The Signature of All Things (68 page)

As for the hotel that did accept them, it was a squalid place, run by a rheumy old woman who peered at Roger over the desk and said, “I once had a cat who looked just like him.”

Dear God!
Alma thought in horror at the idea of such a sad beast.

“You aren’t a whore, are you?” asked the woman, just to be certain.

This time, Alma uttered her “Dear God!” aloud. She simply could not help herself. Her answer seemed to satisfy the proprietress.

The tarnished mirror in the hotel room revealed to Alma that she did not look much more civilized than Roger. She could not arrive in Amsterdam looking like this. Her wardrobe was a ruin and a havoc. Her hair, which had grown increasingly white, was a ruin and a havoc, as well. There was nothing to be done about the hair, but over the next few days she had several new frocks quickly sewn up. They were nothing fine (she modeled them on Hanneke’s original, practical pattern) but at least they were new, clean, and intact. She purchased new shoes. She sat in a park and wrote long letters to both Prudence and Hanneke, alerting them that she had reached Holland, and that she intended to remain here indefinitely.

She was nearly out of money. She still had a bit of gold sewn into her tattered hems, but not much. She’d kept precious little of her father’s inheritance to begin with, and now—over these last years of travel—the better part of her modest bequest had been spent, one precious coin at a time. She was left with a sum not nearly sufficient to meet the simplest demands of life. Of course, she knew she could always get more money, if true emergency were to arise. She supposed she could walk into any countinghouse at the Rotterdam docks and—using Dick Yancey’s name and her father’s legacy—easily draw a loan against the Whittaker fortune. But she did not wish to do this. She did not feel that the fortune was rightfully hers. It struck her as a matter of utmost personal consequence that she—from this point forth—make her own way in the world.

Letters posted and a fresh wardrobe procured, Alma and Roger left Rotterdam on a steamboat—by far the easiest part of their journey—and headed to the Port of Amsterdam. Upon their arrival, Alma left her luggage at a modest hotel near the docks and hired a coachman (who, for an additional fee of twenty stivers, was finally persuaded to accept Roger as a passenger). The coach took them all the way to the quiet neighborhood of Plantage, straight to the gates of the Hortus Botanicus.

Alma stepped out into the slanting early-evening sun outside the botanical garden’s tall brick walls. Roger was by her side; under her arm was a parcel wrapped in plain brown paper. A young man in a tidy guard’s
uniform stood at the gate, and Alma approached, asking in her easy Dutch whether the director was on the premises today. The young man confirmed that the director was indeed on the premises, because the director came to work every day of the year.

Alma smiled. Naturally he does, she thought.

“Would it be possible to have a word with him?” she asked.

“Might I ask who you are, and what your business is?” asked the young man, aiming condemnatory looks at both her and Roger. She did not object to his questions, but she certainly objected to his tone.

“My name is Alma Whittaker, and my business is the study of mosses and the transmutation of species,” she said.

“And why should the director want to see you?” the guard asked.

She drew herself up to her most formidable height and, like a
rauti
, launched into an imposing recitation of her bloodline. “My father was Henry Whittaker, whom some in your country once called ‘The Prince of Peru.’ My paternal grandfather was the Apple Magus to His Majesty King George III of England. My maternal grandfather was Jacob van Devender, a master of ornamental aloes, and the director of these gardens for thirty-some years—a position that he inherited from his father, who, in turn, had inherited it from
his
father, and so forth, all the way back to the original founding of this institution in 1638. Your current director is, I believe, a man named Dr. Dees van Devender. He is my uncle. His older sister was named Beatrix van Devender. She was my mother, and a virtuoso of Euclidean botany. My mother was born, if I am not mistaken, just around the corner from where we are now standing, in a private home outside the walls of the Hortus—where all van Devenders since the middle of the seventeenth century have been born.”

The guard gaped at her.

She concluded, “If this is too much information for you to retain, young man, you may simply tell my uncle Dees that his niece from America would very much like to meet him.”

Chapter Twenty-eight

D
ees van Devender stared at Alma from across a cluttered table in his office.

Alma allowed him to stare. Her uncle had not spoken to her since she had been ushered into his chambers a few minutes earlier, nor had he invited her to have a chair. He was not being impolite; he was simply Dutch, and therefore cautious. He was taking her in. Roger sat at Alma’s side, looking like a crooked little hyena. Uncle Dees took in the dog, as well. Generally speaking, Roger did not like to be looked at. Normally, when strangers stared at Roger, he would turn his back on them, hang his head, and sigh in misery. But suddenly Roger did the strangest thing. He left Alma’s side, walked under the table, and lay down with his chin upon Dr. van Devender’s feet. Alma had never seen the likes of it. She was about to comment upon it, but her uncle—completely unconcerned about the cur on his shoes—spoke first.

“
Je lijkt niet op je moeder,
” he said.

You do not look like your mother.

“I know,” Alma replied in Dutch.

He went on: “You look precisely like that father of yours.”

Alma nodded. She could tell by his tone that this was not a point in her favor, her resemblance to Henry Whittaker. Then again, it never had been.

He stared some more. She stared back. She was as riveted by his face as
he was by hers. If Alma did not look like Beatrix Whittaker, then this man most certainly
did
. It was a most marked similarity—her mother’s face all over again, but elderly, male, bearded, and, at the moment, suspicious. (Well, to be honest, the suspicion only heightened his resemblance to Beatrix.)

“Whatever became of my sister?” he asked. “We heard of the rise of your father—everyone in European botany did—but we never heard from Beatrix again.”

Nor did she hear from you, Alma thought, but she did not say it. She did not really blame anyone in Amsterdam for never having attempted to communicate with Beatrix since—when was it?—1792. She knew how the van Devenders were: stubborn. It would never have worked. Her mother would never have yielded.

“My mother lived a prosperous life,” Alma replied. “She was content. She made a most remarkable classical garden, much admired throughout Philadelphia. She worked alongside my father in the botanicals trade, straight up to her death.”

“Which was when?” he asked, in a tone that would have befitted an officer of the police.

“In August of 1820,” she replied.

Hearing the date caused a grimace to cross her uncle’s face. “So long ago,” he said. “Too young.”

“She had a sudden death,” Alma lied. “She did not suffer.”

He looked at her for a while longer, then took a leisurely sip of coffee and helped himself to a bite of
wentelteefje
from the small plate before him. Clearly, she had interrupted an evening snack. She would have given almost anything for a taste of that
wentelteefje.
It looked and smelled wonderful. When was the last time she’d had cinnamon toast? Probably the last time Hanneke had made it for her. The aroma made her weak with nostalgia. But Uncle Dees did not offer her any coffee, and he certainly did not offer her a share of his beautiful, golden, buttery
wentelteefjes.

“Would you like me to tell you anything about your sister?” Alma asked at length. “I believe your memories of her would be a child’s memories. I could tell you stories, if you like.”

He did not respond. She tried to imagine him as Hanneke had always depicted him—as a sweet-natured ten-year-old boy, weeping at his older sister’s elopement to America. Hanneke had told Alma many times of how
Dees had clung to Beatrix’s skirts, until he’d had to be pried off. She’d also described how Beatrix had scolded her little brother to never again let the world see his tears. Alma found it difficult to picture. He looked dreadfully old now, and dreadfully grave.

She said, “I grew up with Dutch tulips all around me—descendants of the bulbs that my mother took with her to Philadelphia from right here at the Hortus.”

Still, he did not speak. Roger sighed, shifted, and curled up even closer to Dees’s legs.

After a spell, Alma changed tack. “I should also let you know that Hanneke de Groot still lives. I believe you may have known her long ago.”

Now a new expression crossed the old man’s face: wonderment.

“Hanneke de Groot,” he marveled. “I have not thought of her in years. Hanneke de Groot? Imagine it . . .”

“Hanneke is strong and healthy, you’ll be happy to hear,” Alma said. There was a bit of wishful thinking in this statement, as Alma had not seen Hanneke in nearly three years. “She remains the head housekeeper of my late father’s estate.”

“Hanneke was my sister’s maid,” Dees said. “She was so young when she came to us. She was a sort of nursemaid to me, for a while.”

“Yes,” said Alma, “she was a sort of nursemaid to me, too.”

“Then we were both fortunate,” he said.

“I agree. I consider it one of the finest blessings of my life, to have passed my youth in Hanneke’s care. She formed me, nearly as much as my own parents formed me.”

The staring recommenced. This time, Alma allowed the silence to stand. She watched as her uncle took a forkful of
wentelteefje
and dipped it in his coffee. He enjoyed his bite unhurriedly, without making so much as a drip or a crumb. She needed to learn where she could procure such fine
wentelteefjes
as this
.

At last, Dees wiped his mouth on a plain napkin and said, “Your Dutch is not awful.”

“Thank you,” she said. “I spoke much of it, as a child.”

“How are your teeth?”

“Quite well, thank you,” said Alma. She had nothing to hide from this man.

He nodded. “The van Devenders all have good teeth.”

“A lucky inheritance.”

“Did my sister have any other children, apart from you?”

“She had one other daughter—adopted. That is my sister Prudence, who now operates a school from within my father’s old estate.”

“Adopted,” he said neutrally.

“My mother was not blessed with fecundity,” Alma elaborated.

“What of you?” he asked. “Do you have children?”

“I, like my mother, was also not blessed with fecundity,” Alma said. This understated the situation considerably, but at least it answered the question.

“A husband?” he asked.

“Deceased, I’m afraid.”

Uncle Dees nodded, but did not offer condolence. This amused Alma; her mother would have responded the same way. Facts are facts. Death is death.

“And you, sir?” she ventured. “Is there a Mrs. van Devender?”

“Dead, you know.”

She nodded, exactly as he had nodded. It was a bit perverse, but she was enjoying everything about this frank, blunt, desultory conversation. With no sense of when or where it all might end, or whether her destiny was or was not meant to intertwine with the destiny of this old man, she felt she was on familiar territory here—Dutch territory, van Devender territory. She had not felt so at home in ages.

“How long do you intend to stay in Amsterdam?” Dees asked.

“Indefinitely,” Alma said.

This took him aback. “If you’ve come seeking charity,” he said, “we have nothing to offer.”

She smiled. Oh, Beatrix, she thought, how I have missed you these many years.

“I am not in need of charity,” she said. “My father left me well provided for.”

“Then what are your intentions for your stay in Amsterdam?” he asked, with undisguised wariness.

“I would like to work here, at the Hortus Botanicus.”

Now he looked genuinely alarmed. “Dear heavens!” he said. “In what possible capacity?”

“As a botanist. Specifically, as a bryologist.”

“A
bryologist
? But what on earth do you know about mosses?”

Here Alma could not help but laugh. It was a marvelous thing, to laugh. She could not think of the last time she had laughed. She laughed so hard, she had to put her face in her hands for a spell, in order to hide her hilarity. This spectacle only seemed to unnerve her poor old uncle more. She was not helping her own cause.

Why had she thought her modest reputation might have preceded her? Oh, foolish pride!

Once Alma had contained herself, she wiped her eyes and smiled at him. “I know I have taken you by surprise, Uncle Dees,” she said, falling naturally into a warmer and more familiar tone. “Please forgive me. I wish you to understand that I am a woman of independent means, who does not come here to disrupt your life in any manner. However, it is also the case that I am possessed of certain abilities—both as a scholar and as a taxonomist—which might be of use to an institution such as yours. I can say without reservation that it would bring me the greatest pleasure and contentment to spend the rest of my working life here, giving my time and energies to an institution that has figured so prominently both in the history of botany, and in the history of my own family.”

With this, she took the brown-wrapped parcel from under her arm and set it on the edge of his table.

“I will not ask you to take my word for my abilities, Uncle,” she said. “This package contains a theory I have recently brought forth, based upon research I have conducted over the past thirty years of my life. Some of the ideas may strike you as rather bold, but I ask only that you read it with an open mind—and, needless to say, that you keep its findings to yourself. Even if you don’t agree with my conclusions, I think you will get a sense of my scientific aptitude. I ask you to treat this document with respect, for it is all that I have and all that I am.”