by Kit Sergeant
The man shrugged. “We are waiting for information on the movement of the troops.”
Still, Alouette bought a ticket and boarded a cattle wagon.
Chapter 4
M’Greet
August 1914
M’greet was able to catch a train bound for Switzerland, but it was stopped by frontier police. All occupants were ordered to disembark for questioning.
“Papers?” a portly man asked her.
She handed him her ticket.
He looked at it in consternation. “What nationality are you?”
M’greet sighed. “Dutch.”
“Really?” He glanced up from the ticket to peer at her.
“Yes, meneer.” She softened her brown eyes as she met his gaze.
“Let me see your passport.”
“I don’t have it with me. I haven’t been asked for my passport in years, despite the fact I am a world traveler.”
“Well, fräulein, now that Europe is at war, we need to see passports from everyone. If you don’t have one, you will have to come with me.”
A whooshing noise sounded from the train. “No, meneer, I cannot.” She gestured toward the steam rising from the engine. “My belongings are on that train.”
“I am sorry.” The portly man nodded at a uniformed soldier, who stepped forward.
M’greet ducked out of his grasp as the train began to pull away. She ran after it, banging on the side of a car. “My suitcase. My jewelry. My furs!” The last word came out as a shrill shriek as she stopped, panting. The train had picked up speed.
The soldier appeared beside her. “Now, fräulein, if you would come with me.”
She turned to the guard, her eyes blazing. “You’ve just cost me 80,000 francs.”
M’greet was deported to the last place she wanted to be: Berlin. She checked into a hotel, one of a much lower quality than the Adlon, near the train station. She called her former lover Griebel three times that afternoon, but he did not answer any of her messages. She was truly on her own, and without even a change of clothes.
As evening fell, she made her way down to the bar and, casting her eyes around the room, found a likely evening companion, a blond man with wire spectacles. He introduced himself as Meneer Jansen and stated that he was in Berlin on business, but would be leaving for Holland the next day.
M’greet frowned. “Holland. Oh, how I miss my home country.”
He choked back on his drink. “You are Dutch? I did not perceive that.”
“No one usually does. They think I am of a more exotic descent. But I assure you I am as Dutch as you.”
“Where did you grow up?” He took a sip of beer, his wedding ring flashing in the electric light of the hotel bar.
“Leeuwarden, but I have a home in Amsterdam now.” This was not technically true.
“You are without your husband?”
“I’m a widow.” This, also, was a lie. Her ex-husband was very much alive, and the flat in Amsterdam had been sold in 1902, not long after that terrible day when M’greet returned from running errands to find their small apartment bare of both Rudy and her daughter’s belongings.
“And now I have no money and no clothes.” She filled him in on the previous day’s tribulations. “I’m not sure what to do,” she said in a helpless tone. “I am a lonely woman with no one to aid me.”
Jansen’s expression softened in sympathy and M’greet knew she had hit her mark.
“I cannot help you with your passport, but,” he reached into his coat and pulled out his wallet. “I can buy you a ticket to Amsterdam.” He took out more bills. “If you go to the consulate in Frankfurt, they can assist you in crossing the border.”
In a few days’ time, M’greet was back in Amsterdam. The consulate had indeed issued her new papers with relatively little complications. After a clerk handed over the new passport, M’greet had discreetly changed her age from the correctly reported 38 to 30.
She found herself in Amsterdam once again, as poor as she had been when she left the city for Paris more than a decade before. She looked up Jansen in the phone book and then traveled to his sizable house in the fashionable Herengracht neighborhood. She sighed to herself as she walked past the stately houses along the canal, alike in their tall, narrow structures and square windows, but differing in their vibrant exterior paint colors and the shape of their gabled roofs. This would be the perfect place to stay while she figured out her next step.
She paused on the porch of a red brick building and consulted the slip of paper in her hand before knocking on the heavy door.
A woman answered. Her eyes traveled up from M’greet’s dark blue skirt, which ended just above the ankle to better show off her Parisian boots, to her matching tailored jacket, and landed on the navy and cream lace hat pinned jauntily to the side of her head. “Yes?”
“Is Meneer Jansen home?”
“No. He is at work.” Her tone implied that, while it was obvious Meneer Jansen did honest work, it was equally obvious M’greet did not.
“Oh, I do not mean to intrude. I merely wished to thank him. I was stranded in Berlin, and he lent me some assistance.”
“Yes.” The woman’s voice was still cool. “He told me he did so.”
M’greet could tell she was unwanted. “Well, thank you and please give my regards to your husband. I will be going on my way.” She began walking down the steps.
“Wait.”’
M’greet turned.
The woman glanced over her shoulder before shutting the door and stepping onto the portico in her stockinged feet. “Aren’t you Mata Hari, the dancer?”
“Yes, madame.”
“Can I ask…” the woman looked up and down the quiet, tree-lined street. “Did you seduce my husband while you were in Berlin?” Her voice was barely above a whisper.
“No,” M’greet answered truthfully.
The woman’s voice rose. “Can I ask why not? He’s handsome enough, isn’t he?”
“Indeed. But I would never do so without a clean chemise or a bath and at the time I had neither.”
“Oh,” the woman’s voice filled with relief. Her comfort seemed to stem more from the fact her husband had not done anything to repulse the famed Mata Hari rather than that he hadn’t accepted her non-existent advances. M’greet did not recall ever feeling the same about her own philandering husband, who would often do cruel things to women, but was never in want of mistresses. She adjusted her hat. “G’day, madame.”
“G’day. And good luck.”
M’greet still had no money and no luggage, but her foray into the fancy canal neighborhood inspired her to book a room at the opulent Victoria Hotel. As was custom, she made sure that her room had a private bathroom.
The next day she went to call on Anna, who had been able to return to Amsterdam much earlier than her mistress. As M’greet headed down Prins Hendrikkade, she heard footsteps behind her and peeked backward to see a man in a striped suit. He must have seen her exit the Victoria and assumed she was a courtesan.
M’greet had dealt with such situations before. She decided to detour into the Church of St. Nicholas. Standing in the vestibule, she pushed the heavy door open to get a better look at the man, who was now searching up and down the street. She could see that the cut of his suit and his leather shoes hinted at money. She decided he did not pose a threat and exited the church to deliberately walk in front of him.
“Bonjour, mademoiselle.” He removed his hat to reveal a head of thick hair.
“Bonjour, monsieur,” M’greet returned.
“I was wondering, if you weren’t busy, if you would like to have brunch with me.”
She laughed. “I don’t even know your name.”
The man looked taken aback. “I am Lucas van der Schalk. And you are?”
“Margaretha Zelle-MacLeod.” She held out her hand for him to kiss it. It had been a while since anyone had been interested in getting to know the real her, and not just Mata Hari. “I am terribl
y sorry, but I have other plans this morning.”
Van der Schalk appeared to be disappointed.
“But you can call on me at the Victoria Hotel,” M’greet shot over her shoulder as she continued on her way.
“I will do so… this afternoon!” Van der Schalk called as she crossed the street. She smiled to herself instead of glancing back at him.
“Where’s Non?” M’greet asked Anna when she answered the door of her mother’s tiny apartment in De Wallen.
“Madame!” Anna shouted as she hugged her mistress. When she ended her embrace, Anna said that M’greet was as elegant as ever.
“And Non? Where’s my daughter?”
Anna waved her toward a table before pouring tea from a cracked pot. “She is in The Hague with Monsieur MacLeod.”
“Have you seen her?”
Anna nodded. “I took the train to The Hague and walked past their house. I passed her on the street, but she didn’t recognize me. She looks just like you, madame. Dark hair, dark eyes. She has your skin coloring as well… and she carries her lunch in a box with a picture of Mata Hari dancing on it.”
M’greet’s eyes filled with tears. “Oh, my Non, my beautiful daughter.” She wiped her face with a napkin. “I curse that bastard every day for taking her away from me. A girl should be with her mother.”
Anna bit her lip as she nodded.
“Oh, Anna, I know what you are thinking—that my lifestyle is not conducive for raising a child.” M’greet tossed the napkin. “But I would never have become a dancer if I had my daughter with me. And after Normie died…” The tears were threatening again, but she refused to give into them. She stood up and glanced disdainfully around at the dilapidated furniture and crumbling plaster walls. “I’ve taken rooms at the Victoria. You are welcome to join me.”
“Yes, madame.” Anna began clearing the tea.
“I must get going now. I believe I have a dinner date tonight and my nails are much due for a manicure, not to mention I have to buy a dress.”
True to his word, her newest beau called her that afternoon and M’greet met him for dinner at De Silveren Spiegel. She had purchased a Paul Poiret-style dress at a boutique after leaving Anna’s, and paid extra for the seamstress to fit it right then.
“Have you ever been here?” Van der Schalk asked after he’d kissed her hand.
“No,” M’greet admitted as she gazed around at the old-fashioned candelabras and Dutch portraits on the walls. Unaccompanied women were not to be found in fancy restaurants, and her ex-husband would never have been able to afford such a meal.
“It dates back to the Dutch Golden Ages,” van der Schalk commented as he sat down.
M’greet gathered her silk skirts before sinking onto the flimsy chair. “Are you a historian?”
“Am I? No,” he replied, the amusement obvious in his voice. “I am a banker.”
She leaned forward and put her hand under her chin. “How interesting.”
A waiter came by with a decanter. His eyes dropped to stare openly at M’greet’s décolletage as he poured her wine.
Van der Schalk took a long drink before setting his glass down. “Tell me more about yourself, madame. You are Russian, no?”
M’greet sat straighter and put her hands in her lap. “You really don’t recognize me?”
He gave her a searching look. “Should I?”
She was about to reveal herself as the famed Mata Hari, but then thought of an even more glamorous role than the one she’d been playing for over ten years. She did her best to affect a Russian accent. “I’m a ballet dancer. I’ve danced with Sergei Diaghilev’s Russian ballet company for some time.” This was almost legitimate: in 1910, her manager had nearly convinced the ballet impresario to hire her, but Diaghilev insisted that Mata Hari audition, which she, of course, would not deign to do.
“Ahh,” van der Schalk said delightedly as the meal was served. “I thought you had a dancer’s physique.”
She dipped her chin, pretending to be bashful at the compliment.
“Are you married?” he asked. “I don’t see a wedding ring.”
“Widowed,” M’greet replied without hesitation. “You?”
“Never been married.” Van der Schalk took a bite of meat. “You know,” he stated when he finished, “Peter the Great once visited Holland in order to learn the art of shipbuilding. The little house he stayed in is still there, in Zaandam. I could take you there if you’d like.”
“Of course. I’d love to see where the great Tsar resided.” M’greet had no such desire, but wouldn’t mind touring the town with the handsome van der Schalk. “But then again…” she frowned.
“What is it?”
“I have nothing to wear.” She explained what happened in Berlin, emphasizing the banker’s accusations of Russian ancestry for good measure. “So you see, I have no clothes and no money.”
His eyes traveled over her beaded dress. “Perhaps I could take you shopping beforehand.”
M’greet beamed. “That would be lovely.”
The next day, van der Schalk took M’greet all over Amsterdam’s shopping district, buying her shoes, jewelry, and the latest styles of dresses to replace all that had been left behind in Germany.
Despite the pleasure she obtained from having a full closet once again, M’greet was almost overcome with melancholy when she returned to the hotel. She realized as she walked up the wide staircase to her room that it was due to being back in Holland after so many years abroad. Save for Normie’s death, which occurred in Java, some of the worst things M’greet had to endure had transpired in her native country: it was where her father abandoned her all those years ago, and also where her marriage had officially fallen apart.
“I need to see Non,” she told Anna when she entered the suite.
Anna’s normally pinched face relaxed into a sorrowful look. “Perhaps you should contact Monsieur MacLeod.”
M’greet grimaced. “I don’t want to have any contact with that brute. I should write to Non herself.”
Anna sat across from M’greet at the little table. “I suppose Non is old enough now that she’s heard stories about you.”
“I’m sure her father has filled her head with lies.”
“If you did write to Non, you could tell her about your life. Explain what happened from your perspective.”
M’greet tucked a manicured hand under her chin. “Yes, that is a good idea. She should know that I never willingly abandoned her.”
She pulled a piece of clean paper from a drawer in the writing desk and dipped a pen in ink. I did love your father when I first met him, she wrote before pausing and replacing the pen in the inkwell. How could she describe to her teenage daughter the passion they had experienced when they first met? M’greet was only 18 when she answered the ad John Rudolph MacLeod had placed in the local newspaper. It read Captain in the Army of the Indies, on leave in Holland, seeks a wife with a character to his taste, preferably with means.
M’greet certainly did not have means, as much as her father used to pretend it to be so. Her father was a hat-maker, but like his daughter, preferred to live beyond said means, and his fellow Leeuwardeners nicknamed him the Baron. He had invested in oil shares at a time when coal ruled the world, and had completely wiped out his wife’s meager inheritance before M’greet was thirteen. The words she had written to Non blurred as M’greet became lost in thoughts of the past.
After her father declared bankruptcy, he moved to Amsterdam to live with his mistress, taking M’greet’s two younger brothers with him. She was left to take care of her heart-broken mother, who died eight months later.
M’greet had bounced from family member to family member and had just gotten kicked out of college, where she had been training to become a kindergarten teacher, when she spotted Rudy MacLeod’s ad. Even then she had favored men in uniforms.
Their infatuation with each other quickly grew stale, but M’greet married him anyway, seeing no other viable opportuniti
es. They sailed for the West Indies soon after she gave birth to her son, Norman John. Rudy spent most of his off-time drinking, gambling, and consorting with the local women, and M’greet and her baby son were frequently left alone. Rudy was given a new posting in Malang in 1897, and things looked up: they had more money and Rudy started sharing M’greet’s bed more. A year later they had a daughter, Jeanne Louise, nicknamed ‘Non,’ a shortening of Nonah, which meant “Little Miss” in the local language. After Non was born, Rudy returned to his old ways, and the marriage had already fallen apart when Normie died at just a little over two years old.
But M’greet couldn’t explain any of this to her daughter. Back in the present, she shook off the haunting memories and wrote some nonsense about how she still loved Non’s father, but circumstances had forced them apart. She depicted what living in Paris had been like, the excitement of being on stage, but made no reference to why she never again demanded to see her daughter after Rudy left that day.
She ended the letter stating she looked forward to seeing her pretty face once again and sealed it with a kiss. Anna immediately left to post it.
Chapter 5
Marthe
September 1914
The women and children of Westrozebeke were forced to spend two weeks in the Hoot’s cellar. The atmosphere down there grew foul and damp. They were not allowed to light fires and, as August dragged into September, the nights grew chilly. Their water supply became dangerously low and Marthe worried the Germans might have forgotten about their cellar hostages.
Finally a hauptmann, different from the one who had terrorized Marthe’s family, appeared. “You can come out now.” He spoke so quietly that a near-starved Marthe wasn’t sure she had heard him right.
“What is he saying?” Mevrouw Hoot inquired.
“We are free to go?” Marthe asked him in German.