“Mat—where is Mat?” she mumbled.
“He musta gone on to the hospital—after me wastin’ all this time.”
“Mat is gone to the hospital?”
“I reckon so.”
“Mat is hurt?”
“Naw. It’s Melody.” He saw her quick breath. “Nothin’ bad. Smashed a hand, they said.”
“Melody smash a hand?”
He looked at her closely. “Say, ain’t you awake?”
She drew her hand across her face. He could see her skin puffed and cloudy with old blood. That old blood made the shape of a hand.
“Mat been at you,” he stated.
She went to the dishpan and threw water on her face. Bending, she managed to wipe away the water with the front of her dress. Her lips began to bleed.
Chinatown gave her his bandanna to daub her lips. He saw where they had been cut against her teeth.
“You goin’ to the hospital with me,” he told her.
“I hold kerosene in my mouth,” she told him.
“Naw, them doctors know more ’n you.”
There was no will in her.
“C’mon, git in your shoes,” snapped Chinatown. “Ain't got all night.”
With childlike obedience she knelt and began to fish under the bed for her shoes.
Chinatown watched her bent back. Then his half-ashamed grin widened his lips.
He said, “They fix you up good while I’m seein’ Melody.”
She felt his sympathy, and response showed in her body.
When they walked out into the road Chinatown held her steady.
“Mat a hard man”—he sighed—“but he ain’t mean.”
“It is right for the man to beat the woman,” she said.
“It jest that Mat don’t know how to laugh,” he insisted. “He ain’t mean.”
They walked across town until they came to the trolley line. There was a fifteen-minute wait for a car. In that fifteen minutes Anna bared herself to Chinatown. There was sympathy in him but no understanding. That made it easy for her to talk. She could tell and still keep her secrets.
Three nights ago she had come home late. Mat had been waiting. He had seen the wet of the ground dew on her back. There were twigs in her hair. He had known she came from lying in the hills. He had been wild.
It was true—she had been lying in the hills. But she could not tell him that she had been chilled, miserable and alone there. She could not tell him that she had done that for Sugar Mama’s benefit. He would not have believed. Only that morning he had kicked Sugar Mama into the dirt road.
Yet on that morning she had followed Chinatown and Big Mat when they left the house. Had they glanced behind them, they would have seen her. The dance-hall dress was unpinned from its diaper shape. The high-heel shoes were on her feet. She had kept the two men in sight until they turned off to buy whisky. Her path led straight on to Sugar Mama’s shack.
Why had she gone to Sugar Mama’s shack? It was simple in feeling but hard to tell in words. She wanted Sugar Mama to think that she was on the way to one of the fine houses back in the hills, because Sugar Mama had taunted her. She wanted to hurl those taunts back at Sugar Mama.
She had not gone into Sugar Mama’s house. She yelled the lie from the road. Sugar Mama had come to the porch and laughed and cursed, and she had cursed back. But she knew that the lie had missed its mark. Sugar Mama was not fooled.
Then a puzzling thing had happened. She found herself walking into the hills instead of circling back as she had planned. No, she had not been out of her head. She knew that there were no friends waiting in the fine houses back in the hills. She knew that the intent of her trip had been merely to trick Sugar Mama. But she did not turn back. She had not understood with her mind. . . . Her body was proving something.
So she had crept close to one of the white hill houses. Cars had come up the drive. Afraid, she had hidden herself in the bushes at the foot of the hill. All day she was there. Lying on her back, she had watched the house—almost above her where it hung over the hill. When the moon came out the early dew wet her. Her body had lost strength to the ground. Tired and dispirited, her body could barely take her home.
Big Mat had slapped her around. He had made love to her tired body. It had not responded to either. He had gone to work twice and come home twice. Everything remained the same. Yesterday he had left the house. She did not know where he went. He had not come home.
She was really talking to herself—not to Chinatown.
The trolley came. They took seats at the rear of the car, and Anna had to stop talking. The passengers kept craning to look at her bruised face. She pulled her shawl together, hiding her head.
Bo had come to the hospital with Melody. He felt responsible for the accident. But there were no bones broken. The doctors had joked while they cleaned the wounded hand. They laughed at Bo’s worried face. He’d have to hit harder next time if he wanted to cripple a steel man. Melody would be reporting for work within a week.
Melody carried the bandaged hand in his coat pocket when they left the hospital. He had felt the hurt when the broken flesh came to life after the first numbness of the blow. Now there was no pain. In a detached manner he noted his heartbeat by the dull pulse throb of the hand.
He counted to himself. “One, two, three . . .”
“You all right, boy,” stated Bo. “Ain’t hollered once.”
Melody counted by threes. “One, two, three—one, two, three . . .”
“Yessir, you all right. Hear your brother’s all right too.”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” he muttered, with the beats to mark the count.
“Wonder why they ain’t been near the hospital?”
No answer.
“You ain’t split up or nothin’?” ventured Bo.
Melody stopped counting. He thought a second.
“Maybe we kinda split up.”
“That’s too bad,” said Bo. Then he added: “I hear good talk ’bout the one call Big Mat.”
“What you hear?”
“Hear he one of the best helpers they got on the hearth.”
“That’s a fact.”
“Hear the micks calls him Black Irish too.”
“Yeah. That’s all you hear?”
Bo fussed with a pipe. He started to speak and changed his mind. Finally he said:
“Well, I did hear he took hisself a woman.”
“Yeah.”
“Lots of guys do that,” he said defensively.
“But he got a wife in Kentucky,” Melody burst out. “He got a wife to send for. She there waitin’.”
Bo got the pipe lit. He puffed slowly to collect his thoughts.
“So that what you split up over,” he mused. “Well, I figure you more worried ’bout that than him, huh?”
“I reckon.” Melody felt guilty, because he had not told the whole truth.
“Could see somethin’ was eatin’ at you this morrin’.”
“Things ain’t right!” he cried.
“Things ain’t right nor wrong, boy. Things jest is.”
“Things is all messed up.”
“Look, boy,” Bo knocked his pipe against his palm to give emphasis. “Most ever’ nigger in this mill got womenfolks back where they come from. Still, most ever’ one of these niggers is hitched one way or another to women round here. They don’t bother ’bout no laws or nothin’. They jest ups and starts out a new way. I don’t know why it is, but it ain’t nothin’ to upset a man.”
Bo was practically a stranger to Melody. It suddenly was embarrassing to be talked to like that by a near stranger. Melody felt as though he should say something formal to put them back where they belonged.
“Much obliged,” he said. It was all that came in his mind.
Bo was apologizing when he muttered: “I had me a wife once—ten children back in Dixie. Now I got me a little bitch round here. So I figure I kin talk.”
Not looking at each other, they watched the dark road beneath their feet.
A couple of blocks away they could hear the roar of a trolley. The roar died as the trolley stopped near the hospital. They kept their eyes on the road. They had no reason to be curious.
All of the stove gang were at the lunch wagon when Melody and Bo walked in. A man who had been hurt on the job was a particular kind of hero to the men who had worked beside him. Just that morning Melody had met with silence when Bo introduced him from the blast-furnace floor. Now the crew hailed him.
“Work back in easy, kid. Work back in easy,” said the Irishmen.
“How your hand do for himself?” asked the Slav.
“You stand pain like anything,” said the Italian. “I tell fella on night crew that you Italian. I say you gone back to Italy.”
The hayseed just took Melody’s hand and parted his freckles in a grin.
Bo left Melody with the gang. Before he went he said: “Don’t worry ’bout your job on the blast. I git your brother, Chinatown, in your place till you git back. He’ll start the long shift in the morning.”
Melody took a cup of coffee and sat back near the stove. He had to learn to hold the thick cup steady with his left hand. So he practiced, sipping at the heavy coffee. Listlessly he half listened to the gang’s kidding of the waitress.
The girl popped her gum and matched them word for word. She drew a cup of coffee and leaned over the counter. In her own tongue she spoke to someone behind the stove.
The answering voice rang old chords in Melody’s ears. He saw a hand hook out for the cup. He knew that hand. Many a time it had been hooked over his own to lift a slag hunk from the pit floor.
The gang was kidding again.
“Who you got back there, baby?”
“Your sweetie, heh?”
“The boss ain’t gonna like that, baby.”
Melody leaned backward to look. The old Slav sucked his coffee in the shadows back of the stove. He saw Melody. His head nodded up and down. His eyes crinkled. Melody started back to where he sat.
The waitress was back at the coffee urn. Her voice crackled.
“Don’t be so Goddamn funny. It’s my grandfather.”
The kidding stopped.
Melody sat on a box in front of Zanski. He nodded at Melody again.
“Yes, yes—my big girl, Rosie—a fine girl born at mill but like girl in Ukraine.”
“Yeah,” he agreed. “She do all right back o’ the counter too.”
The old man stroked the long, uneven beard away from his lips and took another sip of the coffee. His faded blue eyes became thoughtful.
“No, no,” he said, “she is not like girl in Ukraine. Don’t look for husband and have kids. Girl around mill work in box factory, eh? Make food in lunchroom, eh? Get money like man.”
Melody didn’t care what the old man talked about. Zanski was a good guy to be with. He liked the sound of the talk, but, like all talk nowadays, it came from a distance. Wound up in his own world, he half listened, half dreamed.
“Man don’t tell kid nothin’ at mill,” the old man was saying. “Not Rosie. Rosie don’t listen to old guy with bad arm, eh?” He tried to move his left arm to point up what he was talking about. That arm was held across his chest by two big safety pins. “Fellas tell you I get tagged. Now I don’t never go back to mill.” He smiled. “Goddamn steel do a good job—take skin off arm—fix chest up like fella peel onion. No work no more . . . So, so, so . . .” he chanted.
Zanski leaned back in the chair to suck at his coffee.
Without volition Melody’s right hand fingered for the tobacco sack. The bandaged hand fumbled out through the coat pocket.
“Sonofabitches!” he gasped, and he brought the quivering fingers to his mouth. But he could not suck through the bandage.
“You got hurt hand, Melody?” asked the old man.
“Jest mashed up a little.”
“You don’t say nothin’ much. How it happen? Hot metal ain’t burn?”
“The hell with it!” he told him.
“You don’t be mad. Laugh at me just like you. Old man try to take bath in hot metal, eh?”
“I ain’t mad,” he said.
“You got problem, eh?”
“Naw.”
“Somethin’ up here.” He taps his forehead.
“Look,” he told him, “there ain’t nothin’ wrong up here. There ain’t nothin’ wrong nowheres.”
“So?”
“So?” He mocked the broken English.
The old man went into a shell. His eyes took on an untroubled, vacant look. He sucked at his coffee.
Melody had not meant to hurt the old man. He waited for him to loosen. He waited, but the eyes kept in the distance.
“I jest ain’t myself today,” he finally ventured.
“So?”
“Been off my feed a long time,” he said.
“So?”
“Yeah.”
Zanski was still in his shell. Melody was forced to give in all of the way. “I reckon you hit the test square in the middle. I kinda all balled up here.” And he tapped his head.
“You nice fella, Melody,” said the old man. “We get mad quick like boy, eh?”
“Yeah,” he said, and grinned at him.
“Sure, sure. We get coffee—forget him.”
He leaned out from behind the stove and beckoned to his granddaughter. She came, popping her gum.
“Why the hell don’t you go home?” she said to him. “All day you sit around here. The boss’ll chase us both out.”
The old man beamed on his granddaughter. He reached out his good hand and took hold of her skirt. He pulled her close to the chair.
“Rosie, Rosie,” he said, “what I tell you?”
“Aw, all right.” She took the gum out of her mouth.
“This my frien’ from mill,” said the old man, nodding at Melody. “This is Rosie. Shake hand.”
The girl put her gum behind her ear and then shook the hand.
“Pleased t’meetcha,” she said.
“Didn’t know you and him was kin.”
“Sure.”
“Bring one cup coffee for my frien’,” the old hunky told her.
The girl told him, “Whyn’t you go home and get coffee? All the time you hangin’ around here. The Goddamn coffee is for sale.”
“So . . .” The old man gave her a little push.
She started back for the counter. She went a few steps and turned.
“Midnight?”
“Yeah.” Melody nodded.
“Comin’ up.”
The old man leaned back in his chair and loudly honked his nose into a bandanna. He spoke through the handkerchief.
“Old fella, long time dead now, tell story in my village. Story all about man get devil in his head. Scare him out with big shout. Now I tell my kids if they get devil in head come talk quick. Devil grow if fella don’t say somethin’.” He blew his nose and scrubbed at his mustache again. “You and me don’t tie bandanna round neck no more.” He chuckled. “Just wipe nose, eh?”
“That’s what they made for,” Melody said.
“You get a little coffee. Feel good. Maybe you talk out devil, eh?”
Before Melody could think what to say Zanski leaned from behind the stove and cried:
“Rosie, why you so slow?”
In a few seconds Rosie brought the coffee. Melody sipped at it and tried to think how to get around telling the old hunky all that was on his mind. He wouldn’t want anybody to know about Anna—about that night in Big Mat’s shack.
The front door slammed open, and a wave of fresh air went around the stove. Chinatown had just come in. Melody knew his loud voice.
“China!” he called.
Chinatown came at a run.
“Melody! Melody! You got to come quick! They got Mat.”
“Who got Mat?”
“The sheriff down near Pittsburgh. Say Mat was tryin’ to kill a fella.”
“Tryin’ to kill what fella?”
“They ain’t say in th
e telegram.”
“What was they fightin’ for?”
“Ain’t say that either.”
“What for you waste time?” asked Zanski. “Brother in trouble, eh?”
“What kin I do about it?” said Melody.
Chinatown looked as though he had been slapped in the face.
“Ain’t you comin’? Ain’t you——?” he stuttered.
“What kin I do?”
“You mean, you ain’t comin’?”
“Naw.”
Chinatown couldn’t understand. As though to familiarize himself with all the facts, he checked on his fingers:
“First, Anna and me come to the hospital. But you jest gone. So I go by the bunkhouse. You ain’t there. But there the telegram on your bunk. I wait at the bunkhouse. I wait at Anna’s. I don’t know what to do.”
“Where Anna now?”
“They kep’ her at the hospital,” said Chinatown. “Her lips was all cut up.”
Melody leaned forward and shocked himself with the fierceness of his own voice.
“Look, China, Big Mat a man, ain’t he? He know what he doin’. If he try to kill a fella and get caught at it, then that jest his hard luck. He don’t need me to look out for him.”
“I don’t know what you talkin’ about,” cried Chinatown desperately. “What we goin’ to do?”
Melody was like another person seeing himself, a stranger to himself. A drum in his head throbbed desperately.
“You go on back to the bunkhouse and sit on your ass—that’s what to do.”
And suddenly he couldn’t bear for Chinatown to be there looking at him. In a fight two men had stood breast to breast, and then one of them got that fear in his eyes when he knew he had to die from the hog sticker pushing into his belly. He knew it and he didn’t know it. Melody couldn’t bear Chinatown to look at him with that fear in his eyes. He hopped off the box and gave Chinatown a push. Chinatown fell against the stove.
“I don’t know what’s the matter,” he stuttered.
“Git outa here! Git!” Melody yelled at him.
He backed out of the way of the stove and, keeping his slant, scared eyes on Melody, backed out of the lunchroom.
The men of the stove gang were all on their feet, looking, saying nothing. One by one they paid their checks and filed out.
The old hunky said, “Wait!”
A lot of cuss words started up from Melody’s belly.
Blood on the Forge Page 13