Toward the Sunrise (11 page)

“Are you sure I can’t help with weaning the kids?” she asked Mr. Hofstad. Surely that would require a lot of work, and she wouldn’t mind lingering in the village a few more weeks. Claudia translated,
but the old farmer shook his head, letting out a stream of reassuring words.

Ashton peered at her through knowing eyes. “Perhaps you’d like to offer to paint his barn? Build a new pen? Help with the spring planting? If you play your cards right, you might even still be here for the birthing next November.”

“I’m just trying to be helpful,” she defended.

His eyes softened. “And you are helpful. You give everything your best, even if it means working on a goat farm when you ought to be finishing up medical school. You are driven and daring. If someone tells you no, you will always prove them wrong. You are sometimes tough, sometimes terrified . . . but I have faith in you, Julia. You are not destined to spend the rest of your life on a goat farm.”

He was right, but the thought of returning to Philadelphia still intimidated her, for the one thing she had never learned how to do was fail, and her odds of failing her appeal were high.

She didn’t know what she would do with the rest of her life if this door was finally slammed in her face.

Ashton headed to the mansion, the wind causing the too-big clothes he’d borrowed from the farmer to flap in the November breeze. Yesterday, Sophie had offered to try to wash the worst of the goat filth from his tailor-made suit, which was now surely ruined, but it was the only thing he had to wear back on the train to the city.

Besides, he suspected that by now he would have had a response to the telegram he sent two days ago, and he wanted to read it without Julia hovering over him. Julia’s brother couldn’t read, which was the only reason Ashton had felt so comfortable sending Emil to town with his hastily drafted message. He needed answers, and he wouldn’t be able to find them here at Dierenpark.

He continued walking down the path toward the mansion, its rough-hewn granite blocks coming into view around the bend of twisted old juniper trees. Each time he came here, he always pondered the same question: Why did the Vandermarks hold on to this grand old estate if they never intended to return to it? Dierenpark cost a fortune in annual property taxes. They paid a staff to ensure the contents of the house were not plundered, for it was well known that in their haste to leave Dierenpark all those decades ago, a treasure
trove of artwork, silver, and jewelry had been left inside. All of it untouched, as though frozen in time.

He mounted the worn stone steps leading to the covered portico and knocked on the ornate wooden door inlaid with bronze castings. It wouldn’t surprise him if there was a castle somewhere in Europe missing its front door.

Sophie answered his knock, looking as pretty as the morning sun with her blond hair worn in a casual braid over her shoulder and humor in her eyes.

“You look like a dirt farmer,” she said with a glance at his homespun dungarees held up by a pair of suspenders.

“You look like the woman who is going to answer all my prayers by having a freshly cleaned and pressed suit for me.”

She laughed, and even her laughter had a musical cadence that sounded pure and lovely. “Follow me. Florence worked miracles with the suit, but I’m afraid there wasn’t much we could do about that silk vest. Oh, and a telegram arrived for you this morning.”

It was on the mahogany table in the front hall. Ashton slipped it into his pocket, reluctant to read it before Julia’s best friend. “Thank you,” he said. “My suit?”

He followed Sophie to the back of the mansion, passing beneath gothic arches and wood-paneled walls until he reached the oldest part of the house, a charming room reflecting its seventeenth-century Dutch origins with a low-beamed ceiling and a few chairs and tables in quaint groupings. A row of diamond-paned windows overlooked the river, but all Ashton could think of was the mouth-watering aroma drifting from the nearby kitchen.

“What am I smelling?” he asked. “And please tell me you’ve made plenty to share or I may grow faint from hunger.”

“It’s Dutch
gevulde koeken
. Almond cookies, in English.”

“They smell like food of the heavens.”

She laughed again. “They are food of fresh butter, sugar, ground almonds, a little vanilla, and I like to add a dollop of homemade raspberry jam. Would you like one?”

“Sophie, I don’t know if you noticed, but I am about to pass out from craving one of those cookies.”

He followed her to the kitchen and was stunned to see the work table hidden beneath several feet of cookies. Florence Hengeveld,
the housekeeper at Dierenpark since before Ashton had been born, was putting the cookies in little brown sacks.

“Are you feeding an army?” he asked. There must be hundreds of little bags of cookies.

“We sometimes provide food for travelers who sail up the river on the steamships,” Sophie said casually. It was an odd comment, but he didn’t have time to process it after he took his first bite of
gevulde koeken
and nearly fainted at the explosion of warm, buttery flavor.

He knew after a week of eating from the baskets Sophie delivered to the goat farm that she was a good cook, but these cookies defied description. He might never be the same man again.

But he hadn’t come here to sample Sophie’s baking. He just needed his suit so he could leave on tomorrow’s train. The housekeeper brought him his freshly laundered clothes, and as Sophie had predicted, his silk vest was a rumpled, ruined mess, but his suit looked clean and, more importantly, it no longer stank like a goat barn.

With the clean clothes slung over his arm, he wandered toward the library, dragging the telegram out and flicking it open with impatient fingers. He drifted to a window, tilting the telegram into the light to read.

One of his former classmates from Yale was chief counsel for a hospital in Philadelphia and was familiar with the Women’s Medical College. His friend confirmed that Dean Kreutzer was a decent woman, but one with a strict moral code. She could be reasoned with, but ethical standards were paramount.

It confirmed what he suspected. This was a winnable battle, and a rush of satisfaction filled him. It was true that he’d only come here on Nickolaas Vandermark’s orders, but as time passed, it had become vitally important to make sure Julia did not derail her dreams. This telegram contained all the insight he needed to get Julia back into college.

A tiny piece of him—the small, selfish part—wanted to keep her in New York. If he got her back into college, she would eventually board a ship and sail to the other side of the world. He would never see her again, and that would be . . .

Well, it didn’t really bear thinking of. He hoped she would continue writing him letters. He would never see the great sights of Asia, but Julia would, and if he could catch a glimpse of the faraway, wide, wondrous world through her eyes, it would be enough.

He set the telegram on the desk and changed out of the farmer’s clothes. It was time to return to his world. The trousers fit him perfectly, lined with satin, the buttonholes smoothly finished. The freshly starched shirt still carried a trace of the clean smell of soap. He began to feel like himself once again. He clipped on his onyx cufflinks, straightened his collar, and rubbed his freshly shaven jaw to be sure he hadn’t missed a spot. He smelled of new linen and men’s cologne.

This brief, magical interlude at Dierenpark was coming to an end.

Sophie insisted on hosting a grand feast to celebrate the end of the birthing season. It would be held on Dierenpark’s magnificent terrace overlooking the river, and Sophie promised to make goat cheese tarts, along with clam chowder, lobster cakes, and apple pie.

As the sun began to set, Julia helped Sophie carry trays loaded with food down to the slate terrace overlooking the river. Candles were lit, Emil dragged out their father’s old guitar, and the air was heady with laughter and celebration. Mr. Hofstad and his wife came, as did Ashton and the handful of servants who kept Dierenpark operating. Long after the food was consumed, they stayed to talk and laugh as the moon rose high and Emil fooled with the guitar.

Julia drifted to the far side of the terrace, leaning over the balustrade to watch the moonlight glisten on the river. She had been brave enough to set out for college in a new and strange city. While in Philadelphia, she’d landed her first paid job at a pharmacy, completed three years of demanding medical courses, and rescued a dog from angry firefighters. She had even performed three complete autopsies, yet nothing intimidated her as much as going back to face Dean Kreutzer and the possibility of complete failure.

There was a rasp of fabric and Ashton joined her at the balustrade. He smelled of pine soap and looked clipped and groomed, every inch the Manhattan attorney once again.

“You look very fine,” she said, trying to inject a hint of light into her voice. “That little white Alpine goat won’t even recognize you anymore.”

One side of his mouth lifted in a faint smile, but it vanished quickly. “I plan on leaving for the train station at seven o’clock tomorrow morning. I trust you will be ready.”

She turned away. She didn’t want him to see the cowardice on her face. “I don’t know . . .” Her voice trailed off, for she had no good explanation to give him other than that she was tired. And afraid.

“Don’t back down on me now,” he said, his face somber.

She sighed. “I still don’t know if this is the right path for me, after all. If you saw the way Dean Kreutzer looked at me . . .”

His hand covered hers, warm and firm in the chilly night. “This is your first test,” he said with quiet conviction. “Given the path you have chosen, there are going to be more, and it’s going to be hard. There are going to be times when you will feel worn out, ground down, and you may begin to doubt yourself, but I have never seen someone run toward a dream with as much passion as you. Don’t give up now, Julia. You’ve chosen a steep and daring path, and no matter how hard, how grueling, how intimidating . . . you are going to change the world wherever you go. You will leave a path behind you of people who have been healed and inspired because you came into their lives. Don’t give up now.”

No one had ever believed in her this much, and it was humbling. The lump in her throat made it impossible to speak. She turned her palm up to clasp his hand, and he squeezed it in return.

“Are you going to be at the train station tomorrow morning?”

She took a deep, fortifying breath. “I’ll be there.”

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