Girl in the Blue Coat(35)

“An attorney. And then a politician. City-level. He’d only want to hold offices where he could meet all his constituents. He’d sponsor socials and dances. He’d love his family.” Ollie’s eyes are wet, and he’s looking at me. My throat is tight. It would be so easy for us to grieve together.

“The dress is from that day,” I whisper. “That’s why you remember it. I was wearing it that day.”

That day. I don’t need to say any more than that. Ollie puts his hand to his stomach, like I’ve punched him there. The dress is from the day we found out about Bas. Pia came to tell me. I ran to the Van de Kamps’ home, and Mrs. Van de Kamp slapped me, hard, across the face, and Ollie stood there in the middle of their sitting room like if he moved the world would collapse. I went home, and tears poured down my face for hours and hours while Mama stroked my back, until they finally stopped coming because I was all dried up inside, and that was the last time that I cried.

“Oh,” Ollie says. “I didn’t remember.”

“I’m going to make tea,” I say. “You don’t have to have any if you don’t want.”

Ollie follows me into the kitchen. He stands behind me—I can feel his eyes follow my movements. My hands are shaking when I reach for the kettle, and he steadies it for me, helping me place it on the burner.

“The Hollandsche Schouwburg,” he says finally.

“What about it?”

“It smells like death.” Ollie finishes the sentence I started earlier but couldn’t complete. “That’s what it smells like in there. Death and fear.”

Fear. That’s right. That was the odor I couldn’t place before. That’s the smell of my beautiful, breaking country.





I’ve been leaving something out, shielding myself. Before, all those times, when I remembered the tissue with my tears on it after Bas told me he was joining the military.

I don’t like to remember that they were tears of pride.

The Netherlands tried to remain neutral. We wanted to be like Sweden, allowed to be left alone. Hitler said he would. Up until the day he invaded our country, he said he would leave us alone.

I was the one who said that joining the military would be a symbolic stand, anyway, against the Nazis.

I was the one, all along, who had been saying how the Germans shouldn’t be allowed to just do whatever they wanted, to conquer country after country.

I was the one who accompanied Bas to the navy office, and watched while he enlisted. The officer there kept asking if he was sure. The draft didn’t begin until men were eighteen, the officer said. In the army, they didn’t even accept volunteers younger than that. Why didn’t Bas go home, the officer suggested, and wait a year in case he changed his mind.

I was the one who told the officer that Bas had come to the navy so he didn’t have to wait in order to be brave. I talked that officer into signing him up.

Bas wouldn’t have joined if he didn’t think it would make me happy.

And it did make me happy. Until it made me sad.

I thought I knew so much then. I thought the world was so black-and-white. Hitler was bad, and so we should stand up to him. The Nazis were immoral, and so they would eventually lose. If I had truly paid attention, I might have realized that our tiny country had absolutely no hope of defending itself, not when bigger countries like Poland had already fallen. I should have guessed that when Hitler told our country in a radio address that he had no plans to invade and we had nothing to fear that it meant his soldiers were already packing their parachutes and we had everything to fear. Joining the military wasn’t a symbolic statement. It was a fool’s errand.

So that’s why I hadn’t talked to Ollie in more than two years. That’s why I dream of Bas coming to me, angry that I never read his letter. That’s how I learned that being brave is sometimes the most dangerous thing to be, that it’s a trait to be used sparingly. That’s why, if I’m being honest with myself, I’ve become obsessed with finding Mirjam. Because it seems like a fair and right exchange: saving one life after destroying another.

I’m to blame for Bas’s death. Bas was stupid to love me. I only got him killed. It was my fault.





THIRTEEN




Fifty-two hours. I learned of Mirjam Roodveldt’s disappearance fifty-two hours ago. Two sleepless nights. Three encounters with German soldiers. One rescued baby. One still-missing girl. I haven’t seen Mrs. Janssen since I first agreed to help, so I bicycle to her house as soon as Ollie leaves, in the twilight before curfew, to tell her everything that has happened. She installs me at the kitchen table immediately, producing more real coffee and a plate of small croissants. When I bite into one, my mouth fills with almond paste. Banketstaaf, my favorite. Mrs. Janssen remembered from last time and had them waiting.

“I thought of a few more things also,” she says after I sketch out what I’ve learned so far. “About Mirjam. I’m sure they’re not helpful; they’re just things I keep thinking about.” She produces a piece of paper, squinting. “Number one: You said it would be dangerous to go to the neighbors, but Mirjam once mentioned a nice maintenance man in her building. Maybe you could talk to him? Number two: She liked the cinema a lot. She knew all the stars. Are there movie houses open still? You could try seeing if anyone had seen her there. Number three: She was a quiet girl, Hanneke. She didn’t like talking about her family; it made her too sad. She wasn’t afraid to ask about my family, though. Even Jan. Some people are afraid to ask about him, but Mirjam asked me lots of questions. I would come in to bring her a cup of tea, and we would talk and talk until it was late. And she was polite. She hated beets, but she never complained about eating them, not once. She never complained at all.”