Just then, the laughing and shouting of drunken soldiers could be heard coming down the road. Carl Meier fled. With no time to summon her father, Albertha scrabbled in the dirt with her bare hands, scooped up the bulbs from their hiding place,[23] and reburied them in the rubble next door.
As she clambered back over the fence into her own garden, she found her father digging with a shovel. She tried to tell him what she had done, but he was so intent on his work that he ignored her.[24]
For some time, it was uncertain whether Arnoldus would survive his gunshot wound. When he began to recover, Albertha went to retrieve the bulbs,[25] knowing that seeing them would raise his spirits. She climbed over the fence and gasped with horror. An unstable wall had collapsed on the spot, covering the bulbs. It seemed impossible to the little girl that anyone could ever move the heavy slab[26]. Overwhelmed with sorrow, Albertha decided not to tell anyone what she had done.
However, during the last cruel days of winter, ice must have formed in the cracks of the wall, gently forcing them apart. With the warmth of spring, the ice had melted, and the tender shoots[27] had made their way up toward the sun.
Arnoldus had survived, and so had his bulbs. Now father and daughter stood looking at the young green leaves.
It took some time, but my grandfather rebuilt his business, starting with those few bulbs. The rare dark-purple tulips eventually became an enormous source of income for the people in Ridderkerk and provided many much-needed jobs. The recovery of Ridderkerk persuaded its people that there could again be happiness after so much misery[28], and new life after so much death. As the tulips rose from the ruins and came to bloom again, so did The Netherlands.
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