Light and darkness warred for Gerrit’s consciousness. He struggled to lift his eyelids, but the blessed relief of oblivion fought back. He forced himself closer to the daylight on the other side of his closed eyes.
Trying to roll onto his right side brought a rush of pain. He moaned from the effort but couldn’t speak.
“Wim.” The soft word lilted in a most feminine way. “Are you waking up? Let me bring you some broth.”
He heard the muffled footfalls of her stocking feet as she scurried away. The banging of a pot lid, the scraping of a ladle prevented him from returning to sleep.
Vague memories danced at the corners of his mind. He had slept in so many places in the past months and years, he had to work to recall each morning where he had laid his body the night before.
The flaming pain in his shoulder informed him that last night and this morning were different.
Then the blast of gunshots echoed in his head.
He remembered.
He wanted the woman to come back. Last night a haze had clouded her face. He had battled so hard to stay aware that he did not get a good look at her. Or didn’t recall. She smelled of potatoes and carrots and it reminded him of home.
He hadn’t been there in a long time.
This time he refused to give in to oblivion and pried open his eyes. He lay in a cupboard, a bedstee, facing the wall decorated with fancy red paper. A clock, the queen’s picture, and a picture of a young man hung there. He turned his head to the doorway, toward the clanking of dishes. A vision swam before him, a slender young woman, her shoulder-length hair the color of fall leaves, the sides rolled, framing her heart-shaped face.
She strolled toward him, carrying a blue-and-white Delft bowl of something hot, the steam curling around her. She raised her pale eyebrows and hooked her mouth into a small smile.
Gerrit’s breath whooshed from his lungs—whether from his pain or her beauty, he didn’t know.
“You are awake.” Her cheeks turned as pink as a North Sea sunset. “How do you feel this morning?” The bowl clattered on the plate.
“You put me back together?” Even such a short sentence winded him.
Her color heightened and a full minute passed before she answered him. “I helped you.”
“Your name?”
“Cornelia de Vries. And I’m telling the truth. After you eat a little broth, you can tell me your name.”
Ah, she did possess a spark of life.
“I have vegetable soup. You need to get your strength back.”
He heard the directive in her voice. Get strong so you can leave. “I’m not hungry.” The odor of the soup turned his gut.
“You have to put something in your stomach.”
“The pain is too bad.”
“I wish you would. Please.”
He was a windmill, helpless against the breeze, unable to refuse her pleading hazel eyes. “You will have to help me.”
She nodded and scraped a rocking chair to the bed. With his head propped on several pillows, he managed to swallow three or four spoonfuls of the tasty, salty broth to please her, but he couldn’t force down more.
She set the bowl on the floor and leaned forward in the chair, her long, white fingers splayed across the seat. “You have to tell me your name. Your real name. Are you Wim vander Zee or Jan Aartsma? Or something altogether different?”
The Gestapo confiscated his identification when they arrested him. The only way she would know his alias would be if he’d been delirious and blurted it out. Or if they’d been here. “When did they come?”
“About one or two this morning.”
“Then why are we still here? They didn’t arrest you? Us?” He battled to keep his eyes open. He wouldn’t be able to carry on the conversation much longer.
“Johan scurried to his hiding place with the old dressing. When they found you in the bed, I told them you had become very drunk and had passed out. And that you were someone else.”
“And they believed you?”
“Ja.”
He yawned and his weighted eyelids fluttered shut. “You should join the Resistance.”
SEEKING COMFORT IN her morning routine, Cornelia stepped onto her front porch with her broom. Not far to her left arched the bridge that carried bicyclists, pedestrians, and the rare German car or truck into town. The road in front of her house ran perpendicular to the canal, a narrow strip of grass separating the street from the collection of small houses. All the while, a sentry patrolled the bridge. She tingled.
With the sweeping finished, she shifted to her laundry. She tied an apron around her old blue-gray dress, then heated a large pot of water on the woodstove and shaved off a thin slice of lye soap. It didn’t produce the suds of normal laundry soap, but she had nothing else. Another thing they lived without these days. At least it made the clothes and sheets smell fresh and clean.
If only Johan could help as she lugged the hot water to fill the washer tub that sat in their small back garden. A hedge surrounded the yard where a riot of blooms would erupt in a few short weeks. But even as she ran the clothes through the wringer and hung them on the line, the heat of the gray-clad soldier’s stare bored into her. She would string her brother’s items on a line in the kitchen.
As she reached for the line to pin her dark green A-line skirt, shouting came from down the street. Not the shouting of children at play, but the screaming of men and women in anguish, the screaming of taskmasters driving their charges forward.
The damp skirt dropped from her cold hand into her wicker laundry basket, and the wood clothespins she clutched scattered on the ground. She scampered to the front and peered down the narrow street. Soldiers surrounded a red house with a happy azure-painted front door. The Boersma home.
Leaning against the rough brick facade of her home, she watched as the Germans dragged Jap Boersma, their son, a year or two younger than Johan, from the home. Dear God, nee. If the soldiers hadn’t been in the area searching for Wim, they never would have found Jap. He would be safe at home with his parents, not headed to almost certain death in a German factory.
What had she done by taking in this man? She had endangered her entire neighborhood, sacrificing the lives of—how many?—to save one.
Hear and Frou Boersma stood in the doorway, shrieking at the soldiers who hauled their tall, thin son away. “Don’t, don’t, please, he is our only boy. God, please do not take him.”
Cornelia closed her eyes. Her hands balled into fists as she hugged her chest. Her own words echoed in her head. “Please, Hans, please don’t go.” They were as ineffective as the Boersmas’ pleas.
“I love you, Jap. God will watch over you and bring you home soon.” The tears in Frou Boersma’s voice crushed Cornelia’s heart. Perhaps it would be better if she turned Wim over to the Germans.
How many more young men would be torn from their families because of her actions? The chances of Jap ever coming home were small. Almost too small to matter.
When the truck gunned its engine and pulled away from the Boersma home, the acrid smell of diesel fuel contaminating the air, Cornelia dared to open her eyes. The soldiers hadn’t left the area but had moved farther down the road.
She studied her hands, expecting to find blood on them. Intent on examining her fingers, she didn’t notice her neighbor from across the canal, Maria Wierda, until she stood in front of her. The woman’s dark eyes were round. Cornelia dropped her gaze and studied Maria’s brown oxford shoes.
“Did you see that?”
“Everyone saw that.”
“Do you know what that was about? Do you know why they are here searching the houses?”
Cornelia remained silent.
The neighbor lady leaned closer and whispered in Cornelia’s ear, “They are looking for the missing body from the canal yesterday. They shot a group of resisters from Leeuwarden, but when they came back, one of the bodies was not there. Frou Tuinstra said she heard the soldiers talking that they would keep looking until they find it.”
An icy jolt shot through Cornelia’s body. They would find him. Sooner or later, they would find him. And if they located him at her house, she would be arrested for sure. Maybe Johan too.
Wim had to go.
Hear and Frou Boersma sat on their front step. He had his arm around her and pulled her close. Even from this distance, Cornelia could see the woman’s shoulder shake, weeping as if she would never be consoled.
The block of ice in Cornelia’s stomach doubled in size. She remembered that feeling.
The green canvas-topped truck rumbled farther down the street.
Maria pulled her to sit on the front step and continued to whisper. “Last evening a man came to our door. One of the men who the Gestapo shot by the canal.”
Cornelia sucked in her breath, hoping to appear shocked and surprised.
“I know. Unbelievable. Lucas insisted we help him, but once we had the wound dressed, we made him leave. During the night, the Gestapo knocked on the door. They were rough and rude and searched the house so well they would have found the man if we had been hiding him. I am so glad Lucas made me clean up the mess before we went to bed. If they had found it, they would have known the man had been there.”
“They were here too.”
Maria paled. “Did they find anything?”
Cornelia gave her head a vigorous shake, maybe overplaying the part a little too much. “Of course not. We have nothing to hide.”
The color of Maria’s complexion concerned Cornelia. “Are you feeling ill?”
She nodded. “Yes, a little. All this talk, it makes me woozy.”
“Let me get you a glass of water.” Cornelia rose and went inside, surprised when Maria followed on her heels. She hadn’t invited her neighbor in. Johan could be sitting in the kitchen or Wim could be making noise. She raised her voice so the men would hear that the woman had come inside. “Are you sure you don’t want to sit outside in the fresh air, Maria? It might help you to feel better.”
“Nee. I don’t want to hear the screaming and crying. It’s too hard.” That, Cornelia agreed with. Until last night, she had treasured the peace and security of her little home.
Lord, let them stay quiet.
Maria followed Cornelia into the kitchen where she retrieved a glass and filled it with water before handing it to her neighbor. The young, dark-haired woman, her hair done in two rolls at the top of her head, wrapped her long fingers around the cup and took a lengthy drink. Then she sat on the straight-backed chair. Fine lines radiated from her tight lips, though she couldn’t be more than twenty-two.
Cornelia wiped imaginary crumbs from the counter, then leaned against the whitewashed cabinets, hoping to appear calm and unconcerned. Her large pot sat on the small stove, water warming for her wash.
Johan had already strung the clothesline across the kitchen to hang the laundry. If Maria spied that, she would wonder why Cornelia hung half of her clothes outside and the other half in the kitchen.
Maria glanced at the pot on the stove. “Oh, you were in the middle of laundry, weren’t you?”
Cornelia nodded.
“With all of the commotion, I didn’t realize that. I apologize. There are things I need to take care of too.” She scraped the chair from the table over the worn wood floor and came to her feet. “Bedankt for the water.”
Cornelia led the way down the hall, past the front room to the door. “You’re welcome. I hope you feel better soon.”
Cornelia went to turn the brass knob.
A rustling of sheets came from the front room.
Wim must be awake and restless. She pleaded with the Lord to prevent him from calling for her.
Maria turned toward the front room and took a step in that direction. “What was that? Who’s here?”
Cornelia’s breathing came in short spurts. She didn’t know how to answer.
Their secret was about to be discovered.