"He tell you why?"
"I don't care. I'm not curious. Twice a month I sleep late, that's all."
"So, what happened last month? Couldn't sleep?"
"It was a Monday. Not me, one of the other men, it was his turn to move the carts. Ox stepped into the road. Wham. Dead ox, and the driver of the car almost killed."
"Did you see the driver?"
"No, I told you, it wasn't my day to move the carts. I was somewhere else."
"Alright, you were somewhere else. What about the other two accidents?"
"Following week, we stayed off the road on Monday, figured Tuesday was alright. It was my day for the cart. Same thing. About six in the morning. Ox stepped in the road. This time the driver tried to stop, sort of like you did. Only he was going faster than you were. He lost control.
The car spun around and the back end hit the ox. Killed the beast, but it saved the driver."
"What did he look like?"
"Small guy, skinny, mad as hell."
"Was he in any sort of uniform?"
"Nah."
"The car?"
"Back end was caved in. Too bad, nice car."
"Black?"
"Yup. Clean as you'd want to see, except for the gore all over the back."
"Didn't anyone from Pyongyang come out to question you?"
"Funny thing, no one did. I kept thinking the party committee would chew us out, even though it wasn't our fault. They always blame us."
"You sure no one came to see you?"
The older man crossed his eyes and looked at the sky. "Well, no one except the local security man."
"And?"
"He told us he was sorry about the ox."
"And?"
"He gave us a little money to keep quiet. Wasn't much."
"Wasn't much. Alright. Third time. Must have been a Wednesday or a Friday."
"Wednesday. The youngster here had the lead. I was just walking alongside." The older man nodded at the younger one. "He looked both ways, didn't see anything, though there was a little mist. The ox got halfway across when it stopped. Must have felt the vibrations on the road. Wouldn't move. Sure enough, there was a car, almost stopped this time, but almost wasn't good enough for the ox. Not much damage to the car, though the driver howled that he'd have us all shot."
"Skinny guy again?"
"No, this one was military of some sort. Muscular, short hair. Gray uniform, nothing like I've seen before. Banged his fist into the top of the car, he was so mad."
"Still no investigation?"
"Not a thing. And no compensation for the three oxen, either. Just some hush money. Not very much. How are we supposed to explain losing three animals?"
"But last week it was worse-it wasn't an ox, was it, it was a child.
You know what happened?"
Both men stood quietly, as if an invisible hand had pulled a string attached to their jaws.
"Okay, let me tell you what happened." I let my imagination spin out a reasonable scenario, based on what I knew. I liked to hear myself say these things out loud. When I just had a conversation in my head, it was always brilliant, but when it got fashioned into words, my ears could spot the weak points and tell my brain to take a walk. "The car took off after its side window, the driver's side window, was shot out.
The driver, wounded or dead, lost control. The car was going at high speed, hit a bump on this lousy highway, blew a tire, spun around, and landed in a ditch. Almost where I am now. Your nephew, who saw it all happen from that hill over there, was naturally curious and came to investigate.
He saw someone going through the driver's wallet. He turned to go, but the person, more likely two men, saw him, ran him down, and killed him. They told you later he'd been hit by the car, but they never let you see his body. All you got was an urn of ashes, which was buried the same night." It sounded plausible, not brilliant but plausible, though I made up the fact about the car landing on its left side and omitted that the boy's throat had been cut.
The two of them stared at me. The younger one trembled until I thought he would fall over. The older one shook his head slowly. "We don't want trouble."
"Well, trouble is what you've got, and you'll have even worse if you tell anyone, anyone at all, what I just said to you." I let that sink in. "Now help me get this car out of the ditch." Neither of them moved. "I'll put it another way for you. I'm your only hope of finding out who killed that boy, believe me. Or don't. If I were you, I wouldn't believe me. If I were you, I'd get to a phone and call the local security man, Li Min Sung. He and I were in the army together.
We stayed in touch." I could see from the face of the younger man that this made an impression. The locals liked Li; they trusted him.
He had been around here a long time and was always fair with them, didn't give them a lot of trouble over minor regulations. If Li and I were friends, then maybe they could trust me, too. "Tell him Inspector O says hello."
The older one spit on his hands. "Let's get this car back on the road."
11
"Where are you?" Pak was irritated.
"I'm calling from a street phone."
"You're supposed to be in here. People are looking for you."
"I gathered as much. Someone parked in my parking space, so I figured I'd take a ride."
Pak's voice donned the cloak it wore when he wanted me to listen closely. "A couple of muscular types were here about a guy named Chong. You know anyone named Chong?"
"Just a minute. Let me think." I let a decent interval pass. "No.
What are the odds? You go through your whole life and never meet a Chong. Isn't that an Arab name?" I glanced out onto the street to see if anyone had stopped to watch. No one.
"Who's talking about Arabs? They wanted to know where you've been the past week. I told them you were jumpy so I gave you time off to rest. You felt rested when you came back to work, didn't you?"
"Rested isn't the word for it."
"One more thing. They said your brother is joining the case. He'll be here tomorrow to get briefed by you."
"Forget it."
There was a long silence. "Inspector, we weren't asked for our opinion.
We don't get a vote. Your brother has been assigned to monitor this case. Do I make myself clear?"
"I told you. Forget it. And I meant it. I'm not working near him.
Five years ago, we reached an agreement. We're not brothers anymore.
We don't meet. We don't speak. We live on different planets. I'm sticking to the agreement. If he's on the case, you'll have to take me off."
"Family matters cannot interfere-"
"Look, Pak, it's not your business, it's not the Ministry's business, it's not the party's business. This is between me and my former brother.
He's dirtying my grandfather's name. I won't have it. Can I say it again for you? I won't have it. Let's drop it, alright?"
Pak must have thought I was crazy, talking like that on the phone.
Most of the time our line wasn't monitored-too many other targets and not enough personnel-but we both knew that this case had probably put us on the Military Security Red List, meaning the office phones were near the top of some roving team's weekly priorities. I was banking on it. What I'd said would get to my brother. I wanted him to hear it directly from me, even if it wasn't face-to-face. And I wanted the transcript to get circulated in places where it would put a question mark after his name. Not a big one, but a nagging doubt. It wouldn't destroy him, but he would be in limbo for a while. People wouldn't return his phone calls; invitations would dry up. That would make him mad, maybe ruin his appetite for a few days as he tried to figure out why people were avoiding him. He might even lose some sleep, wondering if his name was on the short, black list of those who had unknowingly said the wrong thing, made the wrong decision, had their heads up when they should have been down.