The Calligrapher's Daughter (17 page)

“You’ll learn feminine rituals and protocol. You will meet Princess Deokhye. When I told the empress who your family is, she thought the princess might enjoy meeting you, or at least she could study with you, and even if that doesn’t flower into something more, you’ll come with me now and then to visit the empress, so you’ll need suitable clothes. Close your mouth,” said Imo casually. She unfolded and refolded different bundles of fabric. Thrilled at the prospect of new dresses made of such gorgeous fabrics, I sat on my knees, trying to hold my body still.

“Princess Deokhye, the poor thing, is twelve. She’s the Gwangmu Emperor’s last child. Oh, how he doted on her! He had many children, and many died young. Only four are left, including the Yunghui Emperor. Princess Deokhye’s mother, Madame Bongnyeong, whom you’ll also meet, was the Gwangmu Emperor’s third concubine. The women live in Nakson Hall—the Mansion of Joy and Goodness—in Changdeok Palace;
the princess in the third house, the most colorful.” She studied me for a moment and said, “I will tell you a secret. She’s been betrothed to the nephew of the lord steward for some years now, but unlike your engagement, it’s a necessary arrangement to protect the bloodline. Yes, I know about your betrothal. I see a thousand questions written on your face. You have much to learn before I’ll venture taking you to the palace.”

Her casual way of being critical made it easy to accept, and I froze my features and waited, hoping she’d say more about the royal family. I knew that the former emperor Gojong’s reign was titled Gwangmu, and that he had remarried after Queen Min’s death, but I hadn’t known he’d also had concubines. Jaeyun’s eyes would open wide if she heard all this, and especially that I would meet the princess! This last thought gave me shivers of nervousness. The princess might be my junior, but she would be accustomed to manners I didn’t even know about. I pledged to work hard and learn from Imo. She said nothing more and rummaged among the fabrics, and I kept silent too.

She called Kyungmee, and after undressing to my slip I was measured, prodded and exclaimed over. Accompanied by many tsks of dismay,
bony
was the most-used adjective during this ordeal. Imo chose five different pieces for skirts and two sheer neutrals for a half-dozen blouses, for this season, she said, with more to come for fall and winter, a wealth that exceeded my mother’s and father’s wardrobes combined. In addition to a stipend from her dead husband’s family, Imo’s riches came from land in the south managed by a younger brother, her only sibling. Her widowhood allowed her to spend impetuously, but I knew my mother would frown at this excess. “Imo-nim—”

“Yes, child.” On the floor she smoothed lengths of rose-pink silk with an interwoven butterfly pattern and laid the measuring string against it, while Kyungmee wiped the scissors and snapped them open and shut.

“They’re so beautiful, and so many, I’m embarrassed— Is it— Will I really need all these clothes?”

A quick smile passed through Kyungmee’s neutral features before she bent to cut the silk, and I guessed I’d said the right thing. Imo handed me my clothes. “Not really. You probably only need three.” She had the practiced smile from before, but this time her lips matched the softness in her
eyes. “But look how much fabric I have just sitting in this chest. Why not indulge a little? I’ve hardly made new clothes since—in a very long time. It’ll be a pleasure.”

I knew that Imo’s husband and son had been killed by the Japanese almost fifteen years ago, though I didn’t know the whole story. Her genuine enthusiasm and her response had made it possible for me to not appear greedy. I bowed low, as graciously as I could, and used the honorific idiom. “This person gives deepest thanks, Imo-nim.” She was so pleased she clapped her hands.

Imo’s instruction took fifty days. She was a firm perfectionist and tried to inspire me by saying that when the present empress was betrothed, she had completed her far more stringent training in an impressive twenty days. I relearned how to sit, bow, eat and talk with an exacting precision that made me long to be home running in the gardens with Ilsun. I memorized the royal genealogy of several generations, including birth, ceremonial and posthumous names, style of address and reign title—a feat, since such titles typically filled an entire page. I also memorized the pavilions and halls of Changdeok Palace, which, with the famous Biwon Garden, comprised a square half-kilometer in the middle of the city.

Despite her strictness, Imo treated me more like a little sister than a student, and we laughed often, demurely of course. Her humor and attention helped alleviate my homesickness. She switched from being playful and finding enjoyment in all that we did to being frustrated and blunt when poise and precision leaked from my body and brain. I stabbed at a morsel of fish with my chopsticks, and she cried, “Rude! Rude!” She glimpsed a tiny part of my tongue when I put rice between my lips. “Disgusting! Dishonorable! Bow your head, you must bend to it!” My foot wasn’t in the proper angle in the second stage of sitting down. “Decorum! Decorum!” My artificial smile was too artificial …

Copying her mannered style, and with her reprimands and reminders, I eventually achieved enough inner silence to present a correct face and posture, and I grew comfortable with the distinct inflection of court language. At home I had read the vernacular translations of the
Four Books for Women
, but Imo required me to read the original Chinese
texts. I also slogged through
Instructions for the Inner Quarters, Notable Women, Concise Accounts of Basic Regulations for Women
and
Mirror of Sagacity
, among others. Reading these archaic roots of a thousand rituals was slow, but I persisted, for this study in itself helped prove my virtue, dutifulness and grace, and thus my filial obedience to my family, my father and hence to the emperor. While none of this was entirely new to me, the training was vigorous with seemingly more at stake. I often thought about my father’s devotion to tradition. Certain that my leaving home had enraged him, I hoped this training would one day help to prove my own devotion.

On sunny days we went sightseeing, walking long distances to see ancient Buddhist holy sites and parks, or what remained of the four other palaces in Seoul. Sometimes the crowds were so thick that strangers— both nationals and Japanese—jostled against us, and I clung to Imo like a little girl. Downtown, we walked in the angular shadows of new government buildings and scaffolded steel skeletons. The broad paved boulevards and our occasional rides on the tram recalled my neighbor Hansu’s boyish exclamations about the wonders of the city, but its telephone poles and ugly wires caging the streets, malodorous alleys, clumsy rigid buildings and unceasing noise made me yearn for mountain paths and unfettered skies. In Gaeseong, the Korean language was most often heard on the streets. Here, there were equal numbers of people speaking Japanese and Korean.

On a cloudy day in early June, we went to the north market, an entertainment activity for Imo who always wanted to buy me things, which made me uncomfortable and shy. On the way home we passed Gyeongbuk-gung, the former main palace, whose grounds were now dominated by a large white building with columns, the Japanese government seat. I sensed Imo’s mood growing pensive. The gray day darkened and it began to drizzle. Saving my questions for later, I held on to Imo beneath her umbrella and we trudged home, stepping over streaming muddy gutters and past the concrete facades stained with rain.

It rained steadily into the evening, splashing loudly on the porches. In Imo’s sitting room, Kyungmee served sweet rice tea, sliced pears and the fancy miniature rice cakes that Imo had bought at the market. She
seemed subdued still, like an unfluffed cushion, and corrected me perfunctorily, “Two hands, that’s right. Fingers closed when you hold your cup.”

I asked to speak and she nodded. “Imo-nim, if I may ask, is Gyeongbuk Palace where Queen Min died?”

“You mean Her Imperial Majesty Empress Myeongsong. Yes.”

This was the posthumous name and title of the former queen, the second consort of King Gojong before he changed his status to emperor. I sipped and carefully returned my cup to its precise position on my little table. “Imo-nim, at my school, classmates told different stories about her, and even my teacher couldn’t say what was true. Did you know her? May I ask how she died?”

Imo sighed. I apologized and asked if she was too tired to talk. If I hadn’t been so young and piqued to hear the dramatic stories from court, I might have considered that remembering this past would be painful for my aunt.

“No, you should know what happened. I was about your age and still living at home when she died, so I never met her. They say she was unusually strong-willed and intelligent, very involved in politics. Some say she was ambitious and cared only about power. As a matter of fact, when the Gwangmu Emperor acceded to the throne, most of the ministerial appointments were given to her clan.”

I admired how Imo handled her chopsticks to pick up pear slices, and while waiting for her to finish chewing I recited in my head the high court positions: minister of the left, minister of the right, minister of the state council, minister of justice, minister of war, minister of rites, minister of personnel, minister of public works … I was confused if this was the cabinet before or after the 1895 Kabo Reforms, but suddenly recognized the reform year as being the same as the queen’s death, and wondered if the two were related.

Imo told me to finish eating. One was supposed to eat everything served, hence portions were small. She continued, “After Japan won the war with China, the queen spoke strongly against foreign influence in court. This was also immediately after the Donghak Revolution, the peasant uprising, and it was a complicated time. You probably don’t know that many officials were actually grateful for the Japanese. Japan was seen as a
generous friend who would help guide us into the modern age. Hundreds of newspapers came out, and suddenly anybody who could read, or anyone who could listen to someone else read, had an opinion about how things should be. There was a widespread popular movement toward ‘civilization and enlightenment.’ Since it meant following the Japanese example, it raised opposition from traditionalists, like your father. But it was fashionable and trendy to strive for modern ideas and Western goods.” She sipped her rice tea. I wondered what kinds of “civilized and enlightened” products of that time might have attracted Imo.

“So you see,” she said, “Japanese advisers were already involved in court. The queen was like a rock they had to kick from the road to pass through.” She moved her tray aside, checked mine and called Kyungmee, who removed them. Imo told me to get my sewing from across the room and asked Kyungmee to light the brazier and bring a shawl.

“In early October 1895, in the evening, a eunuch alerted the queen and her ladies that the new Japanese envoy, Miura Goro, had entered the palace with soldiers and was heading her way. To conceal herself, the queen dressed in simple clothes and sat among the ladies-in-waiting. The soldiers couldn’t know which of the ladies was the queen, so they slashed to death the women closest to them. Some say she tried to save her ladies-in-waiting by identifying herself, but who knows? They killed all the witnesses, desecrated her and burned her body in the garden.”

I couldn’t swallow.
Desecrated
rang in my ears. I felt terrible for wanting to hear the story as if it were gossip. I remembered Teacher Yee and what she’d suffered. My eyes filled with the horror of it, and the shame. “Yes, child,” said Imo quietly. “When the news came out, everyone was shocked and there were many protests.” I felt pangs of sadness for my teacher and the queen’s tragic end, and was glad to have sewing to hold my attention until the intensity of the feelings eased. Imo asked me to get her a deck of cards from across the room, which allowed me to pull a handkerchief from my skirtband and surreptitiously blot my eyes and nose. Her example showed me how women could help each other preserve decorum, and I hoped that one day I would be as deft as she in this regard.

Imo shuffled cards and played solitaire, while coals smoldered in the iron brazier. I embroidered a floral edging on several meters of heavy blue silk that would be a gift to the princess. The rain fell and fell.

“They tried to suppress the news for as long as possible, and held the king at the palace, as if under house arrest. A few months later he managed to escape, hidden in a palanquin. He fled to the Russian legation where he stayed for almost a year. As you can imagine, this was an extremely difficult time for the royal family, for the whole country. The Japanese had taken control of Gyeongbuk Palace entirely. The king had no alternative but to move into Deoksu Palace—back then it was called Gyeongun Palace. He tried to consolidate power and strengthen the monarchy during that time. He made Korea an empire and initiated many laws that changed the old ways. But he had no army, no palace guard, and the Japanese had maneuvered Korean ministers favorable to their cause into his cabinet. The government was in chaos, and the people were angry because the queen had been murdered and nothing was being done. They had a trial in Tokyo for the assassin, Miura, but everyone knew it was a sham.” She stopped speaking for a while. Her cards clacked against each other, the silk in my lap rustled and the wooden embroidery frame creaked. The sound of rainfall on the roof tiles gently thinned.

Captivated by this tragic story, and remembering that Imo said she would’ve been about my age when the queen was murdered, I felt very close to my aunt. I sewed and waited for her to continue.

“Yah, I won.” She displayed all forty-eight cards face up and perfectly arranged.

“Lucky!” I said.

She admired the cards and swept them together to shuffle. Her features and posture remained unchanged, but her words sounded deliberately casual. “Yes, lucky. I was married in 1900 because it was supposed to be a lucky year. Indeed, good luck came soon. I bore a son, and soon after that, my husband was appointed prime minister.”