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Show 51 Veronica, who had already set six plates on the table. Veronica added a seventh. Karl sat on a kitchen chair watching Mrs. Stulak drop pirohis into a pot of boiling water -- they were his favorite of all the Slovak dishes. Mrs. Stulak was as round a dumpling as the pirohis. Her thin hair was drawn into a tight bun; her eyes blinked rapidly because they watered too much. When he was little, Karl had thought that Mrs. Stulak's eyes watered because her hair was pulled too tight. "Good!" Karl told her, pointing to the pirohis in the pot. Since Mrs. Stulak could speak no English at all, she and Karl communicated mostly in smiles and nods. "Good pirohis," he said. She chuckled at his pronunciation of the word. Soon all of them were seated around the table, the men wearing clean, collarless shirts. Andy's father and the boarder Vaclav Hrenko let their suspenders hang around their hips, but the younger Hrenko brother, Emil, had his suspenders where they belonged, his hair neatly combed, and his fingernails painstakingly cleaned, because he was in love with Veronica Stulak. They were going to be married. During the meal, Andy's father seemed worried and distracted. When he'd finished eating, he sat with his chin pressed gloomily against his hands. Three priohis remained in the bowl; Mrs. Stulak offered them to Karl. As Karl spooned the pirohis onto his plate, Mr. Stulak pointed a finger at him and made an angry-sounding comment in Slovak. "Bohze moj!" his wife exclaimed, looking shocked. The others |
