Evening Star Newspaper, September 29, 1935, Page 106

. Magazine Section THIS WEEK September 29, 1935 The Kerchief of Peace by PEGGY VON DER GOLTZ HE red maws of the blast furnaces lurked like small retarded sunsets in the murky night. Fog filled the valley, greasy with coal dust, clammy as cold potato soup. Fog wrapped the darkened cottages in a blanket, and mutlied the sound of Peter's lurching foot- steps. It muted the song he sang. The song slipped and stumbled as Peter did, and the words were muzzed in 2 haze of prune brandy fumes. It was a song of Peter’s youth; but the nights of his youth had been different, and the song not quite the same. He was remembering the blue-dark, star- sprinkled nights that had hung so high above the Tatras. His voice had been clean as the mountain air then, his footsteps steady. He remembered how the setting sun used to drop behind the crags, drenching the world in ghay — like God, he thought when he was young. His foot crashed into a broken box. He clutched at the picket fence, slumped heavily against it. “Damn,” he muttered, and kicked the box into the gufter. He felt along the fence until he found the gate and turned into his tiny yard. He crept cautiously around the corner of the house. A light was burning in the kitchen. He blinked at it in surprise, then heaved the door open and stood, weaving a little, grin- ning uncertainly, on the sill. ~<Meta sat at the kitchen table, her arms thrown across it and her face down in the crock of an elbow. Peter noticed how grey her hair was, and how tired her work-worn hands looked. “‘Then what she set up for?"’ he grumbled. He slammed the door. Meta ramsed her head. She rubbed her eyes with her fists, and yawned in a dull moment of awakening. “Peter, you are late,” she wailed. Illustration by Paul Meylan Peter grunted. He stalked over to the low chair by the stove and started unlacing his heavy boots. The smell of fog, of prune brandy, of wet boots and stale sweat filled the room. Meta jumped up. “‘Peter, you're drunk. Drunk!” “Shut up!" said Peter. She twisted the corner of her apron, tied a hard little knot in it. Her lips quivered, and tears filled her eyes, brightening their faded blue. ‘“Peter,” she said. “You listen to me! Just when we have the trouble you get drunk — " Her voice broke on a sob. “Trouble?” said Peter. ‘‘What trouble?” “Stephan. He’s in the prison. It’s in the letter. Here . . .” Peter opened the letter and painstakingly spelled out the words. “Well,” he said at last, ‘“‘good thing he's in the prison. He fought the police. And for what? Because they tell him to move on — and in the market place! The fool!” “Fool! My brother a fool?" ‘“He is a fool,” said Peter. ‘‘Stephan is better man as you any day!"” “He's fool,” said Peter. “Dumb fool. He stay in old country when we come over here. Now look at him — in the jail. Look at me! I'm a big guy, huh! I'm a foreman, huh! I'ma delegation to the union, huh!"” “Yaaaaaaa,” Meta shrilled. “And what good it do you? Work and get drunk . . . work and get drunk ... workand ...” “Shut up!" roared Peter. “If I don't work, what you eat, huh? Look at what you got — water in the sink, gas for the lights, oil cloth on the floor, good shoes all-a time. You got all the kids married and moved away. You She stood up, heaving, got four rooms to the house, and don't got to take a boarder. I make good money. . . . When I want-a get drunk, I get drunk.” He folded his big hands and leaned back. “Drunk! You get drunk all-a time.”” Meta was pacing back and forth, calico dress sway- ing, grey hair flying. “‘But you don't say to me Stephan's a fool.” “He's a fool and a bum, see. Any fella goes to jail’s a bum, see. I'm American citizen, You don't catch me —"" “You don't call my brother a bum. You don’t. You don’'t! Old country is better, better, better. Don't work all-a time. Don't get drunk all-a time. Don’t got fog all-a time. Sun shines in old country. Got flowers in old country.” She dropped into a chair, gasping. Her face was the yellowish white of old newspaper. Peter stared at the stove. Meta pressed her hands against her mouth to stop the gasping. Then she crossed herself. After a while she said slowly, “Peter, 1 will get the kerchief.” Peter waggled his stockinged toes, and didn’t answer. “T will,”” she cried. ““What I care for the kerchief? Old woman's tales —" “The kerchief of peace,” Meta said in a dull, unbelieving voice, “‘old woman's tale? Why Peter, every woman must have kerchief to cry on when husband make her sore — must have kerchief to make — to make — peace in the home. . . ."” “You listen to me,” said Peter. ‘We been-a here thirty year, huh? We talk American, huh? The kerchief is, what you call him, a her breath whistling, clutching the kerchief racket. You suppose to cry, and I suppose to say is all my fault. I don't say so. Is old woman tale. You throw it away, see!"’ “Never — so long — I live,” Meta whis- pered. Then her voice rose to shrillness, “‘I get the kerchief —1 will— I will!” She jumped up and ran, gasping, panting, to the big chest in the corner. She rummaged in it, flinging out bright dresses, gay linens, cheap trinkets, all the accumulated treasures of her lifetime. She stood up, heaving, straining, her breath whistling, her face mottled purple. She clutched the kerchief, a lovely thing that seemed made to wave in laughter, not to dry women's tears. Peter dropped his hand heavily on her arm, “Cut it out,” he said. She dabbed at her streaming eyes, and crumpled the kerchief into a hard wad. A gasp of fear clutched at Peter’s heart. “You stop it,” he said. “You make a bum out-a me. I swear you don't never use the kerchief. Now look at you!" Meta looked at the damp, tear stained cloth. “‘But,” she said sadly, “I have used it.” Her flush faded. Her face became very white. For a breathless instant her eyes were young, and round, and blue again. Her cheeks were plump, and her lips were full. “Oh, Peter," she whispered-—and pitched forward to the floor. Peter stood, fingering his scrubby mustache, staring at her awkward, unlovely figure. “Meta!” he said in a loud, scared voice. “Get up!” She didn’t move. He poked her cautiously in the side with a stockinged toe. “Get up, I tell you! Get up!” He rubbed his suddenly cold and sweating hands on his trousers. “You can’t fool me!"” he cried, his voice cracking with terror. He stooped, and touched her arm cautiously. It was warm. She was all right. He shook her. ““Meta! Meta!"” He turned her over. Her eyes were not quite closed, but not open either. He knelt and pressed his cheek to hers, tickled her chin with his mustache. He stared wildly around the kitchen, lurched to his feet, and staggered drunkenly, though he was sober now, over to the sink. He drew a cup of water, and dashed it in her face. The water ctricnikd down &er nock. hes bosom, into her hair. He saw that that last instant of beauty was still in her face, imprinted there. “Meta! Maticko!”’ He lifted her head and nestled it in his arms. He kissed her. She couldn’t smell the prane brandy now. He raised a limp hand. It seemed colder. He rubbed it with all his great strength. He slapped her cheeks. Her mouth sagged open a little. He ripped a mirror from the wall over the sink and held it to her lips. But no breath blurred the glass. “It's a lie,”” he muttered. “It’s a damn lie.”” But he knew it was not a lie. Slow tears ran down his face, trickled into his mustache. He licked them away but they kept coming — hot tears, awkward tears. Dully he wished he knew how to stop them; but Peter had never cried before. He sat there for a long time. His fat cheeks sagged. His big body slumped. His stubby hands that had grown heavy in the steel mills clenched and opened mechanically. Finally he cursed and struggled to his feet. He looked at the clock on the wall —two o'clock. He ought to go and get the priest ; tell the children — he'd have to go all over town for thein. He'd need to tell the neighbors. He touched Meta's face. It was cold. He couldn't leave her here on the floor. Heaving and panting, for she was heavy, he got her onto the rickety cot in the corner of the kitchen. He folded her left hand across her breast, reached for the right. The kerchief was tight clenched in it. He stared at the bedraggled rag. Slowly, gently, he fumbled with the stiff fingers. Inch by inch he worked the kerchief loose. He sat down on the edge of the cot and spread the kerchief across his knees. He smoothed it with grimy, blackened (Continued on page 15)