A light mist fell, leaving Cornelia damp and chilled as she wandered the streets of town. She peeked in a few of the shop windows. Nothing but empty shelves.
Each building, though packed right against another, had a special uniqueness. Some were covered in light red bricks, so pale as to be almost pink. Others boasted brown or gray bricks. Many offered sloping roofs that pointed to the sky. Several were rectangular. Here and there, one had a green-striped awning, another a red-striped awning. All of them butted against the sidewalk that ran adjacent to the road.
She didn’t think much, just meandered here and there. After thirty minutes or so, she discovered herself shivering on Anki’s doorstep, hoping neither she nor Piet were napping.
Her sister invited her in, a much-loved book in her bony hand. “What brings you by?”
“I was out wandering. Would you like to take a walk with me?”
“In the rain? And you with no coat?”
“It’s stopped. Please?”
Anki gave a reluctant nod and fetched her red wool coat, which she held out to Cornelia. “Wear mine. I have Piet’s.”
“Always watching out for your little sister, aren’t you?”
“That’s my job.”
“You will make a great mother someday.”
She and Anki linked arms and stepped outside. “Someday.”
Anki’s smile overpowered her face. She had a look like . . .
“Someday soon, Anki?”
“Sooner rather than later.”
“Really?”
“That is all you are going to get out of me.”
Could it be? Oh, Cornelia prayed it was so. Piet and Anki had longed for a child since the first day of their marriage. Four years later, perhaps God had answered those prayers.
They walked in silence for a while before Anki broke the quiet. “Did you see Frou de Bruin this morning at the tsjerke?”
Cornelia shook her head. “Nee. I should go and see her after service this afternoon. Her gout must be giving her trouble. I am sure she will give me all the details.”
Anki chuckled. “I’m sure she will. And you will listen and nod in the appropriate places and make her feel better.”
“Of course. That’s how I keep my job, by agreeing to all she says.” Cornelia stopped in front of the tailor-shop window. The dark blue door had been locked for many months now because of a shortage of cloth.
Anki leaned next to her, the sides of their heads touching. “Will we ever be free? Will the Allies ever get here?”
Cornelia lowered her voice. “The Boonstras have a secret radio. They told me this morning the queen is making plans for a new government once liberation comes. If the queen is that optimistic, perhaps she knows something we don’t. But I agree—it’s a distant dream.”
They stood silent under the tailor’s green-striped awning as the cold drizzle began again.
“So what did you want to talk to me about? I am sure it wasn’t Frou de Bruin’s gout.”
Cornelia watched the rain drip from the gray sky. “They came back today while I was at church.”
“The Gestapo?”
Cornelia nodded.
“Not surprising.”
“Our little drunk ruse worked again. The same soldier who shot Gerrit was there and saw him. By God’s grace alone, he didn’t turn in Gerrit. I could have been arrested. We both should have been.”
“Corrie, you have to get that man out of your house, especially with Johan home. Both of you will end up in prison. Or worse. And now Johan is involved in this clandestine work.”
Cornelia massaged her hands together. “And he is still not home. I don’t know. Gerrit said he is waiting until dark to brave the streets.” Icy cold hands gripped her stomach.
Out of the corner of her eye, she glimpsed three NSBers patrolling the street, huddled in their black coats. She and Anki stood in silence as they approached. Cornelia shrank back and averted her gaze, her hands shaking as they passed and turned the corner at the next block.
Anki rubbed her arms. “You both are too involved. As soon as he can be moved, you have to get rid of Gerrit. You are both in too much danger. And Johan. What will you do if the Gestapo comes again?”
Cornelia stared at the spot where the NSBers disappeared. She shrugged. “I did well enough when they came to the house the other night.”
Her sister blew on her hands. “I have to admit you did.”
“I wished I could melt into a puddle on the floor.” She giggled.
Anki laughed. “Me too.”
Cornelia gazed at the little house across the street, squeezed in between two others. “If I turn Gerrit out, I would be signing his death warrant. Maybe his contacts will have a place for him to go. If not, I suppose he will have to stay.”
“You are going to risk your life for a stranger.” Anki shook her head in disapproval.
“He doesn’t feel so much like a stranger. We get along well.”
Her sister’s mouth rounded into a circle, her brows raised. “You have a crush on him.”
“I don’t.” Cornelia cut her sister off but then thought of her encounter with Gerrit earlier.
Nee, she didn’t. She refused to open herself up to the crushing pain of loss again.
“Corrie, you don’t know the man at all. Don’t confuse your sympathy for him with anything more.”
“Don’t worry. There is nothing going on.”
“Such a dangerous man. And he is putting you in danger.”
“What else am I supposed to do?”
CORNELIA WOKE WITH a start, drenched in sweat, her heart thumping at an alarming rate. Bits and pieces of the nightmare came to her—the sound of shattering windowpanes and screaming women, the vision of shadowy figures and blood.
Her breath came in short gasps and she hugged herself to stop her quivering.
Several minutes passed before the dream faded and the adrenaline drained from her body.
She stretched, an ache in her back and a crick in her neck. Light framed the blackout shades.
This wasn’t her tiny bedroom under the eaves. She found herself lying on the blue sofa in the front room with its red brocade wallpaper, Gerrit snoring in the bedstee. Why had she slept here? Her foggy brain searched for the answer, and as she roused, the realization hit her.
Johan never came home last night.
Gerrit told her he had waited for darkness, but she had sat up until the small hours of the morning in vain. Perhaps he had snuck in after she dozed and crept upstairs without waking her. Clinging to that glimmer of hope, she rose from her davenport, hoping the springs wouldn’t creak and wake up Gerrit.
For the second morning in a row, she climbed the steps to Johan’s door. For the second morning in a row, she discovered an empty room.
Her chest rose and fell quickly and her airway constricted. If Gerrit hadn’t come into their home and disrupted their lives, none of this would have happened. Johan would be sleeping in his bed where he belonged.
How dare Gerrit send an impressionable young man into such insanity as strutting about the streets dressed as a woman, dodging Nazi officers on a Sunday morning? The gall of the man, telling a stranger how to live his life. Yesterday she had been willing to let him stay. Today she changed her mind.
She didn’t tread lightly down the stairs but stomped, wishing she had on her klompen. Marching into the front room, she stood next to the bedstee, her hands on her hips as Gerrit left sleep behind. He smiled at her. Imagine that.
“Good morning, Cornelia.”
“Where is my brother?”
His face paled. “He didn’t come home?”
“Nee. You put him up to this crazy scheme, risking a young boy’s life to let your friends know you were alive. Was it worth my brother’s existence?”
“Don’t think the worst. We don’t know what might be going on. He could be well and safe somewhere.”
“Don’t think the worst? How can I help it? You sent my brother on a dangerous mission and now he has disappeared. People who vanish like that do not come home again. I used to know where my brother was and that he was safe. You have stolen him from me.”
He reached out his work-worn hand to touch her, but she shrank away. “Listen, Johan volunteered to go. I didn’t want to send him, but you were unwilling. What was I supposed to do? I needed to make contact with the Resistance here. You want to get rid of me as fast as possible—well, this is the way it needs to be done. In fact, you may have to go to the Underground cell yourself and find out what happened.”
“Why did you come here?”
“If you remember, your brother brought me here. I didn’t have much choice in the matter.”
“You didn’t have to shoot a missile through our happy life.”
“Were you really happy?” His bright blue eyes bored into her, as if he could see into her head like a gypsy’s crystal ball.
He had no right to ask her that question. Safe and secure—that’s what she wanted. Happiness had died with Hans. Happiness carried too great a price.
She clutched her stomach and turned away from the man who made her think too much. “I have to go and check on Frou de Bruin, do a few chores for her, and get her noon meal prepared. I have a job. When I get back, you need to have a plan to find Johan.”
She turned and strode out of the room, not wanting to give Gerrit a chance to say anything more. Especially not anything that would make her delve further into long-locked-away memories.
CORNELIA WALKED BRISKLY down the road lined with farm fields, away from Gerrit and the intense gaze of the German soldiers. She lifted her shoulders and inhaled a deep breath of cold air and tasted the ocean on her tongue. She had known Gerrit Laninga for less than sixty hours and he had toppled her world.
Because of him, Johan had disappeared. Would she ever see her brother again? Danger hung about Gerrit like a cloak. He brought only heartache and trouble with him.
Since that first night of the war, since her soul had been torn from her chest, she had structured her life so she might live in peace. Having Johan home had disrupted that some, and Gerrit disturbed her calm further. Just because she followed the rules didn’t mean she liked them or thought them right.
A windmill rose above the flat, windswept landscape, its sails turning and whispering in the breeze. Her breathing slowed. The wind gusted and then calmed. The iconic structure kept spinning.
For a moment or two, she forgot the war, forgot Gerrit, forgot everything.
Then the drone of an Allied plane on its way to Germany split the quiet air. Though the sight of the aircraft had become familiar, especially in the last year and a half or so, it still caused a shiver to run through her. She tugged her sweater around her shoulders and picked up her pace. She needed to finish and hurry home to see what Gerrit had done toward finding her brother.
Cornelia discovered her regal old employer, no taller than a twelve-year-old boy, ensconced on a straight-backed kitchen chair in her sunny front room, rejecting the comfort of the light brown davenport and the dark brown wing chair. An ancient wood-burning stove chased away the chill.
Several rings adorned the woman’s bony fingers, each of the many fake diamonds sparkling in the light. At least four strands of pearls weighed down her skinny neck. She rapped her nails on the wobbly end table. “You are rather late this morning, girl.”
“I apologize. A matter came up that needed my immediate attention.” She should promise it would never happen again, but with a wanted man under her roof, she could offer no guarantees.
“What could be more important than getting an old woman her breakfast? It will be dinnertime before I have anything to eat.”
Cornelia tipped her head to one side. Though Frou de Bruin was slight, she doubted the elderly woman would blow away in the wind. “Do you want an egg?”
“Ja, and some bread. It would be nice to have some of that newfangled hagelslag on it.”
Cornelia’s mouth watered at the thought of the delicious chocolate sprinkles on a piece of light toast. “No hagelslag today.” That was Johan’s favorite breakfast. Would he be around to have it after the war?
Her shoulders sagged in defeat.
“Stand up straight, girl, and no pouting. We all have privations in war. You can’t let a little thing like chocolate sprinkles get the best of you.”
Frou de Bruin didn’t understand. She hadn’t lost anyone in the war. Cornelia shook her head.
Her employer shifted in her chair and scooted to the edge of the seat so her feet touched the pitted wood floor. “What’s the matter with you? The only thing that should be blue is the sky.”
“I, well, so much happened this weekend. It’s, well, complicated.” Cornelia stared at the other woman.
“I am not a dunce. I understand hard things.”
The younger stared at the older. True, Frou de Bruin had been kind to her when she had come to work here two years after Hans’s death, the pain still raw. But how far could she trust another person? Children turned in parents and brothers betrayed sisters. Benevolence at one time did not translate into trustworthiness in the present moment.
“I am not sure I can explain it.” Her stomach writhed.
“I will let you know what you didn’t explain well. Just spit it out.”
Frou de Bruin stayed alone in her house, only going to church on the rare occasion when none of her many ailments were bothering her. She didn’t have anyone to tell if Cornelia shared her secret. Secrets.
Cornelia studied the petite, majestic woman from her tightly pulled-back gray hair to her claw-like fingernails to her tiny yet ladylike crossed ankles. Today she wore a dark purple evening gown, the scooped neckline encrusted with darker purple beads, the entire ensemble more appropriate to the nineteenth century than the twentieth.
She appeared so harmless.
“My brother is missing.”
Frou de Bruin leaned forward, like a child anxious to hear the ending of a suspenseful story. “Did those Nazis get him?”
Cornelia shrugged. “I don’t know for sure, but I think so.”
“How can you not know for sure?”
“He is missing, that’s how I know. He was out and never came back.” Why had she blurted even this part of the tale?
“And you have been hiding him? Good for you, girl. You have some fortitude after all. So now what?”
“That’s the question. Perhaps he will be home when I get there. Maybe Johan spent the night at a friend’s house.” Cornelia needed to stop talking.
“Set me up with some nourishment so I don’t wither away before tomorrow morning, and you can go and find out what happened to Johan.”
“Are you sure? You will be okay here?”
“I don’t think I will die before tomorrow, although at my age, you never know.”
Cornelia wanted to jump up and down. “Heel hartelijk bedankt, Frou de Bruin, heel hartelijk bedankt.”
GERRIT ROSE FROM bed once Cornelia left and sat in her rocker for a while, the quiet of the house broken only by the ticking of the schoolhouse clock, its hands inching their way around the dial. Clouds filled the sky throughout the morning and the wind blew hard. He pulled the blue blanket from the bedstee and wrapped it around himself.
Forgive me, Lord, for hurting Cornelia. Forgive me for any role I played in Johan’s disappearance. May she forgive me too.
He couldn’t bear it if she remained angry with him. He enjoyed her closeness, her tender care, her gentle touch.
She had ordered him to figure out a way to find Johan and bring him home. How would he go about that? His shoulder wound and the fact that he was a wanted man complicated things. He racked his brain for an hour or more but found himself no closer to a solution.
Gerrit didn’t know how long it would be before one of the Resistance workers would arrive. The possibility presented itself that Johan had been rounded up in a razzia, along with the others. No one may come.
A knock at the door broke into his thoughts. No banging, no demanding to be let in, just a knock.
Did he dare answer? If the neighbor had come to visit as she had the other day, he would give himself away. But the neighbor should know Cornelia worked.
In the end, he didn’t have to say anything. A voice he recognized as his friend Maarten called, “I have a delivery for Frou de Vries.” Gerrit sighed. Maarten must be bringing Johan home.
Gerrit shuffled to the door and Maarten greeted him with a grin, his dark hair parted and slicked back, not a strand out of place, as usual. “The man you sent told Bear about your wound, so I won’t give you the slap on the back I would like to.”
Gerrit swallowed hard and he bit back the pain as he grabbed his chum in a hug. “So good to see you. A little bit of Leeuwarden in this place.”
His friend’s smile widened. “You manage to get yourself out of more scrapes than anyone I have ever met. Only you can fall into a manure pile and come out smelling like a rose. We thought you were dead.”
Gerrit led him into the kitchen. “Pull up a chair and listen to my tale. No ersatz coffee. I have never been in this kitchen and feel strange about helping myself.”
Maarten waved as he folded his tall, bony frame into a ladderback chair. “Don’t worry about it. I’m fine.”
Gerrit launched into his story, still amazed at God’s providence in his life.
Maarten leaned back and stretched his legs when Gerrit finished. “Incredible.”
“I know.”
“What about this man you sent to us? He said you were staying with him and his sister.”
“She has been nursing me and fussing over me. Like my mother, only better because she is beautiful and compassionate and very sweet.”
“Watch it. A wartime romance complicates things.”
“Don’t worry about that. No romance of any kind between us.” After what happened with Mies, he wasn’t sure he ever wanted another romance—wartime or not. “I have a message for you, some information to share. But first, I have to tell you that Johan, the man I sent you, has gone missing.”
Maarten tented his long fingers. “He never arrived here? We sent him straight home yesterday morning.”
Gerrit sucked in his breath. “Nee, he never showed up here.”
Something had indeed gone wrong.