Kansong Jeon Hyeong-pil
After his visit to the record-shop owner, Ki-jo went on to the Jongno residence of Jeon Hyeong-pil, the man known by the pen name Kansong. Jeon Hyeong-pil was the son of Jeon Yeong-gi, a late-Joseon magnate of a hundred thousand seok. In a time when the kingdom's annual budget stood at five hundred thousand nyang, his father's income in a single year exceeded the treasury of the entire nation. The family held so much land—not only along Jongno and through the heart of Seoul, but across all eight provinces—that they had been obliged to raise villas here and there simply to manage it.
Heir to that astronomical fortune, Jeon Hyeong-pil had spent it buying up cultural treasures, giving himself wholly to the work of keeping Korea's heritage from being sold off overseas. He remained an immense man of wealth and a guardian of art, and to anyone who rented his land or his buildings he was little short of an angel. He was famous for readily cutting ground rent and lease payments for tenants in hard straits.
Ki-jo stood before the imposing tile-roofed house where Jeon Hyeong-pil lived and knocked at the gate. A servant came out to receive him.
"Is Master Kansong at home? I've come to present some old works of art. My name is Lee Ki-jo, from Yeoncheon."
"Is that so? Please wait a moment."
The servant went inside and, a short while later, returned to lead him in. Ki-jo was shown to the sitting room of the Kansong residence, where Jeon Hyeong-pil sat on a sofa, waiting.
"How do you do. I'm Lee Ki-jo, from Yeoncheon."
"A pleasure. I'm Jeon Hyeong-pil."
Ki-jo took his hand and studied his face. The cheeks were full—at a glance, the fortunate face of a rich man, a face that seemed made for blessing.
"You've come on account of antique art, I understand?"
"Yes. Something I believe would interest you, sir."
"From what period is the relic?"
"The Three Kingdoms. Baekje and Silla."
At that, Jeon Hyeong-pil's eyes widened.
"Surely not. How could you have cultural treasures that old..."
What Kansong chiefly collected were relics of the Joseon and Goryeo eras. Pieces from the Three Kingdoms barely circulated at all, and what little had survived had been systematically looted by the Japanese. Almost nothing remained.
"Might I see them with my own eyes?"
Expectation and wariness showed on his face at once. It was only natural. In the course of buying countless treasures, he had met every variety of swindler there was.
"Not until spring, I'm afraid. They're still in the ground."
Jeon Hyeong-pil's expression soured. It was the face of a man who had already heard this speech from frauds beyond counting. Grown cold, he asked—and the tone of it said, plainly enough, let's hear what joke this latest swindler means to tell.
"So what is it you want from me?"
"Guests are coming from Harvard, and I'd like to show them the collection at the Kansong Art Museum."
What?
Jeon Hyeong-pil felt as if someone had struck him hard across the back of the head. A swindler of this sort—this was a first. He would reveal where Three Kingdoms relics lay buried, and in return he wanted a tour of the museum? For guests from Harvard, no less?
"See here. I'm not sure I follow what you're saying."
From the breast of his suit, Ki-jo drew two sheets of paper and set them before the bewildered Jeon Hyeong-pil. He spread them on the table and explained.
"This is the site of the tomb where King Muryeong of Baekje lies buried. The other is a Silla tomb. I can't say with certainty whose it is, but the grave goods and the murals ought to be preserved just as they were."
They were maps marking King Muryeong's Tomb and Cheonmachong.
Jeon Hyeong-pil studied them closely, then asked,
"You're telling me there are still unlooted tombs in Gongju, in South Chungcheong, and in Gyeongju, in North Gyeongsang?"
"That's right."
King Muryeong's Tomb would not be excavated until 1971, and the Songsan-ri tomb cluster that held it would not be designated a national historic site until 1963. For now it was unclaimed ground, nobody's land. Cheonmachong in Gyeongju, too, was known even to the locals as nothing more than a hill. No one paid it any mind.
Cheonmachong, discovered in 1973, would at least be excavated with care, its original form well preserved. King Muryeong's Tomb would be another matter: rushed through in a mere seventeen hours, it would go down as the worst excavation in the country's history. Not only the relics but the interior of the tomb itself would be left in complete ruin, and because no photographs of its original state were taken at the outset, accurate restoration would prove impossible.
Ki-jo thought it better to give Jeon Hyeong-pil the locations of both tombs and let the man excavate them himself. He was not someone who would pocket relics for his private use. He was more trustworthy than the state.
"And in exchange for telling me this... you want me to give foreign guests a tour of the museum?"
"Yes. That's right."
"Ha... ha ha..."
Kansong laughed as if he could scarcely believe his ears. It was not unlike the look on a baseball manager's face when a play unfolds too absurd to answer with anything but a laugh.
"Forgive me for saying so, but this is extraordinary. I've never met anyone like you."
Ki-jo understood. The man had never met a regressor.
"Please keep the maps I'm giving you. When the weather breaks and the ground thaws, put an excavation team together and dig."
For the moment, Jeon Hyeong-pil accepted the maps and set them carefully aside. The other man was asking for nothing of substance. At worst, he would come out even. A tour of the museum was something he granted to anyone who made a reservation.
"When might this foreign professor visit my museum?"
"In two days."
"Very well."
Curiosity stirred in him toward this Ki-jo, who seemed to want nothing further.
"If... if works of art should come pouring out of those two tombs, the ownership of them would..."
"All of it should be yours, sir."
"Well. It's kind of you to say so, but..."
Kansong was a man accustomed only to giving, and to paying his way through life. Something about the arrangement sat wrong with him.
"Is there nothing you want? If the old relics do come to light, I'd like to make some small return..."
This was the moment Ki-jo had been waiting for. His faith had been sound: Jeon Hyeong-pil was not a man who would take a gain for nothing.
"Please take this first."
From the paper bag he had brought, Ki-jo drew something out and offered it to him.
"What is this?"
"A record."
Jeon Hyeong-pil studied the wrapper and smiled faintly.
"You bought it at Hanyang Records."
He had. The shopkeeper's circumstances had looked so pitiful that Ki-jo had bought a record before leaving.
"Yes. I stopped by the shop on my way here and exchanged a few words with the owner."
"I see. He's a good man. Through the war he held fast to precious recordings and never let them go."
"Yes. He struck me as a man of real character."
"He is. You saw him truly. Ha ha."
When Kansong tried to hand the record back, Ki-jo would not take it.
"I don't have a record player at home. Please keep it."
"But why would you give me something like this..."
Kansong looked faintly at a loss. As expected, he was unused to receiving anything from anyone. He had been the richest man in Joseon, and his heart was generous; all his life he had only ever given. To that man, Ki-jo came to the point.
"Please make me one promise."
"Go on."
"If cultural treasures come out of the two tombs I've told you about, give me the Hanyang Records site."
"I beg your pardon?"
Kansong started, his brow creasing.
"Are you asking me to drive out the proprietor of Hanyang Records and sell you the land?"
Affection for the shop and its owner showed plainly in the words. Just as he himself had risked his life to protect cultural treasures through the Korean War, the proprietor had protected his records, and Kansong seemed to feel a kinship with him.
"That's not it."
"Then what are you saying?"
Ki-jo explained himself to the puzzled Jeon Hyeong-pil. What he wanted was to raise a model house of Cheongsan brick on the street in Jongno. On Jongno, the finest commercial thoroughfare in Seoul, he meant to put up that house and advertise the fine brick Cheongsan produced. People would walk freely into a two-story building of brick, take in a refined space, and listen to beautiful music. That was his strategy for publicity. Cheongsan brick was a luxury product, and he wanted a house built of luxury materials to catch the eyes of the rich.
Having heard him out, Jeon Hyeong-pil asked,
"So you mean to employ the proprietor of Hanyang Records yourself, and have him play music in the model house and receive the guests?"
"Yes. I'd hire him as caretaker of the building. And he'd share the music he loves with people."
The notion of a model house, which he was hearing for the first time in his life, struck Jeon Hyeong-pil as fresh. He knew Hanyang Records was failing, and out of love for the arts he had not even been collecting rent on the building. If Ki-jo meant to pay the man a salary and employ him, that might do the proprietor more good than anything else.
"Hm... What you want to build is a kind of museum of music. Like the art museum I built."
"You could see it that way. But I'm doing it to make money, so it's a little different from what you do, sir."
Ki-jo had said plainly what set him apart from Kansong.
"Do a good thing, and the money sometimes follows. If the relics only come out of those tombs, I'll gladly do as you ask."
They shook hands.
"The day after tomorrow, don't come here. Come to Bukdanjang."
Bukdanjang was his villa, standing just to the right of the Kansong Art Museum.
"I'll guide the foreign guests myself."
Ki-jo understood what that meant. He intended to open his first-rate holdings to them.
"Thank you."
He was satisfied to have won the trust of Jeon Hyeong-pil, Kansong. When the man dug in Gongju and Gyeongju in the spring, ruins would come up. Of that he was entirely certain, and coming forward with that confidence seemed to have done the work. Even Jeon Hyeong-pil, who had dealt with swindlers beyond number, must have sensed a mind with nothing hidden and nothing on its conscience to flinch from.
Just as Ki-jo was letting himself relax, Jeon Hyeong-pil asked,
"But why is a professor from Harvard coming to Korea?"
Damn it.
It was the question he had hoped would not be asked. He hesitated. Tell the truth? Or slide past it somehow? Strictly speaking, Paleolithic relics were Korean cultural property too. If Kansong learned that the professor had come to him so that those relics might be sold at a high price, wouldn't he be furious?
He had come to Kansong in part because he wanted a model house in Jongno, but his greater purpose had been to choose the Kansong Art Museum as the ground on which he would take the measure of Professor Mobius. He did not know what sort of man Mobius was, and if he meant to hold the upper hand in the negotiation, he needed to know. Can I lay all of this before Kansong?
He did not deliberate long.
"He's come to buy relics that are here in Korea."
"What did you say?"
Jeon Hyeong-pil started so violently he nearly sprang from his chair.
"Say that again. An American professor means to buy something in Korea and carry it away?"
During the Korean War, Kansong had staked his very life against the People's Army to protect cultural treasures. His anger was only natural.
As Kansong made to rise, Ki-jo caught the edge of his coat.
"Please hear me out to the end. These are cultural relics that ought, rather, to be sold abroad."
Ki-jo seized the arm with which Kansong shook free of his grip.
"They're relics our ancestors used some hundred thousand years ago. Paleolithic tools. A Harvard professor has to buy them and present them to the academic world. They'll be proof that the culture of this peninsula developed every bit as far as Europe's."
Having said it, he let go of Jeon Hyeong-pil's arm. Once the arm was free, the man's anger eased a little. The claim that Ki-jo meant to sell relics in order to make known the excellence of peninsular culture did not sit well with him, but he was willing, at least, to hear the details. If Lee Ki-jo had been a swindler, he would never have brought up selling relics at a moment like this.
"Master Kansong. Would you sit for just a moment?"
At the request, Kansong took his chair again. Ki-jo drew a breath, and then he explained what it was he meant to do.