Winter's End, page 10
Her father was adamant. “No, Mila. Please indulge me and cancel. We have no dinner guests scheduled this evening. Just your mother and me. The three of us. Won’t that be nice?”
Mila thought frantically. “But father, I am to be the fourth at bridge. They will not be able to play without me.”
“Then they will have each other for company. No, Mila. Dinner will be served at seven. Your mother and I will be delighted to have you to ourselves.”
. . .
At seven precisely, she took her place at the table, dressed, as expected, in a proper dinner dress set off with her father’s birthday pearls. She had alternately raged and fretted and agonized, even considered alerting Pieter that the mission was in peril. But in the end, she decided that if she could manage to sit through dinner, there should time enough for her to get back to the Cinema before the German gathering was over.
To her surprise, her mother was already seated. More and more frequently these evenings, she begged off with a headache and took dinner in her room. But tonight, she sat tall and elegant in navy blue silk, her steel gray hair in a fashionable chignon.
“You look lovely, Mila,” she said, her expression rueful. “As well you should. Your dressmaking bills have been enormous.”
Mila opened her mouth, but her mother shushed her. “It is not that we mind, for heaven’s sake, Mila. You have an admirable fashion sense. Are you still wearing your own designs?”
Mila swallowed. “For the most part, yes. Mother – and I do have a wonderful seamstress.”
“So you do…and in these trying times, the world is need of beauty.’
She leaned toward Mila as Reit filled her wine glass. “So, my dear, when this war is over, do you plan to go back to design school?”
Her father strode in. “Sorry to be late. I had to take a phone call.” He seated himself, signaled for the wine. “Do I hear something about going back to school?”
Mila held a hand over her glass. “None for me, thank you.” She looked at her father. “Possibly – perhaps some advanced classes in fashion design.”
To her vast relief, her mother signaled for dinner to be served before the wine glasses were refilled. “Pity,” she said, “for the universities to be closed just when we need them most.”
As if, Mila thought, they had closed on their own simply to inconvenience the wealthy.
There was a roast of beef with potatoes and broccoli. Mila pushed the food around her plate, glancing at her watch under the table.
As dessert was served, she asked to be excused. “I can still make that bridge game, Father.”
He looked at her for a long moment. “All right then, Mila, go ahead. Take the car, if you wish.”
“I’ll walk, I think, but thank you.”
She said quick good nights, kissed her mother on the cheek, and hurried out of the room.
EVI
Mam’s ear was glued to the Radio Oranje broadcast, her face inches from the contraband radio that sat on the table between them.
Evi listened with dread. The Germans had broken through the American front in almost the same spot where they had broken through years ago. But this time, apparently, the American troops had been depleted and unprepared, giving the Germans an opportunity to seize key crossroads on their march to the Meuse River.
So fierce and determined was the onslaught, the British commentor said, that some Belgian townspeople were already taking down their Allied flags and displaying swastikas.
Mam began to cry. “How could this happen?” she sobbed. “Only six months ago, after Normandy, we were so certain liberation was near!”
Evi took her hand. “God knows,” she murmured, close to tears herself.
. . .
When she could listen no more, she picked up her mug of tea, went to her sleeping quarters and sat heavily on her bed. Then she set the mug on her nightstand, pushed open the curtain at the front of her closet, and fingered the silk scarves and taffeta dresses Mila had given her to wear for her rendezvous with German officers.
She recalled every moment of each encounter, the first one that went exactly as planned, the second less so, but successful in the end, even if it had taken an American airman appearing out of nowhere coming to her rescue.
She fumed for a moment. She would learn to shoot. She might not yet be seventeen, but she had proven herself to be capable under pressure – and picking off Nazis one at a time was not enough in the scheme of things. She wanted to kill dozens – maybe even hundreds, until there was food enough and freedom in the Netherlands.
It was clear from the Radio Oranje broadcast that the Americans needed help. They needed the French, the British, the Americans, the Dutch, all of them, to step up their efforts in whatever ways they could. How fast could they respond – and would they?
She sat on her bed and sipped the cooling tea. She would try to reach Mila tomorrow – or perhaps she could talk to Zoe Visser, who was near enough to Daan Mulder to plead Evi’s case for learning to shoot.
ZOE
She was halfway to Heemstede, just past the Franz Hals Museum, when she came suddenly upon a makeshift German check point. She felt her heart begin to hammer. Had news of the train wreck spread so quickly?
She was too near, even in the murky darkness, not to have been spotted by the guards. But lieve god, what of the others, carrying all that food?
“Approach and halt!” The guard spoke in rapid German, but there was no mistaking his intent. His rifle was pointed in her direction and her blood froze.
She managed to slow the bicycle to a stop and put both her hands in the air.
A younger guard, who looked barely old enough to shave, joined them. “Papers, bitte.”
She reached inside her jacket for her identification papers, keeping one hand in the air.
The younger guard examined them, looking up more than once to check her face against the photo.
“What is your purpose?” he said in passable Dutch.
Zoe tried a smile. “I was out for some exercise,” she said. “I fell asleep, though, when I stopped to rest. I am horrified to be out after curfew – and look, my bicycle tires are damaged. I am afraid to pedal too fast.”
The older guard looked at her sternly. “Your bag, bitte.”
Evi could not remember all that was in her shoulder bag, but she handed it over and held her breath.
“I am a veterinarian – an animal doctor, in Haarlem,” she said, with as much friendliness as she could manage. “I take care of pups and kittens who are sick.”
The guard was not impressed. He pored through her bag, trained a flashlight inside, examined everything in the inner and outer pockets.
“Where are you coming from?”
She paused. “No place, really. A little clearing a kilometer or two up the road When I woke up and realized how late it was, I turned around to go home.”
He regarded her through narrowed eyes.
“Please,” she said. “Bitte, you must believe me. I fell asleep. I meant no harm.”
“Sit.” He motioned her to a bench.
Zoe sat, huddled into her coat, anxiety gnawing at her belly.
The pair of guards conversed in German, glancing back at her from time to time. They kept her sitting there for nearly an hour. It was all she could do to sit still.
Finally, the older guard beckoned her.
“Gehen,” he barked. “Go!”
She moved to her bicycle, her mind working.
“My bag, bitte,” she began.
But the stern-faced guard motioned her through, whacking his stick against the back of her bicycle as she passed.
Her breathing slowed, but her thoughts were frantic. Was there anything in her bag that could feed information to the Germans – a business card, a scribbled note, anything that could mark her as a Resistance fighter – or implicate someone else?
Were the Germans yet aware of the wrecked train? Where were the farmers and their carts? She prayed they were more vigilant than she about watching for, and dodging, German road blocks.
Pedaling hard, worried about her tires, she headed in the direction of the hospital. She sensed, rather than saw, a second check point on the approach to the city limits, and managed to circumvent it, certain now that the Germans were already hunting for connections to the demolished train.
. . .
At the hospital’s loading dock, to her great relief, she saw half a dozen carts and wagons being offloaded – nourishment enough for weeks, perhaps longer. She looked for Leela or her husband, did not see either, but she recognized Lukas Jensen’s mother.
“Mevreow Jensen,” she said, approaching. “The German check points. Godjjzdank, you were able to avoid them.”
The woman did not stop unloading goods. “We were careful,” she said heavily. “We left our wagons behind, passed through the check point, then circled back and took another route. My husband stayed behind to warn the others.”
“Lieve god -”
“Do not think of it, Dr. Visser. He will be fine. We would do it again in a moment.”
It was dark, but Zoe scanned the horizon and saw another bicycle and wagon approaching. Other volunteers were leaving as their carts were unloaded, so it was not possible for her to know for certain how many were accounted for.
She decided to circle the property to be sure they were not being observed. The parking lot was sparsely filled, little movement this late in the evening, and the only uniform she saw belonged to the guard posted at the door, who waved at her as she approached.
By nine, the approach of volunteers had slowed to a trickle. Zoe shivered in the cold night air.
MILA
If she walked quickly, she would reach the Cinema by nine, she thought, counting her steps, looking for stars in the dark night sky, anything to keep her from thinking about what she was about to do.
In her mind’s eye, the street would be deserted, all those Reich bastards packed like sardines in the cramped seats of the Cinema. She would walk past casually, across the street from the building, depress the detonator she held deep in her coat pocket and walk away quickly, undetected, as the theater burst into flame.
She gingerly fingered the small device, just to be sure it was still there, careful to avoid the lever. She was going to be fine…absolutely fine…assuming the connection worked. Assuming there was no one around to see her… Assuming her father did not find out and murder her if the Nazis did not…
The little she had eaten threatened to come up in her throat. She closed her eyes and swallowed. What had she been thinking, volunteering for this mission, what made her think she truly had the nerve to do this?
She reminded herself these were ruthless Nazis, the same leering pigs she had toyed with and loathed during her father’s endless dinners, their polished boots firmly planted on the necks of the innocent, the Reich slowly smothering them to death.
She wished Herr Hitler himself were in that Cinema. How satisfying would it be to annihilate him…?
That was the thought on which she would focus. She could do it. Of course, she could…
. . .
To her distress, as she neared the Cinema, she saw three SS men in heavy black coats standing outside, smoking cigars. In the dark, she could not see their faces. It was not likely they could not see hers.
Head down, a scarf obscuring her face, Mila crossed, head down, to the other side of the street. She wished she had thought to take Hondje with her. Just a woman out walking her dog…
But she had not. Lieve God, she had not thought to do so. And now…now it was time.
EVI
Evi haunted Radio Oranje for news of the fighting in the Ardennes, but no amount of hoping or praying changed the disheartening fact; the Germans’ surprise attack had overwhelmed the depleted American forces. Hitler’s army was advancing, more or less unimpeded. On top of that, bad weather was prohibiting aerial reconnaissance, and American forces were suffering high casualties.
On the verge of tears, she stashed the radio in its hiding place and paced the barge’s cramped spaces. The day was gray under an overcast sky, and from the window, she could see the river waters rippling under the might of a persistent wind.
Mam was at the Dans Hal, boxing up a supply of food that had appeared there out of the blue, and there was no one presently in the hold.
Unable to contain her own restless energy, she wrapped a woolen scarf around her head, put on gloves and her warmest winter coat, and let herself out the barge. She hopped on her bicycle and headed to the main road, pedaling fiercely against the wind with no destination in mind.
Perhaps Mam would bring home something besides root vegetables and tulip bulbs. She sometimes woke herself in the night dreaming of beef, or sausages, her tastebuds salivating, and cried soundlessly into her pillow, pressing her hands against her stomach to ease the near-constant hunger pangs...
. . .
She could turn off at the old school road and visit Sophie, she thought. She had not seen her since that last day of school. It seemed so long ago. Had Sophie seen or heard from Lukas Jensen since he joined the Resistance?
She could head to the pet kliniek and look for Zoe, or try to find out where Mila lived and plead her case for shooting lessons.
But she kept pedaling along the main road, eyes stinging in the unforgiving wind.
All at once, she found herself at the tavern where she had nearly been raped. She stared at the squat brick building now, drab and deserted in the daylight, and it came to her in a rush that she had never had the chance to properly thank the American who saved her.
She narrowed her eyes against the wind and looked around. She had no idea where the Beekhof farm was, but it must not be too far, she though, from the tavern where the American had come upon them.
Squinting, she saw perhaps half a kilometer ahead a road sign indicating a crossroad. She pedaled until she reached it, then hesitated. Left, or right?
She tossed a mental coin and turned right, pedaled a full kilometer before she saw the first sign of life – an empty pen, perhaps for sheep, far back from the road, and beyond it a farmhouse badly in need of paint, surrounded by fir trees, and seemingly deserted.
She pedaled closer, read the name on the mailbox – Van de Berg, with a slash of black paint crossed through it. Evi’s shoulders slumped. What had become of the Van de Bergs?
These were large tracts, she discovered as she moved on, separated by lengths of rundown fencing, mostly withered acreage, and no sign of a working farm.
Pulling up short, she turned around and pedaled in the other direction, crossing over the main road with fading expectation. She had not gone more than two kilometers when a silo loomed into view, set far back from the road.
She pedaled faster until she came upon a break in the roadside foliage, a narrow dirt road that could be a driveway. Had she not noticed the battered mail box nearly hidden in a bank of overgrown ivy, she would have missed it altogether. She pushed the brush aside. Beekhof.
Hesitating, she sat there for a moment, then made her way up the dirt road, her tires spitting dirt. Eventually, the dirt road turned to gravel. She heard a dog barking as she came upon a pen with a few squealing pigs, a single horse grazing beyond a picket fence. A big German Shepherd loomed in front of her, barking furiously, racing at her side to the weathered porch.
She took in the two-story white frame farmhouse, its black trim peeling in places, and rang the doorbell. There was no answer. The dog danced around her, barking. She glanced at the windows, covered by curtains, and rang the doorbell again.
“Nice dog,” she said, shading her eyes against the bleak winter sun. “I don’t mean anyone any harm.” She pedaled backward, looking for movement behind the upstairs windows.
She was about to give up, when the door was opened little more than a crack. A boy of perhaps fourteen or fifteen peered out. He wore denim overalls, a worn plaid shirt, and a decidedly wary expression. The Shepherd barked.
“Hush, Otto.”
“Hallo,” she said quickly. “My name is Evi Strobel. I hope I have come to the right place. I am looking for Jacob Reese.”
The boy retreated, began to close the door. “There is nobody here by that name.”
“Please!” Evi held a hand against the door. “Please, wait! The American airman saved my life.”
The boy peered out again, eyes narrowed. “There is no American here.”
He started to shut the door, but Evi was faster. “Wait! I am telling the truth. Jacob Reese saved my life! I want to thank him.”
The boy stared through the narrow opening. “Why did your life need saving?”
“I was – I was in a very dangerous situation,” she blurted, a hand still on the door. “Someone was trying to – hurt me, and the American came from out of nowhere and shot him.”
A pause. “Where did this happen?”
She blinked. “At the tavern, just down the road.”
The boy took a long moment. “Wait here.”
Evi peered at the Shepherd. “Otto, is it? Hallo, Otto. My name is Evi.”
The dog peered back, his tail wagging. “Good boy, Otto.” She rubbed her hands together, swaying in the cold.
Finally, the boy reappeared in the doorway. “It is cold,” he opened the door a bit wider. “Come in. Jacob is out in the field with my father. You can wait inside.”
ZOE
Piercing sirens for most of the night made sleep impossible. Zoe tossed and turned, reliving the flash and fury of the exploding train, haunted by the fear that not all of the volunteers had made it safely home.
She was up and pacing before first light, and from the moment she emerged from her small apartment, she felt the tension in the air.
Word of the train explosion was likely everywhere by now, and if the liberated food was an unexpected windfall, there was little doubt the Germans would find a way to unleash new furies in revenge.
Daan was waiting for her at the kliniek. He motioned her into his office and closed the door.
“If I close my eyes,” she said, “I can still feel the force of the blast.”
