Slicky Boys (10 page)

Their largest artillery pieces were emplaced only thirty miles north of Seoul, the capital of South Korea. The North Korean guns were capable of firing shells into the city itself. North Korean aircraft could drop bombs on the downtown business district within two minutes of the first warning of their approach.

Meanwhile, the South Koreans hadn’t been sitting on their hands, waiting for the big bad North Koreans to come south and gobble them up. Their army was over 450,000 strong. Every able-bodied man was drafted into service at the age of twenty, and their soldiers were amongst the toughest and best trained in the world.

Between these two snarling dragons sat the 30,000 GI’s of the United States 2nd Infantry Division. They were the trip-wire. If the North Koreans ever invaded, their heavily armored legions would slaughter the outgunned and out-manned Americans of the 2nd Division. It was planned that way. Casualties would provide the U.S. President with the ideal pretext to fly in more troops to help defend South Korea from the Communist hordes.

When I’d first arrived in-country, a colonel delivered an orientation speech which summed up the situation we were facing. If war ever broke out again in Korea, he told us, United States soldiers would be involved in the most brutal conflict they’ve seen since the founding of our nation.

In a tribute to how things change, the poets of ancient China had once referred to Korea as the Land of the Morning Calm.

Did the Communist North Koreans send spies into South Korea? By the truckload. One commando raid had actually reached the grounds of the Presidential Mansion in Seoul.

The spies came in by land, across the DMZ through barbed wire and mine fields; by sea, along the rocky coastline of the Korean peninsula; or by air, with phony passports via Japan.

Still, Cecil Whitcomb being a spy for the Communist North Koreans didn’t seem likely. If he was really playing with fire and going after classified documents, why would he have stolen a typewriter and stashed it in his locker? Petty thievery wouldn’t pay much and would only bring unwanted heat. Meanwhile, the North Koreans would be paying him big bucks.

It didn’t make sense.

There had to be something else happening here.

The second possibility was that Miss Ku was exactly what she seemed to be. A woman in love who’d been wronged and decided to hire somebody to exact her revenge.

That made’ some sense when you considered the murder site. Whoever had taken out Whitcomb was a pro. The meeting spot was right in the heart of Seoul, a seemingly safe place for a rendezvous, and yet, because of the layout of the buildings, it was actually quite isolated from prying eyes. Someone had carefully selected it.

Also, Whitcomb had not been very effective in fighting back. He had been stabbed cleanly under the sternum and into the heart. A swift, deft move delivered by an expert.

And he had received many light cuts on the arm. Whoever had assaulted him had been so sure of their abilities that they’d toyed with him before killing him. That didn’t seem very professional, but I suppose some professionals enjoy their work.

Afterward, the money in his wallet had been removed, but that could’ve been done just to make it appear that the murder was a common robbery.

Option number two didn’t appeal to me much. Miss Ku had seemed like a determined young woman. If she wanted to take revenge on Whitcomb she would’ve done it herself. Korean women are bold. When they feel they’ve been wronged, they will attack a man in public, challenge him toe to toe, dare him to hit them, and physically fight if it comes to that. Of course, it’s a great loss of face for the man. And if he beats the hell out of her, he loses even more face. That’s how Miss Ku would’ve gone after Whitcomb.

Maybe.

The third possibility was that it was a random killing perpetrated by a thief who spotted a foreigner in downtown Seoul, attacked him, and stole his money.

Two things argued against that.

First, why would anybody have gone to the trouble of sending Miss Ku to hire us to entice Whitcomb to go to the Namdaemun area? Street thieves prowl likely areas looking for random victims. They don’t make elaborate plans to entice their victims to certain spots.

Second, if it were a common thief, the Korean National Police probably would’ve cracked the case already. And so far they had no more than we did. In a high profile case like this you can bet they’ve already rounded up the known muggers and questioned them thoroughly. The KNP interrogation methods are extremely effective. They don’t have to worry about civil liberties. As long as the guy lives through the interview, the KNP’s are safe from criticism.

It was the last possibility that seemed most likely to me.

When Whitcomb became a freelance thief on Yong-san Compound he’d elbowed into someone else’s territory. He didn’t know it, but it was a territory that had been extremely well-organized for decades.

Ernie nodded as I spoke.

“The slicky boys,” he said.

“Exactly.” I leaned forward. “Think about the bruises that Terrance Randall told us Whitcomb had on his legs.”

“They tried to discipline him?”

“Right. And when he kept it up, the slicky boys hired Miss Ku, used her to dupe you and me into giving Whitcomb that note, then killed him when he showed up in Namdaemun.”

Ernie sipped on his coffee, set it down. He shook his head. “I don’t like it.”

“Why?”

“Koreans wouldn’t rock the boat like that. They knew Whitcomb would only be here a few more months. They’d try to discipline him but if it didn’t work, they wouldn’t kill him. Bring too much heat.”

“Maybe his sloppy thievery would’ve brought even more heat. Ruined a sweet deal.”

Ernie thought about that. “Maybe.”

“And maybe they knew that by compromising us, by getting us to take money from Miss Ku, they’d effectively eliminate the Eighth Army CID from the investigation.”

“Because we’re the only two investigators who even have a prayer of solving a case off-compound?”

“Right.”

“And they wouldn’t be worried about the Korean police?”

“No.”

“‘Cause they got them in the bag?”

“Right again.”

Ernie thought about it. His brow crinkled.

“But that would mean that they would’ve had to know that the case would be assigned to us. That we were on call the night they killed Whitcomb.”

I stared at him.

“Jesus,” he said. “That means they must know damn near everything about us.”

I nodded. We both let it sink in. Finally, I spoke.

“And they expect us to roll over on this. To protect our own butts.”

“Shit.”

Ernie glanced at the two women at the next table. They’d been waiting for him to look over. When he did, they smiled and slowly sucked on ketchup-covered french fries. Ernie stared but he wasn’t seeing them.

“I’m not worried about protecting my own ass,” he said. “It’s hung out there often enough before.”

“Then we have to go through with it, Ernie,” I said. “We have to go after the slicky boys.”

“Nobody’s ever done it before.”

“We’ll be the first.”

A tremor went through Ernie’s body. His lips tightened. I knew he had made a decision. And once Ernie makes a decision he usually doesn’t back away from it, even when he gets hit over the head with a two-by-four.

“You’re damn right we’ll be the first,” he said.

We finished our coffee, stood up, and strode toward the door. The girls had finished their french fries and I almost wanted to go back and talk to them, but we didn’t have time.

We stepped out into the frigid winter air. I took a deep breath, trying to clear my mind of all the jumbled nonsense that had been tumbling through it before. For the first time since we started on this case I felt as if I knew what I was doing.

Whether or not what we were doing was a smart move was another matter entirely.

We’d be going after the slicky boys, the most highly organized criminal organization in the country, to prove that they murdered a British soldier.

Not exactly a routine case.

9

T
HE KILLER CREPT FROM SHADOW TO SHADOW AS
silently as the night itself. Charcoal smeared his face, and his black clothing made him almost invisible.

It was warm in the midnight alleys. Summertime. Crickets chirped from a row of quivering elms across a broad expanse of road; the raw dampness of the River Han filled his nostrils.

At the back wall of the
yoguan,
the killer grabbed a drainage pipe and probed with his foot until he found a toehold in the brick. In the moonlight he hoisted himself up, inching skyward like a huge, lethal spider.

He passed two windows, making no sound. When he reached the third floor, he paused. Listening.

Heavy breathing. Moans.

“Yobo. Dasi hanbon.”
Lover. Once again.

Repeated over and over by a woman’s voice. A voice the killer knew only too well.

Straining with the massive muscles of his neck and arms, the killer pulled himself higher and peered through the open window, past a curtain of fluttering silk.

The light of the moon shone into the room, bathing the two bronzed bodies in a golden, almost holy glow. He saw her face beneath the man’s shoulder, her eyes pinched closed, her mouth cooing soothing words as she ran the long fingers of her soft hands over his back.

Hands that had once touched me, the killer thought.

How many months had she lied to him? Too many. Probably from the very beginning.

The rage bubbled up from his gut like lava exploding from a volcano. Still, his years of training kept his movements deft and silent.

He crawled into the room.

For a time the lovers didn’t notice him. They were still too far away, still enfolded in their cocoon of ecstasy. The killer placed himself at the foot of the bed, feet spread shoulder-width apart, watching.

The woman noticed him first. Her eyes popped open. She pushed up on her lover’s shoulders, unable to say anything—unable to scream. The lover twisted his head, grunting, and then his eyes widened in shock, finally spotting the dark monster looming over them in the shadows.

Before they could move, the killer’s fist shot out like a bolt of black-gloved lightning. The lover’s head snapped back. He rolled off the woman, a lewd slushing “pop” ringing through the room as he slid out of her body.

The woman screamed. The killer backhanded her with his ironlike knuckles.

The lover was on all fours now, shaking his head, moaning, but when he started to rise to his feet, the killer shot forward, jabbing his fingers brutally into the man’s neck. Slicing deeper, gripping flesh, he jerked backward with all his strength. The lover’s throat flopped out onto his naked chest.

Blood splattered everywhere. Against the wall, onto the sheets, along the outstretched arms of the screaming woman.

Choked by her own terror, still, the woman’s body moved. Clutching at a blanket. Kicking back toward the open window.

As her spine slid over the wooden sill, the killer grabbed her feet and shoved. The woman fell backward, thudding against brick outcroppings on the side of the building and finally smashing, headfirst, into the street below.

Bone cracked.

She lay silent in the alley. A naked doll, twisted and broken.

The killer shuddered, his body aflame, his manhood engorged and stiff.

People were awake all through the building now. Many of them screamed, and screamed again. Louder and louder. The killer stood by the window, gazing down on the snapped body beneath him in the street. Blood dripping from his hands. Confused.

Why didn’t they stop screaming?

The killer jerked bolt upright on his sleeping mat, kicking back the sweaty comforter.

“Yoboseiyo. Shikkuro. Choyong-hei choral”
Hello. It’s too noisy. Quiet down!

He hopped to his feet, instinctively crouching in a fighting stance. His eyes scanned the darkness. Walls, a sleeping mat, a small cabinet, cold air seeping in through a crack in the window.

Not summer anymore. Winter. Outside the steamed window, snow drifted on a sea of tile roofs. He was in a room he had rented last night. Quickly, he groped in the dark. His clothes were here, his money, the knife. It came back to him now. He was safe. The woman pounding on the door was the owner of this rat-infested hovel.

He cleared his throat and spoke.

“Arraso.”
I understand.

The owner’s footsteps pounded down the hallway. The killer listened at the door for a moment to make sure she was gone.

Bending down, he grabbed the
o-kang,
the porcelain pee pot, held it pressed against his thighs, and took a leak. When he was finished, he replaced the lid and shoved the
o-kang
back into the corner. He squatted back down on the sleeping mat.

The same dream. Over and over. How many times? How long would it haunt him?

He checked the time on the clock radio. Zero five hundred. An hour past curfew.

The killer slipped on his clothes, wiped his face with a damp hand towel, reached under the comforter, and examined the knife. It was long, wickedly curved at the end. The handle wrapped in leather, the steel honed to a razor-sharp edge. Fine workmanship. A Gurkha knife. From Nepal.