by Lynn Austin
“I asked at the town house. Let’s walk a bit.” He downed the last of his herring and they crossed the bridge into the old city. She remembered the stolen ration cards hidden in her bag and wondered what he would say if he knew about them. As the crowd hurrying toward the station thinned, Erik leaned close, bending to speak softly into her ear. “I came to warn you not to go anywhere near a certain apartment on Nassaulaan in Zoeterwoude.”
Ans went cold all over. How had Erik known it was one of her houses—the one she had been on her way to visit, in fact? Had the police been following her? Was her entire underground cell in danger? If so, she needed to warn them! But no, right now she needed to remain calm and not panic. She needed to play dumb and hide her guilt from Erik. “I don’t understand,” she said. “Why are you telling me this?”
“The Gestapo knows they’re hiding Jews in that apartment. I overheard them talking this morning, saying they’re going to raid it soon.”
“But I—”
“In the meantime, they’re watching it and waiting to arrest anyone who visits. I know you’re helping Jews, Ans, so I came to warn you. If you have any involvement at all with that place, don’t go near it.”
“Erik . . . thank you.” She wouldn’t say if she was involved or not, but he was certain to notice how badly shaken she was. Not only had she come dangerously close to being caught and arrested herself, but she was terrified for all the people living in that apartment. If only she had learned of the raid sooner. If only she could have convinced the inhabitants to move to safer hiding places. Ans fought hard not to cry, but tears of grief slipped down her cheeks just the same.
Erik pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and handed it to her. “I love you, Ans. I worry about you all the time. I wish . . .” He sighed and didn’t finish.
“Where are we going?” she asked as they walked past the Beestenmarkt. She needed to put aside her fear and grief and warn the other people in her cell.
Erik halted and took both of her hands, facing her. “Ans, let’s not wait any longer. Let’s get married.”
“Married? . . . When?”
“Now. Tomorrow. This week. We could go to the registry office and fill out all the paperwork. Then we could be together from now on. You would be safe with me.” She saw his love for her and thought of Professor Huizenga’s love for Eloise. Both men longed to hide the women they loved behind locked doors and keep them safe from harm. But Ans couldn’t live with herself if she went into hiding and stopped helping the underground—any more than Eloise could.
“If we were married, would you ask me to stop?”
“Ans! I want you to stop no matter what! Don’t you understand that?”
“I’m not sure I can make that promise.”
He released her hands and turned away as if battling his anger. When it was under control, he turned back. “Ans, I’m begging you. If you love me at all—”
“Why not quit the police, Erik, and be an onderduiker? I know people who could help you hide.”
“And I know how hard the Nazis are working to find all the onderduikers.” They had reached an impasse. Neither one was willing to concede. “Will you at least think about getting married, Ans? I want to be together.”
“So do I, but I’ll need a little more time. My parents should be there . . . they’ve never even met you.” In fact, Ans had never told them about Erik. She wasn’t sure if her reluctance had more to do with Erik’s lack of faith or his involvement with the Nazis. Probably both. “You know how much I long to be with you—”
“Then let’s do it. Please, Ans.”
She saw a woman hurrying down the street who reminded her of her contact, and she suddenly remembered why Erik had come looking for her in the first place. How many other members of her underground cell were helping the people in that apartment? She couldn’t think about marriage right now. She needed to warn everyone about the Gestapo raid.
“I promise I’ll think about it, Erik. I should go now.”
“Come back to my apartment with me.”
“I can’t. I’m sorry. I need to tell Eloise I’ve missed my train.” They kissed cheeks again, and Ans rushed away. The underground had a system in place for emergencies like this one. Ans had never used it, but she needed to now. She headed for the busy café on Rapenburg near the university where urgent messages could be left.
“May I use your toilet?” she asked one of the waitresses. The girl pointed to the back. A map of Leiden was tacked to the wall inside the tiny cubicle. There was an envelope with pins and tiny pieces of paper tucked beneath the edge of the commode. She removed one of the pieces of paper and wrote her code name: Voorn—the minnow—and 3:00 p.m. They’d told her the map would be checked several times a day so she could arrange a meeting. Ans pinned the note to the Pieterskerk, a short walk from the town house. Then she flushed the toilet and left.
“I missed the train to Zoeterwoude,” she told Eloise when she returned home. “Our travels this afternoon will have to be canceled too.” She offered no other explanation, deciding not to say anything about the Gestapo raid until after her meeting with Havik.
He was waiting outside the church when Ans arrived, and he pulled her inside as if they were going there to pray. She hoped Erik or the Gestapo wasn’t following her. She quickly told Havik what she’d learned about the apartment in Zoeterwoude and the upcoming raid. He shook his head, punching his hand with his fist.
“We’ve been trying to warn them. Why wouldn’t they listen?”
“Is there any way we can get those people out?”
“It’s too late. If your boyfriend knows about it, then the Gestapo is probably inside already, waiting to see who else shows up.”
The thought made Ans sick. “I would have delivered ration cards there today if Erik hadn’t warned me.”
“He knows about your work?” Havik stared at her as if trying to read her mind, his gaze piercing and hawklike, just like his code name.
“Erik knows I’m helping to hide Jews. He doesn’t know any of the specifics. He told me about the Gestapo raid because he was afraid I might be involved.”
“You have to go into hiding.”
“What? . . . Why? I didn’t go anywhere near there today.”
“Think about it. They’ll force the apartment owner to describe the woman who has been coming with ration cards. They’ll torture everyone in that apartment for names and descriptions of all the people who come there regularly. They’ll follow you to uncover all of your contacts and then their contacts. If you’re arrested, they’ll torture you until you tell everything you know. All of the people you’ve hidden will be in jeopardy. That includes your parents and the baby they’re hiding and the onderduikers we’ve sent them. Your work here is finished. We need to get you out of Leiden.”
“What do I tell the people I work for? And my friends? And Erik?”
“Nothing. You just disappear. We’ll give you a new identity card.”
“I have a job here. I can’t just disappear.”
“You must. Don’t even go back home.”
Ans couldn’t think what to do. Everything was happening too fast. Eloise would be so worried about her if she simply vanished that it might send her over the edge. Maybe Ans should accept Erik’s marriage proposal. He could protect her, couldn’t he? Or might she become a danger to him?
“May I at least go home for my clothes? And so I can explain?”
“You’ll be taking a huge risk.”
“I know. But I have to. There’s a hiding place in the town house where I’ll be safe if the Gestapo does come.”
Havik exhaled as if resigned to her stubbornness. “Well, while you’re there, tell Max and Ina to get ready to leave too.”
“Why?”
“He’s much too important to the underground to risk his arrest. Someone will come for all three of you before curfew tonight.”
Ans waited until the professor returned from work and was with Eloise in their bedroom
before telling them that she had to go into hiding. Eloise moaned and sank down on the edge of her bed. “It’s just like before. I’m losing everyone.”
“The underground is just being extra cautious until this mess at the apartment in Zoeterwoude settles down. Once I know it’s safe, I’ll come back and we can travel together again.” Ans had feared Eloise would break down the way she had after the Leopolds left. But even as Ans watched, she saw Eloise summoning her strength.
“Meta and Sientje are depending on me,” she said. “And you can tell the underground to send more people now that Max and Ina are leaving.”
“I’ll do that.” Ans had written a letter to Erik while she’d waited for the professor to come home, explaining that there was an illness in her family and that she had to return to her parents’ farm. He probably would see through the lie. He would know she’d been involved with the raided apartment. She couldn’t recall ever telling Erik where her parents lived, but she supposed the Gestapo could easily find out if they were after her. She wouldn’t really go to the farm, of course, but to whatever safe house the underground chose for her. She handed Eloise the letter.
“Will you please give this to Erik when he comes looking for me? Otherwise, he won’t know what happened to me.”
“Are you sure he can be trusted?” the professor asked.
“He saved my life today. If he hadn’t warned me about the raid, I would have gone to that apartment. I would be in prison right now.”
Ans hugged Eloise long and hard when it was time to leave. She hugged the professor, too. She couldn’t find words to tell the Huizengas how much she’d grown to love them. How much they’d influenced her life. But Havik arrived, driving a telephone repair van. It was time to go.
Ans picked up her suitcase and hustled out the back door with Max and Ina. “Do you really repair telephones?” she asked Havik as they drove away.
“It’s the reason I’m exempt from the labor camps. The Nazis need their telephones.”
Ans huddled in the back of the van with her friends, her bones jarring on the bumpy cobblestone streets, wondering about her future, wondering which direction they were driving. She wished she could have said goodbye to Erik—and to lovely Leiden, the place she’d called home for nearly five years. She refused to cry, refused to feel sorry for herself. Max and Ina and all of those wretched people in the apartment in Zoeterwoude faced a future much more precarious than her own.
CHAPTER 42
Lena and Pieter rose before dawn to do their chores and found Wolf sitting in their kitchen. He startled Lena, but only for a moment. She hadn’t thought it possible for the young man to get any thinner, but it looked as though he had. “I’m about to cook some porridge,” she told him. “Can you stay?”
“I would be grateful.” Wolf shivered, and Lena hurried to stoke the fire and warm up the house.
“Take off your wet coat so it can dry by the fire. I’ll fetch you a blanket in the meantime.” She didn’t wait for his reply but ran upstairs to pull one from her bed.
“Any news?” she heard Pieter asking as she came down again.
“Everyone’s waiting. The Allied invasion is expected any day, and the Nazis are on high alert. We all are.” Wolf hung his coat over the back of his chair. He nodded his thanks to Lena as she gave him the blanket. “I came to ask a favor of you. Both of you.” Lena went still, waiting. “We need a safe hiding place for a Jewish couple. He has been an invaluable help to the Resistance, forging ID cards, especially for downed Allied airmen. But he and his wife need a new hiding place. They’re an older couple and can’t hide outside in the cold. And he will need a place to work.”
“I’ve had an idea for another hiding place that I’ve been chewing on,” Pieter said. “How soon do you need it?”
“Yesterday,” Wolf replied. He gave the closest thing to a smile that Lena had ever seen.
“Well, in that case, I’ll get started right away.”
“I think I know where he can do his work,” Lena said. “We built a secret room in the cellar to hide food, behind a row of shelves. You can’t tell it’s there. It’s nearly empty now, after last winter. With a lantern for light, it might make a good work space.”
Wolf left before the children got up for school. Lena stood in the open barn door with Bep on her hip, praying as she did every day as she watched Wim and Maaike cycle off on Lena’s wreck of a bicycle. The Nazis had confiscated her children’s bikes. Lena’s rubber tires were long gone and it was especially hard for Wim to pedal on the metal rims with Maaike sitting on the handlebars. Bep waved goodbye, and Lena stifled the urge to shout, “Be careful!” The children had been warned to dive into the ditch alongside the road if they heard planes overhead. One of their schoolmates had been killed by falling shrapnel. Lena would be glad when the school closed for the summer. Trusting her loved ones to God’s care had become a daily, sometimes hourly undertaking.
She kissed Bep’s cheek and set her down, glad that she could keep one of the children near, and went inside to finish her morning chores. Later, Pieter showed Lena what he had in mind for a hiding place. “We can clean everything out of this storage area,” he said, opening the little door to the space beneath the stairs that had become a collection spot for miscellaneous items.
“Sorting through this junk is going to take all day,” Lena said. “You’ll have to help me find places for everything.”
“When it’s empty, I’ll board up the door and seal it from this side. Then I’ll make a secret entrance on the other side of the wall, in the front parlor.”
“Isn’t the piano on the other side?”
“Ja. Come here, I’ll show you.” Lena picked up Bep, who wanted to explore inside the cluttered, dust-filled space, and carried her as she followed Pieter. “I’ll cut a hole in the wall and remove this lower panel on the piano to make a trapdoor.”
“Brilliant. But we’d better not do it while little eyes are watching or it won’t remain a secret for long.”
Lena worked all day to empty the storage area. Her hands and the front of her apron were black with filth by the time she finished. Bep needed a bath after toddling around in the space, touching everything and asking, “What’s this?” as she helped Lena. She and Pieter raced against the clock to erase any trace of their work before Wim and Maaike returned home from school. They finished later that night after the children were in bed, cutting a hole in the parlor wall, opening a trapdoor in the bottom panel of the piano, and covering the entire wall with wood where the old door had been.
“I hope all this hammering doesn’t wake the children,” Lena said.
“If they can sleep through bombers flying overhead every night, they can sleep through anything.”
The lower keys on the piano no longer worked when Pieter finished, but the hidden space had enough room for a makeshift mattress stuffed with straw, and some shelves. It was high enough to sit up in but not to stand. Lena furnished it with bedding and candles and some containers and dishes she thought the shadow people might need. She and Pieter had just headed upstairs to catch an hour or two of sleep before dawn when they heard the door from the barn open and close downstairs. They hurried down to find Wolf and a gray-haired couple who appeared exhausted standing in their kitchen.
“You’re just in time,” Pieter said. “I’ll show you the hiding place.”
“Let them sit down and have something warm to drink first,” Lena said, poking Pieter’s side. “I don’t have coffee, but I can make some tea with mint from my garden. Will that be all right?” She pulled out bread and cheese to go with it and cut up some withered apples from her root cellar. The couple were introduced as Max and Ina, and they seemed grateful for their new hiding place beneath the stairs.
“They told us it was all right to tell you . . . ,” Ina said. “We know your daughter Ans from Leiden.”
Lena caught her breath.
“She’s very pretty, just like you, Mrs. De Vries,” Max added.
; “Please, call me Lena.”
“And I’m Pieter. How do you know Ans?”
“We’ve been hiding with the couple she works for in Leiden.”
“How is she? I haven’t seen her in so long!” Since the night she’d brought Bep to the farm, nearly two years ago. Ans wrote letters from time to time, assuring them she was all right and saying how much she missed them. Lena wrote back, telling her about the farm and how the other children were doing and saying how much she missed her too. Ans would be twenty-four years old soon. A grown woman.
“Ans is good,” Max said. “She’s a very strong, determined, and confident young woman. But she had to be moved from the town house the same time we did.”
Lena went still with fear. “Why? May I ask what happened?”
“Her boyfriend on the police force warned Ans about a Gestapo raid in another safe house.”
A stab of pain pierced Lena’s heart. Ans hadn’t mentioned a boyfriend.
“It was decided that Ina and I should be moved,” Max continued, “and that Ans should also go into hiding.”
“Do you know where she is?”
“Sorry. We have no idea. And she didn’t know that we were coming here.”
Lena hated the Nazis for many reasons, but what they were doing to her family was at the top of her list. Lena had often turned to her own mother when she was Ans’s age, asking about love and life and marriage. Exchanging letters with Ans simply wasn’t the same. And now her precious daughter was hiding somewhere in the Netherlands, probably in danger, cut off from everyone. Cut off from her. The thought broke Lena’s heart. She clenched her hands into fists as her helplessness stirred a powerful rage inside her. If only she could do something to save Ans and protect her—to save and protect all of her children. But how could she lash out against such an overwhelming enemy? How long until she and her family would be safe again? Would they ever be free from Nazi control? Lena had to believe that they would be or she couldn’t face another day. She had to believe that she was doing something to fight back by hiding Max and Ina in her home. “We didn’t have time to finish your work space, Max,” Pieter said. “We thought that fixing you a place to hide was more important.”