Chapter 38

Geesje

Holland, Michigan
1897

Joy floods through me as I pull this beautiful young woman into my arms. Christina’s daughter! Anneke. My granddaughter. I can hardly believe it. We are both weeping as we cling to each other. “My goodness . . . oh, my goodness . . .” It’s all I can manage to say.

We finally pull apart because we both need to sit down. I can feel Anneke’s body trembling, and my own knees feel as though they’ve turned to water. We sit side by side on my sofa, gripping each other’s hands, the family photograph lying in her lap. There are so many questions I would like to ask her, so many missing parts of Christina’s life that I would love to have Anneke fill in for me. But that’s probably asking a lot of a child who was only three years old when her mother died. I’ve noticed her fiancé, William, checking his pocket watch. I know Anneke has a life and a home in Chicago that she must return to, but I don’t want her to go.

“Can you stay a little longer, Anneke? Please?” I beg. “We’ve only just found each other. I would love to get to know you, and to have you meet the rest of our family. This is my son Arie,” I say, pointing to the photograph. “He’s a war hero, and he runs our family’s printing business. And this is Jakob. He’s a minister, and he and his wife, Joanna, have four children, including your cousin Elizabeth. You must meet them! And this is my husband, Maarten—your grandfather. He’s gone now, but I would love to tell you all about him. He never lost faith that God would bring Christina back to us—and here you are! Her daughter!” I hold Anneke’s face in my hands as I drink her in. I kiss her forehead. Then I pull her close to my heart again.

“Yes!” she says. “Yes, I want very much to stay!” When we move apart she looks up at her mother and William. Mrs. Nicholson is discreetly wiping a tear with her lace-edged handkerchief. William is moved as well, but he is frowning and chewing his bottom lip in an effort to remain in control. “I know it’s time for the two of you to leave,” Anneke tells them, “but I’m not going with you.”

“She’s welcome to stay here with me for as long as she likes. I’ll take good care of her,” I assure them. In fact, I probably won’t let her out of my sight.

“We’ll make sure she gets home to you safely,” Derk says. “I give you my word.” He has tears in his eyes, too, but he’s beaming with happiness for both of us. I notice William studying him with a hint of jealousy.

“Are you a family member, as well, Mr. Vander Veen?”

“Please, call me Derk. And no, I’m not really a family member but Tante Geesje has been a second mother to me ever since my own mama died. I live in the house next door.”

Anneke rises to her feet and goes to her mother, resting her hands on her shoulders. “Nothing is going to change, Mother. I love you. And please tell Father that I love him, too. He’s a hero. He saved my life. But I’m a grown woman now. Tell him I’ll be home in another week or so.” She goes to William and stands on tiptoes to kiss his cheek. “Thank you for understanding, William. But I think you’d better hurry. You don’t want to miss your steamship. Would you please ask the driver to bring my bags inside before you leave?”

I close my eyes in joy. Anneke is going to stay with me. Christina’s daughter! My cup is running over with happiness.

I stand on the street with them in front of my house as they say good-bye. I can see that William cares for Anneke—and that he is not happy about her decision to stay. I’m guessing he likes to be in control, to take charge of every situation and quickly fix things. And he probably wants a wife who leaves all the decision-making to him. If Anneke is as strong-willed and independent as her mother was, then I see rough seas ahead for them.

I can also sense the enormous loss that Anneke’s mother is feeling. I go to her before William helps her into the carriage and say, “I understand how you must feel. We adopted our two older sons after their parents died. I think every adoptive mother in the world fears that the day will come when she will lose her child to their ‘real’ family. But please don’t worry. I don’t think that will happen with Anneke.”

“It won’t, Mother,” Anneke says.

“Mrs. Nicholson, I’ve learned through the years that all of our children are only on loan to us from God,” I continue. “They belong to Him, not to us. Our son Gerrit died in the war when he was nineteen. And then we lost our Christina when she was twenty-four. Arie and Jakob are still with me, but they are adults, with lives of their own to live. I’ve had to learn to let them go, too. But I thank God every day for all of the years that He loaned them to me.”

Anneke holds my hand as we watch the carriage drive away. I’m overjoyed that she will be with me for a few more days and that we can get to know each other. “Let’s go inside,” I say. “I’ll fix us something to eat.”

“I guess I’ll head home now,” Derk says, “and leave you two to catch up.”

“No!” Anneke and I both say at the same time. “We have you to thank for this wonderful day,” I tell him. “You must stay and have lunch with us.” The two of them sit at my kitchen table, watching as I slice my homemade bread and some cheese and fresh tomatoes from my garden. “I’m sorry I don’t have more to offer you, but I wasn’t expecting company, and I don’t usually cook on the Lord’s Day.”

“This looks wonderful,” Anneke says. “I don’t need a big lunch, Mrs. de Jonge.”

“You can call me Oma, if you’d like. That’s what Dutch children call their grandmothers.”

Anneke’s smile lights up her face. “I would love to call you Oma.” I pour coffee and sit down at the table with them, but we’re all too excited to eat. “For as long as I can remember,” Anneke says, “I’ve had the same nightmare about the shipwreck. I didn’t know it was real until today. I’ve had other dreams about Mama and me, and now I think they were probably memories, too.”

“I would be grateful to hear anything you can remember about your mama—if it isn’t too painful for you. You see, we didn’t know where Christina was or what she was doing after she left us. We never even had a chance to say good-bye. She had fallen in love with a young man named Jack Newell.”

“Do you think he’s my father?”

“I don’t know. She told us that he was originally from Ohio, and he had left home and a difficult family life with barely a cent to his name. He came through Holland looking for work and met Christina. She ran away with him after the fire destroyed most of the town, including the tannery where Jack worked. Christina said she wanted to find a job in Chicago as a servant for a wealthy family like yours.”

“Of course, Chicago was destroyed, too, at the same time as Holland,” Derk adds. “They wouldn’t have known that when they left, but maybe Jack found work rebuilding the city.”

I’m hesitant to admit the truth as I add, “I don’t even know if he and your mama ever married. She never wrote to us.”

“Maybe William can ask his Pinkerton detectives to check the marriage records in Chicago,” Derk says.

“I don’t ever recall having a father before the shipwreck,” Anneke says. “In my dreams, Mama and I are always alone. I dream about living in a tiny room with little more than a bed. It’s shabby and it smells terrible, and we can hear men fighting in the room next door. Then Mama says, ‘I’m going to get us out of here, Anneke. I’m going to take you home.’ If my dream really happened, then we must have been coming here. . . . I had another dream that we’re riding on a train that’s crowded with poor people like us. The sun is setting behind us as we reach the dock and I see the big steamship. . . .” She pauses for a moment, and I see her steeling herself. “In the nightmare I’ve had ever since I was a child, I’m in a terrible storm at sea. People aboard the ship are getting seasick because the waves are so rough. It thunders and the lightning lights up the sky outside like daylight, but all we can see is water. Mama holds me tightly, soothing me. She sings to me. She has such a sweet voice.”

My eyes fill with tears at the memory of Christina standing beside me in church, singing from the Psalter in her clear, pure soprano. “Yes, you’re right . . . she did have a beautiful voice.”

“When the ship starts to sink and they make us get into the lifeboats, everyone is terrified! Suddenly a huge wave washes us right out of the boat, and we sink beneath the water. I feel Mama fighting with all her strength to get to the surface, but I think her skirts are making it hard for her to kick, and they pull her down. Father is also trying to stay afloat a few feet away from us. He had been in the lifeboat with us. Mama handed me to him saying, ‘Save my daughter! Save her, please!’ Then, as soon as I was safe in his arms, she sank beneath the waves.”

Anneke pauses again, and I want to weep at the horror of Christina’s final moments of life. I hope she is looking down from heaven, and that she knows that the daughter she loved until her very last breath has survived. How proud Christina would be of this lovely, poised young woman. I want to meet her adoptive father and thank him for saving my granddaughter. He could have thought only of saving himself.

“Father had to struggle to keep our heads above the waves,” Anneke continues. “He was growing tired, breathing so hard. Then I saw a man reaching his hand out to us. He was the last man in a long chain of men, all holding hands. He grabbed Father by his lapels saying, ‘I’ve got you . . . I’ve got you now. . . . Hang on, and you’ll both be safe.’”

“Your grandfather was one of those men. And your Uncle Arie. They helped pull you and the other survivors to shore.” I wait while Anneke gathers herself. This must be so hard for her, but I long to hear more.

“That’s all I remember about my mama,” Anneke says with a shrug. “I’m sorry.”

“You have no reason to be sorry. Thank you for sharing those memories with me. I know it must be difficult to relive that day.”

“Mama loved me with all her heart,” she says, wiping her tears. “I know she did. I was always certain of that. I felt safe and happy when I was with her. . . . And lost and alone after she was gone. Even now as an adult, I still feel alone at times, as if I don’t really belong with all the other people in our social circle. I guess now I know why.” She looks up at me and says, “I’m looking forward to learning more about my mama.”

A smile spreads across my face. I always smile when I remember how much joy Christina brought to our family. “She was beautiful and independent and strong-willed from the day she was born—always happy and carefree and full of life. She had three older brothers, and she wanted to be just like them and do everything they did. But as she grew older, she became impatient with our quiet life here in Holland. She wanted to explore the world outside our city limits. She was raised in the church, as all of our children were. We taught her right from wrong and what the Bible says about how to live. Then when she was seventeen she met Jack Newell, and he planted doubts in her mind and heart about her Christian faith. Christina knew it was a sin to run away with him if they weren’t married, and so she left without even saying good-bye. She broke our hearts when she did, but our grief was even greater because we knew she was walking away from God. I was overjoyed when she wrote and said she was coming home to us. I wish I knew if she was coming home to God, too.”

Anneke looks up, staring at me as if she has suddenly remembered something. “She did come back to Him—she came back to God!”

My heart seems to stop beating. “What? How do you know?”

“Last winter I stumbled upon a church on LaSalle Street in Chicago. They were having some sort of special event there, and the building looked so familiar to me that I got out of the carriage and went inside. I knew as soon as I stepped through the door that I had been there before. The music, the lights, the way the pews were arranged—everything was so familiar. I listened to the preacher for a few minutes, and his sermon fascinated me. He said God loved me and wanted me for His child. After that first day, I kept going back again and again. It was as if I was being drawn there by pulleys and ropes. When William found out, he got very angry with me and forbid me to go back, but I went anyway. I couldn’t help it. Then I started having dreams about the church, and now I know why. It’s because I went there with Mama. I dreamed that I was sitting beside her in the pew. She gave me peppermints, just like the ones you have on your sitting room table, while she listened to the sermon. The preacher’s words must have touched her heart because she wiped her tears on a plain cotton handkerchief with tiny blue flowers on it.”

I inhale sharply. “Christina had one like that. I embroidered it for her myself.”

“In my dream I asked Mama if she was sad, but she said, no, her tears were tears of joy. When I visited the church last winter, the minister always invited people who wanted to repent of their past mistakes to come to Jesus and find forgiveness. He asked them to come forward so he could pray with them. In one of my dreams Mama takes my hand, and we walk down that long aisle together. She knelt at the front and prayed, I’m sure of it.”

I lower my face in my hands as I begin to sob, remembering how Maarten used to remind me of Jesus’ promise: “‘My sheep hear my voice . . . I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand.’” After twenty years of waiting and wondering, God has finally answered my prayer. Now I know for certain that when I join Maarten and Gerrit in heaven someday, Christina will be there with us, too.