Chapter 5  The Reunion

1902

The French Bakery was the latest rage in town - well, if truth be told, in a part of town hitherto unfrequented by the wealthy and the genteel of Joseon.

It stood at the corner of what the local townsfolk called a "rough" area, where fights broke out frequently, where a band of men clad in black samurai robes, and wielding huge swords, ruled.

But then, one day, for some unfathomable reason, the French Bakery decided to set up its shop there, occupying the first lot at the corner.

Word soon spread of the wonderful new foreign shop.

The affluent quashed their misgivings, and gave in to curiosity, and came to see for themselves, riding in their fine carriages, and dressed in their fine clothes, whether the glowing accounts of the new shop recounted to them by their servants, were justified. The first few brave ones came, and they went back to their part of town, bearing sweets and delicacies, the likes of which had never been seen before, nor tasted, in Joseon.

And that was how the French Bakery became a staplehold in the lives of the Joseon upper class.

Every morning, the new shop opened for business, and the fragrant smell of freshly-baked delights, made with the finest of ingredients - one could tell just by sniffing that delicate, wonderful smell - wafted onto the streets, and into the nostrils of the passers-by. Baskets of freshly-baked breads, buns, pastries, colourful round sandwich biscuits in pink and blue, with thick wedges of cream wedged in between, the mountains of candy in pink and white stripes, of all imaginable shapes and sizes, piled up high on rack upon rack, lined with crisp white sheets of paper, stacked neatly in their baskets, were truly a wondrous sight to behold.

Joseon had never seen anything quite like it.

And so the affluent flocked to it, while the less fortunate sighed, swallowed hard, and looked on with curiosity, and envy, at the long rows of delights, alien to their eyes, the latest sign yet, of the existence of an other world beyond the shores of Joseon, a strange land, remote, unreal, far away, where people with light hair and white skins, wore strange, new, tight-fitting clothes, and spoke a strange language.

They registered, vaguely, the existence of this new world beyond their shores, and shrugged, uncaring; for they had more weighty issues on their minds, like the presence of the soldiers from Japan, who had black hair, like theirs, but spoke a different language.

Of late, there had been more and more of them in town; they wore identical uniforms, and stayed together in their army camps on the other side of town, which the locals took great care to avoid; for men in uniform could be rather an unsettling sight, in a town filled with traders and common folk, going about their day-to-day lives, dressed in nothing out of the ordinary, nothing that stood out.

The soldiers kept to themselves for the most part, but on their off days, they came to town, and ate together, and drank together, and sometimes, they looked at the women a little longer than was proper, and it made the women flush, and the townsfolk uneasy, so that they quickened their steps in a sudden haste to walk past them, and their breaths came a little faster.

Opposite the French Bakery, the tarot card shop stood, a tiny dark shop, on the upper floor, hardly noticeable amidst the hustle and the bustle of the streets below, with its narrow windows obscured by blinds, half-shuttered, against the noise and the world outside, so that if a curious onlooker stood on the streets below, and looked up, he would see nothing, but a funny little crooked sign, faded and rusting at the edges, which declared: TAROT CARD READER, and below, in smaller characters: READ YOUR FORTUNE, KNOW YOUR FUTURE, nor sense the brooding presence of the man who stood in the shadows at the window, looking down, between the gaps peeking between the horizontal slivers that held the blinds together, his eyes fixed on the carriage that had stopped outside the French Bakery, and on the girl who had just alighted.

She was ten years older than the girl he had sat with that day, long ago, in the narrow carriage, knee to knee, staring into each other's eyes, the day he spoke those cruel words to her, the day he made her cry; that long ago day, as fresh, as real, as painful, as if it had happened only yesterday.

She turned slightly, so that he saw her full in the face, her woman's face, for the first time in ten years.

She was beautiful.

He drew in a sharp intake of breath.

She was pretty enough, but he had seen women more beautiful than her. Her beauty drew from the vibrancy, the energy, that radiated from her being; from the eyes that flashed and sparkled as she spoke, issuing instructions to her maid, accompanied by quick, animated gestures with her hands, as white, as smooth as he remembered, pointing with a steady finger at the mounds of candy that had brought her to this part of town, a part she had never set foot on before; for if she had, she would have known that this was his turf, his kingdom, that, here, in the narrow alleys, and the lines of wooden shops, and the French Bakery at the corner, that looked strangely at odds with the rest of the streets, he ruled, the King, the undisputed ruler of his territory, respected, revered - and feared.

The maid said something that she did not agree with; he could see, from the way she drew herself up straight, and looked down at her maid, in that lofty, arrogant manner, in the stubborn set of that pointed chin on her small face.

The maid shuffled over, and passed candy sticks to the footmen, who shoved them straight into their mouths at astonishing speed. They were grinning widely, for nothing gladdens the heart of a tireless footman more than an unexpected respite in the middle of a scorching day: stretching out his tired legs, and chewing on a stick of sweet sticky candy in his mouth.

He watched as she carefully reached into her precious bag of candy, and selected one, popping it whole into . Her eyes widened with surprise, then delight, and finally, dismay, as she tried manfully to chew the hard candy with her small, sharp teeth, rolling it about her tongue to soften it, but to no avail, and finally, giving in to laughter. He could not hear her laugh, from where he was standing, but he could see the mirth in her eyes, as she tried, without success, to chew the huge ball of candy into pliable submission. She threw back her head, laughing, the irreverent ball of candy peeking between her teeth, uncaring of the curious stares of onlookers. He could see her maid wringing her hands, for it is quite unbecoming of a noble lady, the epitome of good breeding, class and modesty, to laugh out loud, and chew candy in the company of her servants, openly, in a public place, for all to see.

He could not help, but smile at her joy, her childlike enthusiasm.

"That girl looks like she would be easy."

"All these rich Joseon girls are alike."

"You take them, use them, and discard them."

"And they just go on living. The same lives they lived before."

Laughter.

Men's voices, speaking in Japanese, interjected with coarse guffaws, drifted up to the window where he was standing.

His smile faded.

He turned to the woman dealing a pack of cards on the table at the corner of the darkened room.

"Tell me, what does my tarot card say about today?"

Silently, she spread the cards on the table.

She flicked a card open.

She looked up at him, her eyes dark.

"A reunion, best left unmet."

He laughed.

Then he opened the side door that led to the balcony.

Bending over, he saw them almost directly below.

Two men, not soldiers, but Japanese, drunk, staring at the laughing woman across the street.

He vaulted over the balcony in one swift, lithe motion, and landed on his bare feet, behind the men.

They started in shock.

He raised his sword high, and slashed at them, in a powerful, swinging .

It cut them open, almost simultaneously, blood spurting out, and splattering on his face.

They crashed to the ground heavily, and lay at his feet, twitching.

The crowd of onlookers gasped.

"Dong Mae -"

"He is here -"

They whispered among themselves, afraid, and yet curious.

He replaced his sword carefully into its scabbard.

He looked up.

She was standing directly in front of him, face to face, the corpses of the two dead Japanese men lying between both of them.

He stared at her accusing eyes.

Behind her, the maid shrieked, " My lady, my lady, it is him, the boy, the boy in the carriage, the butcher's son! He has come back - "

"Indeed I am. Indeed I have," he bowed mockingly. "My lady."

She looked at him with unflinching eyes, and spoke coldly, "I see that you have come back, and I see what you have done."

Her eyes rested on the two corpses lying on the ground in a pool of blood.

"Do I offend you with my presence, my lady? A butcher's son is no fitting company for a lady, and I will take my leave, now, at once, so as not to offend your sensibilities."

"That you are a butcher's son is of no consequence to me," she said, steel in her voice.

"What is of consequence to me, what I find offensive," she paused, her eyes dwelling on the streaks of blood entangled in his hair, lowering to the smears of blood on his face, and finally, coming to rest on the blotches of blood on his kimono, "what I find repugnant, is not who you are, but what you have become -"

tightened.

" - a traitor," she said softly, every syllable dripping with icy scorn.

He stood frozen.

She picked up her skirts, and stepped into the carriage.

The door shut with a loud clang.

"You have misunderstood."

"I did it for you."

"I did it to protect you."

He screamed the words out loud at her inside his head.

But his lips did not move, and he remained mute.

Instead, he stood frozen, still, unmoving, as the carriage rumbled past him, and out of sight, carrying her further and further from where he stood, alone, with the corpses of the men he had slain in cold blood for her; where he stood like a man carved out of stone, with a strange feeling akin to pain in his heart.