Chapter 31 A colourful day.
After the emotional day the couple retired immediately after arriving at the hotel, but only after transferring James cot back to their room. They were all very tired. They quickly took their turn in the bathroom and prepared for bed. When they were watching James settling in, Martin took Louisa in a close embrace.
'Thank you Louisa', he said, swallowing hard, 'for your comforting support'
'It's OK Martin', Louisa whispered in his ears, 'I am glad I could be here for you. And I am so proud of you!'.
When Martin stroke his forehead with the forefingers and thumb of his right hand, Louisa recognized the symptoms of a headache. And when she saw him grab his ear with his left hand, Louisa she knew he was nervous too.
'Now relax, Martin you've had enough stress for today', she suggested and led him to the bed.
Louisa knelt next to him and with her cool strong hands, she softly massaged his forehead and slowly working down to his neck and shoulders. Occasionally, Louisa brushed his lips with a light tender kiss and slowly the deep frown on Martin's face smoothed away. He gazed at her lovely face, not sure how to react and too tired to ignite a passionate moment. For a moment, the thought of disappointing his wife revived his stress, but Louisa understood exactly what he needed.
'Shhh, Martin, it's OK, enjoy the moment and close your eyes if you like.'
Martin gave in and relaxed. Under Louisa's soft caresses, he closed his eyes and soon dozed off. Louisa continues her ministrations for a few minutes and then settled in herself, snuggling close to Martin, who in his sleep gently put an arm around her waist.
In the room across the corridor, Morwenna tried to find some sleep as well, but she struggled with it. She was very impressed by the events of the day. She had seen the doc saving a person's life often enough and he even had guided her and Al by telephone, to save Caroline Bosman's life. At a moment when he was in a very stressful situation himself. But this time the blood had ejected like a fountain from the boy's neck wound. She shivered when she thought back of that scary moment. She missed the presence of the little boy in her room. Of course she could understand that the Doc and Louisa wished to take care of him again, but yet she felt so damn lonely. She started to cry softly.
Suddenly she saw the flickering light from her smartphone, which she had set to silent mode. It was Al.
'Oh Al, I am so glad you're calling!'
Al could hear that she was crying.
'What's the matter Morwenner, shall I call the Doc?'
Despite her tears, Morwenna chuckled and melted by the lovely thought of someone worrying about her. She reassured him and explained the events of the day. Al felt relieved that nothing was wrong with her and started to distract her from the scary memories of the afternoon. He sent her a very funny picture of his father holding a lobster that had pinched the grey woollen cap on his head. They both giggled at the sight of it. As soon as Morwenna had calmed down, Al advised her to go to sleep and to benefit from her last day in the Netherlands the next day.
'Oh and .. er.. Morwenna… I miss you!'
'thank you Al, I miss you too… Good night!'
Completely reassured and with her loneliness gone, Morwenna settled down between her sheets and soon was far, far away in the land of sweet dreams.
Louisa woke up early the following morning. Earlier, Martin must have opened the curtains a bit, so there was just enough light in the room to see her husband lying on his back, seemingly still sleeping. She then found James in foetus position on Martin's front, his legs folded under his tummy like a little frog and his head resting on his daddy's chest, securely kept in balance by his father's arms around him. The little boy was sound asleep, obviously soothed by the regular rhythm of his father's heartbeat.
Louisa smiled and couldn't refrain from picking up her smartphone from the bedside table to take a snapshot of this precious moment. Louisa cuddled close to Martin and watched her sleeping son in awe. Martin opened his eyes and pulled his wife closer. Louisa smiled at him, but both remained silent because they didn't want to wake up James yet. Louisa shivered at the thought of what she could have missed should she have gone to Spain. The seminar and more in particular the last day, had learnt her that having to deal with this phobia must have been tremendously hard for Martin. She understood that better now. She really hoped that the coming holidays would bring them even closer together and that he'd be able to share his worries with her. She wouldn't force him though. They both needed a relaxing stay. Having pleasant thoughts about the places they would visit, she dozed off again.
Half an hour later, James woke-up. With his little hands, he patted on his father's chest.
'Dada', he said.
'Good morning James', Martin answered. He was rewarded with the brightest smile his son could produce.
'I thought it was bad to let babies sleep in their parents' bed?', Louisa informed, trying to hide the smile on her face.
'Ehm …James was restless tonight. Must have had too much new impressions lately and I didn't want to wake you up', Martin explained.
Soon the little family was preparing for the day. While doing this, they discussed what to do on this sunny day in Amsterdam.
The doorknob already in his hand to go to the breakfast room, Martin asked
'You're not going to share that picture with the villagers, are you?'
'Of course not, not even with Morwenna', Louisa replied, showing him that she had understood the message.
They knocked on Morwenna's door and all together they went downstairs.
'Morwenna', Louisa said, once they were all enjoying a healthy breakfast, 'as it is your last holiday, we'd like to let you choose what to do today. Of course we will assure that you will be at the airport in time, but as your flight is only at the eight PM, there is plenty of time to visit something or to do some shopping if you prefer.
Oh no, no shopping please, Martin thought, but he remained silent.
Morwenna hesitated, but then said,
'I have never been to a zoo, can we go to Artis please? I saw some publicity on it and I found some interesting information via Google.
Morwenna's choice surprised Martin, but with enthusiasm he replied to her,
'That's an excellent choice Morwenna. Naturis Artis Magistra as it's called officially is one of the first zoos. It opened in 1838. Already at the time, it opened for all people and not only for the rich as was done earlier in London. It is located in the middle of Amsterdam and is surprisingly large. There is a beautiful aquarium which houses in a wonderful Neo-classical building. There are all kinds of animals and it will be interesting for James to see, although he is too young to understand it. If you allow us to come with you, that is…'.
Both Morwenna and Louisa were astounded by the knowledge Martin had on this subject and by the fiery argument he held for going there. He looked like a ten year old boy! They only knew him as the village's dog hater, so they both had held their breath when Morwenna had made her suggestion.
'That's a deal then', Louisa concluded. 'I'll ask the hotel to prepare us a picnic, then we will not use precious time by going to a restaurant. And probably the restaurant at Artis will not meet Martin's requirements for healthy nutritious food.'
'And I'll call Edwin to get us there', Martin added.
At ten, the opening hour of Artis, the little family was getting out of the Lexus. Martin gave Edwin some instructions for later that day and off they went to the entrance.
As it was still early, they made a complete tour around the park first. Morwenna exited and in awe at every animal she saw. The chimpanzees, the giraffe and the impressive elephant were her favourites. She took a lot of pictures of the animals. Louisa also took quite some pictures. Her favourites were the pictures of Martin with James perched on his arm, explaining lots of still hardly understandable things to his son. She loved to see her husband paying so much attention to their son. Even if he was fully dressed in his suit and tie, because he pertinently refused to wear his casual clothes in Amsterdam, he looked relatively relaxed.
Only once that day, he lost his temper, when a badly behaving twelve year old boy kept throwing gravel stones to the elephants. The boy must have thought that Martin was the Zoo's general manager, because before running away, the boy bent his head and said 'Sorry sir, it won't happen again'.
At lunch time they found a nice place with tables and benches, so much too Martin's relief, they didn't have to sit on a blanket. The prepared lunch didn't disappoint, so refreshed, they continued their visit.
Martin directed them to the Butterfly hall, with over thousand square meters and more than thousand butterflies of various species, the biggest in Europe. He hoped to see the Glasswing (Greta Oto), the longwing butterfly (heliconius spec), the wonderful blue morpho or the rice paper butterfly (Idea leuconoe). Before he entered the hall, he had to swallow, because an unpleasant memory of his youth flashed through his mind. Louisa saw it happen and reassuringly laid her hand on his arm.
From the freshness of the Spring afternoon, they entered the warm, humid habitat of the butterflies. There were beautiful flowers everywhere and on each plant they discovered colourful butterflies. Martin amazed them again by telling them the names of the most exceptional butterflies they had ever seen. James giggled at the fragile creatures that were fluttering around. He even tried to catch one with his chubby hands. Martin knelt next to him and took his son's hands in his.
'James, butterflies are not to be touched by us humans, that will damage their wings and they will die if they can't fly anymore'.
James frowned when he saw his father's serious face, but as soon as he discovered that his daddy wasn't angry with him, he smiled again. Still holding both his son's hands in one of his, Martin pointed at a blue butterfly on a plant nearby. Martin tried to keep James as quiet as possible because he didn't want to frighten the blue Morpho. Suddenly, the butterfly flew up and landed on the back of Martin's hand. Both father and son were literally speechless of what they saw from such a short distance. Louisa stood a bit further away. She tried to save this priceless moment for the future, by taking pictures of it. So did Morwenna, but she focussed a bit more on the butterfly than Louisa did.
It didn't take long before the butterfly flew away and the little family moved forwards to another part of the hall. When the tour was finished, Martin had seen most of the rare species the butterfly hall housed, so he felt really satisfied.
They spent some more time in the zoo, they had seen all animals and even the special exposition of hippopotamus Tanja, who had lived in the zoo all of her forty nine years of life.
'When I was here years ago, I saw her', Martin said. 'At that time, animals were still kept in small cages. The basin Tanja lived in was really small for such a huge animal, but she didn't seem to bother. She was loved by all staff and also by persons that came to see her on a regular basis'.
After this, Louisa and Morwenna spent some time in the souvenir shop, while Martin sat down to have a quiet moment with his now sleeping son.
Exactly at four PM, Edwin waited outside the entrance of the zoo to bring them to the airport. That morning, they already had loaded Morwenna's luggage in the car.
At Schiphol, Edwin stopped the car at the kiss and ride area, but Martin ordered him to park the car or to make a little tour on his own, because he intended to bring Morwenna to the check-in desk.
Not exactly knowing what to do or to say, Morwenna hesitated to say goodbye. Louisa, benefitting of her social skills, took the matter at hand. She handed James over to Martin and gave the young girl a real big hug and a kiss on each cheek. Much to Morwenna's surprise, Martin gave her a fifty pound bill to take a taxi home from the airport, then shook her hand and finally also bent to give her a peck on the cheek. He scraped his throat.
'Ehm… Thank you Morwenna, you did a good job', he said. 'Don't be late at the surgery tomorrow, Dr Brown expects you to be punctual.'
Finally the youngest of the Ellingham claimed his goodbye moment with Morwenna.
'Wen' he babbled and reached out for her. Morwenna took him in his arms and he clang to her like one of the little monkeys they had seen that morning. A last big hug for her little friend and then it was really time to go. Just before customs, Morwenna turned around and waved. She liked what she saw, the tall grumpy doctor having his wife and son in one embrace. She smiled and waved a last time.
Once at the other side of customs, she finally allowed herself to worry about Al. Unlike the other three days of her journey when he had spammed her with messages every twenty minutes or so, she hadn't received one single sign of life since breakfast…
To be continued
I Hope you enjoyed this little virtual visit to Artis. Let me know what you think about it.