Chapter 30 - Reunion
The children stayed fast asleep for the entire flight to France. When they hit a storm over Switzerland, strong winds rocked the plane and threw it around but the children did not wake. Even when they landed in Paris, they did not stir. The plane bumped along the runway and then came to an abrupt standstill inside a cavernous hangar.
The two sleeping children, plus Andrea and Alexander, stayed inside the plane after landing, while Captain Hudson fetched his car. He drove his metallic pink people carrier right up to the plane’s door, and Alexander carried Ursula off while Andrea brought Eric. The two children were placed onto the back seats, but they remained fast asleep and did not even murmur. Once Alexander and Andrea were in the car, Captain Hudson drove away.
It was warm in Paris; the sun was shining, trees were full of blossom and the roads were reasonably quiet. After less than an hour of driving, and following Andrea’s directions, they arrived back at Saint-Denis.
The children were finally woken by Andrea forcefully shaking them. The white hair around their ears had spread further and the crow’s feet around their eyes were more noticeable.
Mémé took a last bite of her lunch and stood up from the table. She was wearing a yellow apron over a brightly coloured frock and her hair was in curlers. Her husband was still eating; scattering baguette crumbs over his ‘Allez Les Bleus’ T-shirt and black trousers. Mémé took his plate into the kitchen before he had finished eating and began to wash up. When the knocks on the front door came her hands were covered in soap suds, and she instructed her husband to go and answer it.
On seeing Ursula at the door, Granddad Benjamin had to stop himself from crying. His eyes went red and he fought to hold back the tears as he held his Granddaughter tight. Ursula then hopped off to surprise Mémé. Granddad Benjamin gave Eric a welcome hug before politely kissing Andrea on the cheeks and then shaking hands with the two strangers - Alexander and Captain Hudson.
Like her husband, Mémé was over the moon to see Ursula again and was also delighted to see Eric and Andrea too. She politely welcomed Captain Hudson and Alexander, whom she was sure she had seen somewhere in the past. Within an hour, she had warmed to both men and her suspicions had been confirmed - she had indeed seen Alexander before.
During this time, Ursula and Eric told Mémé and Granddad Benjamin all that had happened to them since Christmas. In places, Andrea and Alexander joined in, either adding bits to the narrative or correcting a number of exaggerations. Captain Hudson listened to the story, as absorbed by it as the Benjamins. He found it curious how his own fate seemed to be linked in some way to the Meyer’s.
The living room was cramped with seven people but they all had a seat. The children, plus the Benjamins, squashed up on the itchy sofa and the three other adults sat at the table. Mémé had provided them all with tea and homemade biscuits, and there was a warm, safe feeling in the room.
When they got to the part of the story involving Ursula arriving to Earth in the pod and her grandmother finding her, the three Benjamins were left alone in the living room. The other four stood on the balcony, amongst the plants, and gazed out across the block.
It was not long before they were beckoned back into the room. All three Benjamins had shed a tear, but they were tears of relief and gratitude rather than of sadness. Their heart-to-heart and the truth behind Ursula’s past did not divide them but brought them even closer together.
When the children had finished telling their stories, Captain Hudson wiggled his moustache and said, “The last two days have been most illuminating. When I saw grainy images of men land on the moon, it changed my world forever. I did not think that would happen to me again, but I was wrong. My life changed beyond measure when I met Martin Meyer many years ago and has changed again now I have met his descendants. The information you possess is valuable and so are the four of you.”
He pointed to Eric, Ursula, Alexander and Andrea.
“Use the information wisely and plan your futures with great care and precision. If you need me at any point I will always be at your service,” he stood up, bid everyone farewell and Mémé saw him to the door.
“It was a pleasure to meet you Madame Benjamin. I apologize for my departure but if I do not go soon Cécile will be thinking I have a girlfriend,” he said, slowly winked at her and then left.
Mémé returned to the living room and refilled all their teas, except Andrea’s which was untouched. She sat back down between the children and put her arm around both of them. Ursula knew that Eric was happy for the first time in several months, and she felt the same.
“I believe this is where we add our piece of the story,” began Granddad Benjamin. “We always wanted a child but for reasons only God knows it never happened. We hoped and prayed but as the years passed, and we aged, we came to accept our childless fate.”
“Then one night,” continued Mémé, “I was walking home down a poorly lit underpass with an old, shopping trolley in it. It was cold, and it had been raining. There was nobody out, but there was a man lurking near the entrance to the underpass who was watching me. I tried to go as quickly as I could because he put me on edge.”
“Sorry,” apologized Alexander, “I didn’t mean to scare you. I didn’t think you had seen me.”
Mémé gestured with her hand that it was nothing and went on, “As I got near to the trolley I heard crying. I was worried about the man,” she corrected herself, “Alexander, watching me but I stopped anyway. Laying in the beaten up trolley, wrapped in thick blankets, her little nose poking through a gap, was the most beautiful baby. The moment I picked her up she stopped crying. A voice echoed down the underpass, ‘She’s yours, take her.’ When I turned to speak the man had gone. So I did as he said and took Ursula home. After peeling the blankets away, I removed her strange, silver baby clothes and found a compact disc lying against her chest.”
“We didn’t know what it was,” said Granddad Benjamin standing up. “We have never been very good with technology but we kept it anyway. As it was with the baby, we thought it might be important.”
He approached the glass cabinet and opened the doors. Near the back, behind Kinder toys, glass animals, china ornaments and underneath a wind-up clock was a CD. Carefully he removed it and handed it to Ursula. She turned it over in her hands trying to find a number. Next to the hole in the centre, faded by sunlight and Mémé’s cleaning, was a very faint number five.
“It is number five,” she said excitedly and passed it to Andrea.
“Do you have the laptop I gave you?” Andrea asked the Benjamins.
They both looked suddenly very guilty.
“It was very kind of you to give it to us,” answered Granddad Benjamin, “but technology is a young person’s game, and we’re a bit too long in the tooth for something new. To be honest, we’ve been too scared to turn it on. Will it still work?”
Andrea shrugged, “It is not a problem, but do you still have it?”
“Oh yes,” replied Mémé, “I put it in Ursula’s bedroom. It is on her desk.”
“Alexander and I will go and watch the CD. The rest of you will stay here.”
The three Benjamins were happy for this to happen, but Eric argued until Granddad Benjamin said that he wanted to talk to him. Andrea and Alexander left the living room with the disc and went into Ursula’s bedroom.
When they had left, Granddad Benjamin pulled up a Formica chair and sat in front of the sofa.
“Ursula and Eric, I would like to tell you something and then I would like to ask you something. My grandfather was the chief of his village on the plains of the great continent of Africa. One day he told my father that he was special that he could change the world, and asked him what he would do? My father thought carefully about these things and after careful deliberation decided to leave the village of mud huts and start a new life in the town. Many years ago my father told me that I was special that I could c
hange the world, and he asked me what would I do? I puzzled over this problem for weeks and then finally decided to leave hot and dusty Africa and start a new life in France. I now turn to the two of you and say that you are special, you could change the world, and I ask you a very important question, what will you do?”
Eric and Ursula were lost for words.
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