16
THE FOLLOWING MORNING, Sophie met Pieter on the roof to take the climate readings. Dr. Clark’s dismissive comments about her intelligence still hurt, but she fell back on Quentin’s beautiful defense of her. You touch everyone around you with kindness and grace, and that has an incalculable effect on the world.
It was enough. She didn’t need the glory of a fancy position at a new climate observatory; she simply wanted to go on cooking for and supporting the amazing work taking place at Dierenpark. The house was alive with the sounds of men at work as they staked out excavation plots, carted mounds of dirt, and lifted out long-abandoned pieces of history from the soil. At the river, the biologists took water samples, soil samples, and plant samples. They brought them to the grand dining room, laying them on long rows of tables that had been set up with rows of microscopes. They compared the samples taken from a few miles upstream, trying to pinpoint microscopic differences that might account for the vibrant health in Marguerite’s Cove. Stacks of reference books filled the tables, and Sophie had no idea what they were doing, but she secretly cheered the biologists on.
Not that she wished the archaeologists ill, for every day it seemed they found some new treasure to dust off—but Dierenpark would only be saved if the biologists could identify a scientific cause for the splendid lilies and oysters in Marguerite’s Cove.
After the incident in the tulip garden, Sophie hesitated to keep meeting Quentin on the overlook for their regular afternoon chats. The last thing she wanted was for him to assume she was seeking him out in hopes of a closer relationship, but she truly savored their visits each day. And when one of the biologists showed her the largest oyster she had ever seen, it was a perfect excuse to visit him.
She need not have feared Quentin’s reaction. His smile was broad and genuine as she joined him on the overlook.
“The biologists found a slew of huge oysters clinging to the underside of a long-sunk keelboat,” she said as she handed him the shell. Oysters usually lived only seven or eight years, but these had to be at least fifteen based on the size of the shells. “See how pretty the inside of the shell is?” she said as Quentin took it from her hand.
He tilted it to the sun to see the iridescent shades of pink, blue, and silver on the inside.
“Mother-of-pearl,” he murmured as he admired the shell. “I’ve always found it odd how something so ugly on the outside can hide such great beauty. What happened to the oyster?”
Heat flushed her cheeks. “It was delicious.”
“You carnivore,” he said in mock indignation. “We find an abnormally long-lived oyster and you can’t stop yourself from swallowing it whole?”
She shrugged. “There are dozens just like it in the same spot we found that one.”
“I thought you weren’t supposed to eat oysters during the summer months. Aren’t they more likely to make you sick?”
“They go bad faster if they sit around in a marketplace in the summer heat, but if you eat them straight out of the water, they are fine. Oyster-catchers tell people not to eat them during the summer because it’s when the oysters spawn, but we’ve never had a problem with the oyster population in this stretch of the river. If anything, we’ve got too many, rather than a scarcity.”
“In that case, I want some oysters for dinner.”
Sophie listened in fascination as Quentin told her about the first time he’d sampled an oyster. He was twelve years old and Nickolaas had taken him to a Greek island where all the fishermen pulled up their boats and hauled in huge nets bulging with oysters. Rumor had it they would feast on oysters and Kalamata olives under the stars, and Quentin wanted to join them. He desperately wanted to be accepted by the hearty, vigorous men who seemed to take such delight in cracking open the oyster shells. The sight of the pale, glistening blob inside the oyster shell was mildly terrifying, but it was a matter of pride. His grandfather had already swallowed half a dozen oysters, and Quentin had felt like his manhood rested on his ability to conquer his fear.
“I closed my eyes, tipped it into my mouth, and left childhood behind me forever,” he said. Sophie laughed at his enraptured expression, and he continued to wax poetic over his first experience with oysters. “It was the cool saltiness of it. It was like tasting the sea and the entire bounty of life it contained.”
“I wish I had known you were so passionate about oysters,” she said. “I’ll make a nice pot of oyster stew for you.”
The sound of thudding footsteps came from the ledge nearby, and Pieter came bounding into view. Quentin stood.
“Careful, lad!” he warned. There were no guardrails to protect over-excited children, but nothing could dampen the excitement on Pieter’s face.
“Come quickly,” he panted. “The archaeologists have found something!”
A box had been unearthed from the trash pit inside the old smokehouse. It was encrusted with centuries of hard-packed mud, but Professor Winston held it as carefully as he would a newborn baby as he carried it to the work table outside the cabin and then began whisking away the mud with a soft-bristled brush. Everyone in the household gathered around to watch. The biologists left the river, the bodyguards clustered around, and Pieter wriggled through them to get a prime view across the table. And standing beside Professor Winston was Nickolaas Vandermark, watching every movement through guarded eyes.
Sophie glanced at Quentin, who seemed captivated as they all waited to see what the ornate box contained. It was about the size of a loaf of bread and made of dark wood, but silvery flashes indicated it was inlaid with some special material. Still holding the oyster shell in her palm, Sophie suspected it was mother-of-pearl, maybe even taken from the same oyster beds the biologists were studying.
Despite gentle prying, the lid refused to open. Professor Winston grabbed a magnifying glass, kneeling on the ground to be eye level with the box as he scrutinized the lid. Then he set the magnifying glass down and ran his finger across the side of the box.
“It’s nailed shut,” he said.
A murmur of confusion rippled through the crowd. Putting nails into a box of such beauty seemed a crime. They were crude, rough nails, deeply embedded in the wood.
“Open it,” Nickolaas ordered.
The archaeologists looked concerned, shifting their weight and glancing at one another. “We try to preserve the historical integrity of artifacts. Opening the box might destroy it.”
“It’s my box, found on my land,” Nickolaas said bluntly. “Open it.”
The nails were deeply embedded, and a fine pick was used to scrape the decaying wood from around each nail, creating a hollow where a pair of thin pliers could work in and pull the nails. When the last nail was removed, Professor Winston carefully lifted the lid.
“It’s a page of text,” the professor said. “I don’t want to touch it with muddy hands.”
He stepped aside, and an archaeologist with clean hands gently lifted the page from the box. “Just a single page,” he said. He turned it forward and backward, confusion on his face. “I’m not familiar with this language. I’ve never seen anything like it.”
Other men lined up to examine the page, each of them baffled by the strange document. The collective knowledge of twelve college professors, speaking over a dozen ancient and modern languages from around the world, was flummoxed by the nonsensical words.
When Nickolaas stepped forward to scrutinize the page, his face went pale. For a moment, Sophie thought he was about to be sick, but he stepped back to allow Pieter to take his place and get a good look. She forgot Nickolaas’s strange reaction when Pieter’s eyes widened in delight.
“What does it mean?” Pieter asked, his voice brimming with wonder.
“I have no idea, but it certainly looks very old,” Professor Winston said. “The printing press dates to 1440, so it can’t be any older than that.”
Sophie couldn’t resist nudging her way through the men to get a peek at the page. It was on thick paper yellowed with age. She ran her eyes along the first line of heavy black type, understanding why the scholars were so confused by the senseless text.
Neit mittumwossis nag ne in wunnegen mahtug meechinnáte, & wunnegen nah en moneaumunneate . . .
She couldn’t even begin to pronounce the words that looked like pure gibberish. A few of the sentences were underlined in a firm mark. As she scanned the dense page of bizarre text, her gaze snagged on the one word she recognized.
Genesis.
She caught her breath at the word then stood aside so others could get a look. Excitement rippled through the men as they gathered to examine the page, pointing to the only word that was familiar to them all. Genesis.
“Could it be a page from the Bible?” one of them asked.
The format of the text seemed to mimic the chapters and verses of the Bible, and the word Genesis at the top made it hard to doubt that it could be anything but a Bible.
“I am fluent in Latin, Hebrew, Aramaic, and Coptic,” one of the archaeologists said. “That text has no affinity or derivation from any of them.”
Sophie instinctively reached for Pieter’s hand, squeezing it. At times like this, she wanted someone to share her excitement.
“Burn it,” Nickolaas ordered.
Stunned silence settled over the group, but Nickolaas paced the ground beside the table, dragging an agitated hand through his hair. It seemed sacrilegious to burn anything that even might be a page from the Bible, but Nickolaas was resolute.
“Burn it,” he repeated. “It’s nothing but gibberish, and I won’t have anything to do with it.”
Sophie looked to Quentin, the only one here likely to countermand Nickolaas Vandermark.
“We are not savages who burn books,” Quentin said calmly.
“It’s not a book. It’s a single page found on my land,” Nickolaas said. “This is my land, my house, my estate, and every scrap of it belongs to me. I say burn it.”
Quentin limped forward, and the others parted as he drew closer to his grandfather. “You and I have a deal,” he said quietly. “We aren’t burning or destroying anything until we understand what is happening and why. The page will remain with Professor Winston for safekeeping.”
Relief trickled through Sophie as the scientists closed rank around Professor Winston. Even the biologists drifted over to stand in front of the professor, who clutched the wooden box with its strange piece of paper inside. Byron, the youngest and most audacious of the scientists, stood with his arms folded across his chest, daring Nickolaas to challenge them. Only the bodyguards remained to one side.
Nickolaas’s eyes turned flinty. “Ratface, go get that box,” he ordered.
Ratface shifted his weight, uncertainty on his thuggish face. “I don’t know if that’s such a good idea, sir.”
Beads of perspiration appeared on the old man’s face. His breath came rapidly, and his gaze darted among the other bodyguards. “Don’t just stand there,” he stammered. “Someone go get that box. This is an order.”
Sophie was relieved that none of the guards moved, and it seemed Nickolaas began to wilt in a strange combination of despair and agitation. He was wrong . . . deeply and profoundly wrong in his desire to destroy something he couldn’t understand, but her heart went out to him. He was a proud man being humiliated before all these people who refused to obey his commands.
She stepped forward. “The sun is very hot this afternoon,” she said gently. “I’ve got raspberry tea cooling in the kitchen. Let me help you inside.”
Nickolaas hesitated. If she pressured him too much, it would be condescending and destroy his dignity, so she turned to glance at Pieter. “Pieter, you’d better come, as well. You look overheated, too. None of us is used to this much sun.”
Pieter looked confused, but Quentin understood. “Run along, Pieter. It’s a hot day, and I could use some tea, as well.”
All of the archaeologists and scientists remained standing in a protective circle around Professor Winston, but as soon as Pieter scampered toward the house, Nickolaas turned and began to follow with slow, dragging steps.
Immediately after Sophie coaxed him inside, Nickolaas retreated to his bedroom, not even joining them for dinner and refusing a tray. Sophie could think of no reason for his virulent suspicion of the strange bit of text, but she intended to find out, and Quentin was her best way of unlocking the puzzle.
Quentin’s leg seemed to ache less when he was outside. Sitting on the front steps of the mansion, watching shadows lengthen across the meadow, it was so serene that it seemed to make the relentless pain ease a tiny bit. It wasn’t much, but it was a gift worth having.
He closed his eyes, listening to the rustle of the leaves in the soft evening breeze and the rumble of the men’s voices inside the house. Each evening after dinner, the professors gathered in the parlor to discuss the day’s findings, then moved on to discuss politics, theater, books, or whatever struck their fancy. Sometimes Quentin joined them, but he could take only so much before the lure of the outdoors beckoned him. The scent from the nearby copse perfumed the air, still warm from the haze of summer.
He had traveled all over the world, but this might be the prettiest spot he’d ever seen. Maybe there was something buried deep in his nature that harkened back to the generations of Vandermarks who had once lived on this precise spot. Perhaps he was tapping into the collective memory that had been handed down through the centuries of his ancestors. It was the only logical explanation for why he felt this profound sense of tranquility here.
Or . . . perhaps there was something to Sophie’s belief in a divine being. On evenings like this, so soft and still, it was almost possible to believe the majesty of the world was not mere chance but had been created by a higher power. He scanned the sky, looking for the tiniest hint of God.
Are you out there? Or are we really alone? Why don’t you send us a sign?
It would be nice to believe there was something more to the world than what he could see and touch. That they were more than a collection of carbon and hydrogen particles that would grow old, die, and then decay into nothingness.
The door opened behind him, and he immediately knew it was Sophie by the gentle way she closed the door and the swish of her skirts as she joined him on the steps.
“The men are saying you’ve given Professor Winston permission to take the page to Harvard for translation,” she said.
“I did.” There was a chance someone at the university would recognize the language, but more importantly, he wanted to get it away from Nickolaas. His grandfather couldn’t be trusted to give up so easily. Mr. Gilroy was intensely loyal to Nickolaas, and between the two of them, they were likely to get their hands on the document and destroy it.
“Do you know why it upset your grandfather so much?”
It was a question that had been plaguing him all afternoon. He drew a breath and rolled his cane between his palms. “I think he knows more about this house than he is willing to share,” he finally said. “He once said that his father hired a series of translators to go through some old papers found in the attic, and that his father became very despondent after the translations were complete. Karl Vandermark died shortly after.”
“What were they translating?” she asked.
“I have no idea. And if my grandfather knows, he’s not telling. He’s always been very tight-lipped about his father’s death.”
Which was not surprising. Karl Vandermark had been lionized by almost everyone who knew him. He was wealthy beyond all imagination but still took a genuine interest in running the timber mill. He rolled up his sleeves and learned the trade from the ground up. He mingled with his workers and gave generously to the town.
“Your grandfather once said something strange about his father,” Sophie said cautiously. “He said Karl Vandermark was no saint, although everything I’ve heard about him indicates he was an honorable, hardworking man. The people in the village adored him. Do you know what Nickolaas meant by that?”
It was a fair question, but he didn’t want to answer it. He continued rolling the cane between his palms so hard they started to hurt. The silence stretched and became uncomfortable. The tragedies of his family were not something he enjoyed speaking about, but he was as intrigued as anyone about that strange document found this afternoon, and the possibility it was related to Karl’s death.
“The people in my family don’t tend to live very long,” he said slowly. “There is a streak of melancholia that can be seen as far back as our records exist. I’ve read that physicians are now suspecting this might be a hereditary condition that is passed down from parents to their children. From what Nickolaas has told me about his father, it appears that Karl Vandermark suffered from the dark moods.”
“I see,” she whispered. “And you? Do you have this condition?” She said the words cautiously, as though she feared the question too personal.
Dark mood was too mild a term for the despondency, the despair, the days he didn’t have the energy to lift a fork to his mouth.
There had been no cataclysmic event or day he could point to and declare it the beginning of his long descent into melancholia. It was merely years of oppressive darkness that sapped the joy from his life. The knowledge that nothing endured, and ultimately nothing mattered.
“I suppose I do,” he admitted. “I was happy enough until . . . well, the past decade has been very difficult. Altogether awful, to be honest.”
“Has it been all bad?” she pressed. “In all that time, was there never a period where you were happy and hopeful?”
His response was immediate. “The day Pieter was born. That was the best day of my life. It was perfect.”
“Why?” Sophie asked. “What made it perfect?”
Only a person who had never witnessed the birth of a child could ask such a question, but he wanted to answer her rationally and reached back to analyze those few moments after Pieter’s birth and articulate exactly what he felt.
“When I first held Pieter, I felt a surge of love for him. He was so innocent, and I wanted the world to be perfect for him. I felt a sense of new hope. It was like being born again, and I felt like anything was possible if I only reached out and asked for it. I was overflowing with hope and love and the certainty that I had been put on this earth to raise this child.”
“And you don’t feel those things anymore?” she asked quietly.
He blanched. He loved Pieter . . . but that sense of hope? The belief he could conquer the world merely through the force of his love? No, he hadn’t felt that way in a long time.
“Despair is a powerful force,” he admitted. For a brief while after Pieter was born, there was a possibility he and Portia could overcome the problems between them and find happiness once again. “I’m afraid my wife and I had a less than perfect marriage,” he said slowly. “Portia and I grew up together. Our families had neighboring estates in Newport, and we’d always been friends. Our families traveled together, took the grand tour of Europe together. We shared a love of sailing, and although our friendship was platonic, I always assumed I would marry her one day. There are reasons very rich people tend to marry one another, and it has nothing to do with amassing wealth. I trusted Portia.”
She was pretty and smart and fierce. From the time they were old enough to take a sailboat out, they’d shared a love of racing across the sea toward the edge of the known horizon. They should have had a good marriage.
But on their wedding night, Portia had wept, saying he was like a brother to her and sharing a bed would be awkward and horrible. It was something he never saw coming. He was nineteen years old and eagerly anticipating the physical side of marriage, but Portia dreaded it.
Their wedding night was a disaster. Portia knew what to expect of a marriage and was willing to endure it in order to have a child, but their friendship collapsed. She avoided him, no longer even wanting to be in the same room with him. The troubles in the marriage bed reached out to taint every aspect of their friendship.
He’d had such hopes for his marriage, but they were snuffed out quickly. For a fleeting time after Pieter had been born, he’d thought things might get better. After he set their newborn child in her arms, he held Portia, and they both wept in joy. She welcomed his embrace and laughed as he kissed her face and they took turns holding the baby. They had been so happy on that day.
It hurt even worse when she rejected him a second time. Like all decent husbands, he had moved into the adjoining suite during her pregnancy and recovery, but when he attempted to rejoin her, she refused.
“If we’d had a girl, I’d have been willing to endure it again until we had a boy, but there’s no need now,” she explained.
Endure it. Those words still haunted him.
“I learned that sometimes platonic friends don’t work out so well in a marriage,” he said to Sophie. “It wasn’t what I hoped for or expected in a marriage, but it gave me Pieter, so I will be forever grateful.”
“What happened to her?”
“Cholera. She died when Pieter was only ten months old. I’ll always wonder if it could have been a real marriage if we’d had more time to overcome our troubles.”
He shook away the memories, wondering why it was so easy to confide these deeply personal things to Sophie. She seemed to have that effect on people. She was kind and open and didn’t have a mean bone in her body.
And she had been good for Pieter. It wasn’t until he saw the way Pieter responded to Sophie that he regretted not providing a real mother for the boy. The series of nannies and governesses were employees who were paid to be nice to the child. Sophie did it from genuine love.
Above all, love one another.
The phrase popped into his head without warning. He knew it was one of Sophie’s fussy Bible quotations, but she truly lived her faith. He was deliberately rude and mean to her when he first arrived, venting years of accumulated pain and disappointment on her simply because she seemed so cheerful. It hadn’t blunted her kindness. She had a gentle dignity in the face of his rudeness, consistently being kind, compassionate, and, in her own way . . . wise.
She would be good for Pieter. She would be an excellent mother. He’d never considered remarriage after the disaster with Portia, but there was something undeniably appealing about Sophie van Riijn. And when one found a treasure, it was only logical to try to secure it for himself.
A flicker of hope flared to life. Sophie was everything he could ever hope for in a woman. He didn’t need money or connections in a marriage, he simply wanted a wife who would complete his family. Complete him. Maybe it was time to make Sophie more than just his family’s cook.
He glanced over at her, but she was staring into the distance in confusion. He followed her gaze, surprised to see a handsome, auburn-haired man heading toward them in the distance. Grabbing the rim of the balustrade, he pulled himself to his feet, Sophie rising at the same time. The man noticed them and waved his arm in a wide arc over his head.
“Hello, Sophie!” he called out.
“Marten?” The confusion in her voice was obvious, and Quentin narrowed his gaze on Sophie’s delinquent, one-time fiancé. Dressed in a dapper suit and carrying two traveling bags, he had a reckless smile and a confident air that put Quentin on alert.
“What are you doing here?” Sophie asked, mild reproach in her voice. He was glad to hear it. Any red-blooded man who would throw over Sophie van Riijn for life as a steamship tour guide in Manhattan wasn’t worth his salt.
Marten lifted one of the bags. “I’ve brought tulip bulbs, a special order for Nickolaas Vandermark. Once they arrived, I figured I would deliver them in person.”
Sophie crossed her arms, an unusual spark of annoyance on her face. “Bulbs,” she said dryly. “You’ve come all this way to deliver tulip bulbs.”
“Not just any bulbs. These are from his cousin’s estate in Holland. Very hard to get in this country, but I was happy to oblige. What’s this I hear about a gang of college professors living in the mansion? Everyone in town is talking about it. The butcher says he can barely supply enough beef to keep you all fed.”
Sophie reached out for the bag. “Thank you for the bulbs. If you wait a moment, I’ll fetch you a tin of cookies to thank you for delivering them, but you’d best hurry if you are to get home before dark.”
Marten’s grin was annoyingly wide. “Sorry, Sophie. I met that Mr. Gilroy fellow in town, and he said I could stay for a few days.”
Quentin narrowed his eyes. The story would be easy to verify, which meant it was probably true. And that meant that either Mr. Gilroy or his grandfather saw some underhanded use for Marten Graaf here at the mansion.
Which meant there was no getting rid of him. Dierenpark had just acquired yet another houseguest.