Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine. Vol. 50, No. 1 & 2, January/February 2005

“And land in trouble with my superiors for harassing the brave Americans who are here to protect us from communism?” Sergeant Oh laughed again. “You must be out of your mind.”

“Forty percent,” Kimiko said.

In a tin ashtray, Oh stubbed out his cigarette. “The money’s gone. She’ll never get it back. Forget it.”

He barked for a guard, and Kimiko and Miss Kim Ji-na were escorted out of the Itaewon police station.

Out on the street, Kimiko said, “Now do you understand?”

Ji-na bowed her head. “Now I understand, Older Sister. None of them will ever help me. I must help myself.”

The smell of burnt beans filled the cold morning air. Kimiko and Kim Ji-na stood at a public phone just outside the entrance to the Hamilton Hotel Coffee Shop. Using a handful of bronze 10-won coins, Kimiko placed the call. It took her fifteen minutes to reach the 8th Army switchboard, but finally she made it through and was transferred to the orderly room of the Twenty-first Transportation Company (Car).

Greene pulled duty last night, Kimiko was told, at the 8th Army head shed, which was why he hadn’t been in his room last night. He was still unavailable, but the GI on the other end of the line was friendly and promised to give Greene the message. He repeated it back to Kimiko.

“Meet Kim Ji-na tonight in Itaewon at her hooch. She won’t be angry.”

“You got it,” Kimiko said.

She flirted with the GI a few more minutes and then hung up.

“Will he come?” Ji-na asked.

Kimiko shrugged. “Maybe.”

Kimiko did her best to put Kim Ji-na’s troubles out of her mind. That evening she made her usual rounds, hopping from nightclub to nightclub, tossing back shots of bourbon, putting up with insults from GIs and evil stares from younger business girls. It was a normal night. She made a few bucks and tried not to think of who she was or what her future held. The booze helped. At the end of the evening, exhausted, she returned to her hooch.

Alone on her down-filled mat, she tossed and turned, sleeping the troubled sleep of someone who knows she’s doing everything wrong but has never found any other way to survive.

The midnight to four A.M. curfew had just ended. Despite the early hour, Kimiko rose from her sleeping mat and put on the same woolen skirt and knit sweater and cotton scarf she’d worn yesterday. She slipped on sandals over thick socks, left her hooch, and made her way through the dark and empty streets of Itaewon. Hugging herself against the cold, she hurried toward the home of Kim Ji-na.

Last night, early in the evening before she started her rounds, Kimiko hid outside of Ji-na’s hooch. She waited almost an hour, but finally she’d seen the GI known as Corporal Greene enter Ji-na’s home. Bearing gifts. A brown bag overflowing with PX groceries. Kimiko lingered a while, wondering if there would be an argument, waiting for shouting and shrill voices. But all had been quiet. Then the lights were turned off and Kimiko listened for a while longer. When she heard nothing, she left.

Still, she knew what to expect this morning. And that’s why she decided to be here at Kim Ji-na’s hooch early, before anyone else arrived.

The front gate was locked.

Three other families lived in the hooch complex so Kimiko knew she had to be quiet. She checked in either direction to make sure the alleyway was empty. When she was sure that everyone in the neighborhood was still sleeping, she found an empty wooden crate and propped it against the wall. Stepping atop it, she grabbed the top of the brick wall, studded with broken shards of glass, and carefully pulled herself up and over.

The courtyard was deserted. No roosters. No small dogs to bark and announce her arrival. She approached the latticework, oil-papered door that led to Kim Ji-na’s hooch. Carefully, she slid it open.

In the dark, Ji-na sat against the wall. Fully clothed. Staring straight ahead.

Kimiko shoved back the door even wider, allowing moonlight to flood in.

Corporal Greene lay in the center of the hooch, surrounded by a sea of blood. Below him, sopping up the gore, lay scattered shards of nurungji, crusted rice.

Kimiko stared into Ji-na’s eyes for a moment. Vacant. She was still alive, still breathing, still unhurt, but her mind was far away, in a land of lotus blossoms and sweet rice cakes and silk gowns wafting in a spring breeze.

Gingerly, Kimiko entered into the hooch, being careful not to step into puddled blood. Greene’s body didn’t move.

Kimiko crawled toward Kim Ji-na and placed her fingers on the soft flesh of her cheek. Cold. And she didn’t flinch at the touch. Leaning closer to the woman, Kimiko slipped her hand inside Ji-na’s tunic, beneath the waistband of her skirt. There, in her belly, the hard spherical rise that Kimiko knew she’d find. Kimiko withdrew her hand.