One of the Two Witness Seats Was Empty

One of the two witness seats was empty.

Yun Haejun held his brush over the north gate priority telegram and looked at the sandglass. The last grain had already fallen. A copper stub cut to the right dimensions was barely holding contact under the transmission stand, and the night operator Jo Mansu had fallen asleep in his chair.

Waking him would make two people. But if the one who opened his eyes could not read code and time, that was not a witness, only borrowed name.

"What time is it?"

Day operator Choi Ikdo looked at the sun outside the window and answered.

"Past the second quarter of the hour of the dragon."

"North gate shift change?"

"Third quarter of the hour of the dragon."

Less than one quarter left. Haejun could write his own name in the empty box and send it now. Until yesterday, that was always how he did it. He chose the priority code and wrote that he took responsibility himself. That fast judgment had once saved a life, and once pushed another order aside.

The new rule he had made was blocking that very hand.

"Do not wake Jo Mansu."

"Then we can't send it." Choi Ikdo said.

"I know."

Haejun called a runner. Running to the north gate would arrive later than a telegram. Still, he sent the runner off with a copy of the transmission sheet and the withdrawal conditions. The runner tucked the paper into his coat and ran. An order that could have gone by electricity went back to a man's legs.

Choi Ikdo pointed at the copper contact.

"We have to use it while it's still connected. That stub is done for the moment it overheats once more."

"Is there another operator?"

"Oh Chilbok is at the protective housing. Bae Sangmun hasn't come back yet after his apothecary outing was logged."

Haejun sent someone to Im Gwanpil. The moment a protected witness was brought to the transmission stand, investigation and operations would mix. But those two were among the remaining people who could read code.

In that time, the first reception came in. Not from the north gate, but from the southern relay station. A short, irregular call sounded three times. Choi Ikdo did not touch it.

"There's no priority code."

"One person alone can receive an ordinary transmission."

"What if someone later says the log without a witness was changed?"

Haejun could not answer. The rule required two witnesses only for priority transmission. One person was enough for an ordinary reception. But if the other side, blocked from monopolizing the line, switched to sending ordinary calls without a priority code, that became a gap.

"Don't touch the received text. Record only the time and any errors, and make two copies."

Choi Ikdo took down the code. The first line read "grain order," the second was a merchant's name, the third was the ferry for cart delivery. Before the final code arrived, heat rose at the contact. The copper stub turned dark red.

"We have to cut it."

Haejun nodded. Choi Ikdo pulled the line. The order quantity and payment terms were not received. Only the merchant's name and the ferry remained.

"Who placed the order?"

"Under the name of a private merchant, Yun Taeseong."

Haejun did not know that name. Not knowing was not the same as writing it off as false right away. One copy of the received text was sealed for the telegraph bureau, another for the finance office's confirmation. Choi Ikdo signed the original, Haejun signed for receipt of the copy.

Haejun's hand paused once while winding the two bundles with red thread. The first bundle was wound twice from bottom to top, the second started from top to bottom. Choi Ikdo pointed it out.

"The order is different."

Haejun untied the knot.

"My mistake."

"Should I mark it?"

"Mark it. Draw the shape before you undo it too."

Winding the red thread wrong was a trace left by fatigue and haste. Choi Ikdo drew the winding direction and the time of correction beside the operation log.

Footsteps of soldiers sounded outside. Im Gwanpil came in with Oh Chilbok. There was no rope on Oh Chilbok's wrists, but Oh Bokrye followed behind holding the protective housing entry pass.

"Who requested this man?" Im Gwanpil asked.

"I did."

"For what purpose?"

"Second witness for the north gate priority telegram."

"Mixing witness testimony with transmission duty changes his standing."

"That's why I'll offer him a choice."

Haejun held out the transmission sheet to Oh Chilbok. It listed the reason for the north gate's priority, Yi Gyeom's grounds for objecting, and the runner's departure time.

"If you refuse to witness, your protection continues as before. If you take it on, I'll record a separate wage apart from your usual daily pay."

Oh Chilbok asked.

"If I sign, won't the investigators suspect again that I tampered with the telegraph?"

Im Gwanpil answered.

"The record before and after transmission will be kept separately. The act of witnessing will not become grounds for the past forgery charge."

"Who guarantees that?"

"I sign for it."

Im Gwanpil wrote in the protection ledger, "The current witnessing is separated from the past charge." He did not dismiss Haejun's new rule as obstruction of investigation. Instead he accepted it as a device for preserving evidence of who touched which code and when.

"Though the number of arrest targets will be reduced." Im Gwanpil said.

"Who will you remove?"

"Simple transmission witnesses and copy transcribers are excluded from the forgery conspiracy. Only those directly involved in altering the original text, choosing the priority code, or using the seal will be investigated."

Choi Ikdo let out a breath. Until yesterday, he could have ended up on the investigation list for no more reason than having sat at the transmission stand. Im Gwanpil drew a line through three names that had been listed by position alone and rewrote them as "conduct unconfirmed." He left the trace of the deletion visible.

Haejun asked.

"Is my name reduced too?"

"No."

"I made the rule."

"That fact is separate. The first choice of priority code and the act of forgery are still under investigation."

Oh Chilbok read the transmission sheet. He asked whether the north gate withdrawal conditions were in the original text. Haejun showed him along with the copy.

"If it doesn't arrive before the shift change?"

"There's a strong chance the runner will be late. I meant to send it the moment the line reconnected."

"Is it connected now?"

Choi Ikdo held up the dark red copper.

"It overheated while receiving the southern order. We need to cool it and test it once more."

Oh Chilbok had still not signed.

"Then what I've seen is only preparation for transmission. Not a witnessed success."

"That's right." Haejun said.

He revised the heading above the witness box. What had been one box, "transmission witness," he split into "preparation confirmation" and "connection and completion confirmation." Oh Chilbok wrote his name only under preparation confirmation. Two signatures now existed, but the telegram had still not gone out.

While the copper cooled, someone arrived to verify the southern order. Finance office clerk Jang Hojin said a merchant named Yun Taeseong was listed in the army grain trading register.

"Then is it a genuine order?" Choi Ikdo asked.

"It only means the name exists." Haejun answered.

Jang Hojin took out a copy of the merchant's seal impression. The shop code on the received sheet matched the first two strokes, but the final stroke was missing. There was no way to know whether the transmission had been cut before completion, or whether someone else had imitated it.

"Which ferry is the cart supposed to go to?"

"The eastern Reed Ferry."

Jo Dokgu's restricted route was the western ferry. The remaining two carts were still at the assembly point. If it were a private order, a cooperative vote and renewed village consent would be needed. But before the order ever reached the telegraph bureau, someone might already have sent a paper messenger to the assembly point.

Haejun started to write a new priority telegram ordering the carts stopped, then stopped his hand. The north gate telegram came first. If he shifted the existing emergency order because of one new suspicion, he would once again be turning his own discretion into an exception.

"What's left?" he asked.

Jang Hojin answered.

"North gate on hold, cart warning, one more copper test."

"The two operators?"

"Choi Ikdo and Oh Chilbok."

Oh Chilbok said.

"I can go back to the protective housing."

"You may. If you stay, you don't need to witness both transmissions."

Oh Chilbok chose the north gate telegram. He said he could not take responsibility for the cart order, since it was a private transaction he had never received himself. In exchange for being given the choice, the second transmission's witness seat was empty again.

The copper test began. Choi Ikdo connected the contact and Oh Chilbok watched the battery plate and the time. Haejun stepped back from the transmission lever.

"Who chose the priority code?" Im Gwanpil asked.

"I did."

"Who objected?"

"Lord Yi Gyeom. The risk that it would look like guaranteeing success while the repair's limits were unconfirmed."

"Did you read that objection?"

"Both operators read it."

Choi Ikdo and Oh Chilbok each confirmed the same objection sentence in their own copies. Only then did Haejun attach the priority code to the head of the telegram.

The contact hummed. The north gate telegram went out at a slow interval. The first line was the withdrawal conditions, the second the delay in shift change, the third a request for confirmation of receipt. On the second line, the copper stub heated up again.

"Lower the speed." Choi Ikdo said.

"If we keep slowing down we won't finish." Oh Chilbok objected.

Haejun took his hand off the lever. This was the moment a witness's objection turned into a halt in transmission. By rule, the final decision belonged to himself as sender, but if he ignored the objection he would have to write the reason in a new box.

The north gate shift change would already have begun by now.

"Send only through the second line. Record it as halted, not completed."

Choi Ikdo cut the line. Oh Chilbok wrote down the time of the halt. Haejun wrote his own name in the box for responsibility for the unconfirmed receipt. The rule made forgery harder, and it also slowed down how fast a complete telegram could reach the north gate.

Im Gwanpil said.

"Because of this record, the scope of arrests can be narrowed. At the same time, your responsibility for the halt has become clearer."

"That's the rule."

The words came easily. If someone at the north gate was hurt because they never received the withdrawal conditions, the clarity of the ledger would not stand in for the wound.

Oh Chilbok returned to the protective housing. The second witness seat was empty again. Haejun decided to send the cart warning as an ordinary dispatch. He attached no priority code, and wrote only that the order's authenticity was unconfirmed and that the cooperative needed to renew its consent. It was slow, but he made no exception for himself.

Half a quarter hour after the runner had dashed off toward the assembly point, a mud spattered cart driver shoved open the telegraph bureau door as if ramming it.

"The remaining two carts have moved."

Haejun stood up.

"Who approved it?"

"A grain order came in stamped with the Yun Taeseong trading house seal. There was even a receipt for advance payment."

"To which ferry?"

"The eastern Reed Ferry."

Jang Hojin gripped the merchant register tight. The received telegram had been missing its final stroke, but the on site order form bore a complete seal impression. Someone had used the private merchant's name and seal together.

The cart driver held out the damp order form. Beneath the paper, faint lines of the thin ledger style used by Japanese trading houses showed through. That alone could not confirm who had sent it.

But the cart wheel tracks had already turned east, not west.