by Lynn Austin
“I know. I thank God every day for it.”
I heard Jakob fussing in his cradle inside the cabin, ready to be nursed. Maarten and I released each other and I went back inside. My love for him would grow one day at a time, I told myself. One loving act at a time.
Chapter 26
Geesje’s Story
Holland, Michigan
49 years earlier
Dominie Van Raalte understood the importance of a shipping channel to connect Holland with the Great Lakes and the rest of the nation, but at first only a shallow, unnavigable creek connected Black Lake to Lake Michigan. He petitioned the American government for help in digging a deeper canal, and when his efforts stalled, the men of our community took picks and shovels and proceeded to dig out the channel themselves. Maarten joined the other workers, leaving me to tend the children and the farm animals and the garden by myself. In the end, it was worth the effort even if sand continued to fill the new waterway year after year. Maarten was able to use the open port to get our printing business up and running after the delivery of a secondhand printing press from Chicago, along with the other supplies we needed. Our new shop occupied one end of our property where the city street would one day be, and we built a new wood-frame house on the other end with lumber from Holland’s new planing mill. Our old log cabin became our barn.
I sat at the dinner table one evening with my husband and three little boys, savoring the scents of newly sawn wood and the fresh pea soup I had made. While the others bowed their heads to say grace, I surveyed my cozy home and thought, Look what God has given me. Look how rich I am. God had blessed me with a good husband who loved me and with three precious sons. It would be selfish and ungrateful to want more. And I would be insulting God if I wished for anything different than the life He’d given me. Yes, we had been poor at first and had suffered tragic losses, but thanks to God and our community of hardworking people, the town was growing and prospering. And I was content. My only wish was that my parents had lived to see their dream fulfilled.
Nearly four years after Jakob was born, our daughter Christina joined our little family. I had suffered a miscarriage in between the two births so we thanked the Almighty when she was born safe and sound. Jakob had been a contented child with Maarten’s easygoing nature and his tender heart toward God. Our adopted sons Arie, who was nine, and Gerrit, who was seven, continued to be quiet, eager-to-please boys. They attended the Pioneer School now, where they enjoyed their lessons and were learning to speak English. Our community believed in educating our sons and daughters to find their places in life, armed with faith, to become beacons of light in a dark world. All was peaceful.
Then Christina burst into our lives, healthy and strong and wailing for attention. She was demanding and headstrong and knew her own mind from a very young age. Yet she was such a delightful and charming and affectionate child that her three doting brothers raced to grant her every wish. Christina was a mystery to me her entire life. Instead of glorying in her unique position as our only daughter, she followed her three brothers everywhere they went, determined to be just like them. She was as rough-and-tumble as they were, catching frogs in the creek and shooing rabbits out of our garden with a homemade slingshot. I despaired of keeping her dresses and pinafores clean and mended. She would have gladly worn Jakob’s outgrown clothes if I had allowed her to. She chafed at having to work alongside me at home the way I had worked alongside my mother, insisting she preferred her brothers’ chores. She hated sitting still in church, grew impatient and bored when Maarten read from the Scriptures every evening after dinner, and rebelled at having to observe a day of Sabbath rest each week. She required more stern discipline on my part than the other three children combined. Yet she was the delight of my life.
By the time Christina was two years old, our community had outgrown the log church on the hill, so we constructed a beautiful new one on Ninth Street near the heart of the growing village. It was a handsome wood-frame building with six tapered white pillars adorning the portico in front—and referred to informally as Pillar Church. It contributed a great deal to helping our town look like one of the civilized cities I had left behind in the Netherlands, yet the village still had a rickety impermanence to it. If only they would build with brick or stone instead of wood, I remember thinking as I walked to the cobbler’s shop with Christina one morning when she was four years old. And if only the streets were paved with cobblestones or bricks so we didn’t have to slog through a sea of mud every spring or inhale lungsful of dust on hot summer days whenever a heedless vehicle swept past.
We were nearly to the cobbler’s shop when a wagon drew to a halt near us in a choking dust cloud. I was thinking unkind thoughts toward the driver when I heard someone call my name. “Geesje? . . . Geesje, is that you?” I looked up at the man who had stepped down from the wagon to tie his horse to the post.
“Hendrik!”
“I thought it was you, Geesje. How are you?” I froze in place, fighting a powerful urge to run into his arms and hold him tightly, letting him lift me, laughing, off my feet. He seemed taller than I remembered, stronger and sun-browned and still handsome. He lifted his hat for a moment and ran his fingers through his golden hair, and the once-familiar gesture nearly left me undone.
“I’m good . . . very good,” I stammered. In the years since Hendrik went away I thought I’d reached a full measure of contentment with my life—but it vanished in an instant as I stared up at the man I loved. I had made the wrong choice half a dozen years ago. I should have run away with him instead of staying married to plodding, boring Maarten.
Hendrik walked around to the other side of the wagon and lifted a woman and a little girl about Christina’s age down from the wagon seat. “Geesje, I’d like you to meet my wife, Nella, and our daughter, Rosie.”
“I’m pleased to meet you,” I said, trying to smile. “This is my daughter, Christina.” I didn’t want to take my eyes off Hendrik for a moment, but I forced myself to be polite and face his wife. She was about the same height and build as me, the same age, and as fair-haired and blue-eyed as I was. We might have been sisters. “I understand you live near Zeeland,” I managed to say.
“We do. We have a farm there.”
Hendrik and I chatted for a few minutes, our conversation stiff and formal. He told me about the land he’d cleared, the crops he’d planted, the barn and frame farmhouse he had built for his family. I told him about Maarten’s print shop and how it reminded me of the shop Papa had owned in Arnhem—the one where Hendrik and I had met. A flood of memories threatened to overwhelm me as we talked, and I found myself gazing at him so intently that I finally had to force myself to turn to Nella and ask what had brought them into town. I have no idea how she replied. I wasn’t listening. Instead, I was trying to think of a way to meet Hendrik alone later, remembering how we had often snuck away to meet in secret in Arnhem. I wanted to feel his arms around me, ask if he was truly happy with Nella, and confess to him how lonely I often felt when Maarten was busy with work or his obligations at church. I wanted to tell Hendrik that I loved him and hear him say that he still loved me.
As we talked our two little girls played together outside the cobbler’s shop. They became instant friends and stood with their arms entwined, their laughter bubbling up like spring water. It was the first time I had ever seen Christina so engaged in play with another little girl. She usually wanted nothing to do with girls and ran off to play with the boys, instead.
The loss I felt when Hendrik and I finally said good-bye was as if my heart had been ripped away. I didn’t know when—or if—I would ever see him again. I went inside the cobbler’s shop, barely able to recall why I was there, and finished my errands in a daze. I returned home to my plain clapboard house feeling desolate and unable to cope with Christina’s whining demands. She had fussed at having to separate from her newfound friend and continued to nag me about wanting to play with Rosie until my own raw emotions made me lose my temper with her.<
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I decided not to tell Maarten that I had run into Hendrik, but later, as the six of us sat down to dinner, Christina began fussing again, this time nagging her father. “Can I play with Rosie again, Papa? She’s my best friend in the whole world. Will you take me to visit her tomorrow?”
“Rosie who?” he asked with a mouthful of potatoes. “Who are you talking about?”
“The girl we met at the cobbler’s shop today. Mama said I can’t play with her again but you’ll let me, won’t you Papa? Please?”
“Who is she talking about, Geesje?”
I had to explain or Christina would pester her father to distraction. She was accustomed to getting her own way and aware that Maarten was like warm butter in her hands. “We ran into Hendrik Vander Veen and his wife outside the cobbler’s shop today,” I told him. “Their daughter, Rosie, was with them. I hadn’t met his wife before so we talked for a few minutes.”
“And I played with Rosie. She was so nice, Papa, and I want to play with her again, but Mama won’t let me.”
I couldn’t help snapping at her. “I told you, Christina. They live in Zeeland, not Holland!”
“But you’ll let me see her again, won’t you, Papa?”
Maarten’s face darkened as he struggled to control his emotions. “You need to obey your mother,” he finally said. “And don’t come running to me when she says ‘no.’ Understand?” He was upset, but not at Christina. Maarten was usually very even-tempered, but he strode off to his meeting that night in a sour mood. As soon as he was gone, Christina threw a temper tantrum. It was the last straw for me. I came dangerously close to venting my grief and sorrow on my daughter.
Just in time, Arie came to my rescue, scooping Christina up in his arms and soothing her as he chatted with her in English. They were nine years apart in age, but there had always been a close bond between them. Arie and Gerrit were learning the American language in school and Christina thought it was a great treat to talk with her brothers in a language that her parents still didn’t understand very well. Arie carried her off—I don’t know where—leaving me alone with only my thoughts for company.
I couldn’t get Hendrik out of my mind, how tall and muscular and handsome he still was. I loved everything about him, including the way his hair stood on end after he’d run his hand through it and the way his tanned skin crinkled at the corners of his eyes when he squinted into the sun. What would my life be like if I had run away with him years ago? I was fond of Maarten, and I had a good life with him, but I didn’t love him. The rush of passion I’d felt for Hendrik today revealed what was missing from my marriage. How could I go through the rest of my life without feeling that breathless, intoxicating emotion?
I knelt down on my bedroom floor and dug in my steamer trunk for the tin box I’d brought with me from the Netherlands. Inside were all of Hendrik’s letters, tied in a bundle with a wide pink ribbon. I loosened the ribbon and began reading through them as tears of regret and loss washed down my face. As my mind spun once again with plots to somehow meet with Hendrik in secret, I understood the temptation that my ancestor Eve had faced as she’d doubted God’s goodness and the truth of His word. How easy it was for a lie to turn contentment into dissatisfaction and sin. Unlike Eve, I had resisted temptation the last time and had obeyed God. I’d stayed with Maarten—and ended up with second-best.
I was still reading through Hendrik’s letters, still wandering down the dangerous road of bitterness and self-pity, when Arie and Christina returned. I hastily shoved the pages into an envelope as Christina burst into my bedroom, happy again, her tantrum forgotten. She threw her arms around my neck and gave me a kiss. “Arie said I have to say ‘sorry,’ Mama.” I hugged her in return, too filled with emotion from Hendrik’s letters to reply. Christina spied the box and asked, “What’s that, Mama?”
“They’re letters, lieveling. From someone I knew a long time ago in the Netherlands.”
“Can I have that box for my things? It’s pretty.”
“Then I wouldn’t have a place to keep my letters.”
She picked up the pink ribbon a moment later and said, “May I have this, then?”
“All right. Shall I tie it in your hair?” Christina nodded, and I loosened her braids, which were already coming undone. I tied the ribbon in a bow around her thick blond hair. It was so unlike her to let me fuss with her hair that she surprised me.
“Rosie wore pretty ribbons in her hair, didn’t she, Mama?”
“Yes, lieveling, she did.” Hendrik’s daughter had resembled a little porcelain doll with every hair and pleat and bow in place—just like her mother. His wife, Nella, was much prettier than I was. I pulled Christina close so she wouldn’t see my sudden tears.
As I lay in bed beside Maarten later that night, I was aware that I had sinned. Jesus said if we even looked with lust at someone who wasn’t our spouse, we’d committed adultery in our heart. Maarten didn’t know how I still longed for Hendrik—but God did.
I needed to pray for forgiveness. I needed to erase Hendrik from my heart and mind all over again and burn his letters in the fireplace. The stakes were high if I didn’t repent and flee temptation: the loss of my faith, my soul. I needed to return to a place of contentment and gratitude for everything God had given me; to believe that He loved me and wanted what was best for me. I lay awake for several hours, praying to be forgiven, vowing that tomorrow I would begin again.
The sky wasn’t even light yet when someone knocked on our back door. For a wild moment I thought it might be Hendrik coming to beg me to run away with him. I wrapped a shawl over my nightgown and followed Maarten to the door. Pieter Visser from church stood on our step, looking pale and distraught. He removed his hat when he saw me and held it over his heart. “Geesje, can you come? It’s Johanna—”
“Is her baby coming? Is it time?” Johanna and I had become good friends, and I’d offered her advice and reassurance during her pregnancy—her first. I had suffered my miscarriage the same week that Johanna’s mother had suddenly died, and together we’d shared our bewilderment at God’s incomprehensible ways. “Have you sent for the midwife?” I asked Pieter.
“Yes . . . she has been with us all night.” Tears filled Pieter’s eyes. “The baby was stillborn, Geesje.”
“Oh, no!” I covered my mouth as grief for my young friend welled up.
“Johanna wants you. She asked if you would come.”
“Of course. I’ll get dressed.”
I prayed to find words of consolation as I hurried to Johanna’s bedside in the pale predawn light. None came to me. When I arrived, all I could do was hold my friend tightly and weep with her, a silent companion in her grief. The midwife let her hold her child for a few minutes—a perfectly-formed baby boy, as gray and cold and colorless as the dawn sky—before taking him away for burial. He had died inside her womb without ever drawing a breath.
“Why does God allow such terrible things to happen?” she asked. Her arms were empty, and she hugged herself tightly, rocking in place. I sat on the bed beside her, holding her, weeping with her.
“I don’t know,” I said simply. “But it isn’t right. And I’m very angry with God right now.”
“I am, too,” she whispered, as if afraid to say the words out loud. She swallowed and said, “I wanted you to come, Geesje, and no one else because I knew you would take my side. You won’t tell me everything will be all right or that I can have another baby to take his place. You won’t say that this was God’s will and I must accept it or that God must have needed my little one in heaven. When terrible things like this happen, I’ve heard people say that we must examine our lives and repent of our sin, but I know I didn’t do anything to deserve this, and neither did my baby.”
“Don’t listen to the stupid things people say, Johanna. They’re wrong. And you have every right to be angry with God right now. I was furious with Him when my baby died, and I didn’t try to pretend that I wasn’t. Besides, He already knows exactly how we feel
.”
“But you didn’t stay angry. And right now I feel like I’ll never be happy again. Help me, Geesje. Tell me how to make sense of this. You’re such a strong woman of faith.”
I didn’t reply. I was glad she couldn’t see my face or read my heart and see the rebellion I’d felt toward God only yesterday after seeing Hendrik.
“How can I ever trust God again after He took my baby?” she asked.
I squeezed her tightly and said, “No matter what, don’t ever stop trusting Him. I believe that God is as grieved over your baby’s death as we are. He created us and gave us life on this beautiful earth because He wanted us to live here for eternity. But death entered this world when Adam and Eve sinned. Now we feel pain and grief each time a loved one dies because we know it isn’t right. God knows it isn’t right, too. That’s why He sent His Son to die in our place, so that death would be destroyed and we would have eternal life. Keep your eyes on the cross, Johanna, and you’ll know that you can surely trust Him.”
“Is that how you keep going, Geesje? By waiting for heaven?”
“In a way . . .” I said, stroking her hair. “But Jesus also taught us to pray for God’s kingdom to come now and for His will to be done now, here on earth, as it is in heaven. He has work for us to do, Johanna. A life to live for Him now. When I felt the way you do right now, I asked God to let me know He was still beside me. To show me that He loved me and that His ways were good and right. Then I watched and waited for His replies. . . . Slowly, little by little, He let me know in dozens of everyday ways that He was near me and that He loved me. He’ll do the same for you if you ask.”
I stayed with Johanna until she fell asleep, exhausted from her ordeal. After promising Pieter I would come back as soon as I could, I hurried home to my family. I needed to be with Johanna when the other women came to offer comfort, shielding my friend from any hurtful words.
