When they reached the house, Induk bade the girl wash herself and smooth her hair.
“What shall I do now?” the girl asked.
“Wait for me in the kitchen,” Induk told her.
With this Yul-han and Induk went aside into the bedroom to consider what they had done. Neither knew how to begin. It was Yul-han who spoke first.
“The time has come,” he said thoughtfully. “I must declare myself on one side or the other. Either I am a Christian or I am not a Christian. If I am to follow you into every trouble where your religion guides you, then I must share your religion. When we are summoned, as sometime we shall be, I cannot say that you are Christian and I am not. They will ask me why I allow you to interfere in the lives of others, for you will continue to interfere, I can see that.”
Tears came into Induk’s eyes. “But we are told — it is the command of Christ that we must bear the burdens of the weak!”
“So we will bear them,” Yul-han said resolutely. “Otherwise we shall be parted, you and I — you driven by your conscience in one direction and I — what? Prudently staying at home, I suppose! Then sooner or later you will hate me — or I may hate you. This is a Christian marriage. You make it so by being what you are.
“You are not to be Christian because I am,” she insisted.
“I am Christian because I must be, if I am your husband,” he retorted. “Otherwise our paths diverge, and that I cannot accept.”
She let tears fall now. “You make a monster of me,” she sobbed.
He took her hand and put the palm to his lips. “Not a monster,” he said, “only a Christian.”
He drew her to him by this hand. “I shall not enter blindly into your religion, I will study and understand. I must be convinced as well as converted. Now cease these tears. You should be happy.”
“I want to be a good wife,” she whispered against his breast. “I would die before I bring you into danger.”
He did not reply for awhile as he smoothed her dark hair. Both knew what she meant. In the last few days they had heard fresh news of the increasing harshness of the ruling government toward the Christians. Whenever Christians sought to work against some evil circumstance, the rulers declared that by so doing they rebelled against the authorities, until all over the country helpless simple Christians were seized and accused of rebellion when what they did was only against an evil which, according to their doctrines, they must oppose, whatever the government.
“It is better if we face danger together,” Yul-han said.
At this moment a voice spoke from the door. It was the girl, who had grown weary of waiting. She stood there, her two feet planted widely apart, her bare arms hanging at her sides, her hair neat and her sun-browned face red with scrubbing.
“What do you want me to do next, mistress?” she demanded.
Yul-han and Induk parted and Yul-han turned his back properly on the girl.
“What shall we do with you?” Induk countered. “Shall we not send you home again to your parents?”
“If you send me home,” the girl said, her country accent thick on her tongue, “the wineshop owner will only get me back again, since he has paid for me. He has a license from the Japanese police. How can we escape him? I will stay here with you and do your work if you will feed me.”
Induk was perplexed. She had saved the girl and now must be responsible for the life she had saved!
“What is your name?” she asked.
“I am called Ippun,” the girl said, and stood waiting, her eyes, small above her high cheekbones, beseeching and helpless and her big mouth hanging open.
What could they do then but let her stay? Therefore she slept in a corner of the kitchen at night, and by day she worked without rest, as devoted as a dog to its owners. Not knowing what else to do, Yul-han and Induk accepted her as a member of the household.
“Though you call it a gospel of love, yours is a hard doctrine,” Yul-han said one morning in late summer.
He was seated on a chair beside a high table in the vestry of the Christian church in the city. The missionary sat opposite him, the book open before him, and Yul-han thought secretly that he had never before seen so craggy a face, or one so ugly in features and yet so noble in spirit, the blue eyes deep-set under brushy red eyebrows, the pitted white skin, the high nose broken, it seemed, in the bridge, the wide mouth and big teeth. Altogether the face was formidable and so were the huge hairy hands and the strong hairy neck. Under its clothing, was that thick strong body also covered with red hair?
“So you think Christianity is hard,” the missionary said.
“It is,” Yul-han replied, “hard even in its doctrine of love. What is more cruel than the command to turn the right cheek to the enemy when a blow has been struck on the left?”
“What is hard about that?” the missionary demanded.
East and West faced each other across the table. “Imagine to yourself,” Yul-han said earnestly, “if I am struck on this cheek”—he put his narrow, aristocratic hand to his right cheek—“and I turn this cheek”—he turned his head—“what am I doing to the man who strikes me? I am saying to him without words that I am his superior, one far above him in spirit. I am compelling him to examine himself. He has given way to evil temper — I am daring him to do so again and thus prove how evil he is. What can he do? He will be ashamed of himself, he will slink away, condemned by his own conscience. Is this not cruel? Is this not hard? I think so.”
The missionary shook his head. “You make me see things I have not seen before.”
He was silent for a while and then he took up the book and read aloud from the sayings of Paul. Yul-han listened and after some time he held up his hand for pause. He repeated the lines which he had just heard.
“‘Dare any of you, having a matter against his neighbor, go to law before the unrighteous and not before the saints?’ Do you not see what burden this places upon your innocent Korean Christians?”
“Burden?” the missionary repeated.
“It puts them in danger of death,” Yul-han said bluntly.
“Death?”
“Do you think the rulers will be pleased when our people come to you instead of to them?”
“There are many Christians in Japan,” the missionary said.
“Ah, but there the Church is ruled by Japanese Christians, some of them of high rank. Here it is true that the Church is composed of Koreans — how many did you say? two hundred and fifty thousand — a good number, but the Japanese do not rule the Church here. And my people when they become Christians are altogether devoted — there is too little else in our life nowadays. I feel the need in myself for enrichment and faith and some sort of inspiration. There seems no hope ahead. Some of us, like my father, find refuge in writing poetry and studying ancient literature. But what of those who have no such learning and no such talent? They are finding their interest in the Christian Church and in strong men from the West like you, through whom they seek connection with that outer world, a stream of culture new and modern from which we are cut off by the invaders.”
The missionary was listening, his blue eyes fixed on Yul-han’s face with intensity and comprehension.