The calligrapher's daughter_ a novel - Eugenia Kim [53]
As a result of an injunction that cited modernization, the partitions dividing the church by gender had been removed last year. Everyone knew that the collaborators in the congregation wanted to watch both sides of the aisles. Han could now see his family across the aisle and a little ahead of him: Najin’s unruly braids, his wife’s small taps on Ilsun’s head to quiet him, her perfectly tucked hair bun, her neck curve when she bowed for prayer. He recalled his wife’s accusations about the wedding vows they’d made in this very church. He was certain that accepting God and Jesus as his Lord and Savior didn’t conflict with his Confucian beliefs. Furthermore, four hundred years before the Bethlehem star heralded Jesus’s birth, the Christian story and the practice of universal love had been expounded by the philosopher Mo Zi.
The sermon ended and everyone stood for a hymn and benediction. He glimpsed the dark suits of yet more new congregants and despaired. Not long after last autumn’s terrible earthquake in Tokyo, Gaeseong was flooded with Japanese citizens, many of whom superstitiously believed that Koreans had both contributed to the devastation and taken advantage of it. Police reacted quickly and impartially to many street clashes— eruptions of pent-up resentments and imagined slights. The more the Japanese came and stayed, the more they usurped, compounding the difficulty in fighting complacency. He wished his wife could join him in seeing his daughter’s marriage as a deterrent to stasis, an act of defiance against Japanese-instigated modernism.
Outside, Han bowed to Reverend Ahn, greeted others, had a few private words with Deacon Hwang, then walked home, his family a few steps behind. The rains had left a thin veil of moist air on a rapidly warming day. He remembered from his childhood the deep, cool dampness of the tall pines of the family’s forests in Manchuria where they summered annually. Thinking of childhood and Manchuria naturally led his thoughts to Chungduk. A wedding celebration would present an opportunity to reconcile with his brother. His step quickened and he thought he’d take some time in the afternoon to consider this possibility. How would he find him?
Once home, his wife and daughter went to their rooms with Ilsun. It struck him as odd that they hadn’t headed immediately to the kitchen as they normally would this hour on a Sunday. A bit later he heard the side gate open and saw his wife and daughter carrying a bundle to the Changs. Han settled into his study, his desk neatly spread with brushes, a carved inkstone, a celadon-glazed turtle with a small o for a mouth—his grandfather’s water dropper—and sheaves of paper. He composed a letter to the future groom’s father, whose last correspondence had welcomed the match and lauded the virtues of the bride. Chae had also mentioned in code his dissatisfaction with both the Shanghai and Hawaii provisional governments, and conveyed news that Kim Il-sung’s guerrilla army had ransacked a Japanese copper-mining operation in the north. Han had whispered this news to Deacon Hwang.
He was surprised to see his son following Cook when she brought the midday meal, Ilsun asking to eat with him. He consented, and she left to bring Ilsun’s table. He washed his son’s hands with his at the basin, cautioning him against splashing. When Cook returned, she acted so jittery he was tempted to ask for his wife’s whereabouts, but it wouldn’t do for Ilsun to see his father begging information from a servant. It wasn’t a market day and many shops were closed on Sundays—a testament to how much Christianity