Once it seemed safe enough, I inched closer, then peered through the crack in the door, drawn to look inside by the sound of solemn voices.
I shouldn’t be here, I thought, but curiosity anchored me to the spot, as did the question: Was Lady O’s death related to the other murders? Had heresy from the West killed her too?
“The crown and the left side of the head look normal,” Damo Hyeyeon observed aloud, speaking to the men, who stood with their backs turned. She was their eyes, the only method they possessed to examine the naked victim. “There is an old scar a little behind the right side of the head, beanlike in shape…”
Hyeyeon explained every detail, however trivial, and the men trusted her observations. Unlike me, Hyeyeon and the other damos were educated girls, possessing vast medical knowledge and skills. Rigorously trained to become palace nurses, but having failed to achieve good grades, they had been demoted to the position of damo and would remain in this low position until they successfully passed the medical exam.
A harsh punishment indeed for bad grades.
But if Hyeyeon ever thought this unfair, not a ripple of irritation ever disturbed the surface of her countenance. Her cheeks hadn’t even flushed with anger when Kyŏn called her “a pretty face ruined by too-big ears.” At eighteen, she had the grace and maturity of those highly respected palace nurses who served the queen herself.
“There is a single knife wound across the throat, with no hesitation marks.” So calm was her voice, always so calm. “The nose has been cut off with a blade.” With a ruler, she measured along the wounds and offered the lacerations’ depths and widths in the measurements of ch’on and p’un.
“The knife wound was deep enough to be fatal,” the coroner’s assistant murmured.
“Based on the condition of the victim, and other factors like the rain and the late summer’s heat,” Hyeyeon explained, “Lady O’s death occurred around midnight. By morning, she would have been dead for several hours already.”
“Hmm. Then the murder occurred during the curfew hours,” the coroner’s assistant remarked, referring to the period that began an hour before midnight and ended at dawn. “Watchmen would have been patrolling nearby, yet the killer took the time to cut off her nose. Why do you think he did this, sir?”
He turned to a gigantic man standing in the room, who wore a wide-brimmed police hat that cast a deep shadow over his eyes. Only his long purple scar was visible, rippling down his red cheek, inflamed by a rash. It was Commander Yi.
“The murder was surely committed by someone with a deep grudge,” the commander said. “Let me see what it was she was clutching.”
My brows crinkled. What? She had been clutching something? I only remembered her fist, but had not looked closely.
A clerk presented Commander Yi with a wooden tray. A string the length of a man’s arm lay coiled there. As he examined it, I craned my neck to have a better look.
“One can see it was knotted,” Commander Yi said. “Inspector Han suspects it was a necklace, perhaps pulled off by the killer. I have officers searching the area for its ornament, if there was one.”
A restlessness rippled through my limbs. I wanted to run out and search for the ornament, which might identify the killer, but before curiosity could pull me away, I saw Hyeyeon spray lees and vinegar on the corpse. My lips parted as I watched the way the flesh reacted. Something in the substance made all the injuries more visible, making patches of purple and yellow and red blossom all over. I clutched the doorframe.
“There is a bruise around her mouth, purple in color, the shape of a hand,” Hyeyeon said.
“Someone tried to muffle her cries,” Commander Yi observed.
Since my first day at the bureau, life had turned strange. I didn’t know where I was heading, where I would end up, and I often walked around the capital without purpose. Each day ended like an unresolved case. While I could find no solution to my life, the tangle of frustration in me loosened as I watched Hyeyeon take the strangeness out of the corpse. There was a story behind every bruise and gash, evidence that—when pieced together—would surely return life back to normal.
I strained my ears, trying to better hear their low-voiced conversation. Then a flush burned up my chest and spread across my face as Hyeyeon examined the private parts. I spun around, hearing her declare, “She is not a virgin,” only to find myself standing before Inspector Han.
“What are you doing here?”
The tips of my ears burned. “I was j-just looking. Curious, sir.”
“Curiosity seems to be your perpetual state of being. Where exactly is the end of it?”
I hesitated to answer. “I never reached the end myself, sir, so I do not know.”
The slightest smile twitched at the corner of his lips. “Tell me, damo investigator, based on all that you’ve observed, what do you think led to her death?”
“I … don’t know, sir.”
He nodded. After a moment, he said, “There are usually only three causes for murder: lust, greed, or vengeance. Among these three, vengeance is the most common.”
“I never knew that,” I admitted quietly.
“No, you would not have. I wouldn’t be surprised if she was killed by her family or an intimate partner. I have worked for so long at the police bureau that I find very few things to be surprising or new.” Expelling a weary sigh, Inspector Han gestured to the door. “Announce me and go.”
I announced his presence to Hyeyeon, who temporarily covered the corpse with a straw mat, and once alone, I made my way toward the main pavilion, still blushing. There, I swept the vast floor, and the repetitive swishing of the broom allowed my thoughts to drift back to Lady O. So she wasn’t a virgin; she must indeed have had a lover. Perhaps, I thought, a lover with a dagger.
I stopped sweeping and covered the end of the bamboo handle with both hands, resting my chin there. Fog that hid the morning sun rolled in through the open gates and swam in the courtyard, leaving a sheen of dew on the massive wooden pillars and the cold, gray stones. It was as though the bureau had plunged into the deep and livid sea, a boundless space between myself and the world.
I wondered if the underworld might look like this. The home now to Lady O, and the home to my father, my mother, my brother …
“Hurry! Faster!”
My thoughts scrambled as voices echoed from the distance. I saw shadows, shapeless lumps behind the fog. The shadows grew larger and more distinct. It was two officers, their black robes flapping behind them as they entered the bureau through the main gate. “You there!” one of them called out. “Where is Inspector Han?”
“In the examination room.”
They ran past me, disappearing into the southern courtyard.
A complaint must have arrived. Perhaps another loose woman like Lady O, slashed to death for the sake of family honor, a crime I was coming to learn was quite frequent. Honor was everything here in the capital, more important than life itself to these nobles. I’d heard a bizarre story of a woman who had hacked her shoulder with an ax simply because a male stranger had touched it.
My thoughts wandered as I swept here and there, though mostly pulling the broom along, leaving large spaces untouched. I rarely put my whole heart into domestic chores, especially when it came to sweeping. There were more important things to do with my life than to chase after dust.