Chapter 47
chapter
St. Helier, Jersey
The damage to her beautiful island struck her fresh. The windblown oaks around St. Aubin’s Bay chopped down for firewood. The concrete bunkers studding the beaches. The railway lines slashing through the hills.
“We’ll rebuild,” Gerrit said from behind her, carrying their suitcase. “And restore.”
With her medical bag in hand, she smiled over her shoulder at him, so handsome in his dark blue suit and homburg. After helping repair bomb damage in England, now he’d work for the States of Jersey to undo what Organisation Todt had done.
The medical practice would also be rebuilt. Charlie had completed a year with the evacuated version of Victoria College in England, and he would now complete his final year in Jersey, in the hope of studying medicine at Oxford.
At the Weighbridge, Uncle Arthur and Aunt Opal stood waving and crying with Uncle Leo and Aunt Ruby, and much kissing and embracing and laughing ensued.
Aunt Opal gave Gerrit a particularly long hug. “You dear boy. Now you’re family.”
Aunt Ruby lifted her nose as if offended. “Leo and I are rather hurt to have been left out of all the excitement.”
Ivy squeezed Aunt Ruby’s arm. “You did deliver a clandestine message, remember?”
“Yes.” Aunt Ruby turned a mock glare at Charlie. “Because of you, you cheeky lad.”
Charlie laughed and marched away with his suitcase in hand. “Come on. I want to go home. Look! The Pomme d’Or—the Union Jack is back. And over Fort Regent. Glorious.”
“It is indeed.” Uncle Arthur fell in beside Gerrit as they walked up Mulcaster Street. “Any news on Bernardus? And your family?”
“Bernardus went home a few weeks ago, and I’ve been able to write my family. Ivy and I plan to visit next month. My family all survived but are much thinner. There was a severe famine in the Netherlands, the Hongerwinter, they call it. Many thousands died of starvation.”
Uncle Arthur grumbled. “We had a similar winter here. Almost nothing to eat, no heat, no electricity, no gas. If the Red Cross ship hadn’t brought supplies, we would have starved too.”
“The SS Vega,” Aunt Opal said. “The Red Cross parcels saved our lives.”
Ivy passed a shopfront. “We have goods in the shops again.”
“Yes.” Aunt Ruby’s eyes lit up. “Still rationed, but we can actually buy tea and sugar and salt and soap and clothing.”
“And we have electricity and gas,” Uncle Leo said. “And we’ll have coal this winter.”
“How lovely.” Ivy slipped her hand inside Gerrit’s as they passed St. Helier Parish Church, where they’d met. If only they could have married there, but it had been a blessing to marry at her grandparents’ church.
“Ruby?” Mum asked from behind Ivy in a quiet tone. “Did you tell Fern we were coming home?”
“I did. She rarely goes out, not since Liberation Day.”
Ivy winced, and Gerrit squeezed her hand. Fern’s denunciation of Ivy had indeed won back Helmut’s heart. But on Liberation Day, mobs had attacked women who had consorted with Germans—including Fern.
Uncle Leo and Aunt Ruby had taken Fern into their home to protect her, and Helmut and the rest of the German forces had been deported to prison camps in England.
“I think we’ve convinced her to go to England,” Aunt Ruby said. “Have a fresh start.”
“That would be best. Bill and the boys will come home soon.” Mum let out a little sob. “I want to see her.”
“Give her time,” Aunt Ruby said. “She may want to see you someday, but not . . .”
Not Ivy. But she drew herself taller. She’d done everything in her power to allow reconciliation, but reconciliation would require contrition and remorse on Fern’s part.
Gerrit slipped his arm about her waist and kissed her cheek. “Even if.”
“Even if,” she said. Even if she never saw her sister again, she’d praise God for his goodness and praise him for revealing glimpses of his goodness in clouds and flowers and rabbits, and in people like Gerrit and Charlie and Thelma.
And in her home. La Bliue Brise looked tired, the blue paint on the door and on the window trim faded and chipped. But paint could be replaced, and Ivy stroked the door as she passed through.
Joan de Ferrers and Dr. Tipton stood in the waiting room. “Welcome home.”
Ivy rushed forward and hugged Joan. “Oh, it’s good to see you.”
“Miss de Ferrers and Dr. Tipton kept an eye on the house after Liberation Day,” Aunt Ruby said.
“Not Miss de Ferrers.” Joan returned Ivy’s hug. “Mrs. Tipton.”
“Mrs. Tipton?” Ivy pulled back to study her friend’s face, and she laughed. “Why didn’t I see it? You’re perfect for each other.”
The two redheads beamed. Her two dear friends.
Dad shook Dr. Tipton’s hand. “Thank you for watching our home, Harold.”
“It was an honor. And I have a proposition.” Harold glanced between Dad and Ivy. “A partnership between our practices. As people learn how Ivy helped the foreign workers and how you served in the Army, your patients will return, but . . .”
But gossip was easier to spread than to gather.
“A brilliant idea,” Ivy said. “A partnership would not only help us rebuild but would also lighten the burden during epidemics and make it easier for each of us to take holidays.”
Dad looked at her with his eyebrows raised in surprise and admiration. She hadn’t asked his opinion first. “I agree with Dr. van der Zee. The three of us can discuss this soon.”
Joan tugged on her husband’s arm. “We should leave you to settle in.”
“Yes, we should.” Aunt Opal gave Mum one more hug. “Come to the farm for dinner.”
“Thank you. That sounds lovely.”
The family carried their luggage upstairs, and Ivy brought Gerrit into her room—their room.
“We’ll need a bigger bed.” Gerrit patted the bed and grinned at her.
“We will. And soon.” With a little smile, Ivy set down her medical bag and pulled out her sketch pad, which would be a permanent part of her equipment, along with Charlie’s timer.
Gerrit removed his hat and lounged on the bed with his hands behind his head. “I never imagined myself in your bedroom.”
“It is a logical result of our love.” She perched on the side of the bed and opened her sketch pad as bubbles danced in her chest. She handed the book to Gerrit. “So is this.”
He studied the sketch with a blank expression. Sat up. Swung his legs over the side of the bed. Stared at the sketch. “Is this . . . ?”
“Don’t you see?” Ivy patted her belly. “Oh, you can’t see. Not for another seven months. You’ll need to have faith.”
Gerrit held aloft the drawing of a tiny round face, tiny hands, sweet eyes painted a shade of aquamarine, the same shade as the waters in St. Aubin’s Bay, not far from shore. Although their children would surely have brown eyes.
Gerrit turned to Ivy with a look of joy and wonder and gratitude.
That morning in church almost three years earlier, she’d captured his likeness on paper. His goodness. His kindness.
Ivy had seen this and was seeing it, and she’d see it for the rest of her life.