I smiled as I put on the white cotton gloves. All of us were required to wear them because the oil on our fingers might damage any of the finishes, if not today, then somewhere down the line.
My smile was not because I put them on, but because Min’s Auction House sat on Maunakea Street, smack between a cha-lang-a-lang bar on the left, and a clattering greasy spoon of a Chinese restaurant on the right. Hard to imagine finding much of white-glove-worthy value here, I thought.
After we’d filled out cards with our contact information, we were assigned a bidding number. Then we donned our gloves. Filing through that line near the front door, I could detect whiffs of both the Chinese cooking oil and the stale alcohol that plagued bars with a permanence no opening of doors to allow Chinatown breezes to waft away could accomplish.
Finally, we were allowed to venture into the depths of Min’s repository.
Indeed, the shop was deeper than I’d imagined from the outside, and quite clean and well-lighted. Spotless glass cases ran down both sides of the narrow interior. I guessed 30 yards or so. Beyond that, I could see the auction area where rows of chairs faced a small stage in the very back.
There was no distinctive smell in Min’s. But there was a distinctive décor. Above the glass cases, all the way back to the auction area, the walls were covered with painted fabric murals of scenes of Korea. While the theme of nature ran through them, I could see that many involved soldiers or battle scenes. I was impressed by the brushwork. And also by the beauty of the mother country from where, I assumed, Min had come. Being half Korean myself, I felt an affinity with this place and especially the paintings.
This didn’t bode well, I thought. It probably meant I was going to be wasting too much money here.
There were almost as many people behind the glass cases as there were potential bidders. The lines of people inspecting the objects upon which we’d bid were quiet and orderly. When each one had seen whatever it was he or she needed to see, the person would head to the seats in back.
I began with the cases running on the right. To begin with, most of the objects were different sorts of jewelry, rings, necklaces, and other items, none of which interested me. I’m single and well past the dating scene age, and I wear no jewelry at all. Which led to a case of watches. I wasn’t interested in these either, not having worn a watch since I’d retired.
Time and retirement don’t mix. The workaday world slowly slips away, a fainting memory. Reality tells you there is that big clock running, but the care of filling that remaining time has little to do with lock-step activity meted out in assigned blocks of time. At least for me. Aside from doctor appointments, which, luckily, were still at a minimum for me, I did what I wanted to do whenever I felt moved to do so.
The final cases on the right were filled with a mishmash of various Asian objects, statuettes, and the like, none of which interested me either.
Having reached the end, I went back to the front door and proceeded down the left-hand side. Now, I was closer to the kinds of things that interested me.
Ceramic articles were first up. There was plenty of celadon, a finish that Koreans have perfected and for which they are universally known. I still hadn’t handled anything, but here I did ask a woman if I could see a vase and some tea cups. They were well made and nicely glazed, but none of them gripped me the way things do when they want me to buy them.
As I moved along I came to a case of cutlery and other utensils, including several sets of very old metal chopsticks. Beautiful certainly, but not calling to me.
And then I came to the case that interested me most of all. A large knife, the blade perhaps seven or eight inches long struck me. I asked the man standing behind the case if I might examine it.
He, wearing white cotton gloves as well, took the knife from the case and handed it to me as if he were passing along a baby bird whose kind was nearing extinction. This show of care seemed a bit over the top, but I supposed if you wanted to inspire high bids, you had to make every item seem as if it were the most valuable thing in the world. Here, his gesture seemed to suggest, was a knife made at the time when Koreans had discovered fire and the wheel, but were still ignorant of forks and spoons, knives being the second utensil created after using two long sticks to pick up kimchi and rice.
The craftsmanship was exquisite. A fleur-de-lis design at the top of the handle flowed to finely engraved lines that ran down three inches and ended in a delicate filigree at the blade’s heel. Alternating diamond and lotus blossom inlays ran in between the lines to the blade heal as well.
I especially liked that the knife was all one piece of steel, and the blade had a barely discernable but detectably hand-pounded texture. A true work of art. Gently running my thumb down the blade edge, I could tell, even gloved, that it would slice through a sheet of paper with ease, cut see-through tomato slices, or even carve up a roast as if it were butter.
I wrote down the tag number and handed back the knife. I proceeded down the cases and stopped in front of a short sword. The work was good, but the sheath looked bulky and shabby. No, that knife, now that was a weapon. I moved on.
Last were into guns. Not a fan, I’d choose that knife every time.
Having seen everything, I proceeded to the seating area. Taking a chair in the front row, I waited.
After fifteen minutes or so, the chairs filled up all around me, and finally, the elderly man took to the podium. Briefly, he thanked us for coming. Then asked if there were any questions before he began the auction.
There were none. The bidding began. Since I’d only been interested in the knife, the whole process felt excessively long. Finally, nearly an hour in, the knife came up.
“I’ll start this at $100,” he said. “Anyone?”
I raised my hand.
“$100, thank you. Do I hear $125?”
“$125,” came from the back. I recognized the man as someone who’d been checking out lots of celadon pieces.
“$150,” I said.
“$175,” shot back the man. Dollars signs flashed through my mind. I saw a sack of money deflate. I wished the guy had only been interested in celadon.
“$200,” I said, knowing this was more than I’d wanted to spend.
“$250,” shouted my chief competitor.
I thought about the knife, my life, my bills. Crap. “$300,” I said.
To my surprise, there was only silence from the back.
“$300 going once,” said the old man, pausing to look around the room. “Anyone for $325?”
Silence.
“Going twice.” He looked around again.
“Sold to the man in the blue aloha shirt,” he said, pointing at me.
The items that had already been bid on were carried back to their respective cases. You could leave at any point, but most people were interested in more than a single item. Very few had collected what they’d successfully bid on and left.
Since I wasn’t interested in anything else, and because I knew that if I suddenly were there was no way I could spend any more money, I stood and followed my knife to the counter.
“Would you like to pay now?” the woman asked, which struck me as an odd question since I’d followed her back.
Handing her my charge card, I commented on the fine workmanship.
“Yes,” she said. “This is an exquisite knife. And quite old. What a great weapon, huh? I wonder how many people have been killed with it?”
I stared at her. She smiled.
“Don’t you?” she asked.
“I, uh, well, actually no, I hadn’t wondered that,” I said.
“Can’t you imagine it, though?” she said, handing me my card. “All that blood all those times. It’s kind of thrilling to think about. Have you ever killed anyone?”
I shook my head but had nothing to say.
She finished wrapping the knife and putting it in a plastic bag.
Passing it along to me, she said. “You know what I wonder?”
This was one odd girl. At this point, I figured she wondered something in The Twilight Zone. I shook my head.
“I wonder how many more people will be killed with it.”
The way she said it completely creeped me out. She reminded me of the woman selling another woman a gold thimble in one Twilight Zone episode. They’re alone on the top floor of a department store. The place resembles a storage room. The gold thimble is the only thing for sale on that floor. It turns out they both are mannequins who’ve come to life. One of the most chilling episodes.
This woman was attractive. I might have tried to date her 30 years ago, but as I said, I’m way past the dating game age.
“You know,” I said, “I don’t think I’ll be using it to kill anyone.” I didn’t mean this as a humorous comeback. I was serious.
“You,” she said, looking me up and down, “you look like a killer to me. I can see you using it that way for sure.”
I’d had enough. “Thanks,” I said, turning and walking out the door.
Heading to the car, all I could think about was how weird the woman was. If that was her idea of humorous banter, I’d never have guessed.
I turned on the engine for the air-conditioning, then I took the knife out of the bag. Carefully unwrapping it from the tissue paper, I examined my too-expensive purchase. A lot of money for someone on a pension. Geez, in terms of real-world survival, this was about as superfluous a luxury acquisition as I could imagine. Stacked up against my monthly Social Security check, throwing money away on this knife was just plain stupid. Why did I always do this to myself?
Rewrapping the knife and putting it back in the paper bag, I laid it on the passenger seat. I needed toothpaste, so I headed for the Pali Longs parking lot. The place was busy, so I had to park along the wall near the back, I was just about to get out when a man rapped on the passenger side window.
I nodded at him. “What do you want?” I asked, not lowering the glass, hoping he could hear me and do a bit of lip reading to get my question.
“Help me,” I sort of heard him say. And then he placed a bloody palm on the glass and slid down and out of sight.
Startled, I jumped out of the car and ran around to the other side. The man lay face down.
“Are you all right?” I asked, kneeling and placing my hand on his back. It was a stupid question. He wasn’t all right.
“Can you hear me?” I said, putting my head close to his.
His eyes were glassy. I’d never seen a man die, but I got the feeling that I’d be checking that one off the list.
Looking around to see what might be going on or where the man had come from, I saw nothing but parked cars.
Then suddenly there was a man standing over us.
“Eh,” he said, “What’s going on?”
“This man,” I said. “I think he’s dead.”
The guy looked us both up and down. “You killed him?”
“No no no,” I said. “He just came here to my can. He asked me for help. I saw he was bleeding and then fell on the ground like this.”
“Eh Jeff,” the man said, looking to the left. “Try come.”
A second man joined the first.
“Whoa,” he said. “What’s going on here?”
“I think this guy,” he said, pointing at me, “killed this other guy.”
“No no no,” I said. “He was already wounded when he came to my car.” I pointed to the bloody handprint on the glass. “See,” I said. “I was just parking, and he came up and knocked on the window asking for help.”
“Eh, Stan,” said the second man. “That’s Kawehi, Brah.” He looked at me and nodded. “You killed Kawehi, you fuckah.”
“No no no,” I said again, getting up. “I did not hurt this man in any way.
The punch from the second man knocked me against the bloody glass. Stunned, but still standing, a vision of the knife came to me. I swung the door open and grabbed the knife just as the first man took me by the collar.
“Shit,” he said, a look of amazement on his face as the blade plunged into his stomach, wrapping and all. He staggered backward and grabbed at the wound before he stumbled over lifeless Kawehi’s body and withered in a lump to the ground.
“You fuckah,” growled the second man coming at me.
Still holding the knife, the blade now exposed, I simply reached forward as he came at me and ran straight into the blade.
“Ahhhh,” he cried out as he crumpled to the ground.
I stared at the three. The first man I’d stabbed had stopped thrashing around. Now only the second man made any kind of motion. He moaned several times and then lay silent.
Not wanting to be here, in a daze I went around the car and jumped into the driver’s seat. I hit the ignition button and backed out of the space. Taking a last look at the three bodies, I drove off.
When I made it home, I sat in my garage with the engine running. I wondered what the chances were that the police would show up. At any second I was sure I’d hear sirens. I waited.
There was a good amount of blood on me, and I’d managed to get it all over the steering wheel. I’d tossed the knife, still partially wrapped, on the passenger seat. That seat was a mess as well.
Still, I heard no sirens. Finally turning off the engine, I took the knife and headed inside. After I’d showered and cleaned off the knife, I headed back to the car with my wet vac and a fistful of rags.
It took a good hour to clean up. Finishing, I went back inside and made myself a cup of coffee. Still no sirens.
Just as I sat down at the dining room table, my phone rang. This was it, I thought.
“Ah, hello?” I said, hoping for the best but expecting the worst.
“Hello, Mr. Lee, this is Susan from Min’s Auction House.”
Yes. It wasn’t the police.
“Ah, I’m sorry, Susan from Min’s?”
“Yes, Susan. I’m the one who handled the payment for the knife.”
“Oh, yes, yes, right. Susan, so . . . ?”
“So I was wondering how you felt about it now?”
“Felt about it? Felt about what?”
“The knife you bought. We try to do follow-ups as soon after our auctions as possible. Mr. Min wants to make sure every customer, he hopes, will be satisfied with the purchase.”
“Ah, uh huh, okay, I . . .”
“Mr. Lee, I have to know, so far, are you happy with your purchase?”
I cleared my throat. “Yes, tell Mr. Min that I think this was a great buy.”
“Oh, that’s wonderful, Mr. Lee. We’re always happy to hear that our customers feel good about what they bought.” She laughed. “And be sure to let me know if you kill anyone, okay?”
The line went dead.
Lanning Lee 