Synopsis/Details
The story opens on an August afternoon in 1943. Hadassah Kalman, a.k.a. Hennie, lives with Paul and Margaret Visser in a row house in Haarlem during the Nazi occupation of The Netherlands. The house has a secret compartment in an upstairs bedroom where she can hide. On this afternoon, two policemen arrive to inspect for contraband, and Hennie hides in the compartment. She dozes off and awakens to a world that seems subtly different. She opens the panel in the wall and enters an unfamiliar and empty house--her house in 1993. She goes to the window and sees two women and a girl in the back garden. They are Deborah, Sarah, and the property owner, Frida. Deborah and Sarah have moved from London to be close to Deborah's mother, Dinah, who is in a nursing home, and they are looking for a house to rent. Sarah sees Hennie in the bedroom window and waves to her. Terrified, Hennie returns to the compartment to hide from them. The women search and find no trace of her, but they see the lights flicker as Hennie is transported back to 1943.
Hennie appears to Sarah again, and after a startling introduction, they begin to become acquainted, but Hennie is cautious, telling them she lives next door. When Deborah arrives home, Hennie disappears when Sarah is out of the room. They go next door and find that the owner of the house is an old woman with no children living there, the people Hennie said she lived with hadn't lived there in nearly fifty years, and that there was a fire in their house sometime during the war.
When Hennie appears again, she shows Sarah the secret compartment in the wall. Sarah is even more disturbed when Hennie says that she is hiding from the Nazis in 1943. She initially refuses to believe it, but when Hennie attempts to lean out the window for some fresh air, the lights begin to flicker, leading Sarah to believe that Hennie may be something extraordinary. Hennie reveals her parents' names and demonstrates her prowess on the piano. Sarah tells Hennie that she used to play the clarinet. Sarah takes a picture of them both and gives it to Hennie to take back as proof of her journey. Hennie goes back into the compartment, and after the lights flicker, Sarah looks in, finding only an odd electrical smell. Hennie recounts her experience to Margaret, who is skeptical, but when Hennie mentions the flickering lights, Margaret tells her that the lights flickered there, too.
Sarah tells Deborah about Hennie's return, and things become awkward when Sarah explains that Hennie is hiding from the Nazis in 1943. Deborah checks the secret compartment, but only finds the photograph Sarah took. Deborah believes that Hennie may just be a mischievous neighbor playing a tasteless prank or a troubled girl with a dissociative personality. Sarah convinces her to at least see if the Vissers and her parents actually existed. They check the city archives and find evidence of the Vissers. While visiting their grave, they discover a reference to Hennie, which deepens the mystery.
One afternoon in December, Deborah arrives home from work early and meets Hennie for the first time. Sarah arrives that evening to find Deborah sitting in a darkened house smoking a cigarette. Deborah recounts her encounter with Hennie, her sense that Hennie reminded her of her own mother, and the strange manner of her disappearance. She tells Sarah of taking Hennie's photograph to the police, inquiring about her parents, and learning that there was no record of Hennie's parents since their arrest in 1942. Against all her scientific experience, Deborah begins to consider that Hennie may really be from the past. When they visit Deborah's mother Dinah in the nursing home, Deborah shows her Hennie's picture. Dinah finds her familiar, but doesn't elaborate, and they don't tell Dinah about her strange origin. Deborah realizes that they must find out when the house fire happened, learning that it occurred on March 26, 1944. They must figure out how to help Hennie.
Hennie appears to Sarah again in January. Sarah is playing the clarinet for band class. Sarah tells Hennie that something will happen on March 26, and to be prepared. When Hennie returns to 1944, we learn that Paul has a serious infection and they are nearly out of medicine. Hennie is able to go back to Sarah the next day and ask for help. Sarah fakes a cat bite with a staple puller in order to get a prescription of antibiotics, but they are unsure whether the pills will go back through time. She is able to take them through, and Margaret is convinced that Hennie is really traveling to the future.
Hennie appears to Sarah again in February. Sarah is getting better at the clarinet. Hennie hears the song "Memories of You" on Sarah's stereo and asks if Sarah could learn it. Deborah and Sarah visit Dinah one day and find her disoriented. The nurse tells them that Dinah mentioned a flower she lost, a fire, and a "lemele," or "little lamb." Neither mean anything to Deborah or Sarah.
Deborah and Sarah visit the Red Cross archive and find that Hennie's parents were sent to Auschwitz and were already dead when Hennie began appearing. They arrive home to find Hennie waiting and must console her. She tells them about how she went into hiding and gives Sarah a gift--a knitted myrtle flower with a Hebrew "S" on it. She shows them a similar one given to her by an older cousin when she was a baby. Deborah has an insight that only love can bring something through the time portal, but they are faced with the question of whose love is bringing Hennie through the portal, as neither have any obvious connection to Hennie. Sarah gives her a drawing she made of them based on the photograph for her to take back with her. When Deborah and Sarah visit Dinah again, she sees the flower Sarah is wearing. Dinah tells them that it looks like two that she had made long ago. She reveals how she lost hers when the Warsaw Ghetto burned and how she survived and made it to Amsterdam after the war.
During dinner one evening, Deborah asks Sarah and Hennie about the song they were practicing. Deborah has the idea for them to play the song for Dinah, but Hennie reminds her that she can't leave the house. Sarah persuades Hennie to try again, but when she does, there is an electrical disturbance that trips the circuit breaker. They warn Hennie about the fire, and they decide that Hennie would be safest if she were with them when it happened. While Hennie was with Sarah, two policemen were searching her bedroom, discovering Sarah's drawing of them.
Hennie asks Sarah if she can celebrate Passover with them, and they realize that Passover is also the day of the fire. On the eve of Passover, Deborah and Sarah visit Dinah. Sarah plays the recording and a dam breaks in Dinah's mind, bringing back memories of her singing the song to her "lemele," to whom she also gave one of her lost flowers. Deborah and Sarah realize Hennie is Dinah's cousin and rush home to wait for her.
On the same evening in 1944, the policemen who found the drawing raid Paul and Margaret's home, believing that they are hiding Jews. They begin searching the house and are about to discover the hidden compartment. The lights flicker when Hennie is transported to 1994. She tells Deborah and Sarah that her hiding place has been found. They tell her that they have discovered that Dinah is her cousin and the reason for her time traveling. Someone from the nursing home calls to say that Dinah is having a flashback. They must take the risk of leaving the house in order to take her to Dinah. There is a something like a lightning strike as Hennie exits the house, leaving them stunned, but unharmed. At that moment in 1944, the policemen are interrogating Paul and Margaret when the lights blow out and the house catches fire.
Deborah, Sarah, and Hennie arrive at the nursing home and hear Dinah raving. Hennie calms Dinah and shows her the flower. Dinah then reveals the true nature of her relationship with Hennie--that she is her daughter born out of wedlock and adopted by relatives. After this emotional reunion, the three return home to find firemen at their smoldering house. The time portal is gone. The story ends with Sarah and Hennie playing "Memories of You" together in the school band's spring recital and then with Dinah and other residents in the nursing home.
