A Single Shard

  Chapter 8

  Min began work on another set of inlaid vases. But before the throwing was complete, the emissary's ship docked. Emissary Kim sent a messenger to ask if any of the potters had anything new to show. Min waved the messenger away without a word.

  The next morning the news blew through the village like a sudden sea breeze: The emissary had visited Kang's house. Kang had been chosen for a commission.

  Later that morning Tree-ear swept up the remains of the destroyed vases in Min's yard. It was as he had guessed—all of the pieces bore traces of brown clouded glaze. Tree-ear felt numb with disappointment; he wondered how much worse it must be for Min.

  The potter had still not come out of the house with instructions for the day, so Tree-ear turned to the vegetable patch. He squatted down and began to pull the first of a thousand noxious shoots that threatened the cucumber plants so precious to Min's wife.

  Someone called out from the front of the house; Tree-ear recognized the voice of the government official Yee.

  "Potter Min! The emissary is here. He wishes to speak with you."

  Tree-ear dropped the ragged weed he was holding and stole around to the window at the side of the house. He could see little but heard everything. Min welcomed Yee, Emissary Kim, and the men of the royal cortege into his home. They sat around a low table in silence. Tree-ear heard the clink of pottery as Min's wife served tea.

  Then Emissary Kim began to speak. "This inlay work of your colleague's. It is something new, and will be of great interest to the court."

  There was a pause; Tree-ear imagined Min nodding in polite agreement.

  "I will speak with no veil over my thoughts, Potter Min. Other aspects of Potter Kang's work are—how can I say it?—not as much to my taste. Kang has been given what I will call a limited commission. He will produce work for the court for a year, to see if it pleases His Majesty."

  Kim hesitated, then continued. "I would far rather have given you the honor of a royal commission. But I would be remiss in my responsibilities if I were to ignore this new technique. It must be presented to the court.

  "I will now return to Songdo. But if you were to produce something using this inlay style, and bring it to me in Songdo, I would guarantee a careful consideration of the work."

  Tree-ear could barely contain his excitement. The shards! he wanted to shout. Show him the pieces from the rubbish heap! He is an expert—he will understand about the firing.

  But Min was speaking now. "The royal emissary honors me with his words, and I wish to disappoint no one. But I am an old man now. I could not possibly make the journey to Songdo. I thank the emissary for his consideration and beg his understanding for my failure."

  Tree-ear heard the swish of fine heavy fabric as the emissary rose to his feet and went to the door. The emissary spoke once more.

  "It is my wish that you find a way somehow, Potter Min. It would be a great sorrow to me if this were to be the last time I saw your fine work." Then he and his entourage were gone.

  Tree-ear turned and slid down the wall, slumped over with his head in his hands. The old fool! he thought. He does not wish the emissary to see the imperfect glaze ... his pride keeps him from a royal commission. The fool...

  Just then Min's wife came around the house with a basket of laundry. Tree-ear jumped to his feet to help her. She nodded her thanks, calm as ever, as if the tumultuous events of the past few days had never happened. They stood on either side of the clothesline; he handed her the garments and she hung them. Her serenity and the rhythm of the task helped soothe Tree-ear's raw nerves.

  Yet again he wished he could think of a way to show his gratitude for her kindness. What was it she wanted? he wondered. She seemed to have no desires of her own ... or perhaps her wishes were those of her husbands.

  Suddenly an answer came to Tree-ear as if calling from the clear sky.

  Doing Min a favor—a great favor—that was the way to thank her. Her husbands success—that was what she desired. Before he could think about it any longer, he heard himself speaking.

  "I have a request to make of the honorable potter's wife," he said.

  "Please," she replied.

  "I—I am aware of the generous offer made by the royal emissary," he confessed, and glanced quickly at her. Her eyes crinkled in amusement, so he knew she did not mind that he had eavesdropped.

  "If the master would make a vessel he considers worthy of the court's attention, it would be my greatest honor to be allowed to take it to Songdo for him."

  Her face was partially hidden behind the linen sheet she was hanging; she fixed it firmly to the line before she answered.

  "I will ask the master, under one condition," she said. "No, two conditions. The first is that you return to Ch'ulp'o quickly and safely."

  Tree-ear bowed, puzzled. Why should it matter to her how he journeyed?

  "And the second..." She paused. "The second is that from now on, you will call me Ajima."

  Tree-ear's eyes filled with tears. He bent to pick up another piece of laundry. Ajima meant something like "Auntie"; it was a term of great affection, reserved only for older kinswomen. Tree-ear was kin to no one, and yet Min's wife wished for him to call her Ajima. He did not even know if he could say the word.

  "Well, Tree-ear?" The gentle teasing had returned to her voice. "Do you agree to my conditions?"

  Tree-ear nodded. He spoke from behind the clothes that flapped on the line. "I agree," he said, then faltered. His voice fell to a whisper. "I agree—Ajima."

  A few days later, Tree-ear crouched under the bridge, watching idly as Crane-man shaved another sliver of wood from the chopstick he was whittling. Without looking up, Crane-man said, "It is too bad that your thoughts are not on a string. If they were, I would have given them a good yank by now—to see what I could see."

  Tree-ear chewed on the inside of his cheek. He should have known it was folly to keep a secret from Crane-man, even for a few days.

  "I will be going on a journey soon," Tree-ear said. He meant to speak firmly, but his voice sounded loud and coarse instead.

  "A journey, eh?" Crane-man continued whittling. "It is a good thing for a man to see the world if he can. Where will you go?"

  Two days before, Min had handed Tree-ear some tools to be cleaned, saying, "The vessels will be finished by midsummer. If you leave then, you will be able to return before the snow." In this way Tree-ear learned that Min was sending him to Songdo.

  Since that moment Tree-ear had regretted the rashness of his offer. He had never once left Ch'ulp'o since his arrival as a toddler. How could he possibly think of making such a journey? It would take many days, over unfamiliar mountains where there might not even be a path to follow, much less a road. He might well lose his way. And who knew what perils awaited him? Robbers, wild animals, rockslides ... What had he been thinking? But, then, what was he to do—tell Min he had changed his mind?

  No. Going to Songdo was hardly possible, but not going was worse.

  "Min has some work that must be transported—for an audience at the royal court."

  Crane-man put down his knife, leaned back, and crossed his arms. "An audience at the court? Why the riddle-talk, my friend? Why do you not say, 'I am going to the capital—to Songdo'?"

  Tree-ear swallowed. He rose to his feet and walked the few steps to the water's edge, picked up a flat stone, and threw it so it skipped across the water. Four times it lit on the surface; how was it that a stone could be so like a bird?

  Crane-man stood, too, and skipped a stone of his own. Six touches. Tree-ear shrugged as a little smile stretched his lips. In all the years under the bridge he had never once defeated Crane-man at this game. Together they watched until the ripples from the stone had melted away.

  "I am going to—to Songdo," Tree-ear said at last, as if testing the words. He looked at his companion pleadingly. "It seems too far away, to say it."

  "No, my friend," Crane-man said. "It is only as far as the next village. A day's
walk, on your young legs."

  Tree-ear frowned, mystified. But before he could speak, Crane-man continued. "Your mind knows that you are going to Songdo. But you must not tell your body. It must think one hill, one valley, one day at a time. In that way, your spirit will not grow weary before you have even begun to walk.

  "One day, one village. That is how you will go, my friend."

  Tree-ear watched as Crane-man stirred up the water with his crutch a little. Then he raised the dripping crutch and pointed it at Tree-ear.

  "Off you go now, to bring me some straw. You will need some extra sandals for such a journey, and who is to make them if not I?"

  ***

  Min spent his time on the new set of vases, one or two of which would be selected to be taken to Songdo. In the meantime, the pace had slowed considerably for Tree-ear. So frenetically had he worked during the time surrounding the emissary's visits that he was ahead of schedule on all his tasks. Plenty of wood filled the shed at the kiln site; balls of clay and bowls of slip awaited Min's need. Tree-ear found himself idle on occasion, with too much time to think.

  And think he did, gathering his courage until at last there was enough of it to enable him to stand before Min with a request.

  "What is it now?" Min asked. Tree-ear had lingered by the house at the end of the day, waiting for Min to look up from the wheel.

  "Master." Tree-ear bowed. "It is now more than a year that I have had the honor of working for you."

  "A year ... yes. So?"

  Tree-ear pulled in the muscles of his stomach to stop their quaking. "I was wondering ... if the Master would be so good ... if he thinks my work worthy—"

  Min snapped, "Ask your question or leave me in peace, boy!"

  "If you would one day be teaching me to make a pot." Tree-ear's words rushed out in a single breath.

  Min sat motionless for a long moment—long enough for Tree-ear to wonder if perhaps his request had been unclear. At last, Min stood and Tree-ear raised his head.

  "Know this, orphaned one," Min said slowly. "If ever you learn to make a pot, it will not be from me."

  Tree-ear could not stop himself. "Why?" he cried out. "Why will you not teach me?"

  Min picked up the half-formed vessel before him and slammed it back onto the wheel with such force that Tree-ear flinched.

  "Why?" Min repeated. "I will tell you why." The potter's voice was low, but shook with the effort of control. "The potter's trade goes from father to son. I had a son once. My son, Hyung-gu. He is gone now. It is him I would have taught. You—"

  Tree-ear saw the potter's eyes, fierce with grief and rage. Min choked out the last words: "You are not my son."

  Chapter 9

  Tree-ear could hardly breathe on his walk home. Min's words rang in his ears, over and over: orphaned one ... father to son ... not my son. He realized now what he had never thought to notice before: All the other apprentices were indeed sons of the potters.

  It's not my fault! Tree-ear wanted to shout. He wanted to run all the way back to Min and scream the words. It's not my fault you lost your son, not my fault that I am an orphan! Why must it be father to son? If the pot is made well, does it matter whose son made it?

  Crane-man hailed him cheerfully from under the bridge with the news that two pairs of sandals were complete. Tree-ear feigned eagerness as he tried them on, but he knew that Crane-man had read his troubled face at once. Crane-man said nothing, only waited.

  Tree-ear tied the sandals together carefully in pairs. As he hung them up in a safe place under the bridge, he said, "The potter's trade passes from father to son here in Ch'ulp'o. Is it thus everywhere?"

  "A story tells the answer to that," Crane-man replied. He hobbled over to a large rock and sat down. Tree-ear knelt beside him.

  "Potters have not always been considered artists, you know. In the long-ago days when potters made objects for use and not beauty, it was considered a poor trade indeed. None wished for their sons to have such a lowly life.

  "Year after year, more sons left the trade until at last there were not enough potters to supply the needs of the people! So the king at the time decreed that sons of potters must become potters themselves."

  Tree-ear shook his head and even managed a grim smile. Imagine, sons running away from what he wished most to do!

  "I do not know if it is still a law," Crane-man continued. "But a well-kept tradition can be stronger than law."

  Tree-ear nodded. At least he knew now that it would be useless to leave Ch'ulp'o in search of another master.

  Crane-man stood and leaned on his crutch to stretch out his good leg. He glanced sideways at Tree-ear. "My friend, the same wind that blows one door shut often blows another open," he said.

  Tree-ear stood, too, and went to fetch the supper bowl. It sometimes took him a while to figure out Crane-man's riddles, but he preferred puzzling over them to being told what they meant.

  Work no longer felt the same to Tree-ear. He now realized that he had been working all along toward the goal of being allowed to make a pot. With that hope gone, so went his eagerness to work. More than ever, he wished that he had not been so rash as to offer to take Min's vessels to Songdo. He would do it—not for the old potter, he thought bitterly, but for Ajima.

  Tree-ear checked the clay at the draining site. Some of the clay balls were drying out too quickly; he dampened the cloths that covered them. Then, using a wooden blade, he scored the surface of the clay in the drainage bed so it would dry faster. How much slower the work went when the joy of it was gone.

  The clay in the bed was coming along well; it would be ready to form into balls soon. Tree-ear took up a handful of clay from the corner of the bed and kneaded it. Absent-mindedly, he began to form a petal shape. After so many attempts at making the petal that was eventually used for the water pot, his hands seemed to work of their own accord, flattening here, pinching there...

  Tree-ear's hands paused in midmotion. Slowly he brought the half-formed petal up to eye level and examined it closely.

  Molding, he thought. There was more than one way to make a piece of pottery. Throwing, of course—using the wheel to assist in shaping a symmetrical piece. But the little animals atop the incense burners, the handles of some vessels, the water droppers—they were not thrown. They were molded by hand without any aid from the wheel.

  For the first time in days, Tree-ear grinned as he crushed the petal back into a fistful of clay. The second door had just blown open.

  As usual, Min's work took far longer than he had predicted, and summer was merging with fall before the pieces were ready. A dozen replicas had been fired in three separate batches, and the last firing yielded a pair of superb vases. Their delicate floral inlay work shone against the perfectly glazed background.

  Under Min's instruction Tree-ear built a special jiggeh to wear on his back. As they worked, Min grumbled about the problem of transporting the vases, speaking more to himself than to Tree-ear.

  Ajima came out to the yard with tea. She served them while Min continued his muttering.

  "A straw container," Ajima suggested. "Such as those used to carry rice, only perhaps double thickness, lined with more straw and silk. The vases would be well protected."

  Min sipped his tea, then turned to Tree-ear. "Do you know of one who could make such a container?"

  So it was that Crane-man too came to work for Min. He and Min agreed on a price for the labor, and Crane-man began to weave the container under the eaves of Min's house.

  Tree-ear would be leaving in a few days. The straw container had been completed. Sturdy, with double walls and an attached lid, it was exactly the size to take the vases and padding tightly packed.

  Crane-man fussed about with his creation, making invisible adjustments to the straw. Ajima came out to see it; she and Tree-ear exchanged amused glances behind Crane-man's back.

  "It is finished?" Ajima asked.

  Crane-man stopped his poking and pinching and bowed to Ajima. "It was a
n honor to be a part of this endeavor."

  Crane-man stood aside while Ajima lifted the lid of the container and closed it again, fastening it with the straw bobble and braided loop. "Fine work," she said, nodding in quiet admiration.

  Then she turned to Crane-man, her brow furrowed. "Crane-man," she said, "I have a favor to ask of you."

  Crane-man stood up proudly on his one leg. "Nothing that the honorable potter's wife could ask would be too much," he answered.

  Ajima bowed in turn. She glanced at Tree-ear and gestured at him with one hand. "This one—I have grown accustomed to his assistance," she said. "A hundred little chores he does for me each day. It is a great help to me in my old age."

  Now it was Tree-ear's turn to bow, which he did in bafflement. What was in Ajima's mind?

  "I would be most grateful, Crane-man, if you could come to the house and continue this work while Tree-ear is away," she said. Then she hung her head a little and wrung her hands as if ashamed. "I could not pay you. I hoped that perhaps my thanks in the form of a meal..."

  Tree-ear felt an enormous wave of relief wash over him, but caught himself in time to show no emotion. It would not do to embarrass Crane-man. It had been his greatest worry—how Crane-man would eat while he was away.

  Of course, his friend could always go back to rifling rubbish heaps and foraging in the woods. But Tree-ear had felt that it would be like abandoning him for Crane-man to go back to such scavenging. For days now he had been worrying over the problem—and Ajima had offered the answer unasked.

  "Your offer of food is kindness itself," Crane-man said. Tree-ear looked up in alarm. This was the phrase of polite refusal. What was Crane-man doing? "I would be happy to come by from time to time," he continued.

  Ajima nodded soberly. Crane-man bent over and picked up his crutch, then bowed in farewell to her. "I will see you back at the bridge, Tree-ear," he said, and hopped away.