He attempted to cup her breast again, but she took hold of his wandering hand and placed a mug of coffee in it. “You are incorrigible.”
Chapter 3
That same evening Hannah Pender made her way home from her job at the university, clothed in her navy-blue felt hat and coat, leather gloves, her tiny waist emphasized with a wide, black, patent-leather belt. She moved at a fast clip through clouds of her own icy breath that numbed the side of her face as she walked. On the corner of her street, she stopped. Even in the cold weather, she took a moment to look up. Though chilly, it was a beautiful twilight evening. She admired a chevron of birds returning for the spring, forming long dark streaks across the red-marbled sky that stretched above her.
“Red sky at night, shepherd’s delight,” she said out loud to herself and smiled. Her great-grandmother had been British, and she’d heard her say that many times. As she continued to stare up, a young boy came running toward her.
“Hannah, Hannah, it fell out!” he yelled with gusto as he beamed at her. He pointed to a gaping hole in the front of his mouth, where a tooth had been the day before.
She smiled and crouched down to meet him on his level. “Let me see,” she said, a glint in her eye.
Even with his mouth wide open he continued to talk. “I found a five cent coin; it was under my pillow this morning.”
Hannah stood to her feet. “Well done, Albert. Did you have to force it?”
Albert shook his head a little too vigorously. Then, sensing her lack of belief, added reluctantly, “Well, maybe just a little.”
Hannah ruffled his hair, and then he ran off to announce his achievement to someone else. She was charmed, reminded that not everything was swept away by such desperate times; innocence still prevailed. Teeth fell out of children’s mouths, and swallows still built spring nests.
She turned the corner and noticed a woman standing in a doorway, waving vigorously to her. It was her mother’s old friend, Mrs. Oberon, whom all the neighborhood children called “Oma”, meaning “Grandmother”. She was a tiny older woman bundled into a fringed shawl and a dark, heavy skirt. Upon her feet, thick black stockings and traditional wooden clogs. As Hannah made her way up the path, the woman tucked a few strands of gray, greasy hair back under her threadbare headscarf and fingered a brown paper package clasped in her dark, wrinkled hands. At five foot six, and in her high-heeled shoes, Hannah towered over her.
“Wool for your mama,” Mrs. Oberon said with a full gummy smile, thrusting out the parcel. “I would take it myself, but I have stew boiling on the stove.”
Hannah took it and and bent down to hug the woman. “Thank you, Mrs. Oberon. You shouldn’t have. She’ll be so grateful.”
Oma shook off the thanks with a flick of her hand. “Clara has done so much for me over the years, especially when my husband died. It’s the least I could do. Besides, I had to wait in line anyway.”
She kissed Hannah warmly on both cheeks. As Hannah moved off down the road, Oma shouted after her, “Give her my love.”
Hannah waved back her response.
As she stood waiting to cross the street, a truck pulled in front of her and came to an abrupt stop in traffic. Sooty, angry smoke and the putrid smell of gasoline fumes caused Hannah to take a step back as the idling truck rocked in front of her. It was German. Heaped in the back were piles of bicycles.
Hannah sighed as she thought of the waste. The metal and rubber were apparently needed for the war effort, but everyone knew it was just another ruse the Germans were using to suppress them and take away every aspect of their independence and freedom.
As the truck pulled away, something flew off the back and clattered to the ground. It was a pedal that had worked itself loose from an overhanging bicycle. Instinctively, Hannah reached down and picked it up. She slipped it into her pocket and continued down the street to her door.
Walking up the path, she admired the indomitable boldness of crocuses springing up either side, fighting their way up through the frozen earth. Beside her door, a red-and-blue painted milk jug had been turned into a home for a nest of daffodils.
She placed the key in the lock, and her cheery, warm home was a welcoming sight to her as she stepped inside. Her paneled hallway was painted a soft, muted lemon, and hand-painted blue plates were displayed with honor on high shelves. As she closed the door behind her, the mahogany grandfather clock that dominated the hallway pounded the five o’clock hour in deep dulcet tones, wrapping its familiar arms around her to welcome her home.
From the sitting room, a strained, older voice called out to her, “Hello, dear.”
Hannah took off her coat and hung it on a wooden peg. “Hello, Mama,” she sang back.
She found her mother in her usual chair in the sitting room, bent over her latest knitting project. Her hair, like fluffy cotton wool, framed her wrinkled face, which broke into a broad smile, not unlike her daughter’s. She looked up to her with pensive eyes reflecting the same shade of blue.
“Still so cold,” she said, shaking her head.
“Yes, it is.” Hannah nodded as she picked up the thick woollen shawl that had slipped to the floor and placed it around her mother’s shoulders. Then she added wood to their fire.
“Did you get anything new today?” asked Clara, spotting the package Hannah had temporarily laid at her feet while she fixed the fire.
“Yes, I have something for you from Mrs. Oberon.”
Clara dropped her knitting needles to her lap and her eyes danced with anticipation. Hannah loved to see her mama so excited.
“Well,” said Clara, impatiently, “do I get to see it?”
Hannah moved across the room and dropped the wrapped bundle into Clara’s upstretched arms. Even though they were twisted with arthritis, her mother’s hands still managed, somehow, to undo the package in record time. Then she clasped them together with joy.
“Green. Perfect. It will do so well for a new hat for Pieter, if I can get that scoundrel to keep a hat on!”
Hannah looked down at the soft skeins of forest-colored wool as Clara’s artful fingers smoothed them out on her lap. “Mama,” she laughed, “are there any Dutch children left in Holland who aren’t wearing one of your creations?”
Clara chuckled to herself and returned to her discarded project. “It’s my own personal act of resistance,” she confessed. “I plan to keep all the young boys in Holland warm even if I can’t keep them safe.”
Hannah shook her head and moved to the kitchen to place the kettle on the stove. As she returned to the sitting room, she noticed her mother’s hands gripping the chair arms.
“I need to stand, I’m getting stiff,” she announced, shooing away her daughter’s attempts to help her as she slowly pulled herself up. Her body took a few moments to uncurl, and she hobbled her first few steps. Then she straightened and walked stiffly on her cane toward the window. “How was the university, dear?”
Hannah was pensive; she wondered how much to tell her mother. She settled on, “More of the same. Fewer students, more rules.”
As Clara tugged at the curtains, she looked out into the twilight and became thoughtful. “It’s hard for anyone to breathe in all of that, so much sadness in the air. Sometimes I’m glad I’m housebound. I’m not sure I could take it. I’m sure if I ever get out I’d be locked up in a cell the very first day for selling secrets to the British or knocking down one of those German soldiers with my cane.”