Girl in the Blue Coat

The following Saturday, Hanneke takes a train to Kijkduin to find the real Mirjam and tell her what has happened. Mirjam is upset by the news, and hearing of Hanneke’s friendship with Elsbeth, she says, “You know what it’s like to love someone like you love yourself and then lose them” (293). Mirjam explains the secret that led Christoffel to cast Amalia out: Amalia complained to her uncle that the boy she loved, Christoffel, “would rather pine after a girl who had to hide in a furniture shop […] than be with [her]” (296). Her uncle then reported Mirjam’s family. Mirjam insists that Amalia “didn’t mean to” cause her family’s death (297).

Hanneke returns home, at peace with the events that have transpired. She says, “I believe it’s possible to be healed without feeling whole” (300). She thinks back to a conversation with Bas, during which he said it was stupid to read the last page of a book first. He opened Hanneke’s book and wrote on the final page, “Everyone was mauled by a bear, it was very sad, let’s go get ice cream” (301). Then, he said to Hanneke, “Maybe the bear didn’t maul you.