The Vow

Before he set off for America at the age of 25, Athanassios Konstantinides, a poor Greek farmer in Asia Minor, made a vow to a 15-year-old girl. Never would he be "lured by an American beauty"; when his fortune was made, he would send back to the Turkish village of Yala-zik for his beloved Soultana, and they would be married. Soultana promised to wait for him. That was in 1913.

Athanassios made his way to the automobile factories and metal shops of Detroit. From time to time he mailed $5 bills back to Soultana, but World War I prevented a reunion. In 1922 Soultana and her family were driven from Yalazik by the war between Turks and Greeks. A year passed before the lovers re-established contact; regretfully, they despaired of getting Soultana into the U.S. immigration quota. In 1930 Athanassios sent $275 to his brothers to buy Soultana's passage to America. The brothers, he says, never gave her the letter or the money, and reported that Soultana had disappeared.

In 1933 Soultana, by now 35, at last bowed to her family's argument that she would never see Athanassios again, and gave in to the demands that she marry one Christos Savides. As the Depression years and World War II passed, Athanassios Konstantinides (his name changed to Tom Constantine) went into the cafe business, and Soultana Savides became first a mother and then a grandmother.

By 1956 Athanassios, still a bachelor, had learned that Soultana was married and living in the village of Mavrodendri. He left his business and rushed off to Greece. But, fearing that "it would be hard for Soultana to abandon the little ones," Athanassios returned to Detroit. In January of this year, Soultana dispatched a telegram: COME AND MEET ME AT VERROIA RAILROAD STATION OR I WILL TAKE POISON. They met and eloped.

Last week Athanassios. 70, and Soultana, 60, were living together in a one-room apartment in the northern Greek town of Edessa. "I am not unfaithful to my husband." said Soultana. "I had warned him that if Athanassios ever came back, I would go with him immediately." At first Soultana's husband sent police after the couple, but now reportedly has agreed to a divorce. "We will be married." insisted Athanassios confidently, just as he had vowed 45 years ago.

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