

“Yes, yes. Look at the prodigal son, come back as an American soldier!” Grandfather reached for Calvin’s hand and held it a moment in both of his. “Come in, come in. Daughters, something to eat and drink!”

“I found him at the Bando Hotel! Can you imagine?” Dongsaeng crowed. “We came right home.” Amid the confusion of introductions to Meeja and baby Sunok, the surprise of his monochromatic army uniform beneath his coat and the repeated cries of wonder, I dashed to the kitchen, patted down my sleeves and skirt and hastily wiped water on my face and hair. I slapped my cheeks, as much to ensure I wasn’t asleep as to put color in them. In the sitting room, as I served drinking water and a tin of cookies—another gift from Pfc. Forbes—I saw that Calvin kept his eyes on my every move, and I felt him smile when I smiled as Grandfather took three cookies for Sunok in his lap.

“I’m sorry that I come unprepared,” said Calvin. “My hands are empty today, but my heart is full.”

If I hadn’t been completely stunned by his presence, I might have been embarrassed by the tears that wet my husband’s cheeks once more. When I sat across from him, Grandmother nudged me to sit next to him. Preferring to see his features, to watch him sitting in this room talking, drinking, breathing, I didn’t move. Grandfather asked him to pray.

“Father in Heaven,” said Calvin. “We give thanks for this joyful reunion and are humbled to witness thy mystery and grace, which has gathered us here together in the most extreme coincidence. We pray in thanksgiving for this reunion …” He paused a moment to collect himself, and I peeked at his face. His cheeks seemed rounder, his jaw softer, his mouth fuller. His eyebrows were a little wild, but his skin shone with the same polished gleam that I remembered from when I first saw his photograph. He prayed, his voice sounding deep and as solemn as what I’d heard in my head when I read his letters years ago. A thousand questions flooded my mind, and I wished he’d finish praying so I could learn how he’d found us, how he managed to get here, was he a minister now, did he really know how to drive a Jeep, and what was the meaning of those
colorful patches and bright insignia on his clothing? I closed my eyes, nearly laughing out loud at the sheer joy and shock of him, and at my mounting impatience for him to quit praying so we could talk!

He mentioned Unsook and the Gaeseong house, and I was glad that Dongsaeng had briefed him on all our major life events, which allowed me to sidestep speaking to him about hardship. I kept sneaking looks as he prayed with his head bowed, hair parted as before, still thick on top and cut short around the ears and neck, his eyes shut, frowning, tears coming now and then. Finally, I sensed he was winding down, and I closed my eyes as he prayed for our liberated country. “That its leaders find the strength, compassion and wisdom they need to undertake the tasks of rebuilding and uniting us as a democratic, self-determined free nation. We ask this in the name of thy son, Jesus Christ, who taught us to pray, saying …”