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Chapter 24: The Witness

"You can probably tell from my accent, Ms. Yoon, that I am originally from the North."

Se-ri and Man-bok are sitting on two stumps of wood next to the side of the road, their bodies facing towards the scene of Mu-hyeok's car crash. Man-bok's face is lit white under the glow of the streetlight, which flickers every now and then, bringing his face in and out of focus as if he's some sort of apparition. His accent is slightly strange; Se-ri had noticed that immediately. But only when he tells her does she understand that he's from North Korea.

"You came this far south?" Se-ri asks. "I thought most defectors stayed in Seoul."

Man-bok nods. "I wanted to be as far away from my old life as possible. In the North, I used to live in a small military village at the border. I was an eavesdropper - a rat, the villagers called me. I would listen to the bugs planted in people's homes. When I heard something suspicious, I would rat them out to the authorities. I knew peoples' desires, their strengths, their weaknesses. I had to report them all. I would hear men read stories to their children at night, and then their screams as they were taken away the next morning." Man-bok shudders, a seemingly involuntary reaction. "But I could have endured it, if it hadn't been for U-pil. My son."

A ghost of a smile flits tentatively across his pale face at the mention of his child.

"Even from a very young age, U-pil was the smartest boy in his school," Man-bok says. "He was probably smarter than any child in Pyongyang, too. His teachers were stunned. They told my wife and I that he was a prodigy. A prodigy is a child who is unnaturally advanced for his age." Man-bok's smile grows broader, his bent chest straightening with pride. But then a glimmer of sadness flickers across his features.

"The things we won't do for ourselves, we'll do for our children," he says softly. "My mother was sent to the work camps - they said she had crossed the border to make some extra money in her business. It doesn't matter if it was true or not, it doesn't matter in the North. She knew she wouldn't make it. Before they took her away, she made us promise to leave, to try to make life better for U-pil. It took several years of careful planning, and all our savings, but ultimately, we were able to come here." He gulps and looks nervously at Se-ri.

"I have proof that I lived in the North. I'm prepared to give it to you, Ms. Yoon, if you need to verify what I'm saying is true."

"Why would I need proof?" asks Se-ri, gently.

Man-bok's eyes flit around them, as if searching for figures in the darkness that only he can see.

"Because Ri Mu-hyeok enters this story now."

"I met Ri Mu-hyeok at the Hanawon re-education centre, shortly after defecting. He would volunteer there on the weekends. Sometimes, defectors from North Korea are treated as second class citizens here. People avoid contact with us, because they think we are from a poor country and we are all brainwashed to worship the Supreme Leader. But...Mu Hyeok wasn't like that. He said his grandfather had been a defector, and he wanted to make sure we were treated better than him. He helped me a lot. He would speak to me for hours about what life was like in South Korea - how to run a good business, how to find good schools, and he would bring toys and play with U-pil. He told me that U-pil was a smart boy, and he could make something of himself here someday." Man-bok smiles again, and then his lips tremble.

"Mu-hyeok helped us set up a small restaurant in Jeju after we left Hanawon. He was going to buy us a building, an investment, he called it, but I only accepted enough money for the small building you saw earlier, and made him take rent from us each month. We sold cold beer, soju, and homemade snacks." Man-bok points at where the sandy road turns in the distance. "Where we just came from."