After breakfast, the housekeeper cleared the table while his wife fetched his coat and briefcase. He only called her yeobo. To others, he referred to her as “my wife” or “my children’s mother,” and was almost never reminded of her name, SeoHee. They’d been married twenty-three years and it was impossible to think of her as the shiny-haired sixteen-year-old she’d been when they’d met. Underneath her tidy apron, her breasts sagged and her stomach strained uncomfortably against her skirt. Only her slim and straight calves with their tiny ankles had retained their girlishness. She knew this and wore knee-length skirts even in the coldest days of the winter.
“Yeobo, come home early,” she said as he used a shoehorn to slide into his shoes. It was just her normal greeting, and didn’t mean he needed to actually come home earlier.
“I know yeobo,” he said as usual, wrapping her in a brief hug before walking out.
The graveled path leading out from the front door of the house was covered lightly in frost. HanChol was reminded of something as his feet crunched on the ice, but couldn’t remember what, exactly. It was still quite dark at 6:30 A.M. and he found his way carefully to his car. The windshield had frosted over too; HanChol brushed it away with his gloved hands and got into the driver’s seat.
Of course, he was well able to afford a chauffeur. After the Korean War ended, he had won numerous construction deals to rebuild entire neighborhoods in Seoul. That led to more contracts even in other cities—the whole country needed to be resurrected. Then his father-in-law passed away, leaving his vast fortune to HanChol. In just over ten years since the war’s end, HanChol had become one of the richest people in the South. But he still preferred to drive himself. He didn’t want to become one of those lazy men that he so disliked as a rickshaw driver, many years ago.
His was the only car on the road to InCheon, a dark gray line between light gray seas of fallow barley fields. The moon was still stenciled over the western sky when he arrived at the factory. His chief of staff met him at the entrance, his baggy bomber jacket and twill pants giving him a scarecrowish look. They went over HanChol’s schedule for the day; there was an interview with a magazine reporter at 2:00 P.M. and a dinner meeting with a lieutenant general, who was a trusted confidant of President Park.
“Did you make a reservation?” HanChol asked, taking off his gloves and stuffing them in his pockets. Inside the factory, there were already dozens of workers moving efficiently over the assembly lines.
“Yes, it’s at nine P.M. at MyungWol,” the chief of staff said courteously but without overeagerness. HanChol appreciated that about this young aide; he liked to see some dignity and spine in his subordinates.
“Good, good.” HanChol nodded. MyungWol had been rebuilt after the Korean War in the Western style. Instead of sitting on the heated stone floor covered in golden wax paper, the guests now lounged on ornately carved Italian chairs under crystal chandeliers. The courtesans in braided chignons and voluminous silk skirts were also gone. Now the women, called hostesses, wore tight, low-cut gowns and hair improbably rolled and lifted above the crown.
“What happened to the crankshafts? They were supposed to be here on Monday.” HanChol made his way across the factory floor, his aide dutifully following behind him.
“We got the shipment in last night,” the aide answered, and they walked in silence the rest of the way to the workstation where he would be briefed on the latest prototype.
HanChol only frowned to signal his displeasure—his suppliers were all too prone to late deliveries. In the past, he would have snapped at his aide and considered punishing the subcontractor with reduced orders. But these days he was far less given to impatience over such delays. He had learned that if something was meant to happen, it would happen no matter what, sooner or later. The reverse was also true, so frightfully true. This made him act generously to those people who would not happen on the scale that he had, no matter how much they tried. People like his suppliers, employees, his quietly diligent aide. As a matter of fact, most people he knew fell into this category, except his military and political connections.
At the station, his engineers were waiting to show him the most recent tweaks to the engine, and seeing its gleaming iron pistons and cylinders, all so perfectly formed and in sync with one another, resting in immaculate silence and contained energy, HanChol had the distinct impression that he was looking inside his own heart.
*
JADE HAD SLEPT only a few hours that cold December night. When the sky began to get lighter, she wrapped herself in a thick sweater and stood on the portico, waiting for the sunrise.