The Journey Back Read online

  Dientje would wink at me.

  “Watery, Johan,” Opoe complained, “not the way I used to make it.” She was peeling tomorrow’s potatoes, a brown mountain of knobby shapes. Plop, plop, plop— one after another they fell into the pail, splashing a little, making Opoe’s long apron wet. But she did not seem to care. Plop. “Look at this one, Annie.” She held up a potato for me to see. “Can you tell how special it is? It’s round, and it’s got nothing sticking out?”

  Enthusiastically I’d nod. “Yes, Opoe.”

  “It’s going to be yours.” She beamed. She rummaged through the peels, searching for another special one for Sini.

  “I sure wish the other farmers could see me now,” Johan said, “sitting here with my family.”

  I nestled deeper in his lap.

  Time went on and on. Not fast, not at all. It was 1943 now, or perhaps even later. So many hours and minutes and seconds in each day. Rain or not …getting colder … snow again. The sound of a sled. “Did you hear it, Sini?”

  In the semidarkness I could see her head move. But which way?

  The German army continued to lose, and little by little the Allied soldiers pushed them out of the countries they had occupied in the first few years of the war. The more they had to give up, the angrier Hitler became. “Take what you can from the countries you’re in,” he ordered his soldiers. “Clothing, machines, trains, food. Send home what you can’t carry.”

  Many people were wandering through the countryside, begging farmers for a turnip, an egg, a cup of milk, anything. “Thank you, thank you,” they’d say, and shuffle on … the way time did.

  Uneasily the enemy watched the Allies approach Holland in the fall of 1944. But they had no intention of leaving, especially not the island of Walcheren in the southwestern part of Holland, that pretty island about which books had been written. From Walcheren the enemy controlled a port the Allies needed to bring in supplies.

  When the Germans would not go, planes came, dropping pieces of paper that whirled from the sky,telling the sixty thousand islanders to leave. “There will be floods,” the pamphlets said. “Go.”

  And many refugees from Walcheren, in their old-fashioned clothes, began to wander through Holland, too, begging for a place to stay. “Thank you, thank you.”

  A few days later, the Allied planes returned. When they reached the dikes, the high, high ones that went all around the island, their bomb bays opened.

  The Germans left, but another enemy came in. Through four gigantic holes in the dikes, salt water from the North Sea rushed across meadows and fields, through hawthorn hedges, and over the red, purple, and yellow of fall gardens, into houses through cracks in doors and windows. Inside, the water climbed up over furniture, walls, and stairs, taking pictures from hooks, an empty cup that had been sitting on a table, a coal scuttle, a piece of bread, a blanket.

  Those islanders who had ignored the Allies’ warning and remained on Walcheren looked out from their attic windows in horror. They saw cats, dogs, and chickens floating by, their claws clutched around branches; a cow thrown on her back by a wave; petals, red and yellow and purple; vanes from a windmill; and some instruments that belonged to the brass band—a trombone, a clarinet.

  Six hours later, when the tide turned, the water began to fall, just as it did on the other side of the dikes, and six hours after that, it began to rise again, on both sides. Now we would not be able to go to Walcheren for an even longer time. When anyway? When?

  Again everything was so still outside. Another winter. No sounds again. Snowflakes make none when they fall; they only darken the room even more. Can’t wait until tonight, until Johan, Opoe, Dientje—”Girls,” they’d say, “we’re here.” And it would not be dark any longer.

  *

  4 *

  It was not dark now either. How could it be? The end of the war had come. Yes, now, in spring, 1945. It was all right to make noise again, to shout, jump, run, dance. Slowly I walked to the window. My legs hurt. I had been sitting down for so long, two years and seven months. But no more, no more. It was over. It had to be. This morning Willem was picked up and put in jail.

  “Serves him right,” the farmers yelled. “That numbskull, to have been a friend of the Germans. We’ll never talk to him again. You can be sure of that.”

  That’s what people all over Holland were shouting as a hundred thousand more traitors shuffled through the streets, on their way to jail, too. Singing age-old Dutch songs, townspeople everywhere hung out the Dutch flag for the first time in five years. With every flutter, the red, white, and blue stripes with the orange-colored banner were shedding dust and cobwebs. “Look … ought to be ashamed … should have cleaned. …” “No time. …” Already they were in their gardens, planting marigold seeds so that soon there would be flowers again, orange ones, which the enemy had forbidden—orange, the color of the royal house. That much hate.

  All over Holland there was music and dancing. On country roads rusty accordions were p-u---lled and p-u----shed into waltzes and polkas. In Amsterdam a barrel organ that had been hidden from the enemy was wheeled into the streets again, pouring ting-tingly music across the canals as the man turned the wheel. Faster, louder, while skinny bodies moved to and fro, not feeling hunger, not now.

  There was no music in Walcheren. In the low-lying parts people waited for the tide to come in so that they could step out their windows and onto their rafts as they had for half a year now, steering with poles to keep to the right of the “road” while they floated to their errands or dates, their skirts and pants rolled up to keep them dry. Today, though, they wore paper flowers around their arms, orange ones. “Free. Free.”

  Near the dikes the people had time for nothing but work. Out of brushwood and reeds, mattresses were being woven that had to go down into the holes. Faster, faster. The winter storms were only seven months away. So little had yet been done. All four holes were still open. Yet, they were smiling, the men, that day. After all, wasn’t Holland free! Couldn’t people from other parts of the country come and help now! They paused, just for a second, to see whether a boat with workers was already in sight.

  On the other side of Holland, in Usselo, I walked outside for the first time, tightly holding on to Johan’s hand. Look how well I was doing already—halfway across the road now. For a second I took my eyes off my feet and looked up. Beautiful out, especially the sky. It went on forever. …

  In the bunker in Berlin, Germany, where Hitler and his closest friends and helpers had gone to hide, there was nothing but gloom. Hitler was still certain that his soldiers would be powerful once more,any day now, and gain back every bit of land they had had to give up. He still hated Jews and all the others who had dared to disagree with him. He still thought they were the ones who were responsible for this war, not he, not his friends. On April 30, 1945, when he knew the war was lost, he killed himself, just before the Russians reached the bunker.

  The war in Europe was over. It had taken the lives of twenty-five million people, from many countries, in many different ways, by bombs, on battlefields, in concentration camps.

  In the woods in Usselo. Just this morning, when a farmer tried to dig up the copper pot he had not wanted to give to the enemy, he stepped on a land mine: twenty-five million and one.

  “You’ve walked enough now, Annie.” Gently Johan picked me up. “But already your legs are a lot better, what? There for a while you waddled like a little duck. I was worried.”

  It was a poor country the queen came back to. A great deal had been destroyed—almost the entire city of Rotterdam and much of many other cities and towns. Railroad bridges, telephone lines, factories, raw materials, warehouses—gone, or empty. Only the roads were full. People whose houses had been destroyed in last-minute combat joined all the others who were still wandering along the roads, looking for places to stay, for friends, relatives—and for food, always for food: “Please, please.” Wandering on, looking.

  Sini and I could go back to Winte
rswijk any time now. We didn’t want to. We stayed another week. At night the kitchen was filled with farmers, listening to Johan as he practically shouted out what had gone on right in this house for the last few years.

  They shook their heads in amazement. “How could that be? On this very road, and we never knew.” “Johan, you should’ve trusted us enough to tell us. It wasn’t nice, tricking us the way you did.” “He was not afraid; he just said so. That’s bravery for you. The danger that man put himself in.”

  “It was dangerous for Mother and me, too,” Dientje told them.

  “That Johan,” they shouted, pounding him on the back. “We’ve got ourselves a hero in Usselo, fellows. A real one, our Johan Oosterveld.”

  The first time they said it he looked baffled. But he liked it; he was laughing now. “Who would’ve thought it? All my life I’ve done nothing but dumb work, and here they call me a hero.”

  They all laughed together, Johan the loudest.

  We had to leave. That’s what Rachel said when she arrived. Father said the same thing, a few days later, when he stopped in to thank the Oostervelds.

  “Come, Sini, Annie, I want to take you home with me.”

  Home? Home was here. “One more week, Father.” He, too, went back to Winterswijk without us.

  “It’s the craziest thing,” Johan told the farmers that night. “Those girls don’t want to go back,” he said happily.

  The day came, the hour, the minute.

  “I’m sure going to miss them.” Opoe was blinking her eyes. “I don’t know what I’m going to do with myself now. The house is going to be so empty.”

  “I know, woman. I know.” Johan’s voice shook, too.

  For the last time we walked around the house. In the good room, on the big chest along the wall, were the family portraits. One of Opoe in her Sunday apron— the black one with the dark gray flowers. Johan’s and Dientje’s wedding picture—Johan grinning, in striped pants and a special jacket; Dientje holding a tiny bouquet of lilies of the valley. And now that people knew we had been hidden there, a photograph of Sini and me.

  “Our children,” Johan said proudly. “Don’t we look good there? The five of us?”

  Sini and I nodded. Yes. We hugged again and again. Until the young man who was going to give us a ride became impatient: “Let’s go.”

  Down the road we went. It was daylight now, not nighttime as it had been when we came, almost three years earlier. A tiny village, Usselo, just as Johan had said. Even tinier now. The bakery and parsonage had been destroyed by bombs, just before the end. We went past the school Johan had gone to. It was filled with Canadian soldiers, as many schools in Holland were. The store; the café; the fields, where an occasional plow was already waiting. That was all. I turned around to catch a last glimpse of everything before we rattled across a hole and went around the bend.

  Maybe this afternoon I’d go with Father to call on one of his customers. “I’ve brought my youngest daughter along,” he’d say, “just as I used to.” I’d watch Father and the farmer clasp hands again. I bounced on the seat.

  “One hundred and eighty guilders.” “No, de Leeuw, I won’t part with her for less than three hundred.”

  It could be—I sat up a little straighter—that Bobbie, my dog, would come along. Maybe Father had already gone to get him and had brought him back. Was Bobbie standing by the house now, waiting, wagging his tail, ready to run over to me, bark, jump up?

  Was that Winterswijk in the distance? Already? Nervously I licked my lips. It was such a big town, hundreds of times bigger than Usselo—at least. And it had so many people, thousands and thousands, and so many children, girls my own age—just thirteen. Stealthily I pulled my skirt down as far over my legs as I could. I moved a little closer to Sini until I was sitting right next to her. She put her arm around my shoulders. What would it be like?

  PART TWO

  * SUMMER *

  *

  1 *

  Suddenly the car stopped. No matter how hard the man tried, it would not start again. Desperately he put his foot on the gas pedal. Nothing happened. He pulled out the choke and moved his foot up and down again. Nothing. For a second he sat still. He seemed to be thinking. Then he turned around in his seat. “I was afraid of that,” he said somberly. “The carburetor—it’s finally died.”

  As he was looking up and down the road for an army truck to tow him home, Sini and I began to walk, tightly holding hands. It was mild, warm almost, yet it was only May. The early morning sun was trying to push its way through a cloud. For a second it did, shining on the road, on the broken tank lying on its side, a bird curiously looking in, and it lit up the white stone marker that said Winterswijk .6 kilometers.

  Anxiously Sini looked at my legs. “Is it too far for you, do you think?”

  Of course not. I smiled to show her she needn’t worry.

  A great many people were on the road. Most of them were walking, carrying bundles the way we were. Others were resting, sitting on tree stumps, talking. A young woman was rubbing her feet; they were red, swollen.

  “How are things where you came from?” one of the men called out to us. “That’s where I’m going, north, over a hundred kilometers from here. I’ll get there, too, even if it takes me a week. I want to see whether my old mother is still alive.” Without waiting for an answer, he jumped to his feet and ran toward a delivery cart that was gradually coming out from a side road. “Hey, hey, stop,” he yelled to the boy who was pedaling it. “Where are you going?” Laughing, the man got in. “This is my lucky day.” The bicycle’s wheels, which had no tires, made clicking sounds on the asphalt as the boy pushed on, north.

  Close to me, Sini was talking about this afternoon. ‘I’m going to look up my friends, Annie; find out how they are, what they’re doing. Maybe we’ll all get together.” She squeezed my hand. “I bet it won’t be long before I’m back into things. None too soon, either. Come on, Annie.”

  Yes. I stretched my legs as far as I could. I was in a hurry, too. Let’s see, where could I go? Not to Willy Bos’s, of course. Her father must be in jail. Sure, he’d been a traitor, like Willem. But there was Frits Droppers. He even lived close by. I wouldn’t be able to climb trees with him for a while, but there were other things we could do—sit in the grass, whittle sticks, have fun. Yes, yes, yes. After I got back from visiting a farmer with Father. Father came first.

  And then there was Rachel. I shouldn’t forget about her. She was such a good artist. Maybe she’d show me again how to draw and paint. She even knew how to make things out of wood! I was going to be so busy, I almost felt like holding my head.

  We were very close to Winterswijk now. Just ahead, around the bend, would be the first row of houses, brick ones smack up against each other. They even shared a roof. But when we got there, the roof was gone. One long hole stretched out over the entire row. There were more holes, too, where the windowpanes used to be. A dog stepped out of one of those while his owner was locking the door.

  We were lucky. Our house was still in one piece. Johan had seen it for himself when he had gone to Winterswijk, to make sure the roads were safe for us. The man with the dog was brushing a piece of charred wood. It looked like a table. With a broom made out of twigs, he swept off some of the black. Behind him, on a clothesline, a pair of patched overalls billowed in the wind. It was Monday, laundry day, and a little breezy, just right for drying.

  Rapidly Sini and I went on, past other people, past more rubble and holes, past the movie theater and the beauty parlor. All the fronts of the buildings were boarded up, just the way the furniture store, the shoe store, and most of the other stores around the marketplace were. “Opening again when merchandise arrives” was written on the boards. Only a grocery store seemed to be open. In front of it many people were standing in line, empty bags hanging on their arms. Their voices were excited.

  “Aren’t the Allies wonderful to have dropped food again?” “Six planefuls of it. They say there’s plenty m
ore on the way.” “As soon as I heard, I ran over. I didn’t even bother to comb my hair.” “I just hope it gets here fast,” a fourth woman added, tightening the sash around her skirt so that it wouldn’t fall off. “Because if it doesn’t, we won’t be able to cook the food we bring home. It’ll be time for the gas to be cut off.”

  “Of course, it’s nice that the Allies drop food, but why part of it in the water? In the harbor of Rotterdam it fell, instead of on the soccer field where everyone was waiting. It’ll be soaked. Why didn’t they give the job to someone who knew what he was doing?”

  “The police will get it for us,” someone else said soothingly. “They’ve been swimming around for days, trying to rescue the stuff.”

  Suddenly Sini let go of my hand. “Gerrit, how are you?” And to me, “Wait here. You should take a rest anyway. I want to talk to my friends.” She ran across the marketplace. “Gerrit, Gerrit, stop for a second! It’s me!”

  The people in the line turned their heads and stared at Sini. So did the man she called Gerrit. Sini was talking to him now. His mouth opened, stayed that way. “Don’t you remember me?” Her voice was shrill. He shook his head. No.

  I looked at the ground. Had we changed that much?

  Bong, bong— What was that? I looked around.

  Bong— Nervously I laughed. The church clock, of course. Bong— It struck nine more times. We were going to be late. Where was Sini? I looked, turned all around, looked again. Sini?

  There she was, standing by a building with a group of soldiers. The notice penciled on a cardboard window read “English lessons here. Just opened.” Some students came out.

  “I is a girl,” one of them said.

  “No,” her friend corrected her. “You am a girl.”