Joy Brigade (25 page)

Without even realizing what I was doing, I slid open the door of the cart and my right leg kicked out of its own volition, straightening until my foot dangled in the cold
air. Moon Chaser cursed. The cart was rolling faster than ever.

Behind us, someone shouted. Moon Chaser was now pushing the cart forward at a flat-out run and it was clear that the angle of decline had increased. We were heading downhill.

A shot rang out.

Moon Chaser gave the cart one final nudge and then I felt the thud of his weight on it. We were rolling now, picking up speed. Another shot was fired.

The blacktop and gravel and rocks by the side of the road whizzed by at a tremendous speed. The cart was nothing more than a heavy square box with two bicycle wheels supporting it. There was no steering mechanism and no brakes. At this speed, we were sure to veer off the side of the road, but somehow we didn’t. I felt little jerks, first to our left and then to our right. Something was steering the cart.

Moon Chaser was lying flat atop the cart now, his A-frame still strapped to his back, but he must’ve been using his staff to jab forward at the ground and give us not only a little breaking action but also some steering control. It wasn’t much. Just enough to keep the rolling cart from careening off the edge of the road, into what I imagined to be an abyss below.

The gunfire had stopped. Still, we kept rolling faster down the ever-steepening hill. We were out of range of the men who guarded the dam now, but still in mortal danger of becoming a statistic by dying in your typical soju pig-cart crack-up.

Moon Chaser jabbed his staff hard to the left. The
entire cart lifted, threatening to tip over, but still Moon Chaser kept jabbing his staff. We veered to the right but left the dirt road, one of the wheels kicking up dust and gravel on the side. After attempting to steer for a few more seconds, he suddenly gave up altogether. I felt his body shift above me as if he were curling himself into a ball, and then he screamed.

We flew off the edge of the road.

Moon Chaser slapped me alert.

“Where are we?” I asked.

“Speak Korean,” he said.

I asked the same question in Korean.

“Never mind.” He pulled me roughly to my feet. “Come on. Those guards at the dam can’t leave their posts, but their officer of the guard has a radio. They’ll call this in.”

One of the legs of Moon Chaser’s A-frame had been broken. “Are you all right?” I asked.

“Yes. Quickly now. Up the hill.”

We climbed. And we kept moving throughout the night. I surveyed my body as we moved. A few bruises and a world of soreness, but other than that I was healthy enough. Exhausted, hungry, and the back of my leg still throbbed from the cramps, but I was still in one piece. The thick walls of the soju cart had protected me from suffering any permanent damage.

It must’ve been maddening for the people hunting us to learn that we’d managed to cross the Imjin River, after all the precautions they’d taken. Still, they’d regroup quickly.

Moon Chaser shouted back to me as we hopped across
rocky ridges. “No stopping now. All speed. If we can make it to the Eastern Star Commune before they do, and get into the Kwangju Mountain Range proper, we’ll be safe.”

“How far?” I asked, my tongue already lolling out of my head.

“Don’t ask,” Moon Chaser shouted. “Just move!”

At dawn, we gazed down on a flat plain that stretched about four miles to a mountain range rising jaggedly into the sky.

“The Kwangju Mountains,” Moon Chaser said. “There, the one capped with snow and mist, that’s Mount O-song.”

Just by examining the terrain, I could see how the Manchurian Battalion, with an independent leadership and the protection of a massive mountain range, could maintain its position as a formidable independent power, even in the midst of one of the world’s most repressive Communist dictatorships. And I could understand why Commissar Oh had chosen to send the entire armored might of the Red Star Brigade up against them. By holding the dominant geographic position, the Manchurian Battalion would be difficult to dislodge.

“We need water,” Moon Chaser said. “And food. I’ll get us some there.”

He pointed to the rows of low barracks-like buildings in a neat geometric pattern in the center of the valley.

“What’s that?”

“The Eastern Star Commune.”

“You’ll be caught,” I said. “They must’ve been notified.”

“But you must eat. And drink. Even after we reach
the mountains, it will be a long climb to the Manchurian Battalion.”

“I can get by without,” I told him. “Better if we go around the valley, to the south, and cross there.”

“No. Too close to the DMZ. It’s crawling with soldiers. Better to go straight across the valley.”

“They’ll spot us.”

“They’ll spot you. Not me. If I go into the commune, attract their attention, you can make your way along that irrigation canal.” He pointed. “It zigzags across the valley and eventually reaches the mountains. I’ll join you at the far end, with food and water.”

“How will you pull it off?”

Moon Chaser grinned and patted me on the back. “Don’t worry. That’s my department.”

I gazed back down at the valley. The sky was overcast and even through the day the weather would remain cold, close to freezing, but there still could be some bright sunshine by noon.

“I’ll be too exposed,” I said. “Wouldn’t it be better to wait until dark?”

“Yes. It would. But this valley will be full of soldiers before the morning is out. Right now, they’re probably sending trucks out to pick them up from their gun emplacements along the river. Then they’ll bring them here and form a line between us and the mountains. We have to take the chance.”

Moon Chaser unlaced the pack strapped to the center of his A-frame. He rummaged around and pulled out what looked like a role of hemp material. He untied it and tossed it to me.

“Strip off that uniform,” he told me. “Put this on.”

I did as I was told. It was the traditional hemp pantaloons and tunic of a Korean farmer, slightly soiled. Then he tossed me a hat that had been similarly folded up in his backpack. It was made of straw that spread out slightly when I untied it, but it still held an odd, bent shape.

“How do I look?” I asked, when I was fully decked out.

“The legs are too short,” Moon Chaser said. “The cuffs only reach halfway to your ankles. And the tunic is tight across the chest.” I’d knotted the string holding it together tightly. “If anyone sees you up close,” Moon Chaser said, “they’ll spot you for a foreigner immediately.”

“But from a distance?” I said.

“If you keep your back bent, staring at the ground, and stay low within the irrigation canal, you might not be noticed.”

Moon Chaser turned and studied the main road leading into the Eastern Star Commune from the north. “Nothing yet,” he said. “No time to lose. Let’s go.”

He pointed out a plateau at the foot of the Kwangju Mountains on the far side of the valley as our rendezvous point. He also told me that if he didn’t arrive by nightfall, I was to make my way to Mount O-song on my own.

“I’ll wait for you,” I said.

“No. Your mission is too important. If I’m not there by nightfall, climb farther into the mountains, find shelter for the night, and continue on without me.”

We climbed down to the floor of the valley together. Then we shook hands, Moon Chaser grinning at the oddness of this Western tradition.

He continued on across the cabbage fields. I made my way south to the irrigation canal.

The edges of the canal were made of mud. I kept sliding down into the two- or three-foot-high runoff. I had to wade my way through the sludge until I found solid footing and climbed back up on the side of the canal. As I proceeded, I spotted the work groups and kept low as I crept past them. The water in the canal reeked of human waste and some sort of chemical that reminded me vaguely of ammonia. Probably toxic. In thirty years I’d be stricken by cancer and wonder how I caught it. Thinking of this—getting sick thirty years from now—kept my courage up as I made my way through the valley.

At one point, I climbed up out of the canal and lay down near some piles of hay and a metal pipe where runoff poured into the canal from the fields. The work groups seemed absorbed in their tasks, so I was mostly worried about the occasional groups of farmers, pushing carts laden with hand tools, making their way toward the fields. But with the valley as flat as it was, I was able to see them coming and slide down into the canal before they could spot me.

I gazed at the central buildings of the commune. I forced myself to stop worrying about Moon Chaser and the possibility of capture and concentrate on making my way across the valley.

I was more than halfway across when the old woman spotted me. I hadn’t noticed her because she was squatting down on the edge of the canal, apparently hunting for sour weed, the wild herbs that Koreans often add to soups and stews. She had a bundle of leafy greens shoved into the loose pockets of her full skirt. The material was folded
above her knees as she squatted, her lower body swathed in long underpants made of linen.

She smiled at me quizzically. “You’re dirty,” she said.

I nodded, bowing obsequiously. “Yes,” I replied.

My pantaloons were rolled up above my knees and I’d been wading through a particularly noxious stretch of the irrigation canal, watching my footing as I went. I was less than ten yards from the old woman before she spoke and woke me out of my reverie.

“I’m sorry to bother you,” I said.

She stared at me, her half-smile not fading. “What are you doing here?”

I searched my mind for an answer. In the distance, I heard the singing of a work crew making their way to the fields. They were getting closer.

Like a bullfrog on its haunches, the old woman sidled away from me.

I sloshed quickly through the water and grabbed her. She started to scream, but I shoved my hand over her mouth and pulled her halfway down the edge of the irrigation canal, pressing her body against the mud. Her eyes were wide now, the thin eyebrows threatening to pop off her head. Here in front of her was the embodiment of the dirty, hairy, long-nosed Yankee that she’d been propagandized to hate—and fear—all her life. The bogeyman come to life, staring down into her face, foul body odor and bad breath. She struggled to kick herself free, but I leaned all my weight against her, holding her still.

The work crew’s singing grew louder.

There was a footbridge about twenty yards ahead. Luckily, it was just on the other side of a bend in the canal,
so they wouldn’t be able to spot us—if I could just hold this struggling old woman still. Should I kill her? Hold her head beneath the filthy water until she gurgled her last? Or, once the work crew was past, should I threaten her and make her promise to stay quiet, at least until I made my way to the far side of the valley? But then she’d alert the others, and once they knew I was nearby, they would turn on Moon Chaser. After all his heroic efforts, they’d torture him and kill him. But if I left her body here floating facedown in the muck …

I stared into her terrified eyes, felt the warmth of her old body struggling against mine, and knew—with absolute certainty—that I couldn’t hurt her. No matter what the cost. I wished that somehow I could convey that certainty to her, so she wouldn’t be so frightened, but there was no way.

The work crew passed. Their singing faded.

I told the old woman that I was going to take my hand off her mouth, but if she screamed I would shove her head beneath the water. I asked her if she understood. She nodded. I took my hand off her mouth.

She just stared, open-mouthed.

“If you don’t betray me,” I said, “I won’t hurt you. Do you understand?”

She nodded again.

“You’re going to come with me a way,” I said. “If you do as I say, I’ll let you go once we are far enough away.” Before I could ask if she understood, she nodded vehemently. Evidently, she’d lost the ability to speak.

With me propping her up against the slanted wall of the irrigation canal, we made our way slowly around the
bend that the work party had just passed and continued on our way to the far side of the valley. After about a half-mile of this, I decided that I was moving too slowly. I stopped, knowing I had to let her go.

“I’m going to let you climb up on solid ground,” I said. “But I want you to sit there and make no sound. Do not move for at least thirty minutes. Do you understand?”

She nodded.

“If you don’t promise to sit there quietly for thirty minutes, I won’t let you go. Do you promise?”

She nodded again.

“Say it,” I said.

“Yaksok,”
she croaked. Promise.

I helped her climb back up the muddy slope until she was perched on the ledge of the irrigation canal. She gazed down, clearly terrified. I smiled and told her I was sorry for muddying her dress. She said nothing. Then I turned and sloshed my way down the canal.

I had gone somewhat less than a hundred yards when I heard footsteps pounding away in the opposite direction. Probably her, I thought. She hadn’t kept her promise. Still, she was a long way from the nearest work party. Then I heard the thin, whistling scream wafting along the valley floor.