No Greater Love (18 page)

An awkward silence followed his question and then Pieter answered quietly, “No, she lost all of her family in the Erzincan earthquake in Turkey when she was eight years old. More recently, she lost the family in the United States that had adopted her.” Pieter frowned, feeling despair flaring through him.
Janan had tried to tell him that sometimes you only have love for a short time but having loved only briefly is better than never having known love. His stubbornness, his insistence on being a whole man, a well man, before he told her that he loved her and wanted her for all time had cost him everything.
 

“Poor child,” Maarten said. “So young and she has lost three families.” He sighed. “It is going to be difficult for a young woman alone in a foreign country.”

“Perhaps she will not be alone,” Dirk rushed to respond, shooting Pieter a challenging look. “She is young and beautiful. Most likely she will marry again.

Crispin hurried to fill the awkward silence that followed Dirk’s outburst. “Surely she is not all alone?”

Pieter turned the glass of untouched Jenever in his hands. “There is an elderly housekeeper who was there with the previous occupants and a young woman, a refugee, who helps with the children.”

“There are children?” Crispin asked in astonishment.

“Infants. Twins, a boy and a girl,” Pieter replied in a low voice.  

Reading the misery in his younger brother’s face, Crispin took Pieter’s arm and led him away from the others. “The babies. Carl’s?”

“No.”

“Whose?” Crispin asked in a barely audible whisper.

Pieter met his brother’s eyes. “Mine, and I have lost them.”

“Oh, Pieter, I am so sorry.”

When he paused, Pieter suspected Crispin struggled to compose himself as he thought of the failed attempts to have children that he and his wife had gone through.

Crispin cleared his throat and changed the subject. “What do you think that idiot, Dirk, is planning to do?”

“He says that he loves Janan, that he fell in love with her the first time he saw her. He wants to marry her and take her back to Turkey with him when he returns to the archeological dig in the spring.”

Grispin groaned. “Is he going to stay a thoughtless brat forever?”

“He doesn’t know about the babies but I’m sure he will think of a way to get what he wants.” Wearily, he added, “He always does.”

“What are you going to do?”

“The question is, what is Janan going to do? Dirk is young, excited about taking her home, to Turkey, and he is healthy.” He fixed his older brother with a determined look. “I’ve loved her so long. I want to beg her to marry me as soon as possible but I am not in remission and may never be. I’m not sure it would be fair to even think of asking her to marry me.”

“If she loves you, and I think she must, your health won’t matter but it’s a no-win situation.” Crispin frowned. “If you wait out the year-long mourning period, she will have a very hard time alone with two small children. On the other hand”—he paused, staring at the drink in his hand—“if you marry soon after Carl’s death, there will be gossip.”

“There is going to be gossip no matter when she re-marries.” Pieter stated flatly. “But in a year, I might be dead. I am not waiting out any damn mourning period.” He tossed back the last of his Jenever.

As Dirk walked toward them, they stopped talking and waited. Dirk took a five-by-six-inch manila envelope from his pocket. “I know that it has been a long time since you asked me to find three
Tambac
bracelets but everything takes time in Anatolia.” He held the envelope out to Pieter. “One of the workers at the dig knew someone who was able to locate two of the bracelets you wanted and they were delivered to me yesterday. I have been assured that they are authentic Ottoman
Tambac
bracelets.”

Pieter took the envelope and put it in his jacket pocket. “Thank you, Dirk,” he said, his voice bleak.

“You never did say why you were collecting
Tambac
jewelry.”

“It seemed like a good idea at the time,” Pieter said, thinking back to that moment when he knew he wanted to replace the bracelets that had been lost in the earthquake. He had planned to take them back with him when he went to the States to see Janan again, to beg her to marry him despite his uncertain future.

“I am sorry that it took so long. Are you still looking for pieces?”

Pieter studied his brother, a sturdy, good-looking young man with a zest for life bouncing off him like rays of sunshine. “No, I doubt that I will be looking for any more
Tambac
.”

Chapter 16

In the days after Carl’s funeral, Janan was grateful for the presence of Sophia, now neatly dressed in a well-fitting white cotton blouse and black skirt, who never left her side. Carl had tried to tell her what to expect and she had prepared herself for seven days of condolence calls from people she did not know but the constant line of visitors was exhausting. She smoothed the skirt of the black serge dress that Emine had brought her and hurried to the drawing room as she heard the muffled sound of the doorknocker.

At Betje’s respectful announcement, “Mijnheer Bentinck,” Janan’s heart soared.
Pieter had come. She would see him again
. But it was not Pieter who stepped through the door that Betje held open.

“I am Dirk Bentinck,” he said. “May I express my deepest condolences at your loss.”

She tried to hide her disappointment as she extended her hand. “Thank you.” She motioned him to a chair while she struggled to regain her composure.
Pieter’s younger brother,
she thought wildly.
Why had he come? He had not been at the burial and Carl had never talked about him.
There was something about him, an air of barely contained energy that made her uneasy. Motioning him to a chair, she said, “If you’ll excuse me for a moment, I will arrange for coffee.” She hurried out of the room before he could say anything and found Sophia. “Please ask Betje for coffee for three and then I want you to stay with me in the living room.”

When Sophia slipped into the room and stood beside Janan, Dirk came politely to his feet, and, with a covert glance at the cream-colored headscarf trimmed with pink lace covering her hair, waited.

“This is Sophia Sadik,” Janan said quietly. “She has traveled from Kirkuk and is now my helper.”

Dirk nodded and asked politely, “How was your flight?”

Sophia shot a startled glance at Janan and then said cautiously in Dutch as she moved closer to Janan, “Long.”

Giving Sophia a pat on the shoulder and motioning her to a chair, Janan said crisply, “She is a refugee from Iraq and most likely her ‘flight’ was on foot.”

Dirk flushed uncomfortably. “I‘m sorry. I didn’t know.” He paused as the reality of what Janan had said registered. “My God!” He turned to study the frail-appearing young woman whose dark-brown eyes were fixed on him with a wary expression. “Walked? That would be all the way across Turkey and then across three other countries.”

“Yes. I believe that Turkey was not accepting any more refugees from Iraq at that time.” Janan’s voice was chilly.

“An amazing feat,” he said with a slight bow in Sophia’s direction. Recovering quickly from his blunder, he began to speak excitedly in rapid Dutch to Janan as soon as she had served their coffee. “I fell in love with you the first time I saw you.” He ignored her gasp. “I can take you home, to Turkey. We will be married and travel together. The evacuation site where I am working is near Urfa, not far from Erzincan,” he said with a fine disregard for geography.

Janan ignored the first part of his outpouring. “Erzincan is over 200 miles north of Urfa,” Janan stated matter-of-factly.

After an uneasy glance at Sophia, he directed his full attention to Janan as he pleaded, “I have wanted you since the first time I saw you. Please say you will marry me.”

“I thank you for your offer but it cannot be.” She stood up and moved toward the door.

“But you must want to go home,” Dirk stammered.

“Home? Now, I have to make a home for my children, a home where they will be safe and that is not Erzincan.”

“Children?” Dirk choked out, glancing wildly around the room.

“I have two babies and their well-being is the most important thing in my life,” she said with the dignity of a queen.

“Babies, you said.” His eyes darted to Sophia. “They don’t do much for the first year or two, do they? We could leave them here, with my mother and”—he gestured in Sophia’s direction—“her.”

Opening the door, Janan said with a dismissive glance, “Thank you for your condolences, Mijnheer Bentinck.”

“You can’t stay here alone. Where will you go?” Dirk asked as he stopped at the door.

Dirk’s mention of home had rekindled the question that she had thought about through the sleepless nights following Carl’s death.
Where would she make a home for her children?
Her words, when they, came surprised her as much as Dirk. “Home is here, in The Netherlands.”
But not Leiden.
She did not offer her hand as she said with freezing finality, “Goodbye.”

It’s time,
Pieter told himself firmly. He had waited for a week after Carl’s death while his feeling of restlessness grew but now he couldn’t wait another day. He had to know his fate. He dressed quickly and slipped the two
Tambac
bracelets into his coat pocket. As he poked at the scrambled eggs that Saskia had set in front of him, he planned his day carefully.
He would go to the office as usual, and then at 2 p.m., he would take the train to Leiden. The thirty-minute train ride and a short walk would bring him to Janan’s home at the proper afternoon visiting time. And then what? He knew what he wanted, what he had dreamed of since that night so long ago when he had held her in his arms and they had become as one. He had lost her and the pain had been unbearable but now she was free. He refused to consider that she might not want him as much as he wanted her. He could not live another day without her.

Later that afternoon, when Betje came to the door of the breakfast room where Janan and Sophia were feeding the babies and said that Mijnheer Bentinck was in the drawing room, Janan was stunned.
Why had Dirk come back?

Pieter paced the room while he waited for Janan. He had spent the time on the train ride from Amsterdam to Leiden rehearsing what he would say when he saw her again but now he was not sure.
Should he tell her that he loved her more than life itself? Plead with her to marry him? Tell her that he had carried her in his mind every day and night since that last time they were together. Maybe she had forgotten him. Maybe she hated him for abandoning her. What was he thinking of, racing here to tell a widow of a week that he adored her, that he wanted her in his arms for all time?
He wiped his face with his handkerchief.
What would be the best way to convince her to marry him? How could he persuade her to forgive him?

Striding through the drawing room door, Janan stopped abruptly as she realized that it was Pieter not Dirk waiting for her. Her hand flew up to stifle the cry threatening to explode from her throat. She forced herself to walk sedately into the room and stop a foot from him with her hand outstretched. “Hello, Pieter,” she said and waited.

Oh God,
he thought as his eyes caressed her face and slender body.
She is more beautiful than I remembered. How could I have been such a fool? How can I ever make up for all she went through with only Carl to help her?
The words that burst from him were not the carefully thought-out ones he had rehearsed on the train. “We must marry at once. Not wait.” His voice was rough with emotion. “For the sake of the children, we must marry immediately.”

Scorching pain spread over her and she felt her face flame as she heard his words and then felt herself go cold as she saw her dreams breaking like fine crystal goblets. She had dreamed of being held in his arms again, of the eight beautiful kisses he had taught her, of seeing love for her in his eyes. She wrapped her arms around herself tightly. He did not love her as she loved him. He had only come to do what he thought was the right thing to do, what was right for the children.

When she did not speak, Pieter began to speak rapidly. “I know it is a terrible time for you but I want to protect you and the children. I want us to be married as soon as possible. You must see that it would be best for the children.”

The scorching pain had been replaced by a savage fury. “You want to marry me for the children’s sake?” she asked with deceptive calmness.

“I know that it is too soon after Carl’s death but he would approve. He would agree that it is the right thing to do.” He registered her hostility and, bewildered, asked, “Are you worried about what people will say?”

“I’ve never been concerned about what people will say.” She gave him a look of disdain. “You should know that.” With her head high, she led the way to the front door. Clutching it with both hands, she gave him a lacerating glance. “Thank you for your condolence call.” Holding the partially open door between them, she said, “Good-bye, Mijnheer Bentinck.”

At Saskia’s questioning glance as she opened the door for the visibly shaken Pieter, he said quietly, “Please tell my uncle that I am going to rest before dinner
.” Everything in his life had changed. What was there left to strive for? Nothing mattered anymore. Before, he had the hope of one day being with Janan, but now, he didn’t even have that.

“Your brother is waiting for you in the study,” Saskia said softly, taking in his pallor and the hesitancy of his step.

Pieter squared his shoulders and entered the study to face Dirk and Maarten.

Dirk began to speak rapidly. “I finally located those trees that you wanted. They will be delivered today.” He frowned briefly. “I had a devil of a time finding balled trees ready to be planted at this time of the year.”

“Thank you, Dirk.” Pieter’s voice was lifeless.

Not noticing the anguish in his brother’s face, Dirk hurried on. “The third
Tambac
bracelet came yesterday.” He fumbled in his pocket for the package and then said abruptly, “I am leaving for the dig tomorrow so I thought I would bring it to you now.”