Chapter Four

The cars were tooting.
They went toot, toot, toot.
The people were gabbling.
They went gabble, gabble, gabble like geese.
There were just as many people walking and running, pushing and prodding as had been at the baseball game.
Suddenly all the noise was drowned out by a roar.
It wasn't a roar like a bear would make, or maybe a tiger, or perhaps a lion.
Instead it was a loud, loud deep noise with, now and then, a squeal.
It got louder and louder and louder until, overhead, a big winged creature blotted out the sun.
For a brief moment Cody felt a flutter in his chest. He had to admit he was a little bit scared.
Once he realised what it was, though, he gazed up at the thing in wonder.
No, not a creature. Not an animal at all. Not even a giant bird.
It was big and made of metal. A metal machine. Made by men.
It was a plane.

Cody had learnt all about planes. He had seen them in his books at school and heard the teacher talk about them. She had told the class that she had gone on holiday on one of these big metal machines to a place called My Orca. In fact, she had shown them it on the globe in the classroom.
The globe was a big round ball. It was bigger than a cricket ball. Bigger than a baseball. Bigger, even, than a football.
It sat in what looked like a metal cup, only the cup had big holes in it and you wouldn't be able to pour anything into it because it would just splosh out again.
The big ball - the globe, was decorated with all colourful patterns and between the patterns were big spaces coloured in blue. The teacher had told Cody and his class mates that the blue represented water and that the other coloured shapes were land.
What the globe represented was a map, she said, which showed where every place was in the world.
"What is the world, Miss?" asked one of Cody's classmates.
"Well the world is where we all live," she explained.
"On a ball?" Asked the boy, Roger.
Cody and some of his friends laughed. Of course not, he thought to himself, we would all fall off!
"Yes," said the teacher, and Cody abruptly shut up. "We live on this giant ball that goes around and around very slowly. You wonder why we don't fall off?" That was exactly what Cody had been wondering. "It is something called gravity which holds us down like a magnet."
Strange, thought Cody. He didn't FEEL like anything was holding him down. But, then again, why did he and his friends not fall off the ball. It was all a bit silly, he decided.
He looked out of the window. It all looked pretty flat. There was no sign at all that he was standing on a ball.
The teacher almost guessed what he was thinking.
"Cody, you are looking out of the window. How far can you see?"
"A long way," he said. "I can see as far as the church on the top of the hill."
"And what can you see after that?" she asked.
"After that?" it seemed a stupid question. "Well, nothing, after that. Only the sky."
"Where do you live Cody?" she asked.
He knew this one. His mum had told him to tell a policeman if he ever got lost.
"25 Willow Tree Road, Sodbury Chippington," he said proudly.
"And do you have to walk PAST the church to get to your house?"
"Yes, Mrs Flimble," he said.
"So can you point to where your house is?"
He looked out of the window. He could see where it SHOULD be, but he couldn't see it. It wasn't there. Why couldn't he see it?
"The farthest point you can see is called The Horizon," said the teacher. "You cannot see past the horizon because it curves away... like the curve on the ball."
Wow! thought Cody, so my house is on the other side of the ball. Did that mean Mum would be clinging on to the wall as she put out the washing in the garden. It was all a bit TOO confusing.
Anyway, if the teacher SAID the world was round, who was he to argue.
Another little voice piped up.
"Why don't the people on the bottom fall off?" he asked.
"It is again because of gravity but, because there is no real top and no real bottom, everyone thinks they are on top. I know, it is all very confusing but hopefully one day when you are older you will understand."
Hmm, thought Cody. He WISHED he was older and knew everything there was to know about the world. Still, he had learnt the world was round. The teacher had told him. And the teacher was much older than him. So that was how she knew.
The teacher then pointed to one of the coloured shapes on the map.
"This is where we live," she said. "It is a country called England."
"But I don't live in England," said Cody, now getting rather annoyed. "I TOLD you... I live in Sodbury Chippington!"
"Yes, Cody, you do. And Sodbury Chippington is just one of the little towns that makes up the country called England. It is very small. If you imagine a very small ant sitting on the Globe about..." she pointed her finger "... here. That would be about where Sodbury Chippington is. You see, it is very, very, very small compared to the size of the world."
The teacher went on to explain how there were millions and millions and millions of places exactly the same size as Sodbury Chippington ALL over the world. And, while some were in England, others were in different countries where people spoke different languages, wore different clothes and had vastly different weather.
In some countries it was very hot all the time, like My Orca, whereas in others it was freezing, freezing, freezing cold like Iceland. Ah, that was why it was called Iceland, thought Cody.
And, of course, said the teacher there was Lapland, where Father Christmas and his reindeer lived. There it was snowing nearly all year round which was why the reindeer had warm coats and Father Christmas had a big white beard to keep his chin warm.
At last, something that made sense.
"So how do people get across all that water to go to different countries?" one of the other children asked.
"Well," said the teacher. "There are various ways. Some people would take a boat, while others might take a plane. Some countries like England and France are even linked by a tunnel through which a train can pass."
"How did you get to My Orca?" asked Cody.
"I went on a plane," she said. "It is like a big giant bird that can fly across the sky and take you from one country straight to another."

Shortly after that lesson his dad had told him, "Well, Cody, we are going away on holiday. We are going to go to another country called America. And we are going to travel on a plane."
He was so excited!
His dad told him they were going to see his Auntie Amanda, his mum's sister, who had em-ee-grated there from Sodbury Chippington about 10 years earlier. She had married a man from America and had gone to live with him in his country.
It all sounded interesting.
"And guess what sport, if you are good I will take you to a game of baseball."
Hmm, thought Cody. I wonder what that is. Still, it sounded fun.

Just before the game of baseball was over Cody's dad had tapped him on the shoulder. "Come on, sport," he had said, "We have to go and meet your mum. We are flying back home in a couple of hours and we have to go to the Airport."
Cody knew what the airport was, he had already been to two of them. They were where they kept all the planes. And where the passengers had to gather to get on them and fly to wherever in the world they were going.
Pushing past the big man who was queueing to buy what must have been his FIFTH hot dog of the game, they hurried down the steps and out of the ground. "We mustn't miss our flight," warned Cody's dad.
But try as he might Cody's legs couldn't move very fast.
He was tired.
He had only woken up a little while ago, but he felt very sleepy again and just couldn't go any further. He had to sit down. So he did.
"Cody come on, we have to hurry up," said his dad.
Cody didn't want to hurry up. He couldn't hurry up. It was so frustrating. He started to cry.
"Oh come on, Sport," said his dad, stopping and bending down to wipe away his tears with a handkerchief. "I know, it has been a long day. Come here."
And he lifted the little boy up, up, up into his arms.
That was the last little Cody could remember till just a minute ago when his dad had bent over and gently woken him up.
"We are at the airport, Sport," he told him quietly. "We must get out. Mum is waiting."
He lifted the boy from the back seat and they emerged into the mass of people, scurrying here and there.
They had been in a taxi, a car that people used to get them from one place to another when they didn't have their own car with them.
A man climbed out of the driving seat and came around to open up the boot of the taxi, and lifted out his dad's bag.
His dad found some money in his pocket and gave it to the taxi driver.
He bent to ruffle Cody's hair. "Now, y'all have a nice day!" he said rather pleasantly.
Then he got back into his taxi and drove off into the night.
As the plane passed overhead, very low, Cody felt himself being lifted up again. His dad put him over one shoulder and put his bag over the other and they went in through the sliding doors at the front of the airport. "Oh look who's here?" his dad said and, turning around, Cody's eyes lit up. "Mummy!" he shouted.
His mum came over and lifted him off his dad's shoulders, then gave him a hug.
"Did you have a nice time at the baseball?" she asked.
"Yeeah!" he shouted. "It was great. This big man ate all these hot dogs!"

Pretty soon they were pushing through lots of people again, Cody now lying in his mum's arms. First they had to do something called "check in" where they waited in a huge queue before dad gave over some papers and put their suitcases - the big bags that contained all their clothes - on something called a conveyor belt that carried them away. A lady then gave them some tickets and they went off to a place called the departure lounge where they sat and waited for their plane to arrive.
They waited... and waited... and waited. It seemed to be taking a very long time.
Eventually Cody could wait no longer. "I'm bored!" he said.
"Ok," said mum, "Then we had better find something for you to do to take your mind off things. Why don't you do some colouring."
"Yeah!" said Cody, with excitement. He liked colouring.
He looked around.
But where was his bag?
"Dad, where is my bag?" he asked.
His dad turned around and suddenly a strange look crossed his face.
"Oh no," he said, "We must have left it at the baseball!"
Suddenly, Cody thought about what that meant.
His bag. His bag and all his things. His colouring books... his pens... those nice sweets that Auntie Amanda had given him and... oh no, Stripey.
Gone. All gone. Lost forever.
He felt a feeling come over him. A horrible feeling. His eyes began to get wet and a tear dropped onto his cheek, followed by another, and another.
His friend, his best friend, his tiger, Stripey, had gone.
Before long Cody was crying so loud that all the people around him began to stare at him.
He didn't care.
"B... b... but I wannnnnt Striiipey!" he wailed.
His dad looked like he might cry, too, but he bent down until he was looking into Cody's tearful eyes.
"I promise you, sport, I promise you... I will do everything I can to get him back. We can't go back now because we will miss our plane but as soon as we land I will ring the baseball ground and see if they have found your bag. I promise."
For the little boy it seemed like a promise that would never be kept.
He thought of the globe and how far America was from England. It was a long, long way.
How on earth could his dad get his things back once they were on the other side of the world?