Chapter 3

Rode Heuvels

CONTENT WARNING: This content contains mature situations, and what some may consider gore and inappropriate for children . Discretion is advised.

The Kingdom of Holland, 1813

Three years earlier.

Beige sheets get caught like ship sails in the wind as Victoria stands under a clothes line. She is in a Dutch made dress that shares the color of dark red earthly clay with a mostly white apron around the skirt that she acquired some time ago as a charitable gift. She picks up another beige sheet and while holding it up to be hung she stops to savor the burning orange light of this windy November day. Sometimes the clouds travel in front of the sun blocking its warmth and for a few minutes it pays as a reminder how much its buttery glow will be missed in the coming months. It is the first time she is experiencing autumn in this village.

With more clothes needing to be hung out to dry she continues at the clothes line. Behind her there is a house that is wood framed with a brick exterior and a grambel roof with centered dutch doors. It is similar to most of the homes in small villages that can scarcely be found in the kingdom of Holland. She spends a moment longer to breathe in the sight of the red mammoth beat fields. She see the wind run its hands through the clouds, along the fields and across the trees. She knows this will soon be a world of harvesting before the world goes into wintering. Just as cold as ocean water a tidal wave of northern winds stampedes over Victoria. With her eyes closed she takes in the fresh air and for as long as the wind passes, she is still. Never turning away from the force of nature.

After throwing another sheet over the line she takes a step forward and nudges some rocks with her foot. She looks down and lingers over what formations have been made with a few stones and pebbles. Mosaic’s formed into the images of a dog and a horse. She is stagnant peering over the work. She can hear the clatter of small feet skipping, “Did I do good?” A child no older than nine says from behind her. “Yes child.” Victoria spiritedly responds, “Very brilliant, child.”

She thinks about the stones that have passed through children's hands. Victoria reminisces about how shielded her childhood was and the comparison of how freely children are here in this village; in this time. How grateful she is to see children safely be children when the world they live in is not made for it.

“Susanna?” Victoria calls out to the girl. The girl comes to her side entwining their arms. “Yes beautiful Victoria?” Victoria flattered, laughs tilting her head back. With her hand over her chest she asks, “Why the compliment child?”

Susanna shrugs and answers, “I heard my mother telling father you were a woman of fifty-two. Well I stomped my foot, I spoke aloud to mother and father protestant. I don’t believe them insulting you like that. You are far to beautiful to be a woman in her fifties. But they are not liars. Shortly I believed them. I hope that I am as beautiful as you when I am a woman of fifty.”

Victoria, flattered, looks over Susanna’s long, broad face where she saw her wide nose, her blue eyes that gleam bright with all the artistry of stained-glass windows and her innocent radiant skin. “Brilliant child, carry with you forever an immortal goodness that ne’er crack nor parts at the seams as near’er to what you carry now and you will always be beautiful.”

From inside the house the raspy voice of a woman calls out with a Dutch accent in English, “Victoria?! Come, I have a deed!”

Susanna gasps positively excited at the sound of her mothers voice. She unwinds her arm from Victoria’s and with all the agility of a rabbit dashes inside calling out to her mother before even entering through the door. Victoria takes one last look at the horizon to see herself reflected back as the season’s changing is her mirror. Like the earth she is fragile, and its life will soon seek refuge from the cold. But she has found her refuge in the hands of caretakers. The machine of her life built up momentum in her spring and fueled and greased by her own conducting hands through her summer and autumn to never stop. Her wintering has begun and she looks on acknowledging it. Hoping she will allow for it. To put her stubbornness aside and accept that she is getting old. As a cool breeze sends a chill through her she hopes she can accept it and still have the endurance to enable in action all the knowledge she has obtained. The strength to fully live, in all of its eluding beauty, through her last season.

Victoria finally makes her way inside, “Geertrudia, what deed can I be of help with?” Victoria inquires. While in a rocking chair Geertrudia has her daughter Susanna sitting on her knee. Beside the chair stands a smaller girl by the age of seven in a dark brown tweed dress and white bonnet. She is a smaller version of Susanna with plumper cheeks that swallow her eyes up when she grins and as Victoria connects eyes with her they share a smile together and Victoria greets her with a, “Hello Madelief.”

Madelief walks over to her and reaches her tiny hand out to grip Victoria’s dress with stubby fingers rubbing her thumb across the fabric repeatedly. Geertrudia, who is a slim woman with hands conditioned in toil has a fixed smile that rests inside her pale complexion with wavy auburn hair pouring out of the sides and back of a sky blue bonnet. Motherly in presence and friendly in manner she focuses her attention on Victoria as two men enter the front door of the house.

“This evening is near’er to your first arrival one year ago. We wish to celebrate you being with us for one year by cooking you a dinner full of splendor.”

Geertrudia’s husband is one of the men that entered the house. He is tall and slender with wide shoulders and a plump long nose on an already long oval face. The wrinkles that ripple on the sides of his mouth as he smiles neighbor the crows feet beside his eyes giving hint that he is in close age to Victoria. He speaks in a British accent from across the house, “No better a reason to have a grand meal.”

“Jacop is right.” Geertrudia says, “You have grown to be a part of our family. My husband and I cherish you. Our girls look up to you. You are worthy of a feast.”

“I am grateful for you.” Victoria responds. “There has been no time in my life where I’ve known so many wholehearted people. Nor have I had better friends than I have had here.”

In reciprocation of Victoria’s gratitude Geertrudia responds, “As we are grateful for you. I have made arrangements to retrieve vegetables from the others in the village. Bernardo has agreed to spare us a few carrots from his garden. Will you do me the chore and go to Bernardo for the carrots he has promised?”

Susanna jumps off her mothers knee to then ask in her soft British accent, “Can I join miss Victoria on her walk, mother?” Geertudia tells her that it is up to Victoria. Victoria, with a charming smile gives Susanna a nod and reaches out her palm gesturing to take her hand.

Geertrudia picks up Madelief before saying, “We will get started on dinner while you get carrots from Bernardo.”

Just then Jacop can be heard asking the other man he came in with, “Knelis? Where is the axe we keep near the wood?” Knelis has fragile eyes and soft features for a man in his thirties. With both hands he brushes back his long blond hair and with a thick dutch accent he responds, “It broke earlier today while I was using it at Gerben’s home.” Jacob scoffs, “Geertrudia! Your brother broke our axe.”

Geertrudia stands up, “Its alright Jacop, Knelis will go to Ignaas to have us made up two axes in place of the one he broke. Isn’t that right Knelis?”

Knelis nods in agreement as Victoria turns to Geertrudia, “We are off. We shall return soon with carrots.”

Victoria and Susanna step out into the street of Rode Heuvals. It looks like a growing village with dirt roads and little brick paving around the foundation of homes and buildings. Their home is near the village gates and they pass through the village square where a water pump resides in the center. As they head south through the village Susanna says, “I was lying in the fields a day or two ago. It was me and Madelief. The sun was past noon. We were watching as the clouds swam past and I thought, what if clouds could talk? I wonder what tales they would have. What they love. What hurts them. What do you think Victoria?”

“I don’t believe the clouds have a love to tell of. Nor do I believe they have pain to share in good company. Clouds doth be the makings of gentle nature. Peace in the silence is their creation. Peace in silence is all they speak and need.” Susanna asks Victoria, “Praytell, what of you?” Victoria responds “What of me? What ever do you mean, child?” Susanna looks up at Victoria with a glow of naivety and asks, “What tales of love do you have to tell? What stories of woe?”

“Plenty!” Victoria says humored by the whims of this young girl. She has always been secure in her confidence and such a question would never puncture her ego. She responds with a soft delicate demeanor, “None of which I wish to ruminate about for I do not dwell in the realm of my villains. They need no hand in finding me. Mistake it not for when they do, it will be my realm they are in and it will be my force of nature they will have to answer to.” Victoria can see out of the corner of her eye that Susanna somewhat pouts and turns her face away to hide it as though she was being disciplined for asking. Victoria stops in the street and kneels down in front of Susanna.

“But just this once I will tell you of a love of mine I had some years ago,” Smiling at Susanna like it was their secret. Victoria grabs her hands, “He was gentle and he appreciated the light of life in people. He would call me the sunlight of his life. You see, he was a sad man as well. It was an illness that plagued his waking life damning him to the world of night because he was allergic to the sun.”

“No.” Susanna gasps.

“I’m afraid so. Even being in the shadows of a room that let in a single ray of sunlight blinded his eyes. So I made the quiet mid-night hours feel like a world filled with life, just to see him smile.”

Victoria stands up and they continue walking, passing the water pump that is in the middle of a beaten circular path at the entrance to the village.

“Where is he now?” Susanna Asks.

Reluctantly she answers with an obvious lie, “It has been some years since his departure.”

“He died?!”

“Yes, you see he was taken by his illness.”

“Oh Miss. Victoria! Both a story of love and woe. What was his name?”

“Voivode. He had lost all the members of his family before he could learn his surname. So all he had was one name.”

“Voivode… stupendous.” Susanna says and it makes Victoria laugh lightly finding a joy in learning that Susanna knows such a word as stupendous.

“I wish I were to have met him. He sounds handsome and charming.”

“He was bruiting, often quiet, opinionated… intelligent and understanding. He made it easy to love with little fret to get in the way of it. He was... irresistibly charming, loving, kind... and… at times... terribly sad. He was… beautiful. He was a kind man as well which t’was most important to me. I recall he would gift me my favorite flower every year for my birthday.”

“What is your favorite flower?”

“A white lotus.”