The Front Company
"That's it! Excellent!"
Major General Martin was delighted when he heard how the trial had ended. What pleased him most was that neither Lee Ki-jo nor Ma-ryang had been so much as mentioned from start to finish.
"You and Mr. Jang seem to be entirely clear of the danger now."
Ki-jo thought the general himself was clear of it too.
"So for the brick plant they canceled, all we need is the permit put back? I'll speak to General Taylor. He ought to be able to manage that much without any trouble."
Ki-jo's answer caught him off guard.
"I don't wish to borrow the commander's influence."
"What?"
Martin could not understand why the man would refuse General Taylor's goodwill.
"Have you given up on the brick plant?"
"No. I will never give up the brick plant."
There was no chance of that. American military construction paid well for the moment, but the work would shrink fast. The U.S. garrison in Korea was steadily dwindling, and a base, once established, did not move. That was precisely why President Chung Ju-yung of Hyundai Construction, seeing it early, had turned from U.S. Army contracts to government work. The brick market, by contrast, would hold firm for the next thirty years—right up through the 1980s, when detached houses faded and apartments became the rule. He could not walk away from a business that laid golden eggs.
"Then why won't you take the commander's help?"
Ki-jo could not lay his whole mind bare. He knew perfectly well that a single telephone call from the Eighth Army commander would bring the canceled permit back. But that could just as easily breed a misunderstanding.
The misunderstanding would run like this. General Taylor would ask Korea's men of power to reissue the permit, and everyone who held power now held it by grace of Syngman Rhee's government. They would revive Ki-jo's plant—and the Rhee regime had only six years left. When the soldiers took the country, they would go rummaging through the companies in the name of punishing corrupt firms and illicit profiteers. If the story of his permit ever reached someone's mouth, the plant would look as though it had sheltered under Rhee's protection. No one would care that the man who had actually used his influence was General Taylor.
Am I getting hysterical?
He asked himself the question, and still he could not help it. Once you had been branded a communist, it was easy to believe that worse could follow. Martin and Taylor had stood behind him this time and the matter had come out well, but no one could say what six years would bring.
"General, Commander Taylor has already helped me more than enough. I'd like someone else's help."
"Someone else? Whose?"
"The man who told you the CIC was investigating us. I'd like his help."
"Frank's?"
"Yes. I'd like to meet your junior."
Martin studied him with a puzzled look.
"If you've something to say, say it to me. I'll pass it along."
"No. Please just put me in touch. I'll speak to him myself."
"Well, now... what is it you want to tell him?"
"I want to make the brick plant part of the CIA."
"What? Part of the CIA?"
Martin started.
"What on earth are you talking about?"
"I know intelligence services keep shell companies for laundering money. I mean to turn my plant into a CIA front company."
The clash with Kim Chang-ryong had hardened him. Rhee's government or whoever sat in the Blue House after it—no one was going to lay hands on his company at a whim. For that he needed men in the gray zone, the sort even political power hesitated to touch. Whether it would work, he could not say. If it failed, he could always go back to General Taylor.
"Heh... you..."
Once again Major General Martin found himself at a loss for words.
"I want to make it so no one can touch my company lightly. Please help me."
Martin decided that a man who could ask for such a thing was no ordinary man.
This fellow really is peculiar... How does he even know about that?
Ki-jo could make the offer because he had once heard of the front companies run by the Agency for National Security Planning. They had been listed, bold as brass, in the telephone directory. Ilshin Trading, or some name of that sort. The sort of company known to those who knew, and invisible to those who did not.
"Yes, the shell companies you mean do exist. They're used to launder money, and to give agents cover identities."
"Would it be possible?"
"I'll make the introduction, at least. Senior or not, I can hardly raise a thing like that myself. The rest you'll have to manage on your own."
"Thank you, General."
Watching the grateful younger man, Martin reflected that his tie to Ki-jo had been a blessing in disguise. Through him he had picked up promotion points in civil affairs, a field he had never much bothered with. Saving the people of Eundae-ri had been drawn kindly in the press and had earned him a good mark from the commander, and along the way he had grown closer to General Taylor, with whom things had been a little stiff. That was enough.
"So now all that's left is for the Happy Village people to go back to Eundae-ri?"
"Yes, General. They'll be packing as we speak."
"Ha ha. They must be eager to get home."
It cheered him to think that the six hundred lives he had saved were returning to the lives they had left. That was the second reward he had taken from meeting Ki-jo.
"Ah—I nearly forgot to tell you. General Taylor said he'd provide pesticide and fertilizer."
"Truly? I'd like my thanks conveyed to the commander."
"I'll pass them on. The fertilizer and pesticide won't be ordered until after the Lunar New Year you people keep."
At those words an idea lit in Ki-jo's mind.
"General. Would it be all right if I went to Japan myself and bought the fertilizer and pesticide?"
"You mean to go to Japan yourself?"
Another request Martin had not seen coming.
"You could fly over on a transport as a U.S. civilian employee. But why do you want to go yourself?"
Ki-jo smiled.
"When we build the 7th Division's base, I'd like to put in a golf course for you."
"A golf course?"
"Yes."
From inquiries made before his return, he already knew that Major General Martin was mad for golf.
"You thought of building a golf course inside the division?"
Martin was astonished that Ki-jo had hit on an idea even he, an American, had never had.
"Yes. While I was living on the base, a site well suited to one caught my eye."
He knew that Camp Casey—where the 7th Division was stationed, and where the 2nd would later take its place—had a golf course. It sat right alongside the road, plain to anyone passing by. Only a compact course, but even that would be a considerable comfort to a golf-mad man serving in Korea, a world away from home. In America golf was a popular sport, and for officers with little else to do in Korea it was the sort of game that could be enjoyed lightly inside the wire.
"I'd like to bring turf for a course back from Japan. Korea doesn't have grass suited to a golf course."
"That's a very fine idea."
True to his passion, Martin agreed at once.
"Thank you, General. But could you advance the money for the turf in dollars?"
"Hm... All right. A golf course would have to come out of the division budget anyway. I can give it to you ahead of time."
"Thank you."
"I think I'm the one who ought to be grateful. It never occurred to me to put a golf course on the base..."
Once more Martin found himself admiring the man.
"There's something special about you. Unlike ordinary people, you know how to look a long way off. As a golfer, I'd call you a tremendous long hitter... ha ha ha."
"Thank you, General."
When the talk was finished, Ki-jo stepped outside. Ma-ryang was waiting for him.
"Talk go all right?"
"Yeah. The cancellation on the brick-plant permit will be lifted soon. Don't fret over it—just keep building."
Ma-ryang's face brightened.
"Ma-ryang, do you speak any Japanese?"
"Wasn't I born and raised under the Japs? I can talk their talk."
"Right. It'd be stranger if you couldn't."
Ki-jo laughed, a rough, easy laugh. He meant to tell Ma-ryang the rest by degrees. Besides bringing back turf, there was something else he wanted to do in Japan. He meant to slip in MSG, which the country did not yet produce, and sell it quietly. Expanding the truck fleet and fighting for share in the brick market would take a comfortable store of cash. If the MSG rode in on the same military transport that brought the fertilizer and pesticide the Americans were buying in Japan, the smuggling would be perfect. No customs to worry about, and none of the middleman's cut a smuggling ring would take. Buy Ajinomoto in bulk with dollars paid in advance, and he might even get it below the Japanese wholesale price—dollars were scarce in Japan in those days. The margin on Ajinomoto he brought in himself would run two or three times what a smuggling outfit could clear.
"Let's head back to Eundae-ri."
They were on their way back to the tent village of Happy Village when a voice called from the main gate.
"President Lee Ki-jo! It's me—Chung In-yung!"
Ki-jo saw the vice president of Hyundai Construction hurrying toward them.
"I'm a little late. I was getting the papers together for the partnership."
Chung In-yung spoke through a breathless pant. Ma-ryang did not much care for a man who came running to talk partnership only now, but Ki-jo felt otherwise. He broke into a wide smile and caught In-yung's hand.
"You've thought it through well. If Cheongsan and Hyundai join hands, we can do the work even better."
"Thank you, President Lee. Engineer-in-Chief Lee Man-ik strongly recommended Cheongsan Development as well. He said it was a company with a conscience."
"Has your elder brother agreed too?"
What Ki-jo most wanted to know was Chung Ju-yung's mind.
"My brother came up to Seoul himself—curious about you, I think. I'm speaking only after I've finished consulting him."
"Ha ha ha. Good. Let's talk it over in our tent."
"Thank you. Please, take this."
President Chung In-yung held out a bag of Western pastries from Goryeodang—the very sweets Ki-jo had bought as a gift when he went to call on Professor Kim Moon-hwan.
"Oh, you shouldn't have..."
He said it, and took the gift box readily all the same. He still remembered how awkward it had been when Professor Kim refused one.
He passed the box of pastries to Ma-ryang.
"President Lee, you know that all Hyundai can lend you is a construction license and its credit?"
He knew it better than anyone. That was the heart of the matter. What he was thinking of was the trust Hyundai would later win from the government. By finishing Goryeong Bridge even at a loss, Hyundai would be recognized; government contracts would follow one after another, and on that foundation Hyundai Construction would become the finest builder in the country. Neither Vice President Chung In-yung nor President Chung Ju-yung seemed to grasp what an asset it would later be to complete Goryeong Bridge with bankruptcy staring them in the face.
"Hyundai Construction's credit is its greatest asset. If I may borrow that, it would be a great honor."
In-yung was moved to hear the credit of a failing company called its greatest asset.
"I'm simply grateful. My brother and I won't forget your help, President Lee."
"Ha ha ha, not at all. Shall we get to the heart of it, then?"
At that, Chung In-yung tensed. The heart of a consortium was the split of the profit.
"How does nine to one sound?"
In-yung thought that even ten percent, for nothing more than the loan of a license, was something to be glad of—but it fell far short of the money Hyundai needed. Things at Hyundai Construction were bad. Worse than bad.
"I... I know it's a shameless thing to ask, but could you raise it to eight to two?"
"Well, let's do that. Eight to two."
Ki-jo agreed at once, and set a condition in the same breath.
"On one condition. From here on, Cheongsan Development and Hyundai Construction go in together on government contracts."
In-yung's mind spun. The Goryeong Bridge job had cost Hyundai Construction every bit of its capital and left it on the edge of bankruptcy. Whether the government would give more work to a company in that state was anyone's guess. Against that, a settlement of eight to two was the best terms he could hope for.
"I'll speak to my brother. I'm certain he'll be favorable. Thank you, President Lee."
Ki-jo smiled at that.
I'm the one who ought to be grateful. I've got Hyundai by the hand...
But there was another of Hyundai's strengths he wanted to borrow. He opened the subject lightly.
"I could raise the split to seven to three..."
"Truly?"
"Would you care to talk a little further?"
"Of course! By all means!"
Hard up for cash, Chung In-yung brightened at once.