A Gift, a Brush, and a Debt

The fish shop smelled thickly of brine and the open sea. Dried fish hung in rows along one wall, while heaps of salt sat piled high on the floor.

Song Do-hyeon swept into the shop, the hem of his fine silk robes billowing behind him.

"Good day to you."

"Well, if it isn't Song Haengsu himself. What brings you here?"

Jang-ssi, the owner of the fish shop, rose to greet him with obvious delight, though a flicker of nervousness mingled with the warmth on his face.

"To what do I owe the honor?"

"Honor indeed. I simply missed you, brother Jang, so here I am."

To the merchants of Uiju, a haengsu of Mansang was as exalted as the heavens themselves. Simply doing business with the guild was a mark of prestige — proof that one's goods had been vetted and could be trusted. Falling out of Mansang's favor, by contrast, was tantamount to closing up shop in Uiju for good.

And Song Do-hyeon was widely tipped to be the guild's next Daehaengsu, which meant a man like Jang-ssi could hardly afford to put a foot wrong around him.

Thump.

Song Do-hyeon settled himself comfortably into the very chair Jang-ssi had just vacated, smoothing his robes before speaking.

"I trust all has been well with you?"

"Ah, you know me — nothing ever happens. And yourself, Song Haengsu? No troubles?"

"Well, there is one thing weighing on my mind, but..."

A fishy little smile ghosted across Song Do-hyeon's lips.

"...I'm sure it will sort itself out soon enough."

Then, quick as a snake, he changed the subject.

"By the way, how's business been treating you lately?"

"Oh, getting by. Enough to keep rice in the bowl."

Jang-ssi waved a hand and answered with practiced modesty. In truth, his shop was one of the better-performing fish sellers in the district — but no one boasted about profits in front of a Mansang haengsu.

"Ah, and the salt I sent over a while back — it arrived safely, I trust."

Jang-ssi added this cautiously, gauging his guest's mood.

"Taean sea salt, after all — the quality was simply superb."

"Was it, now."

Song Do-hyeon answered absently, letting his gaze drift around the shop. It came to rest on the stack of gulbi in one corner — the salted, wind-dried corvina, piled in neat strands of straw.

"Is there anything else you're in need of, by any chance?"

"Hmm. Plenty of folk have been asking after dried squid lately. I'd take some off your hands if you had it, but..."

Jang-ssi hesitated a moment before venturing the question.

"Could you get your hands on some?"

"Of course I can."

Contrary to expectation, Song Do-hyeon agreed without a moment's hesitation.

"I have a trading contact in Gangneung, so I'll look into it for you."

"Ha! There's truly no one like you!"

"It's nothing, really."

Song Do-hyeon flashed a benevolent smile.

"If there's ever anything you need, just say the word. Where your affairs are concerned, brother Jang, I'll go to the ends of the earth for you."

"Song Haengsu... you're too kind. Truly, thank you."

Jang-ssi nodded, his face softening with emotion.

"Oh, that reminds me!"

That was when it happened.

Suddenly, Song Do-hyeon began rummaging through his belongings, producing something wrapped in cloth.

"I heard your daughter gave birth to a son not long ago..."

"Goodness — how on earth did you know that?"

Jang-ssi's eyes went round as saucers.

"Is there anything about you I could possibly fail to know? I even know what you had for lunch yesterday."

"Heh heh, you old rascal."

Jang-ssi scratched his head, looking embarrassed.

A moment later, Song Do-hyeon held out the gift he had brought.

"Here — a present for the little one."

"What is it?"

Jang-ssi peered at the object with a puzzled frown. What Song Do-hyeon had handed him was, of all things, a writing brush.

A strange thing to bring to a place that reeked of fish and salt.

"A brush?"

"I went to considerable trouble to obtain it from one of the finest brush shops in Hanyang. When the child grasps a brush at his first-birthday doljabi, surely he's destined for greatness, wouldn't you say?"

Song Do-hyeon said it as though it were nothing at all.

"Oh, you really didn't have to go to such lengths..."

"Please — accept it as a token of my regard, at the very least."

"Thank you, Song Haengsu. I'll treasure it."

Jang-ssi's expression brightened considerably. With Song Do-hyeon remembering even his grandson's doljabi, the shop filled with a warm, convivial air.

But it did not last.

Song Do-hyeon's face changed all at once, and his voice dropped low.

"Now, there is one favor I'd like to ask of you."

"A favor? What kind of favor?"

By now, the look in Song Do-hyeon's eyes had gone cold enough to chill the room.

"You're going to buy some gulbi, brother Jang."

"Buy... gulbi?"

Jang-ssi looked in dismay toward one side of his shop, where the corvina he'd taken in last time already sat heaped like a mountain. Song Do-hyeon had noticed it the moment he walked in. Even so, he pressed on with his "favor" as though he hadn't.

"Yes. Circumstances being what they are."

"Hmm..."

Caught off guard, Jang-ssi looked distinctly uncomfortable. But one could hardly turn down a Mansang haengsu flat to his face.

After a brief struggle, he asked carefully, "Very well. How much shall I take?"

"Seventy dureum should do nicely."

"Seventy dureum?"

Jang-ssi's voice rose an octave. Seventy dureum meant fourteen hundred fish. A shop like his sold maybe sixty gulbi in a month — he'd need two full years to move that much stock.

"Seventy dureum... that's a bit, well..."

When Jang-ssi balked at the sheer quantity, Song Do-hyeon tilted his head.

"What's the matter? You don't want it?"

"No, it's not that... it's just, you show up out of nowhere and ask something like this, and I hardly know where to put myself..."

"Hardly know where to put yourself?"

One corner of Song Do-hyeon's mouth curled upward.

Jang-ssi wiped the sweat from his brow and pressed on.

"You know as well as I do that seventy dureum of gulbi comes to a full three hundred and fifty nyang. Three hundred and fifty nyang is half a year's takings for me."

The quantity Song Do-hyeon had proposed was, in fact, exactly equivalent to six months of the shop's revenue. He had known this all along.

Given everything he's bought from us over the years, I can gauge his capacity to the coin.

Before making these rounds, Song Do-hyeon had drawn up a dossier on every merchant who traded with him — inventory, personal circumstances, recent happenings, the works. Armed with that list, he was now working his way down it, one shop at a time, pressuring each owner to buy gulbi.

"I'm sorry, Song Haengsu."

Yet even under this pressure, Jang-ssi showed signs of refusing, his face full of distress.

"If you'd given me warning beforehand, perhaps. But where would I find that kind of money at a moment's notice?"

Strictly speaking, if Jang-ssi stretched himself, there was nothing truly preventing him from taking the stock. The problem was that doing so would mean draining every last coin of his capital. For a merchant, a choked-off flow of cash was a death sentence. The proposal was one he simply could not accept.

Song Do-hyeon nodded, as though he understood the man's predicament perfectly.

"Which is exactly why I've come prepared with a solution."

With that, he spread a sheet of paper across the table. It was covered edge to edge with dense columns of writing.

"What's this?"

"A promissory note."

"A promissory note?"

Jang-ssi's eyes went wide.

"Write out the note and take the goods today. The money can be paid off at your leisure."

"You don't mean...!"

Jang-ssi could not hide his alarm. A promissory note, in plain terms, meant he was being strong-armed into buying the gulbi.

"Hmm...!"

Faced with the paper, his worries only deepened. Even if he did buy the fish now, the interest alone would be a crushing burden. Sell the whole lot, and after paying interest there'd be nothing left over.

As though reading his very thoughts, Song Do-hyeon spoke up.

"In exchange, I'll waive the interest entirely for six months."

"No interest at all!"

At those words, the earthy pallor drained from Jang-ssi's face and color came flooding back. The whole equation had just turned on its head.

If he could take the goods now without laying out a single coin, it was profit no matter how you sliced it. Six months was a constraint, true — but if he could manage to sell the corvina within that window, every last coin of the proceeds stayed in his pocket.

From where Jang-ssi stood, there wasn't a single reason to refuse. It was an offer good enough to make a man's eyes spin. If anything, he was the one glancing nervously about as he asked,

"You'd really do that for me?"

"What am I to you, brother Jang? Of course I would."

"Hmm, well then — there's nothing left to think about."

In the end, Jang-ssi accepted.

"All right. I'll buy the gulbi."

"A wise decision. You need only sign here."

The moment the words of consent left Jang-ssi's mouth, Song Do-hyeon slid the promissory note across the table.

"But the brush..."

Then it dawned on him — there was no brush with which to sign. Song Do-hyeon glanced around the shop.

"Ah!"

His eyes settled naturally on the brush in Jang-ssi's hand. The very brush he had gifted him mere minutes ago for his grandson's doljabi.

"Just use that one."

"W-with this?"

Jang-ssi was visibly flustered, but Song Do-hyeon shrugged as if it were nothing.

"It's a brush. We'll wash it clean and give it back, won't we?"

"W-well, yes, I suppose so."

"Then sign with it."

"A-all right."

Reluctantly, Jang-ssi began signing the promissory note with the brush meant for his grandson's first birthday.

"Write it just like this: I, Jang-ssi, hereby agree to purchase seventy dureum of gulbi for three hundred and fifty nyang."

"Understood."

At the going market rate, Jang-ssi filled out the note without a shred of hesitation.

Song Do-hyeon watched him work with a look of quiet satisfaction.

"There. Is that all?"

"Thank you for your trouble. I'll have the seventy dureum of gulbi delivered here before long."

"Thank you, Song Haengsu. I won't forget this kindness."

"If anyone should be thanking anyone, it's me — you're buying our goods, after all."

Song Do-hyeon tucked the promissory note safely into the breast of his robes, then rose from his seat and bowed his head.

"I'll be on my way, then. Good day to you."

"Take care on the road."

Thus Song Do-hyeon concluded his contract with Jang-ssi and stepped out of the fish shop. The face he turned away wore a smile as cold as river ice.

"My, my."

He murmured to himself, looking down at the note in his hand.

"The trouble is, it was almost too easy."

Each haengsu had been assigned two hundred dureum of gulbi per head. Having filled thirty percent of his quota in a matter of hours, Song Do-hyeon's face was lit by a smile he couldn't have hidden if he tried.

"Next stop, the fish shops toward Seogyo."

Still, he was far from satisfied. This was the opportunity to press Hayun's nose firmly into the dirt once and for all —

so deeply that she could never climb back up.

Song Do-hyeon quickened his pace.

"Now, the owner there — his family name was Park, wasn't it?"

Despite having known the man for a good ten years, Song Do-hyeon had never bothered to remember his name. Confirming it against his ledger, he nodded.

"Ah, that's right. Mr. Park. Bought a hundred nyang's worth of dried goods recently, did he... then thirty dureum ought to do for this one."

Trusting the entries in his ledger, Song Do-hyeon set off toward Mr. Park's fish shop.