When the Dead Speak

Chapter 30

Chapter 30

Lincoln Thomas shuffled to the kitchen in his modest three-bedroom brick house in San Francisco. From his kitchen window he could see the Golden Gate Bridge lighting up the night sky.

Again he had been unable to sleep. He told himself it was because of business. He should have hired an accountant rather than try to do his quarterly taxes on his own.

His daughter, Nina, had been by earlier to bring him dinner. She knew he never stopped to eat when he had to figure out his taxes. She had a key to his house and stops by to clean and do his laundry. He had resisted her offer for him to move in with her, her husband, Raymond, and their son, Raymond, Jr.

Lincoln had always been independent, didn't want to be a burden on his family. He considered himself successful, accomplished what he wanted in life. Nina had been his greatest pride. She looked just like her mother, Sia. Dark hair, dark eyes. He had buried Sia ten years after Nina was born. Pancreatic cancer, the doctors had said.

Lincoln owned a successful employment agency with a staff of eight. Raymond was the vice-president. Thomas Associates was responsible for placing over three thousand Koreans in varying jobs, from offices to hotels, cleaning services, bakeries, retail stores, hospitals. Every type of market. And he made sure they all took night classes to learn English and skills that would make them more marketable. The people saw him as their savior. And it gave him an overwhelming sense of pride and satisfaction.

He walked through the tidy living room, past the awards hanging on the wall from the Chamber of Commerce, the mayor, the California Businessmen's Association. Next to a picture of Sia and Nina was his certificate of U.S. citizenship, framed in oak, matted in light peach to match the peach floral couch. He ran his fingers down the frame. That had been his lifelong dream since he was five years old. He would sit and listen for hours to his uncle's stories of life in America. He knew that was where he was going to live once he was old enough to travel alone.

He carried his cup of tea to the enclosed breezeway where he sat in the dark. On the coffee table in front of him was a copy of yesterday's Korean Today newspaper. He could still hear Nina's voice saying, "Didn't you tell me once that you were in the war, Papa?"

Even in the darkened breezeway he could see the outline of the man on the front page of the paper. Do You Know This Man? the headline asked. It gave the man's name as Harvey Wilson. A black man, young. Back then, they had all been young, too young. Lincoln himself had been fourteen. He had closed his eyes to that war, but obviously not his mind. Because in his sleep, he started to re-live it. Started to remember. Back then, Lincoln Thomas had been known as Ling Toy.