The Gift - 4
"Soso? What on earth are you doing here?"
At Ha Soso's sudden appearance, Lim Hayeon wondered for a moment whether her eyes were deceiving her.
"I came to see you, unnie! And to do a little sightseeing in Wuhan while I was at it!"
"Then the least you could have done was send word that a guest was coming…"
She certainly was a guest one would be glad to see. Recalling Kang Yoonho's mischievous smile, Lim Hayeon let out a small sigh.
"Unnieeeee!"
In that cutesy cooing voice of hers, Ha Soso came bounding over, looped her arm through Hayeon's, and gazed up at her.
"Wh-why are you clinging to me like this?"
"Sooo — how far have things progressed with the branch manager?"
"Pr-progressed? Why would you even ask that?"
"Well! A man and a woman, all alone in a strange land with nowhere to turn. To overcome their ordeal, they head up to Wuhan together! And the moment their eyes meet, their hearts catch fire! It's a novel plot if I ever heard one!"
"N-nothing of the sort happened."
Any number of memories did flash through her mind at that instant, but Lim Hayeon could only deny it awkwardly.
"Oh, come on. Don't hold out on me — it's just us girls here. Who's going to tattle? This looks like the manager's own room, doesn't it? Don't tell me you two are sharing it?"
Ha Soso was not the sort to let such an awkward denial slide.
Pointing at the bed behind the privacy screen in the corner of the office, she asked with a sly grin far too wicked for her age.
"My room is the one next door."
"Haah. I was a fool to expect even that much from you, unnie."
A sigh heavy with disappointment spilled from Ha Soso's lips.
"Excuse me?"
"Oh, nothing. I just figured the two of you would both agree that unmarried men and women shouldn't share a room. So if that's out — have you at least, mmm, been alone together under the moon? Whispered a few sweet nothings back and forth?"
Cupping one hand deliberately over Lim Hayeon's ear, Soso chattered into it as though she were Kang Yoonho himself.
"W-well, I suppose?"
They had worked late together and watched the moon, and they had traded tender words before, too. Was that the sort of thing you called a lover's sweet nothings?
Assailed by a sudden rush of embarrassment, Lim Hayeon gave a vague, flustered affirmative.
"Kyaa! Then unnie's totally ridden the mood — moonlight, sweet whispers, and then a kiss on top of it all?!"
"N-none of that happened."
"Haah…"
An even frostier sigh than the last drifted out of Ha Soso's mouth.
"Don't just sigh at me like that!"
"It's nothing. Truly, this is just like you, unnie. All right, fine. Then at the very least — y-you have held hands, haven't you?"
Sharing a room was for lovers who were wed. Kisses were for lovers promised in marriage. Right. However stiff-necked those two might be, hands had to be a different matter. And if their feelings truly matched, surely they'd be sneaking the occasional hand-hold when they thought no one was watching. Hoping against hope, Soso put the question to Lim Hayeon.
"…"
Lim Hayeon quietly averted her gaze.
"U-unnie. Don't tell me…?"
Both hands clapped over her mouth, Ha Soso stared at her with eyes gone round as saucers.
"I-I have held his sleeve."
"What are you, five years old?!"
The shriek bursting from the depths of Ha Soso's lungs rang through the room.
"Soso, that isn't what this is about."
"Not about what?! Two people, all alone in a strange land, moving up to the capital together — of course they touch hands! Lean in close! Lips going mwah mwah, smooooch! And from there they end up sharing a bed! THAT is how it's supposed to go!"
"Soso, when did you become so aggressive?"
"I'm not the aggressive one — I'm trying to make YOU aggressive! Waaah! Honestly!"
Frustrated to her very core, Soso pressed a hand to her burning forehead.
"…"
Seeing her like that, Lim Hayeon felt a needless twinge of guilt and could not bring herself to say a word.
"If I'd known it would come to this, I'd have come along."
Watching her two maddeningly slow lovebirds, Ha Soso screamed in perfect silence. And to think she called herself a Romance Expert. Who knew progress could stall this badly from her absence alone?
She would have to administer some intensive training, and quickly. Soso fixed Lim Hayeon with a gaze that burned with resolve.
To be fair, minding other people's love affairs was already her hobby — especially meddling with couples who seemed destined to work out — but this time there was no mistaking her reason to interfere.
"Huh…? Unnie, is something weighing on you?"
Just as Soso steeled herself to launch into a grand lecture, she caught the look on Lim Hayeon's face — heavy with worry.
"It's… it's nothing at all."
Mouth opening and closing as though words were caught behind her teeth, Lim Hayeon hesitated, then shut it entirely.
"Tell me. If not to me, then who else in the world would listen?"
Could she really say it? This was the one little sister she had whom she could bare her heart to about man trouble. After a long while of agonizing, Lim Hayeon at last began to unburden her greatest worry.
"…The truth is."
"The youngest daughter of the Jegal Clan had a matchmaking meeting with Manager Kang?! Unnie, tell me you're joking!"
At the utterly unimaginable news, Ha Soso could not keep her eyes or her mouth shut.
"…It's the truth."
"And you just left him there at the shop?! You should have cried! Thrown a fit! Or better yet, swept Manager Kang right off his feet and onto the bed!"
"Why do you keep telling me to shove him onto a bed?!"
"Unnie, think! Does Manager Kang look like the sort of irresponsible man who would throw over his own woman?"
"He doesn't. When it comes to his own people, he's the kind of man who smiles and carries the burden, no matter how heavy it grows."
"Ugh, exactly! If you knew that, you should have stamped your claim right there in his bed! You're marrying him either way! The man is drowning in a sense of responsibility — enough to turn down a match with the Jegal Clan, or the Sima Clan for that matter!"
"I can't do that. Things like that."
Her shoulders sagging, Lim Hayeon summoned a bitter smile.
"You're worried about means and methods at a time like—… Unnie?"
"There is a reason it can never happen."
She was a runaway courtesan. And Lim Hayeon was a woman who knew her own market value better than anyone alive.
For a courtesan, the raising of her hair — the ceremony marking her first night — could be paid for only once in her lifetime. And if a man took it without ever paying its price?
The runaway courtesan herself might suffer a horrific fate, yet she could still save her life. A man could never.
Lim Hayeon had seen with her own eyes and heard with her own ears precisely what became of men who took a runaway courtesan into their arms.
"That's right! Come to think of it, winning by body-assault is as good as admitting defeat! A man has to be won through love — how could anyone conquer him with a body?!"
Though she hadn't grasped the precise situation, Ha Soso pivoted with impressive speed and did her best to comfort Lim Hayeon.
"…"
Deeply, wordlessly grateful for the girl's tact, Lim Hayeon smiled until the corners of her eyes crinkled.
After mulling it over for a while longer, Soso clenched her fist and declared:
"Since I've come all the way to Wuhan anyway, I'll put my talents to work for your sake, unnie!"
"Put your talents to work how?"
"Know your enemy, know yourself, and you need never fear a hundred battles! I'm going to go meet her."
"Meet who?"
"A young lady called Jegal Hyang."
"WHAAAT?"
"I'm heading over to the Daseogak branch right this instant for a little reconnaissance!"
"Ah — Young Master Kang has arrived."
The entrance to the market district. When I reached the appointed place, the people of Mangeum Hall were already there, waiting for me.
"Good day. It seems I've kept the people of Mangeum Hall waiting. Strange — this is our first meeting, and yet your face looks oddly familiar to me."
I greeted first the young man who had been quickest to recognize me. He seemed to be the head of the group. But that oddly familiar face, though…
"Hahaha. I take it you've met my father, the Chief Steward of Mangeum Hall. I am Jeon Un-yeop, his son."
Was it simply because he was the Chief Steward's son?
He looked just like a friend of mine from another life — a man of legendary madness who would clock out at four in the morning only to stroll back into the office that same day, cheerfully coding away. If he'd just thrown on a plaid T-shirt, he'd have been perfect.
He'd sworn up and down he would change jobs the moment that project ended. I did hope he was doing well, wherever he was now.
"A pleasure to meet you. By the way — where has Lady Jegal Hyang gone?"
I craned my head this way and that, searching for the most important person of the day.
Don't tell me she's hidden herself inside some box.
"Well, you see…"
"Ahem!"
At my question, the Mangeum Hall people around us traded awkward coughs and pained looks.
"Hm?"
Something had happened. When I fixed Jeon Un-yeop with a puzzled stare, he began his answer with a visibly troubled expression.
"The young lady had been waiting with us this entire time. But when the eyes of the crowd turned upon her all at once, she said the room began to spin…"
"Ah…"
I could picture it in an instant.
What happens when a beauty of Lady Jegal Hyang's caliber plants herself in the very heart of a market street packed with people?
A veritable storm of attention comes pouring down on her, that's what. And with her nonexistent conversational ability, a young lady who struggled merely to be around other people would have melted like a slug under a scattering of salt.
"We urged her to go inside instead, but she insisted she wished to enter together with you, Young Master Kang, and her condition only worsened and worsened…"
"Haha."
"She has hurried off to see a physician, so it will likely be some time before she returns."
"Then shall we arrange to wait for Lady Jegal Hyang somewhere else?"
"There is no need. The young lady said she would return to the Daseogak branch herself, so please head into Daseogak first."
I nodded, and, guided along by the Mangeum Hall people, set off for the Daseogak branch I had been awaiting with such anticipation.
"This is the Daseogak Wuhan branch."
"Whoa…"
The moment I stepped inside — the building was visibly larger than the Yichang Daseogak even at a glance — what greeted me was a bookstore dressed from floor to ceiling in the most sumptuous of finishes.
From the outside, at least, I hadn't thought it so very different from our Daseogak. The interior, though, was a different world altogether.
The Yichang Daseogak, back in the day, had been built with too little money and the impossible demand that a single building serve as both bookstore and café — a scrape-by renovation held to the cheapest unit price at every turn.
The Wuhan branch, by contrast, was so lavish I had to wonder whether this much money was even permitted to flow into a bookstore. Luxury seeped from every last shelf.
"The shelves, tables, and display stands are all wrought from sturdy premium hardwood, so that they will not easily wear even under the hands of countless customers. As for the collection, we plan to stock it primarily with the most popular titles of the day."
Casting a sidelong glance at my open admiration, Jeon Un-yeop launched into his explanation of the first floor.
"The gaps between these display tables are awfully wide, though. I'll grant the layout its due — wherever a customer turns, a title catches the eye."
Having barely wrestled my hanging jaw shut, I pointed out the one thing that fell short.
"It is not yet fully complete. When Lady Jegal Hyang arrives, please look over the premises together with her, and should you name any revisions, we will change whatever you wish."
So this was the defect-repair period they give buyers of brand-new homes? If I'd known, I'd have brought a punch list.
For a while I simply stood there, staring blankly around the first floor.
A grand bookstore in the very heart of Wuhan's busiest district. Just how much coin would it take to buy such a building and finish it like this?
"With the revenue this place brings in, the trial would be over in no time…"
"Young Master Kang."
As I murmured in fresh wonder, Jeon Un-yeop quietly drew near.
"Is something the matter?"
"It may be presumptuous of me, but might I offer you one small word of advice?"
Un-yeop spoke with his back bowed in the utmost caution.
"Presumptuous? There's nothing of the sort. Please, speak."
At my assent, Jeon Un-yeop composed his face into the gravity of a retainer bracing for his head to be cut off, and began.
"I would ask that you not forget — the Wuhan branch is a gift that the Mangeum Lord has bestowed upon Lady Jegal Hyang."
So that was it: since it isn't mine, mind the line.
"As for the division of revenue, the Mangeum Lord has instructed that it be discussed and decided with the young lady."
Ugh. She's going to eat my money alive.
"I myself have no intention of quibbling over that point any further. But I do believe, Young Master Kang, that you ought to consider, at least once, exactly what it is you are going through at this moment."
Put plainly: one wrong step and I could fall from the Mangeum Lord's favor. Then why would he go out of his way to warn me?
"Did the Mangeum Lord pass you some private word?"
"He did not."
"Then why say such a thing to me at all?"
"It is only natural for a sailor to worry for his ship, is it not?"
Jeon Un-yeop said this, watching me with eyes that glimmered with something like expectation.
"I'm sorry?"
A sailor — as in a member of a crew? What was the man talking about?
"Haha. The Mangeum Lord holds great expectations of you, Young Master Kang. As one of the household that serves him, I merely pass this along in good faith."
Waving his hand as though it were nothing at all, Un-yeop smiled.
So this was a crewman's advice — offered so that a fresh passenger like me might not catch the eye of the captain called the Mangeum Lord in the wrong way.
His words and his face showed no malice, at least. If anything, his concern was plain to see.
"Then I had best not let blinding greed for money run away with me."
Even I was suffering through the Lord's little game over money I had yet to lay eyes on — heaven only knew what it was like for the man who had served him all his life. I resolved to take the advice as gladly as it was given.
"Just so. As long as you take your portion reasonably, he will make nothing of it. Do not let small money shake you into losing a great opportunity."
So as long as I refrained from, say, strong-arming Lady Jegal Hyang to pocket every last coin of the profits, I could clear this trial without incident.
Good. If that was the case, this was actually welcome news.
Reasonably.
Within whatever bounds kept the Mangeum Lord's brow smooth.
In other words — take the Daseogak branch's profits and all would be well. Wasn't that precisely what he was telling me?
"You needn't worry so much on my account. Truth be told, I was already planning to take it — reasonably, of course."
"…Pardon?"
After all, that part I had already prepared.