Girl in the Blue Coat(68)

“Let’s do that now.”

The projector is in its traveling case by Mr. de Vries’s desk. While I turn off the light and close the door, Mina unloads it, black and heavy-looking, setting it on the desk so the lens faces an empty wall. When she plugs it in and presses a red switch, a white square of light appears.

“You want to see the one with Mirjam in it?” she asks. I nod, and she sorts through the slides to find the right image and position it in the slide holder. The white square of light disappears.

In the small slide, even with the magnifying glass, Mirjam was barely more than a smudge of sky blue toward the bottom of the frame. Now, on Mrs. de Vries’s wall, she’s several inches tall. I can see her more clearly, but it’s still hard to make out details. She’s still a blue coat, in profile, disappearing off the corner of the frame.

“Mina.” I point to the girl in the corner of the frame. “Is this Mirjam?” I am controlled, almost emotionless. I don’t want to influence her answer with my tone.

Mina barely looks at it before turning back to me. “What are you talking about? Of course it’s Mirjam. You said—”

“Forget everything I said. I want you to look at this picture and tell me if it’s the girl you went to school with. Look closely.”

Finally, Mina looks again, leaning on her elbows, studying the frame. The projector emits a low, warm hum. I stay where I am, trying to remain as still as possible. “Well?” I ask when I don’t feel like I can wait any longer.

“Honestly, I’m not sure. That’s her coat. At least, that’s a coat exactly like the one Mirjam wore to school. But it’s from far away, and her head is in the middle of turning. It’s too blurry to tell. Why are you asking me this now?”

“Mina, look more closely. Is that girl Mirjam, or isn’t it?”

“I can’t tell, Hanneke.” She’s beginning to sound frustrated. “If someone showed me this picture and said, ‘Are any of your former classmates in this picture?’ I don’t know whether I would point to any of them. But if someone said, ‘Point to Mirjam Roodveldt in this picture,’ then the girl in the blue coat is who I would point to. Now can you tell me what this is about?”

“I don’t know. Something’s not right, but I haven’t figured it out yet. Can you make it any less blurry? By moving the projector closer to the wall or something?”

I examine the image from left to right like I am reading a book. There are the soldiers. There are the frightened people. There, a blur in the left, is a crèche worker. There, in the bottom right corner, is the girl who looks like Mirjam.

The ring of the telephone pierces the air, making me jump. It could be Ollie. I told him to contact me here. “Are you going to answer the telephone?” I ask Mina.

“I can’t answer it. I’m not supposed to exist here, remember?”

I dash out of the room, toward the telephone extension near the front entrance, and manage to pick it up on the fourth ring. It is Ollie, calling from someplace with noise in the background.

“Hanneke, I’ve just talked to our friend in the country.” He sounds formal and strangely controlled. “The mutual acquaintance from school that you were trying to remember? She didn’t have a birthmark on her chin.”

I keep my own voice as steady as his. “Interesting,” I say. “Perhaps we’re not thinking of the same person. Is she sure?”

“She’s absolutely sure. The girl apparently had a small mole on her neck, and she had the scars on her knee, but she didn’t have a birthmark.” There’s a long pause. “Would you like me to come over for dinner tonight?” he asks, which is really his way of asking What’s going on?

“Thank you for the offer.” I struggle for the same control he’s maintaining. “But no. I’ll be in contact soon.”

I hang up the phone by depressing the button on the base, and immediately dial Mrs. Janssen’s house, my finger shaking as I rotate the numbers on the dial, silently hoping that she still has a phone line. It rings.

What am I doing? A girl is dead. We buried her this morning. No matter who she was, it was sad and horrible and final. Maybe I should let it remain final. Maybe Mrs. Janssen has been through enough.

She answers on the fourth ring, groggy like I’ve woken her; I tell her how sorry I am to have called her and that I have a question I know will sound odd.

“Hanneke? Is that you?”

“Some friends and I have a bet about our acquaintance, Miss R,” I say, waiting a beat to make sure she’s following. “The bet was over whether she had a birthmark on her chin. Do you remember it?”

“Why are you asking me this?”

I close my eyes. “Please. Just answer. Did she have one?”

“I don’t remember. No? I’m not sure. Yes? Can’t you tell me what’s happening?”

“I’m going to come over later,” I tell her before hanging up. “I don’t know when, but I will.”

Mirjam Roodveldt didn’t have a birthmark but did have scars on her knee. The girl on Mr. Kreuk’s table had a birthmark, definitely, but no scars. The girl in Mrs. Janssen’s pantry may or may not have had a birthmark; Mrs. Janssen doesn’t remember seeing one, but admits she could have been wrong. Now the girl is in the ground and it’s too late for me to get confirmation from any of the people who could identify her.