The Thirty-Million-Dollar Man
"A fountain pen? Just go buy one at Montblanc."
"At this hour?"
Ah. Maybe it was too late after all. Then again, our contract specialist—and I use the term loosely—was still in the air, flying in from Germany. The detailed paperwork could wait until Jo Sudeok was back.
"Do you have a place to stay?"
"Oxford arranged something, but..."
"Pack your things and come over. I'll book you into a suite instead."
"Why... why are you being so good to me?"
Song Suhee had been asked something very much like that, the day she bought a student's painting. She had given a truly splendid answer. I wondered what mine would sound like.
"I'm not a philanthropist."
"...?"
"I'm certain you'll make me a great deal of money. I'm only treating you the way that certainty deserves."
"You think I'll make you a fortune?"
I nodded. And nodded again.
"Take your time with the work. A perfectionist on the order of da Vinci needs time—plenty of it."
"I don't know about the rest of it, but... you seem to know exactly how to move a person's heart."
"I may not look it, but I've been out in the world quite a bit."
On that light little joke, I held out my hand, as if we were signing something. We seized each other's hands and held on, hard.
Boston Airport. The next day, I went to meet Jo Sudeok.
He came through the gate looking thoroughly pleased with himself. You know the look—an Olympic gold medalist coming home. No flowers around his neck, and still the face of a man who had the whole world in his fist.
"Jo Sudeok, the thirty-million-dollar man, reporting for duty."
"Aren't you a little too satisfied with your own results?"
"Of course I am. How could I not be?"
He had more to say. I could feel it. Jo Sudeok took one step closer, wearing that slick, knowing smile.
"Hear this next part and you'll jump."
"There it is. I knew there was more."
"No, listen! I'd just hung up with you and was about to sign with Schulz when, like something out of a movie, Gaudi showed up at the hotel. Schulz had been digging in—one last negotiation, all of that—and he went tense on the spot. So I said exactly one thing to his executive."
"What did you say?"
"That I'm not some lightweight who starts wobbling the second another offer walks in. I'd sign for the figure we'd already discussed. But there was one thing I'd forgotten to confirm."
"...?"
"That thirty million we mentioned—that's after tax, of course? Naturally Schulz would be covering the taxes."
Ha! Not a knife on him, and still a highwayman through and through. And people think I like this man for no reason.
"What did they say to that?"
"What do you think? He went white on the spot. Then he asked if he might step out and make a single phone call. The number had jumped, so he needed headquarters to sign off."
I snorted.
"While he was on the phone, I was talking with Gaudi's side. I barely said a word, but Schulz must have gotten nervous. He came running back and shoved the contract at me. Thirty million after tax, he said. Naturally."
A big dog, fetching the ball its master had thrown and trotting proudly back. Jo Sudeok looked at me exactly like a golden retriever waiting to be praised.
"At this point, the Germany trip was a roaring success, wouldn't you say?"
Instead of answering, I put my thumb up.
"Aigoo! Now I can finally sleep with my legs stretched out—no! You told me to put an appraisal team together, so I won't even get to shake the jet lag. I'll be running until my feet sweat."
He was fishing, slick as ever. Oh, come on. Why was he like this?
"I thought it might wear you out, Professor, so I already put the appraisal team together."
"You did it yourself, Boss?"
"There's a sharp young man on the Oxford appraisal panel. Top of his class in physics at MIT, I hear."
"A physics student? What on earth is he doing on an appraisal team?"
"I know. But from where you're standing, less work is a good thing, isn't it?"
"A good thing? Hardly. I grumble, sure, but I'm a work addict. Give me a rest and I start itching, just waiting for the phone. I was thinking it was about time you handed me something..."
Heh. There was truly no winning against him with words.
"Boss, what's the schedule from here?"
"We'll have to send the painting to Germany, won't we?"
"Oh, I can take care of that myself. I mean besides that. Don't you have any plans of your own?"
What was he angling to say? Jo Sudeok, who had been waiting on my answer, let it out as if it had only just occurred to him.
"You've had a hard run of it. A little shopping would be just the thing."
"Shopping?"
"You've come into a lump sum, and you could stand to let the tension out. Go spend some money. I brought back a down payment of no less than ten million dollars."
Ten million dollars. The kid who had lived in a basement apartment and worked shifts in a school cafeteria had made ten million dollars. I scratched at my head. Honestly, it didn't feel real. Maybe if I went out and shopped as freely as Jo Sudeok was urging, it would finally sink in.
"You've been running flat out. There has to be a moment to catch your breath."
A moment to rest? True enough. I had been running without a stop.
"Then change some of it into dollars for me."
"How much should I give you?"
"About a hundred thousand."
"What?"
"You told me to go shopping."
"What on earth are you planning to buy... a-a house?"
I went looking for an electronics shop with a graduate student along to interpret. The 1980s were the years when audio equipment swept through American homes, a time when legendary machines still changed hands at prices that were, relatively speaking, cheap. Question mark very much included.
In my previous life I had been obsessed with speakers. Obsessed, and I had never once bought a proper one. Money was part of it. The rest was the multi-family house I lived in, where nothing was soundproofed, so music always came through earphones. Tch. The greed had been there all the same, and I had devoured audio magazines, memorizing things I could never afford until I could recite them in my sleep: JBL, Focal, Tannoy, B&W, Wilson Benesch, Bang & Olufsen, and on and on. So when I saw my older brother Park Yugeon's room, I had been a little startled. A chaebol household, and the audio system was that ordinary?
I was sunk in thoughts of that sort when the graduate student spoke.
"This is the place."
I looked up. A sign in flowing script hung over the door.
The word was set large enough that there was no mistaking it. An audio shop.
"They only handle high-priced goods, apparently. A high-fidelity store. The biggest in the area, they say..."
What explanation did I need?
"Shall we go in?"
We walked in. As befitted a shop of that class, a clerk came all the way to the entrance and opened the door for us. The place had to be ten thousand square feet at least. Whoa. It really was enormous.
I was still glancing around when a middle-aged man came toward us.
"Is there something you're looking for?"
"Just looking."
"We lead with JBL, but we carry a full range of other brands as well."
Hmm. A kid and a graduate student walk in together, and ordinarily you speak to the young man. This fellow had his eyes fixed entirely on me. The look of a man who knew exactly where the money was. Right. Not just anyone could run a shop.
"If there's anything you'd like to know, call me anytime."
He bowed and was gone. I took my time looking around.
"Oh!"
McIntosh. Not the computer Steve Jobs made—the brand that built amplifiers. But this was the eighties, and even the expensive ones could be had for around ten thousand dollars. There's a hundred thousand in this bag alone, and a McIntosh is ten thousand? That meant I could buy ten of them. I was going to get dizzy. My legs had started to shake.
I turned my head, and there were the other two of the amp world's big three: Mark Levinson and Goldmund. Mark Levinson, if you assumed installments, was a height an ordinary person could at least dream of scraping toward. Goldmund was another matter. It blew through six figures without blinking, a brand you didn't even dare look at. And now I could take one home for a mere thirty thousand? Not quite. Thirty thousand for the amp alone. Add speakers and a turntable, and I'd be cracking fifty at a minimum. Maybe I should have pulled out a cool three hundred thousand.
No. Say it plain: I had been born into a chaebol house. On top of that, I had just brought in thirty million after tax. Compromising on a budget for mere audio—did that even make sense? Value for money is finished in this life. From here on, nothing but the high end. If I run short, I'll just come back for more.
The moment I settled it, strength went into my shoulders. The amp is Goldmund.
I headed straight for the speaker room. Supreme masterpieces that had been discontinued in my previous life, pieces I had never been able to see, waited for my choosing in brand-new condition. That one was Tannoy's Autograph. The magazines always called it a crate, and it certainly was huge. If I wanted a machine with presence, this model would do. I'll put a pin in it for now.
I turned my head, cheerful, and in that instant—
"Oh!"
I couldn't help the cry. Spread out before my eyes was the masterpiece that had stood for JBL in the 1960s: the Paragon.
A good ten feet across. Massive, and yet it settled easily into the room around it, with a design as stately as Nordic furniture. The legendary speaker they supplied to the White House. This was not, in any real sense, a model made to be sold. It was a machine built with every intention of showing off what JBL could do. In my previous life, simply possessing one intact had been boast enough.
I called the manager at once.
"Could I hear this one?"
"The Paragon?"
"Yes."
"An excellent choice. Which amp shall I connect?"
"The Goldmund."
"A dream pairing."
He soon had an LP turning. "I've prepared a large orchestra, so the sense of space comes through."
"Tchaikovsky."
"You know your music. As expected."
I had no room left to answer. I fell straight into it. As the music went on, the instruments began to take their places in my head, one by one. The sense of space was simply overwhelming. Exaggerate a little, and it felt as if a vast concert hall had opened around me. Bliss.
When I came back to myself, more than thirty minutes of music had played all the way through to the end. Good God. So much for a quick listen. Startled, I was about to look for the manager when I noticed them. Huh? A group of people stood behind me—customers who had stopped where they were, overwhelmed by the sound. One of them even asked the price of the Paragon and the Goldmund. Of course, the moment he heard the answer, he turned right around.
I looked back at the system. A miracle that turned a single room into a concert hall. Money... was worth earning after all.