The Histories of Earth, Books 1-4: In the Window Room, A Prince of Earth, All the Worlds of Men, and Worlds Unending

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The Histories of Earth, Books 1-4: In the Window Room, A Prince of Earth, All the Worlds of Men, and Worlds Unending Page 29

by Steven J. Carroll


  But let it not be said that the old farmer had lived a sad life, in truth he had lived a very happy life, where sadness was merely a side-effect of his constant survival.

  And that morning, as he had done every morning, he still had to attend to his animals: his cow, his goats and chickens, before he would allow himself to properly greet his new guests (who should be also counted as survivors, but to a lesser degree).

  And for some time, as the chill of the early morning hours broke and the day became rather pleasant, both boys simply watched the elderly man tend to his barn animals: scattering grain to feed his chickens, gathering freshly laid eggs, milking and feeding his dairy cow and goats, but always pushing and batting the boys’ hands away, and mumbling something at them in French, if ever they tried to help.

  So that in the end, they made a seat on an old sawn stump by the pen, until the last unruly goat had been milked.

  ���Do you think he’ll let us stay?��� Ata eventually whispered, as the sun was starting to raise higher above the lively green hillsides, showing a reflected golden light over Pierre’s average-sized vineyard, and humble vegetable garden.

  Timothy was not entirely hopeful, but thought it better to stay positive, saying, ���He hasn’t got rid of us yet, or called the police. So that’s a good sign, right?���

  However, each boy’s face was not overwhelmingly optimistic, knowing it to be a hard sell, to ask the man who’d found them trespassing in his barn, if they might actually spend another ten nights as guests at his picturesque country farm.

  It is the sort of thing that the average stranger will respectfully not agree to, and Timothy and Ata both knew this. Howbeit, to their benefit, Pierre Legrand had been an unexpectedly generous old man. And since, he’d been lacking for friendships, after his wife had died, he was happy for new guests. And even though they could only barely speak a word of French, there is a certain level of communication that all humanity is capable of, and a smile is a smile in nearly every culture.

  Even so, it was a comedy to see this unusual trio at the kitchen table for a lunch of greens from the garden, and crumbled goat cheese. And the process was like this: Pierre would try to speak, words that Timothy might know in French, and Timothy would make an attempt to translate, but very often incorrectly.

  That was until the group had all come to realize that both sides could speak a rudimentary level of German. For being a survivor of the German occupation of France, Monsieur Legrand had learned it as a forced survival tactic, and it had never left him, even as old as he was. And they spent the rest of that early afternoon speaking with a child’s vocabulary in German, as Pierre recounted the horrors of war that had cause him to learn that new language, and as Timothy explained who both he and Ata were, to the best of his knowledge, but only saying that they were ���lost and in danger���, when Pierre had asked how they’d come to France.

  (The following is a conversation in German, in which I’ve removed the native German, and have replaced it with its English equivalents, so that it will be easier to read.)

  ���Danger?��� Pierre asked, taking a sip of fresh milk. ���Crimes?��� he said, pointing at the two of them from across the table. ���Police?��� he said. (Except that he did not use the proper word for police, but instead had used the word ���Gestapo���, which was a specific secretive military police used in World War II under Hitler’s Nazi Germany. He had used this word out of habit, but Timothy knew what was meant.)

  Timothy shook his head from side-to-side, gesturing and waving his arms in front of him.

  ���No, no,��� Timothy answered. ���We are not crimes,��� he replied, misspeaking and using the inappropriate German form for the word ���criminals���, but thinking the message would be the same, so that he did not correct himself.

  ���We are safe,��� he continued. ���Please, don’t fear.���

  In the evening, while Pierre was out across the fields attending to his vineyard, the two boys who were still becoming friends sat side-by-side on a stone bench near the door of Pierre’s house, overlooking the softly golden hillsides, and they watched as the sun set in her course, and the sky washed in shades of vibrant fiery red and faded into a royal purple. It would certainly be called beautiful and serene, if these words were enough to describe it.

  ���Do you think we’re safe here?��� Ata eventually asked, with a sense about him, as if he did not want to be lulled into any false safety.

  And Timothy looked over at Ata, whose white t-shirt and blue jeans were as soiled from their journeys as his own clothes were, and he wondered to himself, why he should always have to answer difficult questions like this, as if he were somehow the leader of the group.

  But then, in the same thought, it came to mind that he was technically a prince of Earth; Which would be enough, he supposed, to make him the leader in this case, and also, he was the only one of them to have ever come to visit France before, and the only one of them who’d ever encountered this amount of danger, in any world, and had lived to tell about it.

  Which would be enough credentials to bolster anyone’s pride, except that here Timothy did not answer as a member of royalty, or as some sort of military know-it-all, he tried his best to answer as a friend.

  ���Sure, we’re safe,��� he said, though not looking hopeful. ���But that only lasts another nine days, after tonight. And whether we like it or not, I’ll be pulled away into another world, where they will definitely be waiting for me.���

  Ata, however, had obviously no understanding of what this meant, and so Timothy went on to describe the processes of light travel, as best as he could: Stating that each traveler, when they come into a new world, has something like a timer on themselves. So that no matter what they’re doing or where they might be, once their time is up, they are pulled away, ���reflected��� back to whatever place they’d come from.

  [And here his friend asked, if he could see the timer that Timothy had, for Ata, like his father, had a natural affinity for gadgets and mechanisms.]

  But Timothy replied, ���No, it’s not like that, not that sort of timer. It’s a part of me, like a countdown in my head,��� he said, tapping the side of his temple with two fingers.

  After this, Ata thought that he’d understood the process (which he did), but then he came to realize an important question.

  ���So you’re not from Earth, then? You’re from some other planet?��� he asked.

  ���Well… I used to be,��� Timothy answered, perhaps understanding for the first time, the irony that he was a prince of Earth, but technically no longer from Earth. And he looked out over the hills, as Pierre was walking back toward them, and the last sliver of his own sun crested for only a second, and then slipped out of view.

  ���…But now I’m just a visitor,��� Timothy said. Thinking now, as he said it, that he could always come back home to Earth, but never again permanently, never forever.

  Chapter Thirteen

  The Days of Waiting

  Well before sunrise, Timothy was startled awake by the shadowy outline of a bearded old Frenchman, practically shouting in his native language, the French words for ���Awake, awake. Good Morning!���

  And while Timothy had not yet learned that entire phrase, he did at the time know the French word for good morning, which he thought this rattling wakening call certainly didn’t help with. Yet Pierre was such a jolly early riser, that it was nearly impossible to be mad at him.

  And so that Timothy could understand his point, he called out in German, as if chuckling or singing a song as he left, ���Keine arbeit. Kein essen.���

  Ata moaned from his perch on the top bunk, above Timothy, as if he’d just endured some horrific torture.

  ���I’m grateful for him letting us stay here in the house last night, I really am, but does he have to carry
on like that?��� he said, and then rolled onto his stomach with his face and ears buried deeply within his pillow.

  Though Timothy was already wearily sliding his last shoe over his heal.

  ���Get up,��� he said to Ata, as he began to tie the bows on his shoelaces. ���You’ll probably want breakfast before the day starts.���

  Ata pulled himself up onto his elbows and leant over the bed railing. ���Why? What did he say?���

  Timothy stood up and was about to exit their room, when he turned back to answer Ata’s question.

  ���No work. No food,��� he replied, translating what Pierre had said in German.

  And as he shut the door to head downstairs for breakfast, he heard another bellowed moan come from Ata, followed by these words, he’d yelled out mostly to himself, ���Why did he have to be a farmer?���

  With the exception of a break for lunch, which was seasoned cucumber sandwiches and slices of cheese, the two amateur farmers worked through the day: baling hay, tilling a new row for cabbages, chasing obstinate goats around the pen, who’d obviously hated milking and weren’t going to suffer through it without a fight.

  And after the heat of the day had drifted away, Pierre set pruning shears in their hands and guided their movements as he taught them how to cut the dead branches in the vineyard, to make way for new clusters of grapes.

  There was an art to it, and a patience needed; And if ever they snipped the wrong branch, or cut too closely, Pierre would bat at their hands, mumbling in French, and would then show them again the proper way (which to the untrained eye seemed to be exactly what they had done before, that had got their hands batted in the first place). Though by evening they had both learned the basics of the skill, and Pierre would come up close to inspect their vines, as if to be angry with them, but he would turn quick and smile under his beard.

  He would spread his arms open, and stretch out an ���Ah��� sound, as if he’d caught them in a joke. And then he would mumble some congratulatory saying in French, and only once, when Ata had done a particularly splendid job, the old farmer grabbed him from the back of the neck and pulled him close to kiss him on the cheek (which I feel like I must say, is not so strange in that culture, as it would be back in London).

  And each night, when a long day’s work had been heartily toiled through, the three would stay up long after night fall, around the kitchen table, playing games of cards and dice with the old Frenchman, or they would listen to his stories told to them in German, well earned and fascinating stories that he had not the opportunity to tell for many years.

  And each night, when they would ready for bed, filthy and tired from a strenuous day in the fields, Pierre would have laid out for them, neatly folded, a new change of clothes. Each outfit had seemed to be lovingly hemmed and kept, but they smelled as though they had not been worn or taken from their closets for years, having the fragrance of old wardrobes lingering in the fabric.

  ���These must be his sons’ old clothes, when they were our age,��� Timothy said about them the first night, holding up a linen shirt to examine it. ���He must have kept them all these years.���

  ���You still awake?��� Ata called out from his bunk, on their last night in that place.

  There was a weary moan from the bottom bunk. ���Yeah, why?��� Timothy asked, while tucked snugly beneath his sheets. And then added, because there was a sound of concern in Ata’s voice, ���Is something wrong?���

  In a general sense, there had been ���something wrong��� for weeks by that time, but in a more immediate sense, Ata was worried.

  ���Do you think my dad will be there with you in that other world tomorrow?��� Ata asked. And they felt safe to talk about this that night, because it was in the late hours and the house was still and quiet all around them.

  This question took Timothy by surprise, and he thought it over for a few seconds, until finally he said, ���You know, I hadn’t thought about it before… but if they want someone to operate the light travel, then I can’t think of anyone else they’d bring.���

  Ata was on his top bunk, speaking toward the ceiling.

  ���Can you take me with you?��� he asked.

  But Timothy knew the sort of request this was. ���I’d be taking you into a war if you came,��� he replied.

  ���We’re in a war here, aren’t we?��� Ata answered.

  ���Yes… but you’re safe,��� Timothy said. There was a long and uncomfortable pause, in the dark of their room.

  ���I don’t feel that way,��� Ata eventually said. ���And if I have to stay locked up on this farm my whole life to be safe, well I don’t want it. I’d rather be in danger for real, than to pretend to be safe forever.���

  Though Timothy had himself been at times put in danger, enough to know not to take it lightly. ���Alright,��� he said, speaking to the bunk above him. ���As long as you know, you might not come back… Last time I was in Gleomu, we were stuck there for a year.���

  However, Ata did not like so many warnings for his safety, slightly thinking Timothy was just trying to scare him off.

  ���You don’t have to baby me,��� he said, speaking more quickly than he normally had. ���I know how to handle myself,��� he finished with.

  ���Fine, fine… I get it,��� Timothy answered, as if he’d not wanted to argue, and then he rolled onto his side, facing outward, toward the door of their room.

  ���Get some sleep though,��� he said. ���We leave at about eight, you’ll want to get plenty of rest.���

  But as he finished his words, Timothy realized that that too might be considered ���babying���, and he found that to be instantly true when he got an extra pillow thrown down directly in his face.

  ���Thanks, dad,��� Ata said sarcastically, but jokingly.

  Wanting to retaliate, Timothy flung the pillow back up at the top bunk, but missed Ata entirely, and the two boys had a truly good laugh. And in the end, they both lay awake for much longer than they should have, as Timothy answered Ata’s many questions about light travel: Telling great stories of adventures, and about what life would be like for them in that other world.

  Yet in all these good and friendly occasions, you should remember that there was a very frightened girl, who had not fared as well as Timothy and Ata had in all this: And that girl’s name was Barbara Cholley. And that night, on the night before her ���escape��� (the day that she had circled in red upon her calendar, and had wished for desperately, hoping it would come sooner), it was at this time that she was locked up as a prisoner in a comfy bedroom quarters, with sealed windows and a door bolted from the outside.

  An armed guard sat always in front of her door, and she had not left that room in over a week, even while being interrogated about her involvements with light travel. (Except, humanely of course, when she was granted three opportunities every day, to use the loo at the end of the hall; Which she would make use of, even if she hadn’t needed it, just for a change in scenery, and taking extra long baths, until the water bit her skin, because it was so cold.)

  Howbeit, that night she did what she would not allow herself to do for weeks. She cried large tears into her pillows, until she could cry no more, and until her energy had failed her, and she fell into a heavy, burdensome sleep: For as I’ve said, she was very frightened, and understandably so.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Escape Day

  In the morning when they awoke, Timothy told the old farmer in his best German, that they were ���always grateful for his kindness,��� but that they had to leave soon, and they could not return.

  To this the old man’s face filled with even more wrinkles, for he had grown accustomed to having visitors over the past few days, and was obviously sad to see them go.


  But he refused to send them off with empty stomachs, making them his grandest breakfast of farm fresh eggs, and a wedge of Comt�� cheese (that he’d got in town and had been saving for some special occasion), and they had greens from the garden and delicious pressed grape juice from the vineyard. It was the kind of courtesy you might expect from old friends, or visiting family. And Ata and Timothy stayed longer than they should have, until it was nearly eight.

  Yet, once they were able to pull away, they ran quickly upstairs, and fit their forearm bracelets upon their arms, and Ata retrieved his mechanical ball which he’d had wrapped up and hidden in a folded blanket under their bed.

  Then they wished Monsieur Legrand the best and thanked him again, Timothy translating for Ata, so that he could properly thank the farmer in his own words. Then they were gone.

  And at precisely eight o’clock, they stood in the open field of hay, which lay about half the distance between the house and the vineyard. The ground birds around them were chirping and still calling out their morning songs; A peaceful morning, yet both travelers were determined and rather serious.

  ���We have to keep them away from the globe,��� Timothy spoke. ���We can’t let them have it, no matter what.���

  ���Even if it puts our families in danger?��� Ata asked, but in a way that it could be understood that that’s what he’d cared about most of all.

  Timothy thought about Barbara, and his grandparents, and Professor Asim, and all that they must have had to suffer thus far, but he knew he’d had a duty he could not avoid.

  Looking straight faced and unmovingly at his new friend, and though it seemed silly to say in the simple peacefulness of our world, he spoke.

  ���That’s always been the choice,��� he said. ���If they get the globe, it’s not just us who are in danger. It’s every person in every world, in all the universe… We have a duty.���

 

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