Girl in the Blue Coat(46)

“Hanneke? A little assistance?” Mrs. de Vries has walked to one of those shelves and is looking back at me with irritation, waiting for me to help her push it aside.

I brace my feet on the rug, sliding the shelf over. Behind it, cut into the wall, is a small cupboard door, big enough for a person to squeeze through, but only on hands and knees. Mrs. de Vries nods permission for me to open it, and when I do, I see two oxford shoes and a pair of ankle socks. Mina quickly drops to her knees and tucks her head out of the crawl space.

“Hanneke! I thought I heard your voice!”

Once she’s free from the cupboard, Mina throws her arms around me. “I didn’t think I’d get to see anybody. Judith said it was too dangerous. Did Ollie get her into her hiding space? What’s happened since I’ve been here? It feels like a year even though it’s only been a day.”

Before I can figure out which question to answer first, another scraping sound comes from the crawl space. Mina hears it, too. “It’s all right, you two,” she says. “It’s safe.”

“You’re not alone?” I blurt out.

Another pair of legs, wearing brown men’s shoes, appears in the space Mina has just crawled out of. They belong to an old man with a white beard, blinking into the light. He’s followed by an older woman, fussy-looking, with impeccable hair and makeup.

“This is Mr. and Mrs. Cohen,” Mina explains to me. They both nod cautiously in greeting. “This is my friend Hanneke Bakker.”

“A pleasure to meet you,” I murmur, while trying to figure out why the name sounds familiar.

“Is everything all right, Dorothea?” Mrs. Cohen asks Mrs. de Vries. “The inner walls in this building have always been so thin, we couldn’t help but overhear.”

I turn to Mrs. de Vries. “The Cohens are—”

“My neighbors. Yes. They’ve been staying with me for a few days.”

Mr. Cohen extends his hand. He smells faintly of cigarettes and leather, a reassuring smell that reminds me of my grandfather.

“But when your other neighbor was here—” I cut myself off. When the woman with the fox fur stole was here, Mrs. de Vries acted as though she was pleased the Cohens had disappeared. But then, what else could she do?

The Cohens nod politely at me, and then Mrs. Cohen suggests to her husband that Mina and I might like some privacy. They leave; Mrs. de Vries stays, as if unwilling to allow any conversations in her house she is not privy to.

“Here, I’ll show you our hiding place,” Mina says, taking my hand and pulling me toward the cupboard entrance before I have a chance to say no. The entrance smells like paint, the only clue that this hiding space has been recently constructed. The craftsmanship is impeccable. From the outside, it looks like it was built at the same time as the rest of the apartment. There are even scuff marks on the baseboards. Mrs. Janssen’s hidden pantry is amateurish by comparison.

“We only have to go in here when strangers come,” Mina explains. “The rest of the time we can move around the apartment.” She closes the cupboard door again, and the entrance all but disappears. “When I got here yesterday, they made me practice, again and again, seeing how quickly all of us could gather our things, get into the hiding place, make sure we hadn’t left anything out that would give us away. You should see one of our drills.”

“I’d like that, but not now,” I mutter, distracted. When Mina shut the hiding place door, it created a breeze, causing the window curtain to flutter open and reveal a view of a large, familiar stone building.

“The Schouwburg,” I whisper. “This apartment building is right across the street from the Schouwburg.”

I’ve only ever seen out the front windows of the de Vrieses’ apartment building. Because I’d never been invited farther into the family’s living quarters, I never put together what the view would be from the rear. Now I know why Ollie gave me this address.

“Mina. Did you—” My mouth has gone dry. I swallow and start again. “Did you see the group arrive yesterday after the razzia?”

Mina nods. “It was just after I came here. There was so much yelling. I stood behind the curtain and watched it all, feeling so guilty that I was safe, and everyone down there wasn’t.”

“This is important. Did you see Mirjam? Did you see her be brought in with those people?”

“Mirjam was in that group?”

“I don’t know. Someone with her last name was. So you didn’t see her? Are you sure?”

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry.” Her eyes fill with tears. “I didn’t know to look for her.”

Another door closing. Another hope slipping away.

“I did take pictures,” she offers, using her sleeve to wipe her eyes.

“You took pictures?”

“I left behind clothes so I could fit my new camera in my suitcase. I wanted to still be doing something. Even if I’m stuck in here, I can still take pictures of everything happening out there.”

“Can I see them? Your pictures?”

Her face falls. “They’re not developed yet. I just took them a day ago.”

“Let’s get someone to develop them, then. I’m sure we can find someone to trust.” Mentally, I scroll through my list of black market clients, thinking of the artistic ones who might have basement darkrooms. There was the owner of an art gallery once, but when I went to his house, he had pamphlets with Adolf Hitler’s face lying on the coffee table.