Part 7 (1/2)

The old man was quite a character. He had shown considerable devotion to the missionary and his family, but Mr. Reid, with all his efforts in Mr.

Ko's behalf, had never been able to get the old man further than the admission that the Jesus doctrine was a very fair sort of doctrine and, if he only had the time, he would give himself over to the practice of it.

Now the old man was delighted at seeing the missionary and his children again. They must spend some time with him, he declared. Everything had been prepared for them. He had even secured a cook who could give them the food as they liked it. Oh, this was a wonderful man, indeed. Only yesterday he had come. ”The good spirits sent him,” a.s.serted Mr. Ko, ”I am certain they did.”

Nothing would do the old man but that Helen, at least, must have a glimpse of this wonderful cook the moment she reached the dwelling.

”There he is,” said Mr. Ko, with the delight of a child, pointing through an opening into the kitchen.

A tall figure was bending over the _ang-pak_, or great rice jar. At sound of Mr. Ko's voice he raised his head and glanced around. It was the stowaway of the sampan.

CHAPTER VII

AN ENTREATY

Helen uttered an exclamation, then moved toward Mr. Ko. He read the expression of her face quickly.

”You know him?” he asked.

”I do not know him, but I have seen him. He was on the sampan with us after we left Han-Kang.”

”Why, he did not tell me that! He only said that he had seen the honorable teacher and that he was coming. But no matter,” continued Mr.

Ko, and looking encouragingly toward the man. ”He did not tell me because he had some reason not to. It is all right,” he added cheerfully. ”You may go on with the cooking.”

”I know him,” he said, turning again to Helen. ”He was my neighbor in Seoul two years ago. He is a good sort of fellow, only there seems to be something on his mind. I don't understand that. Never did.”

A deep perplexity now came to Helen. She could not decide whether or not to let the others know of the presence of the man at Mr. Ko's. She finally reached the decision to tell her father and Clarence and maybe Dorothy. There was, perhaps, after all, nothing wrong about the man. He had really done nothing to arouse their suspicions, only remained silent and sullen when he was questioned. She knew that her father believed that he had merely been stealing a ride. The only mysterious thing about him at present was his having so swiftly preceded them to Mr. Ko's. She afterward learned that he had fallen in with another sampan almost as soon as he had left them, and had worked his way up the river. While they lingered at the villages he had traveled.

Though Mr. Ko had adopted some of the ways of civilization, he still ate very much after the Korean fas.h.i.+on. Thus when they sat down to supper it was at little round tables not more than a foot or a foot and a half high. Instead of cloths, they were covered with sheets of glazed paper.

Rice was the princ.i.p.al diet. It was set in an earthenware bowl near the center of each table. In addition there was a soup of beef and onions thickened with barley, a batter bread made of flour and oil and a slight sprinkling of sugar, chicken curry, eggs, and rice fritters. Mr. Ko also had tea, a rarity for the rural districts of Korea.

As Mr. Ko, Mr. Kit-ze, and Mr. Chefoo ate, they made a great noise with their mouths. This was done to show their appreciation of the viands, for in Korea, the greater the noise made while eating, the more forcefully defined is the compliment to the food.

Mr. Ko's house was much better than that of the average farmer. It was built of poles, mud-daubed, but the walls of the princ.i.p.al rooms were covered with paper. There were little windows of thick glazed paper while the doors were set in frames of light bamboo. The sleeping arrangements consisted princ.i.p.ally of mats with blocks of wood for pillows. In the winter the beds were made over the brick flues that ran through the rooms connected with the great oven where the baking was done. Thus, in winter, to sleep in a Korean house means to roast and freeze by turns, for while the fire is kept up it is hot indeed, and when it is allowed to go out then ”cold as a stone” gives the literal condition of a brick bed.

The house stood in a grove of mulberries, for to his other pursuits Mr.

Ko added that of silkworm raising. There were clumps too, of the walnut and persimmon, with vines of the white and yellow clematis tangled amid their branches. Here the birds built, and here they poured forth their morning songs or chattered to their mates as they were going to bed at night. In front were the fields of wheat and barley, and farther down, in the very heart of the valley, the crops of rice. As it was near the end of April, the barley was already in ear and beginning to take on its russet coloring.

Mr. Ko, being an old bachelor, there were only men about the house. He had a saying with reference to which Clarence teased Helen and Dorothy rather unmercifully. It was to the effect that where there were women there was sure to be trouble.

”Oh, but Mr. Ko likes girls!” a.s.serted Helen. ”You can't make me believe otherwise, Master Clarence. He and I have been too long good friends.”

”What was that I heard him say last night?” asked Dorothy, a mischievous light in her eyes, ”about sons and how they were like dragon's teeth in the sides of their parents?”

Clarence looked rather sheepish at this quick turning of the tables on himself, and in a moment or so dexterously changed the conversation.

On the following day, which was the Sabbath, two services were held in Mr. Ko's mulberry grove. At the first not many were present, but by afternoon scores had flocked to the place from the neighboring farms and from the village. Curiosity was plainly depicted on all the faces, but as Mr. Reid proceeded, it changed to eager attention on the part of several. Mr. Chefoo made a good interpreter. He was both careful and earnest. Already the sweet, simple truths the missionary taught were beginning to make their appeal to his own heart. It was the old story of Jesus and his sweet ministrations to men, his sympathy for them, his understanding of their needs, the great, warm, deep love that took in all, even the poorest and humblest.

”And this Jesus is the same now as then,” continued the missionary. ”He is waiting to enter each heart and to possess it, to have our lives drawn nearer to his own, to bestow upon us the sweet knowledge of that companions.h.i.+p with him that may be ours through all the way.”