Pil-sun couldn’t wait for her father any longer; “Mother, I’d better go.”
But her mother wasn’t about to let her young daughter wander around Samcheong-dong after sundown. Pil-sun was also afraid that her mother, left alone in the store, would have difficulty selling even a pack of cigarettes. With her father still absent, she was scared that he, too, might be in trouble along with Byeong-hwa. She finally made up her mind and went out, her mother unable to hold her back any longer.
Pil-sun had hoped that Gyeong-ae would come by, but they’d seen nothing of her all day.
After Pil-sun left, the telephone rang. It was Deok-gi again. When he heard that Pil-sun had gone out, her mother was relieved to hear him say that he’d go to Samcheong-dong before coming to the store.
After quite some time, a rickshaw with a shade over the passengers’ seat rolled into view, coming to a halt before the store. Hong Gyeong-ae stumbled out of it.
Pil-sun’s mother was disgusted, thinking that Gyeong-ae was drunk again. Even so, she was glad to see the young woman.
“Where have you been?”
“Byeong-hwa — is Byeong-hwa home?”
The two spoke at once.
“Early this afternoon, he went. ” Pil-sun’s mother stopped short, shocked. “What’s the matter?” she said, taking a closer look at Gyeong-ae’s left cheek. It was swollen with a bluish bruise. Under the light she discovered that her eye over the swollen cheek was bloodshot and had closed into a narrow slit.
A chill shot down her spine as her daughter’s face flashed through her mind.
“He hasn’t come back? Did he leave with someone?” Gyeong-ae’s voice was nasal and shaky, as if she were trying hard to hold back tears, but she was also somewhat drunk.
“Pil-sun went off to look for him. What happened to you?”
Tears welled up in Gyeong-ae’s eyes, but she didn’t reply. Collapsing in a heap by the doorway, Gyeong-ae said, “Please send the rickshaw away.”
Pil-sun’s mother asked the rickshaw driver where Gyeong-ae had boarded and was told that he’d picked her up in front of a Chinese restaurant in Hwagae-dong. After paying the eighty jeon he demanded without haggling, she rushed back in and asked who had been at the Chinese restaurant.
“Never mind. I was there by myself.”
Pil-sun’s mother was beside herself with worry; no one who had gone out tonight would come home safe and sound.
No matter how hard Pil-sun’s mother tried to get the facts out of her, Gyeong-ae remained silent, deep in thought, tears rolling down her cheeks.
After a long silence Gyeong-ae asked, “So where did your daughter go to look for him?” Her voice had steadied.
“Samcheong-dong, I think. Number 110.”
Gyeong-ae leapt to her feet and said she had to go look for them. The desire for vengeance took possession of her.
“Don’t even think of it! You’re not going anywhere in that condition. Let’s wait a little longer because Jo Deok-gi said he’d go there, too.”
Ignoring the older woman, Gyeong-ae flew out the door and headed toward the streetcar terminus in search of a rickshaw. Pil-sun’s mother ran after her. Gyeong-ae carried herself briskly now, filled with purpose, not only to avenge the abuse she herself had suffered but also to defend Byeong-hwa.
Gyeong-ae was about to turn toward Jinmyeong Girls’ School when she halted, her eyes fixed on something in the distance. Pil-sun’s mother, startled, went out into the avenue and saw a group of dark shadows approaching in the hazy moonlight.
Pil-sun’s mother never imagined that anyone would try to make their way through Chuseongmun at night, but when she saw Gyeong-ae sprinting toward them, she, too, broke into a run.
Pil-sun’s mother couldn’t believe her eyes. Her husband was at the front of the group, supported by two others. Behind him was Byeong-hwa, to whom Gyeong-ae clung.
“What happened? My God, how can they do this to an innocent man?” Pil-sun’s mother whimpered, her voice breaking and her breath coming in short gasps.
“Stop talking. so loud. ” her husband said, panting. He was supported by his daughter and Won-sam.
“How could someone do this to my husband? And Byeong-hwa? How is he?”
A rickshaw driver was supporting him, but his gait seemed steady.
Deok-gi, still in his mourning overcoat, told Pil-sun’s mother to rush back to the store ahead of them to lay out the bedding. “Has the room been heated?”
Pil-sun’s mother scurried away.
“Did they take you to the Chinese restaurant first?” asked Gyeong-ae.
“What Chinese restaurant?” Byeong-hwa replied in a nasal voice, for a torn handkerchief had been stuffed in his nostrils to stanch the bleeding.
“Then you didn’t go to the Chinese restaurant. Those bastards!”
“What are you talking about?”
“Some bastard came to Bacchus and said you wanted to see me right away. I followed him, and there were three guys sitting there, bantering and eating and. ” Gyeong-ae choked up with emotion.
Deok-gi cut in. “Why did they act the way they did?”
“I hope they didn’t do anything to you.” Byeong-hwa spoke in a measured voice.
“They’re hoodlums.” Gyeong-ae’s voice was shrill.
“What did they do? Did they beat you, too?” He forgot about his own pain.
“I’ll tell you the details later. Where does it hurt? Do you feel a throbbing or a dull pain?”
“No, I’m all right, except my nose bled some.” Byeong-hwa seemed oddly indifferent.
“Why are you covered with mud? Where did you fight? How many people were there?”
“I think there were six drunks altogether — I’m sure I scared three of them out of their wits. They must have come from the Chinese restaurant.”
When they finally reached the storefront and caught a glimpse of each other in the light, they were shocked; they looked as if they had tumbled into a sea of mud. A thin crust of ice coated the mud. Their suits were ruined, and their hands and faces were quite a sight. Luckily, there wasn’t a single bruise on Pil-sun’s father, who had difficulty standing on his own, but blood was running in scarlet rivulets over Byeong-hwa’s muddied suit. His bloody mouth looked like that of a wild animal. Blood also streamed from a gaping wound on the back of his right hand; it looked like someone had bitten the flesh off. Afraid that onlookers might gather at the doorstep, they went into the store through a back alley. As they took off their clothes and cleaned themselves, Deok-gi tipped the rickshaw driver, who had accompanied them all the way from Suha-dong, and sent him on his way. The driver had left his gear at the stone steps on the Samcheong-dong side and now had to traipse through to Chuseongmun again to get it back.
Deok-gi had taken the rickshaw to Hwagae-dong in order to take Won-sam with him and had asked the driver to accompany them as backup, in anticipation of trouble.
Deok-gi ran to the telephone and called his family doctor to ask him to come over.
The gang had been seven in number; one had given orders to the other six. A pair of thugs had charged toward Byeong-hwa. Pil-sun’s father, who had left the store ahead of Byeong-hwa, was dragged away by a man who had been waiting in the alley. The two that grabbed Byeong-hwa had missed him when he’d rushed out of the store and jumped onto a streetcar on his way to the prison. They had waited half a day for another chance.
Of the group, Gyeong-ae had had the roughest time. A stranger had come to Bacchus, insisting that Byeong-hwa was in trouble and needed her. He accompanied her to Anguk-dong and led her into a filthy little Chinese restaurant at the foot of the Hwagae-dong hill, where another man was waiting for them.