The Journey Back Read online

  “Three movie houses, not only Fred Astaire all week as you have here. Concerts, restaurants … close to Johan and Dientje … lots of places to go to dance. …I’m so excited.”

  We passed the marketplace, and on the left, that café. The sign “Nightly Dances” was gone, pulled down by the proprietor the day the Canadian soldiers left. “Thank God,” people had said, “at last we can get a good night’s sleep again. All that noise. …”

  How could they have thought that? It had been music, pleasant music. They should have stayed, those soldiers. Then maybe Sini would have, too.

  “Come on, Annie.”

  Yes, yes, I was trying to walk fast.

  “Let’s wait here.”

  We had reached the edge of town. And it had taken us hardly any time.

  Sini pulled a mirror from her bag. She looked closely at her face, dabbing at the lipstick a soldier had given her. Rachel had been upset by the lipstick. It was sinful, she said; if God had wanted Sini to have such red lips, He would have made them that way. But to me it looked beautiful. The first car that comes along will surely stop for her, I thought.

  “Well, do you think I look all right for the big city, Annie?”

  “Yes.”

  With her arm around my shoulder we waited, not talking. A motorcycle went by with two passengers squeezed into the back seat. No cars. Once or twice Sini went to the middle of the road, just to look. If none came by dark, we’d have to turn around whether she wanted to or not. Go home … unpack. …

  Numbly I heard truck sounds and saw Sini signal. I stared at the ground. A mail truck was slowing down.

  “Good-bye, Annie.” Sini’s voice was hoarse. “I can’t stay with you forever. I have to get out of this town. It’s dead for me. Rachel cares a lot about you, Annie. You’ll be fine, better even.”

  Of course. Of course. Stubbly grass we were standing on; I could almost feel it through my shoes. She kissed me. Then walked to the truck.

  The people in the back pulled her up. “You’ll love it here,” they said to her, laughing. “Nice canvas armchairs, compliments of the government.” With a plop, she landed on a mailbag.

  “Okay?” The driver stuck his head out the window. “Then let’s go.” More laughter as everyone bounced around.

  My eyes followed the truck. She’d wave, wouldn’t she? Not forget I was still here? Someone half stood up, crawled to the tailgate; a hand moved back and forth, Sini’s. Mine did, too.

  Suddenly a streetlamp went on. “Got it to work,” a repairman said, grinning. The very first one. Could Sini see it? Well, what difference would it make if she did? None. She would still have said there were more lights in Enschede. I wiped my eyes. It’s just that we had been close for so long.

  *

  10 *

  On the island of Walcheren thousands of men were working very hard, yet not one hole in the dikes had been closed. Anxiously they counted the number of days till November, when the winter storms could rip apart whatever had been repaired. “Less than eighty days,” they said worriedly, and picked up even bigger loads of rocks and sand and clay, ignoring the rain that had been coming down on them for days now.

  “Didn’t I tell you the weather we were having was abnormal?” people all over Holland said as they hurried through the streets in waterlogged shoes—or carried them tucked under their arms since no shoe coupons had been issued yet. When they reached the stores, they always found the same long lines of people, no matter how early they arrived. Wet, too, and irritable about many things—the weather, housing, food.

  “I still come home with the same cabbage and beans. My husband said one more meal like that, and he’s moving out.”

  “Where to?” a woman with an umbrella answered. “The government isn’t building any housing yet. They don’t even do repairs. Our roof is still leaking. We had to move the beds to the kitchen!”

  “This is what I want to know. Why do sick people get extra food coupons, whereas healthy people are the ones with appetites?” The man hitched up his pants before he stated his next complaint. “And those refugees. The minister got us to take one in. It’ll be ten months tomorrow. Where’s the end? The only good thing that’s happened lately is that the newspaper is back, even if it’s only two pages long. At least I can sit down with the news again and go over it as often as I want to.”

  Holding my purchases under my sweater, I crossed the street. What was so good about newspapers? Nothing. They had ads from all over—hospital ones. “We need you,” they said in big letters. “Thousands and thousands of sick people are waiting. We can’t accept them unless you become a nurse.” I kicked a stone hard. Good, it splashed right into a puddle.

  At the tree in the marketplace, the people who came to read the notices were irritable, too. “Why hasn’t the man from Town Hall come anyway?” they complained.“Today’s his day. Just because of the rain! We are here.” But their voices sounded a little relieved.

  He came a few days later, carrying the new list. It was a longer one this time. Stiffly people approached the tree, looking for the same names they had been hoping to find all these months: Emma Cohen, Meier Philips, Herman Schaap, Mozes Spier, Jakob Vos—all the relatives and friends they had known, who had ended up in those camps with odd-sounding names. Auschwitz, Dachau, Bergen-Belsen, others.

  Again they did not find them. When they got to the end of the list, they saw what was printed on the last line.

  “COMPLETE,”it read.“ANYONE ELSE SHOULD BE CONSIDERED DEAD. ”

  Mrs. Vos, the woman with the pretty brown hair, clutched the arm of her daughter. Like the others, they were crying.

  Slowly the area around the tree emptied out. The farmers who still had flowers left to sell picked them up and put them in their carts—dahlias, chrysanthemums, marigolds, their orange heads barely sticking up over the rims of the pails. “If we’re lucky, we’ll get home before it gets any windier,” the farmers called out to each other.

  I was going home, too. None of my friends’ names had been on that list either, and not one of Father’s ten brothers and sisters.

  *

  11 *

  Rachel seemed to have changed. In the morning she still enumerated all the chores that had to be done that day: “The windows, the kitchen floor, the living-room chairs.” But she did not mean all day, not any more. After a few hours, she’d say, “Let’s take a break,” just like that. She’d offer me her arm. I’d take it. And off we’d go.

  Sometimes we visited Maria, at the end of the road. On the way we’d stop and say hello to the neighbors—the Ten Riets, Mulders, and Geerdeses—but we’d hurry past the Droppers. Or, we’d go in the opposite direction—toward town—to Mrs. Menko’s house, and sit by her chair. Had she gained any weight since last week? we’d ask.

  “A pound, the doctor told me.”

  “Beautiful, Mrs. Menko, but it should be more.” She’d smile, tell Rachel not to worry. “I’m even walking around the house again, and my hair is growing back a little,” she’d say. “Look.” And she’d lift her kerchief, to show us.

  We were not the only ones who visited her. Others tiptoed in, too, strangers even, bringing something for her to eat—an egg, a cup of milk, a mouthful of meat— the same way Rachel and I did. They’d put it down on the table. “Don’t say no, Mrs. Menko. We can spare it,” they’d say softly, in case her head was hurting again.

  “Aren’t people wonderful,” she said, wiping her eyes. But carefully, for they hurt, too.

  We did other things, Rachel and I. We went to all the stores. Take today. We had already stood in line for a long time, and not to buy either, just to look through the openings in the boards. The mannequin in De Wind’s Mode had her sheet off for the first time. There were real clothes on her now —not ordinary boring ones, either. A slip to her knees, and a bracelet on each wrist. “Isn’t she beautiful, Rachel?” I said, straining to stand even higher on my toes.

  “She could use a tweed suit,” Rachel said, “to go
over everything.”

  “Yes, with a fur collar.” Definitely, soft on the chin.

  “And a hat, Annie. One that sits straight on the head.”

  “With a ribbon—”

  “Walking shoes—”

  “Gloves, Rachel—all the way to the elbow.”

  It had been wonderful outfitting her, and having talked so long about clothes had given Rachel an idea. I was going to get a jacket, a maroon one, she decided. No, not from De Wind’s Mode. They had nothing but underwear yet. Rachel was going to make me one out of a drapery. Soon, she said, so I’d have it before the winter and could wear it to school.

  “Well.” Rachel laughed. “Have a good time exercising, and I’ll see you in an hour.”

  “I will,” I said, laughing, too. Rachel was almost the way she used to be—fun.

  I skipped down the Misterstraat and into another street where the sidewalk was so narrow that you almost had to be an acrobat not to fall off. There. Perfect. Right up to the masseur’s door.

  One thing had not changed, though, about Rachel. Every night she still sat down with the same books—the Bible and those others with the lessons for her baptism. Even now that the library was open again. The praying and the churchgoing, that had not changed, either. A few other Jews in town had come back Christians just as religious as she, but they had already given it up. “Wore off with them after a couple of weeks,” Father said, and he sounded envious.

  Wasn’t Rachel getting tired of it, too? Should I ask her? Or would she get angry with me, as she had with Father.

  “Rachel?”

  Her face became very red, but it was not from anger. “Without the Christian religion I would not have survived the war. And I’m not dropping it simply because that’s over.”

  I nodded. What did she mean? She said so much that evening, Rachel. “I went to church for the first time during the war. It was Christmas. That’s a very special day, Annie, which is why the people who hid me wanted me to go with them. Weeks before they told everyone in church that a cousin would be coming to visit for the holidays. I had not left my room for a year. I was so afraid. How would it feel to be outside again? That was all I thought about. And snow was coming down on Christmas day—I walked in it. I thought everyone was looking at me. Not that they could have seen much; my black hair was hidden under a red kerchief. They couldn’t know I was Jewish. So many people were going into the church, it made me dizzy. Quickly my ‘family’ and I sat down in the back.

  “The minister talked about the birth of Christ, about his life, and what it meant. I never knew any of that before. Then the organ began to play, Annie. First so softly I could hardly hear it. But then, all around me, there was music. Louder and louder, until I no longer knew where it came from or where I was. With one foot in heaven, I thought. It was so beautiful.

  “When I went back to my room, there was still that music. I never got it out of my head. Almost all year long I could hear it.

  “They took me again, the next Christmas. ‘Remember that cousin from the city?’ my ‘family’ told everyone. ‘She’ll be back for her annual visit. We’ll be bringing her to church.’ I was counting the days, Annie. It was the only thing that made staying in the room the rest of the year bearable.”

  She stopped. With an embarrassed look, she picked up the Bible again. It was still open to her favorite part, the Gospel according to Saint Matthew.

  I stuck out my hand to Rachel. After all, what was so bad about it? Why did it make Father so angry? I’d surprise Rachel on Sunday. I’d wait right outside the church door, maybe even take a look inside for myself. Ask her if she had liked the sermon, walk home with her. I bent my head over my book. We both read. Once in a while we’d stop, look at each other, smile—just for a second, but long enough.

  *

  12 *

  When we came back on that Sunday afternoon, Father’s bicycle was standing by the house. Funny, he had come home already; it wasn’t even dark yet. But there was a reason. He had something to tell us, he said. He paced back and forth in the kitchen, taking off his glasses, wiping them on his handkerchief, putting them on again. Finally, “I want you to meet someone.” Without looking at us, he said, “My wife-to-be.”

  “Who?” Maybe I had heard wrong. That could be. But he said them again, the same words, “My wife-to-be.” Then, “Rachel, please be nice. It’s not easy for her,” and bolted out the door.

  I rubbed my arms. They felt cold. Rachel pulled me onto her lap. Time went by—not much. I heard voices— Father’s and a woman’s. Hers was smooth, kind of sharp, though. I knew it, had heard it before, at the marketplace. Mrs. Vos.

  She was not alone. The daughter had come, too. Her name was Nel. As Rachel poured tea, and Father and Mrs. Vos talked, I stared at the daughter. She was older than I was, perhaps five or six years. She looked like her mother. The same brown hair, too. Wavy. I searched Nel’s face. There had to be something about it that was ugly, but where? I tucked my legs even farther under the chair. Where? I sighed with relief. She had a tiny wart under her chin.

  “It’s not a bad house,” Mrs. Vos was admitting to Father. “I must say I’m surprised. It’s bigger inside than it looks.” She turned to Nel. “Don’t you think it’s a little roomier than ours?”

  “But it’s so far from town,” Nel complained. “It might just as well be in Siberia.” That wart wasn’t so little. “There’s not even a streetlight out here. You won’t see a soul this winter—mark my words.”

  Mrs. Vos nodded pensively. “Yes, you may be right.” She examined the plush chair she was sitting on.

  “We had much more furniture,” Father apologized. “A table, of course, and”—he pointed to the corner— ”bookcases.” He showed Mrs. Vos the other places in the living room where things used to be. “A clock, a piano along that wall.”

  “Mother used to play the piano all the time,” Rachel said. When no one answered her, she added, “Very well.”

  I nodded at her. Yes.

  “You need talent to play,” Mrs. Vos said. With one eyebrow raised, she looked as if she thought Mother could not possibly have had any. Wasn’t Father going to say anything? No, he was just listening.“I don’t understand how you can have been so dumb, Ies. I got everything back that I stored. You must have left your furniture with very dishonest people. Well,” she said in a comforting tone to Father, “if the other things were like these chairs, it’s just as well. I won’t say anything about the quality, Ies. That’s probably not bad, but how old-fashioned can furniture get? People have not sat on stiff chairs like these for years and years.”

  “They certainly haven’t.” Nel laughed, shifting to the edge of hers. “Or if they have, I can see why they stopped.”

  Big teeth—practically like a beaver’s.

  Mrs. Vos drank the rest of her tea and handed the cup to Rachel. “You know, Ies,” she concluded, “as hard as I’ve looked, I can’t see much here that will go with what I have.”

  Father shrugged his shoulders. “Let me try to sell this stuff then,” he suggested. “I don’t care.”

  That should be easy, Mrs. Vos said immediately.

  Father knew so many farmers, and for them it would be just fine—exactly their taste. She got up and walked around, trying to decide where her own furniture would go. “It will make a big difference, you’ll see. This whole place will be transformed into something you won’t recognize.” She smiled at Rachel. She got no response.

  Anxiously Father wiped his forehead. “C’mon,Magda, Nel. I’ll take you home before it gets dark.”

  We shook hands. She hoped she’d see us again soon.

  In the door she turned and pinched my cheek. “Good-bye,” I mumbled.

  Silently Rachel collected the empty teacups, the odds and ends that didn’t even match. Mrs. Vos would not want those either, I guessed. She had her own—beautiful ones, no doubt—porcelain or crystal, for all I knew. From China or wherever crystal came from. Should I tell Rachel what Mrs
. Vos had said about my legs that time? No, better not. Why hadn’t her husband’s name appeared on any of those lists from Town Hall. Why not? Jakob Vos. She had gotten everything else back.

  *

  13 *

  It was a week later that Rachel left, to live again with the people who had hidden her during the war. “Winterswijk does not have any job opportunities, Annie,” she said. “Besides, the trains are running again. I’d be a fool not to take advantage of that. I haven’t been on one for years! Especially now. The heather’s still in bloom; I’ll be able to see it just by looking out the window!

  But I knew better. I’d heard them when I was upstairs and they didn’t know I was listening—Rachel and Father. Rachel must leave, Father had told her. It would never work, he said, she and Mrs. Vos together in the same house. Rachel was only ten years younger—that was why.

  “You’re twenty-nine years old, and you’ve seen so little of the world. I would have told you that one of these days anyway. It’s not right for you to stay here and take care of Annie and me. You ought to lead your own life with people your own age. Why don’t you go to Amsterdam, The Hague … or Rotterdam? They’re going to rebuild Rotterdam beautifully, I read. You can get a job. You still have your teacher’s certificate.” He told her to leave. Just like that.

  But Rachel had not wanted to move to one of those cities where she knew no one. “I’ll go back to my ‘family,’” she said.

  That upset Father. “Don’t, Rachel,” he told her. “You’ll be taking a step back, not forward. That little town has nothing to offer you. There’s just a church there!”

  But no matter what Father said, Rachel would not change her mind. She chose to leave on the afternoon train. Father came home early to take her to the station. Silently we walked down the road,Father in front carrying Rachel’s suitcase with her few clothes and the plaques with the religious sayings. Coming toward us was Droppers. He was pushing a wheelbarrow. When he was practically next to us, he looked for a second at the suitcase, then at the three of us. Hopefully, as if he thought we’d all be leaving.