“As soon as that dog hears the door, it starts barking. Even if you were looking in completely the other direction, you would have heard the dog and noticed Mirjam leaving through the front door.”
“That’s what I said.” She’s cross at my conclusion. “I already told you that. She couldn’t have left through that door. And I already looked through Mirjam’s hiding place. You’re wasting time doing things I already did.”
“Did you already find her?” My voice is sharper than it needs to be; I’m covering my inexperience with false confidence. “You keep telling me I’m doing things you already tried, but unless you already found her, I need to see everything with my own eyes. Now, take me to the back door.”
She opens her mouth, probably to tell me again that Mirjam couldn’t have escaped through there because of the inside latch, but then thinks better.
The rear door is a heavy oak, and it’s immediately apparent what she meant by it not closing. Age and the settling of the house have warped the door completely, so that the top half of the door bulges away from the jamb. That’s why Mrs. Janssen has added the latch. It’s heavy, made of iron, and when engaged, it holds the door properly shut. When it’s not engaged, a thin stream of air seeps in through the top.
She’s right. I can’t think of any way that a person could leave through this door and lock the latch behind herself.
Mrs. Janssen is staring at me. I haven’t told her that I’ll help, not officially. And yet I haven’t walked away. It’s so immensely dangerous, much more than anything I’ve allowed myself to do.
But Mrs. Janssen came to me, the way Mr. Kreuk had come to me, and I’m very good at finding things.
I can feel myself getting sucked into this mystery. Maybe because Bas would. Maybe because it’s another way to flout the rules. But maybe because, in a country that has come to make no sense, in a world I cannot solve, this is a small piece that I can. I need to get to Mirjam’s school, the place that might have a picture, the place that might explain who this girl is. Because assuming that Mrs. Janssen is correct in her timeline, assuming the dog always barks when someone leaves, assuming Mirjam couldn’t have gone through the back door, assuming all that is true, it seems this girl is a ghost.
FIVE
I’ve been gone from my daily tasks for nearly an hour. If I don’t get back to my deliveries, Mrs. de Vries will complain.
The line at the butcher’s is almost out the door with tired housewives trading tips on where they’ve managed to locate which hard-to-find item. I don’t wait in the line. I never do. As soon as the butcher sees me come in, he waves me toward the counter while he disappears into the back. It took me at least a dozen visits to build this relationship. The first time, I listened while he told another customer that his daughter loved to draw. The second time, I brought some colored pencils and told him they were old ones I’d found in the back of my closet. They were obviously brand-new, though, and I watched his reaction to this: Would he allow himself to believe a white lie, if it meant he got something he wanted? Later, I talked about a sick grandmother, and her sick, wealthy friends who were willing to pay extra money for extra meat.
When the butcher returns, he’s carrying a white paper parcel.
“That’s not fair,” a woman behind me calls after she sees the exchange. She’s right; it’s not fair. The other customers never like me much. They might like me better if I were hungry like them, but I’d rather not starve.
“Her grandmother is sick,” the butcher explains. “She’s caring for a whole family at home.”
“We’re all caring for people at home,” the woman presses on. She’s tired. Everyone is tired of standing in so many lines for so many days. “It’s just because she’s a pretty girl. Would you let a boy skip the line?”
“Not a boy who looks like your son.” The other people in line laugh, either because they think it’s funny or they just want to remain in the good graces of the man who supplies their food. He turns to me and smiles, whispering that he’s tucked a little something extra into my packet for me to take to my family.
It started to rain while I was in the butcher’s shop, fat, slushy drops mixed with ice. The roads are dark and slick. I put the meat in my basket, covering the package with a newspaper, which soaks through in minutes. At the door of Mrs. de Vries’s apartment, my teeth chatter and water slides off my skirt and pools into my shoes, which would matter more if my feet hadn’t already gotten soaked in the rain. The soles of my shoes are worn through and growing useless in wet weather. I knock on the de Vrieses’ door, and inside I hear the clinking of china. “Hallo?” I call. “Hallo?”