The bounty was posted, but still Chu hadn’t been caught. More rumors sprang up, swirling through the air like falling leaves and disappearing underfoot. Old Raccoon refused to join the hunt. He stayed in his study all day, reading his encyclopedias. So Reseng did nothing, either. The thought of going up against a man like Chu was too much. He had recurring nightmares of running into him. It was always a narrow dead-end street, Reseng trembling at one end and Chu, the brutal assassin, blocking his escape at the other. Reseng knew he was no match for Chu—not in his dreams or in his waking life. The only way someone like him could ever defeat Chu would be by chucking a dagger at him from behind, like the idiot prince Paris.
That summer the rain was incessant. People joked that the monsoonal front had hunkered down right in the middle of the peninsula and was going on a bender. As with any slack season, Reseng passed the time by starting his mornings with a can of beer, listening to music, staring out the window, and playing with Desk and Lampshade. When the cats fell asleep, their heads resting on each other’s bodies, Reseng lay down in bed to read. Books about the rise and fall of the Roman Empire, books about the once-powerful descendants of Genghis Khan who’d roamed freely over the steppes but went into a sudden rapid decline when they settled behind fortress walls, and books about the history of coffee, syphilis, typewriters. When he grew bored of thumbing through pages dampened by the humid air, he tossed the book to the other side of the bed, knocked back another can of beer, and fell asleep. Just another ordinary summer.
On the last day of September, during a heavy rainfall, there was a knock on Reseng’s door. When he opened it, Chu was standing there, drenched. He was so tall that the beads of water dripping off the brim of his cap seemed to hang in the air for a long time. He had a large camping backpack, a rolled-up sleeping bag, and a shopping bag filled with beer and whiskey.
“Having a drink with you was next on my bucket list,” Chu said.
“Come on in.”
Chu stepped through the door, shedding drops of rain and startling Desk and Lampshade, who scrambled to the very top of their cat tower and huddled inside. Chu had lost a lot of weight. Lanky to begin with, he was now just skin and bone.
Reseng offered him two hand towels. Chu took off his cap and set his backpack on the floor. He dried his face and hair and brushed the water from his leather jacket.
“No money for an umbrella?” Reseng asked.
“Accidentally left mine on the subway. Didn’t want to waste money on another.”
“Since when do dead men worry about money?”
“Good point,” Chu said with a light laugh. “Dead man or not, I still don’t want to waste money on an umbrella.”
“You want a change of clothes?”
“No, I’m fine. I’ll dry off soon enough. Besides, I doubt your clothes would fit me. You’re too short.”
“I’m average. You’re just tall.”
Reseng took out a space heater and put on a pot of coffee. Chu turned on the heater and warmed his hands over it. The cats, unable to resist their curiosity, poked their heads out to inspect Chu. He wiggled his fingers at them. The cats seemed intrigued but didn’t leave the tower.
“They won’t play with me.” Chu looked disappointed.
“I told them never to play with bad guys.”
Reseng handed Chu a cup of coffee. Chu gulped it down. Then he put the damp towels on the floor and shivered. Reseng refilled the cup.
“How much is my bounty?” Chu asked.
“Hundred million.”
“You could buy a Benz with that. Hey, I’m gifting you a Benz.”
Reseng snorted. “What an honor. If I kill you, I get cash and glory. For taking down the world’s greatest assassin.”
“Who cares about glory? Cash is all that matters.”
“Why not die quietly on your own terms?”
Chu paused briefly in the middle of emptying the shopping bag. “What’s the point? It’s easy money; you should take it. Besides, I never did anything nice for you.”
“That’s true,” Reseng said. “You never did.”
Chu looked disappointed. “But I paid for more meals than you.”
“Did you? How come I don’t remember any of those meals?”
“So unfair.”
Reseng got ice cubes, whiskey glasses, and some beef jerky from the kitchen while Chu placed the bottles on the table. There were two six-packs of Heineken, two bottles of Jack Daniel’s, a fifth of Johnnie Walker Blue, and five bottles of soju.
“That’s an odd combo. You drinking all of that?”
“It’s my first drink since going on the run.”
Chu lined the cans and bottles up neatly.
“If I were you, I would’ve gotten drunk every day. Must get boring having to stay hidden.”
Chu smiled. He filled a whiskey glass with Jack Daniel’s and knocked it back. His large Adam’s apple bobbed up and down with each swallow.
“Oh yeah, it’s been too long,” he said, wiping his lips. He looked like he had just reunited with an old friend.
He added two ice cubes to his glass and filled it halfway, then stared at the ice for the longest time before smiling mysteriously.
“I was too scared to drink,” he said, his thick eyebrows quivering.
“I didn’t know guys like you got scared,” Reseng said as he opened a Heineken.
“It’s a dumb move to get drunk without someone to watch your back.”
Chu emptied the glass and chewed on an ice cube. The sound of the ice grinding and cracking between his teeth put Reseng’s nerves on edge. Suddenly, Chu shoved the glass into Reseng’s hand. Reseng hurriedly set down his Heineken. Chu filled the glass two-thirds full with Jack Daniel’s and added two more ice cubes. The alcohol sloshed as he tossed the ice in.
“Drink up,” Chu said, gazing at him. “Jack is a real man’s drink.”
Chu’s commanding tone got on Reseng’s nerves.
“Alcohol companies made that up to sell alcohol to fake men like you.”
Chu didn’t laugh at the joke. Instead, he kept staring at Reseng as if he wanted him to hurry up and drink. Reseng stared down at the glass. It was a lot of alcohol to swallow in one shot. He fished the ice cubes out and dumped them on the tray. Then he gulped the whiskey down.
Chu looked satisfied. He stood up, looked around the room, and went over to the cat tower. Timid Lampshade went back inside and refused to come out, but curious Desk tiptoed closer to Chu and sniffed at his hand. Chu gave the cat a scratch behind the ears. Desk seemed to like it; she lowered her head and purred.
Chu played with the cat for a while before coming back to the table, picking up his glass, and sitting on the edge of the bed. He flipped through the books strewn around on the bedspread.
“Did you know I didn’t like you at first? Every time I went to Old Raccoon’s library, you were reading. That annoyed me. I’m not sure why. Maybe I was jealous. You seemed different from the rest of us.”
“I never read. I was only pretending to when you were there. So I’d look different.”
“Well, you did. You looked—how should I put it? Kind of soft.”
“You were in the library a lot, too. I bet you read as much as I did.”
“I hated reading. But I bet even I could handle this