Our Otto,
It’s hard to believe, to understand, that your son is here and you can’t see him – more than that, you don’t even know of his existence. You will be so happy, so overjoyed, I know, when we are at last together again and you will have more than just me, you will have him, little Otto, as well. Do you mind that I have given him your name? When we spoke of children, I know you preferred other names than your own: Jaap, Johannes, Bastiaan, Mathijs, Vincent … But, I’m sorry, I couldn’t give him any other name but yours. When I first looked into his eyes, he was so completely you. And, of course, saying his name keeps me more connected to you, which I’m afraid, I couldn’t resist. I hope you’ll forgive me, I hope you’ll understand, I am fairly certain you will, given these strange and crazy circumstances. Besides, he is only our first. We will have many more children. You wanted five, though I confess, after the birth I did not feel willing to go through it again so many times. Can we compromise on three? Although, as the days pass and the pain fades … perhaps I will be able to do it again and again. We shall see.
Yesterday he looked at me, right at me, right into me, for the very first time. It was … I confess, I cried. Quietly, of course. But, before I knew it, tears were running down my cheeks and I couldn’t stop them. I had spent every hour, every day caring for him: feeding him, rocking him to sleep, holding him – but, even though he needed me, he didn’t seem to know I was there, me, myself, a person separate – and then, suddenly, he did. One day he will see you, his father, too. I hope that day is soon.
Ever Yours,
Marthe
‘He died in Herzogenbusch. He was twenty-three years old.’
‘I’m sorry,’ Pieter says.
‘It means, of course, that he wasn’t my great-grandfather. Though I still don’t understand what happened to Baby Otto. I think he must have died, after all, before my great-grandmother had Granddad,’ Clara considers. ‘And, of course, it means that he never read the letters, doesn’t it?’
Pieter briefly closes his eyes and nods. ‘Which, I imagine, is why your grandfather had them in his possession in the first place.’
‘Yes, of course.’
Clara reaches for Pieter’s hand and he clasps hers in his. It’s a sunny Saturday afternoon and they’re walking back from lunch in a pavement cafe and a visit to De Posthumuswinkel, where Clara bought a selection of papers and her own wax seal embossed with the image of a sealed envelope, along with gold and silver wax. As she shuffled around the tiny shop, feeling as if she were in a church among ancient spiritual relics, Clara slipped into her dream of opening Letters in Amsterdam, of living in this beautiful city that already felt like home. She watched Pieter as he picked up different papers, holding each with tentative reverence before placing it back into its drawer or onto its shelf. And she wondered how he would react if she were to share her dream with him. Though she can’t, she won’t. Not yet.
‘I want to go there,’ Clara says. ‘I want to visit the place where he died. I want to read him the letters. Does that sound stupid?’
‘No,’ Pieter says. ‘It doesn’t, not at all.’
‘I don’t know where it is, I don’t know how to get there, I don’t even know if it still exists, the site of the camp. Maybe they’ve built on it. Maybe nothing’s left. But still, I need to go … I can’t explain …’
Pieter squeezes her hand tighter. ‘You don’t have to. And anyway, it makes perfect sense to me. And I’m sure it’s still there. Most of the camps have been memorialised to commemorate the dead, to allow for visitors. You may even find his name there. You may learn how he died.’
Clara nods. The thought of this traps the words in her throat. She bites her lip and blinks hard to clear her cloudy eyes.
‘It’s not far from here, perhaps less than a hundred kilometres,’ Pieter says. ‘I can take you there, if you wish.’
Clara stops walking. ‘You’d come with me?’
‘Of course. It’ll be a hard thing to do alone. I visited Auschwitz-Birkenau about twenty years ago, after my father died. It was perhaps the hardest thing I’ve ever done in my life.’ He takes a deep breath and drops her hand. ‘I’ve never, I can’t think on it still, without …’
A gust of sorrow sweeps off him and Clara shivers. She fixes her gaze on the pavement, not wanting to intrude on his memories, not knowing how to comfort him if he cries now. She’d find it hard, she realises, to be in the full force of his sorrow and not try to kiss it away, to stop it, but just to let him feel, to let him crumple and hold him and let him be.
‘I’d like to come with you,’ he says softly. ‘I’d like to be there so you don’t have to be there alone.’
‘Thank you,’ Clara whispers. ‘I’d like that too, very much.’
They walk on along the canal, occasionally dodging bicycles zipping past, brushing each other’s shoulders as they step but not holding hands again, keeping their space, curled up in their own thoughts.
‘I’ve always believed, like Marthe did, that letters aren’t complete until they’re read,’ Clara says. ‘And I hate to think of Marthe’s letters never reaching Otto … That she put all her love, all her heart into that writing, and he never heard her words.’
Pieter nods towards a turn in the road, a side street, and they take it. They brush together and he envelops her hand again.
‘Will you read them all?’
Clara nods.
‘Would you like me to?’
Clara looks up at him. ‘Sorry?’
‘Well, they’re in Dutch. I imagine you might struggle a little, both with deciphering Marthe’s handwriting and with our rather, how do I say, elaborate pronunciation.’ He smiles.
‘You’d do that for me?’ Clara asks.
‘Of course.’
‘That’s so incredibly … Thank you.’ She’s so deeply touched by his offer that the desire to declare love rises up within her. The declaration is on her tongue, ready, but it’s too much, too soon and she swallows it back. ‘Though, I don’t know … Somehow, I think I should be the one to read the letters.’ She smiles. ‘Even if it’ll take me a hundred years.’
‘Okay,’ Pieter says, ‘but I’ll be there, if you change your mind.’
Clara reaches for his hand, brings it to her mouth and kisses his fingers. ‘Thank you,’ she says again, then drops her voice to a whisper, pulls him to a stop. ‘And I must say that I’m rather overcome with the sudden urge to …’
Pieter looks a little shocked. ‘Right now? Here?’
Clara grins, basking in the lighter mood that encircles them. ‘No, I wasn’t thinking of a public display, but we’re not too far from your house, are we?’
‘No,’ Pieter says, his surprise now swirled with delight, ‘it’s about a twenty-minute walk.’
‘Okay, then,’ Clara says, already starting to move, pulling him after her, ‘let’s run.’
‘I’ve got you a gift.’
‘You have?’
They sit in Pieter’s kitchen drinking tea. Despite her initial reluctance, Clara is becoming used to the herbs of the Dutch tea. She still misses the comfort of hot milk, a thing that every time returns her to childhood, but she does enjoy the scent of the dried leaves and petals as they steep, finding that just the smell starts to soothe her before she’s even taken a sip.
‘What is it?’ Clara asks, when Pieter is still silent.
‘When you’ve finished your tea, I’ll show you.’
‘Really?’ Clara gulps down the rest of her tea, wincing slightly at the strength of the final gulp. ‘Okay, I’m done.’
Pieter smiles as he sips. ‘You’re not a person of great patience, are you?’
Clara laughs. ‘I used to be, before … I suppose, in my life back then,’ Clara muses, her voice dropping as she remembers what now feels like a hundred days, a hundred lifetimes ago, ‘when I didn’t really—when, when I wasn’t excited by anything. Back then I was slow and I had all the patience in the world.’
For a moment Clara seems sad, swept back to the past in a sharp tug of melancholy. And then she jumps up from her chair and claps. ‘Okay, drink up old man, let’s go!’
Now Pieter laughs. He stands and follows her out of the kitchen. ‘You’ll have to get fully dressed first, it’s outside.’
Clara bounds down the steps and stands on the pavement, glancing expectantly about, while Pieter follows, locking the front door behind them.
‘Where is it?’
‘Wait a moment, I’m coming.’ He reaches her. ‘Here.’ He points across the cobbled street at two bikes chained up against the railing. One is black, one fire-engine red.
Clara frowns. ‘Where?’
‘There.’
‘In the river?’
Pieter laughs. ‘No, the bike. I bought you a bike. The red one.’
Clara’s frown falls. ‘You did?’
‘Yes. Do you like it?’
Clara grins. ‘Do I like it? I-I …’ Then she hides her face in her hands.
Pieter places a hand on her back. ‘What’s wrong? Is it too much? It’s not – it’s just because you said you weren’t rushing off home so soon, and I thought, well everyone here cycles, so—’
‘No, it’s not that,’ Clara mumbles into her hands. ‘It’s a lovely gift, it’s very thoughtful.’ She looks up, peeking through her fingers. ‘I have a confession.’
‘What? You hate cycling?’
‘No, it’s far more embarrassing than that.’
Pieter waits.
Clara drops her voice to a whisper. ‘I don’t know how to ride a bike.’
‘Oh.’ He frowns. ‘Really? But I thought … Isn’t Cambridge one of the cities with the most cycles in England?’
Clara sighs. ‘Yes, yes. I expect everyone in Cambridge cycles except me.’
‘Why ever not?’
She shrugs. ‘My parents tried to teach me but I was too scared to learn and, as I grew up, I just preferred to walk places – probably because I was still a bit scared but didn’t want to admit it – and then, when I started writing the letters, it was perfect because I needed to walk, or I wrote the letters because I walked, I can’t remember which way it happened. But, anyway, there was no need for me to cycle any more.’
‘That’s perfect,’ Pieter says.
‘It is?’
‘Yes, I can teach you.’
A burst of nervous laughter escapes Clara. ‘No, no, no … I’m not a kid any more. I’m thirty-three. People don’t learn to ride bikes when they’re thirty-three.’
Pieter smiles. ‘Perhaps it’s all a matter of perspective. You’re almost a kid compared to me. We could pretend I’m your dad and you’re six years old or something, a perfectly acceptable age to learn to ride a bicycle.’
Clara drops her hands from her face. ‘No, we won’t. That’s a little dodgy.’
‘What’s “dodgy”?’
Clara smiles. ‘Highly inappropriate. With connotations of the sexual.’
‘Sounds like fun.’ Pieter laughs, his low, light laugh. ‘But okay then, you can be a fully grown-up lady who’s decided it’s time to get over her fears, to sit on the saddle and trust me to take care of her.’
He walks over to the bike, unlocks it from the other one and pats the leather seat. ‘So, what do you say?’
Clara shifts her weight from foot to foot.
Pieter smiles. ‘Are you going to keep your father waiting?’
‘Shut up! Okay, okay, I’ll do it.’
Clara stomps over to the bike and Pieter just smiles, saying nothing.
‘It’s okay, you’re okay,’ Pieter pants as he jogs alongside Clara, who grips the handlebars so tight her knuckles are white. She wobbles along, her eyes fixed on the road. Other bicycles whiz past, dinging their bells.
‘Don’t let go, don’t let go,’ Clara murmurs her mantra through gritted teeth.
‘I won’t, I promise, I won’t,’ Pieter gasps.
‘Are you all right?’
‘Fine.’
‘We should stop.’ Clara veers toward the river and gives a little shriek. ‘You’ll have a heart attack.’
‘I’m not going to have a heart attack,’ Pieter wheezes. ‘But, but … it might be better if I, I … wasn’t talking.’
‘Okay, sorry,’ Clara says, still wobbling but not stopping. ‘Just don’t let go – if you do that thing when you say you’re still holding on but you suddenly let go, I’ll kill you, okay?’
Pieter nods.
Another bike zips past, dinging its angry bell. Clara veers in the direction of the river again and squeals.
‘I want to stop, please,’ she pleads. ‘How do I stop?!’
‘Back-pedal,’ Pieter puffs. ‘Just pedal backwards.’
‘What? I don’t …’ But then she does and, as soon as both Clara’s feet are on the ground and the bike is stable, Pieter lets go and leans over, hands on his knees, head between his legs, panting.
‘Oh, God,’ Clara says. ‘Are you okay? Are you having a heart attack?’
He holds up his index finger, signalling her to wait. It takes a few minutes before he can stand straight again.
‘I’m fine,’ he says finally. ‘And this isn’t because I’m old. It’s because I’m unfit.’
Clara laughs.
‘I tell you what,’ Pieter says, ‘have you ever seen Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid?’
Clara shakes her head.
‘Really? You haven’t? I thought all women had.’
Clara frowns. ‘Is it a western? It sounds like one.’
‘Well, yes, ostensibly, I suppose it is,’ Pieter admits. ‘But it’s extremely funny and very moving, and it stars Paul Newman and Robert Redford. Two of the most, or so I’ve always thought, handsome men in the world.’
Clara raises an eyebrow. ‘I didn’t know you were so finely tuned to the female psyche.’
Pieter shrugs. ‘There is much for you to learn. I’m deeply layered, like a fine ancient wine.’
Clara smiles, sliding off the bike. ‘Then I look forward to tasting you again soon.’
Pieter swallows a grin. ‘There is a beautiful scene in the film when Paul Newman takes his girlfriend – or perhaps it’s Robert Redford’s girlfriend, I don’t remember – anyway, he takes her on a bike ride, she sits on the handlebars while “Raindrops Keep Fallin’ on my Head” plays on the soundtrack. It’s absolutely gorgeous.’
Clara gives him a look. ‘You’re not suggesting …?’
Pieter nods.
‘I think that would definitely give you a heart attack.’
‘It wouldn’t, I’ve got my breath back now. And, anyway, cycling is far easier than running.’
‘Okay then, it would give me a heart attack.’
Pieter laughs. ‘Let’s just give it a go. I promise, I’ll stop the second you say. You’ve got nothing to fear.’
Clara raises an eyebrow. ‘I highly doubt that.’
‘Pleaaaase …’
‘All right,’ Clara relents. ‘But if you tip me into the river, I’m suing you for everything you own.’
‘You can have it all.’
‘Deal.’
Clara steps aside and lets Pieter take the bike. He mounts the saddle and waits. She doesn’t move.
‘Come on.’
‘This is a mistake,’ Clara says as she hoists herself up onto the handlebars, ‘a big, big mistake.’
‘Have a little faith,’ Pieter says, kissing the back of her head.
Clara smiles. Again the urge to declare love rises up inside her but she holds on to the words, secreting them in her cheek. And then he begins to cycle. At first he goes slow, with long, languorous pushes on the pedals, so they glide alongside the river, the breeze blowing through Clara’s hair. She closes her eyes to feel the warmth, the sun splashed on her face as they drift through an avenue of trees. Then she opens her eyes and starts to giggle with the sheer joy of it all.
‘All right, hold on,’ Pieter says, pushing harder, faster, until they’re speeding along and Clara’s giggles turn to shrieks of delight. And she can’t believe that she’s never felt this before. That she’s missed out, until now, on the sheer thrill of being alive.