Tempestuous April. Betty Neels
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placidly to watch them flash by; there were farms dotted here and there, with steep roofs, and gardens arranged very neatly around them—the villages were dominated by their churches; Harriet had never seen so many soaring steeples in her life, nor, for that matter, had she seen so many factories, each with its small satellite of new houses close by. She didn’t like them very much and turned with relief to the contemplation of a canal, running like a ruler through the neat countryside, and carrying a variety of picturesque traffic. Presently they were served coffee and ham rolls, and the two girls sat back, watching the country flash by under a blue, rather watery sky stretching away to the flat horizon. In no time at all they were at Rotterdam—Harriet watched the early morning crowds racing to work with a faintly smug sympathy. The three weeks of her holiday stretching ahead of her seemed a very long time indeed. She wondered idly what she would feel like on the return journey. Once they had left Rotterdam, the scenery became more rural, the villages lying neatly amongst the flat meadows, like cakes arranged tidily on a plate—Gouda, even from a distance, looked intriguing—Harriet wished that they might have stopped to look around, but the train went remorselessly on to Utrecht and then to Amersfoort, where they had to get out anyway and change trains. They stood on the platform and watched the express rush away towards the frontier, and then because they had half an hour to wait, they went and had a cup of coffee and Sieske spread the incredibly small Dutch money on the table between them and gave Harriet her first lesson. They laughed a great deal and the time passed so quickly that they were surprised when the train for Leeuwarden arrived and they were stowed on board by a kindly porter, who tossed their cases in after them and waved cheerfully as the train pulled out.
They still had a two-hour journey before them, Harriet settled herself by the window once more, listening to Sieske’s unhurried voice and watching the subtle changing of the countryside. It began to look very like the New Forest, with stretches of heath and charming little woods; there were glimpses of houses too, not large, but having an air of luxury, each set in its own immaculate grounds. Presently the woods and heathland gave way in their turn to rolling grassland. The farms looked large and prosperous, even the cows looked plumply outsize and although there were plenty of villages and towns there was a refreshing lack of factories.
Sieske’s father was waiting at Leeuwarden, a large, very tall man with thick grey hair, a neat moustache and an elegant Van Dyke beard. He had a round merry face, but his eyes were shrewd behind the horn-rimmed glasses he wore. He greeted Sieske with a bear-like hug and a flow of incomprehensible words, but as he turned to shake Harriet’s hand, she was relieved to find that his English was almost as good as her own.
‘You are most welcome, Harriet,’ he said warmly. ‘We hope that you will have a pleasant holiday with us—and now we will go home; Mother is waiting—she is most excited, but she would not come with me because everything has to be ready for you when you arrive.’
He led the way over to a BMW, and Harriet looked at it with an appreciative eye as they got in. She gazed around her as they went through Leeuwarden, glimpsing small side streets that would be fun to explore. Dr Van Minnen seemed to read her thoughts, for without taking his eyes off the road, he said, ‘You shall come here, Harriet, and look around one day soon. There is a great deal to see as well as a museum of which we are very proud.’
Franeker, Sieske’s home, was only a short distance from Leeuwarden; in less than twenty minutes they were slowing down past a large church and turning into the main street of the charming little town.
The doctor lived in a large house overlooking a tree-lined canal which ran between narrow cobbled streets lined with buildings from another era. No two houses were alike, except in a shared dignity of age and beauty. Harriet got out of the car and stood gaping at the variety of rooftops. She would have liked to have asked about them, but Sieske was already at the great wooden door with its imposing fanlight, and the doctor caught hold of her arm and hurried her inside behind his daughter, to be greeted by his wife. Mevrouw Van Minnen was very like her daughter and still remarkably youthful—there was no hint of grey in her pale blonde hair and her eyes were as bright a blue as Sieske’s; she was a big woman, but there was nothing middle-aged in her brisk movements. The next hour or so was taken up most agreeably, drinking coffee and eating the crisp little biscuits—sprits—that went with it. There was a great deal of conversation which lost none of its zest by reason of Harriet’s lack of Dutch, and Mevrouw Van Minnen’s scant knowledge of English. Presently they all went upstairs to show Harriet her room—it overlooked the street, so that she could see the canal below, which delighted her; and although it was small it was very comfortable. She unpacked happily; it was, she decided, going to be a delightful holiday. She did her hair and her face and went downstairs to join the family for koffietafel, and ate her bread and cold meat and cheese and omelette with a healthy appetite which called forth delighted surprise from Mevrouw Van Minnen, who had thought she had looked too delicate to do more than peck at her food. Sieske translated this to Harriet, giggling a great deal, and then said in Dutch to her mother:
‘Harry isn’t quite what she looks, Moeder. She appears to be a fairy, but she’s not in the least delicate; and of course it notices here, doesn’t it, because we’re all so big.’
‘Such a pretty girl, too,’ her mother murmured. ‘I wonder what Aede and Friso will say when they see her.’
Aede wouldn’t be home until the evening, it seemed, and no one knew what Friso was doing—he had taken the morning surgery so that Dr Van Minnen could go to Leeuwarden—he had presumably gone to his own home. They would see him later, said Mevrouw Van Minnen comfortably, and suggested that the two girls went out for a walk so that Harriet could see something of the town.
An hour later, the two of them were strolling along looking in the shop windows while Sieske carefully explained the prices. They had reached a particularly interesting display of clocks and jewellery when Sieske suddenly exclaimed, ‘I forgot, I have to buy stamps for Father—the post office is in the next street. Wait here, Harry—you can practise your Dutch in this window—I won’t be a minute.’
Harriet looked her fill, and then because Sieske still hadn’t come back, went to the edge of the pavement and looked up and down the street. It was surprisingly busy for a small town, with a constant thin stream of traffic. She was standing on the corner outside the beautiful town hall and she watched idly as the various buses and lorries halted by her; the cars were mostly small, so that when an AC 428 Fastback pulled up it caught her attention immediately. There was a girl sitting in the front by the driver—a girl so dark that it was impossible not to notice her amongst the fair-haired giants around the town, thought Harriet; she was quite beautiful too. She turned her head and stared at Harriet with great black eyes which barely noticed her. She looked cross, and Harriet, with that extraordinary feeling that in someone else’s country you can do things you wouldn’t do in your own, stared back openly before transferring her gaze to the driver. He was looking ahead and she studied his profile at her leisure; it was a handsome one, with a domineering nose and a firm chin; his forehead was high and wide and his very fair hair was brushed smoothly back from it. Looking at him, she had the sudden deep conviction that they had met before; her heart started to race, she wished with all her heart that he would turn and look at her. As though she had shouted her wish out loud at him, he turned his head and she found herself gazing into level grey eyes. It seemed to her that she had known him—a complete stranger—all her life; she smiled with the sudden delight of it, wondering if he felt the same way too. Apparently he did not; there was no expression on his face at all, and she went slowly pink under his cool stare. The traffic ahead of him sorted itself out, and he was gone, leaving her gazing sadly after him; the man who had been in her thoughts for so many years; the reason for her being more than friends with the men she had met. He had been her dream; but dreams didn’t last. A good thing perhaps, as quite obviously she had no part in his; indeed, he had looked at her as though she had been a lamp-post.
Sieske came back then, and said, ‘Harry, what is it? You look as though you’ve seen a ghost.’
Harriet turned to walk beside her friend. ‘No, not a ghost.’ She so obviously didn’t want to say any more that Sieske bit off the questions she was going to ask, and started to talk about something quite different.
Aede