Girl In Hyacinth Blue

Saskia and her husband, Stijn, have only lost a few hens in the flood. The cow is upstairs in the bedroom, and the children are alive. Stijn has been working on the dike for two days straight. When he arrives home in his rowboat, he comes in through the upstairs window.

Saskia sees something outside—a horse just tall enough to walk through the water. Everything is so strange. Her husband screams at her, and alarmed, she takes a bundle that he hands her through the window: Someone has put a baby in a skiff and tied it up outside. The shawl wrapped around the baby must be the mother’s. She tells the children that St. Nicholas must have brought them the baby. She finds a painting with a note as well. The note reads: “Sell the painting. Feed the child.” Stijn wraps some cheese and a slab of salt pork and gets into his own skiff. There isn’t time to discuss this strange occurrence. He must go back to work. In parting, he tells his wife to take the painting to the market and sell it.

That night, Stijn returns, discouraged. The floodwaters won’t drain until they fix the sea dikes.