The heat of the fires on a summer's night surrounded her and burned her lungs, but she managed to feel a little relief at the sight of the house still standing. She crossed over the glass-littered yard to the back door, itself having been blown open. Entering the house, she heard the bell of a fire truck as it came up their street but had no time to admire Beth's extraordinary hearing. She looked around the kitchen for something to fill with water.
The glow inside the house was far brighter than that in the shelter. Mary assumed it was the houses opposite that were in flames. Their house seemed to have survived … or at least the shell of it had; everything inside had been smashed against walls and cupboards. And the hot wind of fires that blew through her hair meant the windows no longer had glass.
She found a porcelain jug that was still whole minus its handle, and she crept to the scullery. Turning the tap on, she thanked the God she didn't believe in when the water flowed. With a full jug, Mary left the oven-like shell of the house behind and returned to the shelter to find Beth on the floor searching for something. The lantern still wasn't lit.
“Ow!”
“Glass?” guessed Mary.
“Shit!”
“Beth,” warned her father.
Beth got up to her knees and struck the precious match she'd found. Light filled the shelter and Mr. Wade pushed the door. Mary latched it closed. The heat and sounds of rumbling were both dulled and as Oliver coughed out of his concussion, Mary joined Beth once more on the bunk. Smoke lingered, and outside in the night, lives lay in ruins.
In spite of this, Mary was relieved—happy, even—that no one else she cared for had been taken.
The thought made her feel selfish.
TWENTY-THREE
BILL LEANED BACK ON THE SHELTER WALL with the closed door to his right, stretching his legs out on the bunk. Across from him his wife held their son tightly. They both lay on their side with their eyes closed. Bill marveled at how they were able to sleep.
It had been a few hours since the bomb had hit. In that time bunks had been swept as much as was possible while deathly whistles carried on falling all around, but none of the nearby explosions were as close as the one that had almost ended their war. Mary had said the house was still standing and free from fire, but the closeness of that hit had shaken them all.
After they'd made the shelter habitable once more, they sat thanking the heavens. The assault started to die down. But if nerves were frayed, no one showed it. Bill was used to sleeping in far worse conditions, but he'd been trained to. His civilian family hadn't, yet they dealt with it as well as any soldiers might.
He glanced up to the two girls sleeping.
One girl and one … something else.
He hadn't been blind; Beth had saved Lynne's life. He briefly thought about all the things that had happened and the decisions that had been made in recent years, months even. If one of them had been made differently, he may well be mourning the loss of his beloved wife. Only Beth could've heard what she had. The bombers must've been flying high, and with all the other noise around their sound was lost to everyone except her.
Still, Bill couldn't ignore what she was. As Jeff had said, he couldn't afford to let his guard down. She was still changing, after all. He looked away from her, down at his leg. He could go mad trying to reconcile his mind's warnings with his heart's feelings. It was hard, though, not to think about it—about what would happen to her in the future. And yet, when she'd been a young girl, Bill had sometimes found it easy to look past her dormant malevolence. Every time he caught his guard slipping, he doubled his efforts to keep her at arm's length. It was bizarre that now the suspected monster within her was emerging, he was finding it harder not to care. As his eyes finally drooped closed, he wondered if he was simply so good at playing along that he was beginning to believe his own lies.
* * *
Bill's eyes opened again, this time from shock.
For something signifying peace, the continuous tone of the sirens’ all clear signal was a most rude awakening. His right cheek was numb and he lifted his head from the metal wall, wincing at the ache that had settled into his neck. His wife stirred and in turn woke Oliver. Up on the raised bunk the two girls, lying head-to-toe, propped up sleepily onto their elbows in synchrony, like some rehearsed theatre production.
Stretching his neck from side to side and back to front, Bill swung around carefully and put his legs down, looking up at the blue crack around the door. He didn't need to look at his wristwatch with its cracked glass to know it was somewhere between five and five-thirty in the morning. Leaning forward, putting up with the discomfort in his leg, he pulled up the latch and opened the door. The shelter was washed in a deep early morning blue tinted with golden embers.
One by one they all made their way up to their small yard. It was strewn with debris. The small patch of vegetables on top of the shelter would provide no sustenance now. Lynne proceeded with nurse duty, quickly going around each of them in turn, checking their grazes and cuts. No one had escaped unharmed, though it was hard to say who was better off. Bill hadn't actually seen the mess his wife and daughter had ended up in; he'd only heard tell of it. And Beth didn't look to have come off as badly as expected from what sounded like a very painful incident.
Thanks in no small part to Mary, Oliver was unharmed, save for the lump on his head from hitting a wooden crossbeam on the shelter frame. Both girls had cuts on their hands and knees from crawling around the shelter floor looking for things. Lynne continuously rubbed her wrist where Beth had gripped it so tightly. But they'd all escaped with their lives, and that was all Bill cared for. Slowly, and not particularly steadily, they all walked over the yard and filed through the open back door. Here they all seemed to congregate once more, taking in the full extent of the mess. And this was only the kitchen.
Bill was used to the smell that filled the air, even though it was a little different in this country. There had been no guns firing or men fatally wounded and left for days, but it was a bad smell just the same. The smoke and dust got to the back of his throat as he walked on his crutches through into the sitting room. The tape that had been stuck in X-shapes all over the windows had done nothing, and the glass that used to be there was now scattered all over the floor. Large shards were strung together by the tape, and a few shards still hung dangerously in window frames. There were plenty of pieces to cut the careless. It was undoubtedly the same story with every window in the house. Bill looked through one of them, to the street outside.
“Jesus Christ …”
“William. Jonathan. Wade.”
Bill remained frozen. He just kept staring out of the front window while his wife came in and up to his side.
“Never have we tolerated taking the lord's name in—” Lynne gasped. “Jesus Christ,” she muttered. Her hand darted to her mouth. “Joan.”
The children came in warily, lined in a row, crunching glass and whatever else under their feet as they stood and gawped, all gazing dumbfounded out of the broken window that suitably framed the moving picture outside.
Aside from a thin cloud of light smoke, the far side of Moravian Street was gone.
Royston Street, the road that ran from almost opposite the Wade's house to Bonner Street, had disappeared. It was now buried under tons of brick, mortar and timber that only yesterday had been terraces of houses. Most of the fire trucks had gone by now, replaced with Heavy Rescue workers and their vans and ambulances. As they watched, a couple of tea vans came up their street, parking behind the other vehicles and adding to the eeriness. Only their side of the road was free enough of rubble to offer passage.
It was a maddening scene, as surreal as it was horrific. Sticking out of the rubble in places were the remnants of houses, shells of exterior and interior walls. Here and there people wandered aimlessly, shell-shocked and not knowing what to do. Bill recognized some of them. Along with these aimless drifters were many who, after being bombed out themselves, were helping with
rescue efforts, having no consideration for their own tragedy. Bill limped up close to the window and poked his head out, minding the jagged glass. Already a couple of neighbors were out with their brooms, sweeping the pavement and road outside their house. The young sat or stood, staring at the carnage and not being able to make heads nor tails of it all, while the elderly gladly received a hot cup of tea before complaining about getting their best cardigan dirty.
With nothing now standing in the way of their eastern facing house, the dawn sky was lit with a splendid bright orange glow as the sun broke the roof of the first standing house, quite some way down Royston Street. The sun's rays, highlighting tiles and chimneys, drew perfect lines through the dust and smoke, streaming through the moving gaps. The scene had a new level of dreamlike strangeness cast upon it.
It was easy to think that the rest of London lay in tatters just like this, but this had been the only hit in their immediate area. A few streets in any direction and this scene would be hidden; the smoke that trailed up into the sky would be the only indication of destruction. Bill was sobered. It was one thing to see this kind of destruction in a different country and happening to other people. It was so much worse seeing it happen on his own doorstep.
He heard someone yell.
A rescue worker stood on top of the rubble under which the corner of Royston Street hid, calling out for help from his colleagues.
Somewhere in the rubble was a potential survivor.
TWENTY-FOUR
BETH AND THE OTHER FOUR RESIDENTS of number six Moravian Street, still dressed in Sunday's clothes, were fixated on the broken scene playing out through their living room window. After peering out through the hazardous frame, Beth's father began to limp with his crutches toward the hall and the open front door.
“Bill, where are you going?” asked Beth's mother.
“I've got to help.”
Lynne picked up her nurse's shawl from the floor. “There's nothing you can do in your state.” She shook the garment and all manners of small debris fell to the floor. Glass embedded in the thread twinkled and she threw it back onto the arm of the chair with a sigh.
“I've got to do something,” Bill continued. “I can't just stand around and watch.” He stepped out, and Lynne closely followed through the open door.
Beth and her siblings were still reeling from shock. From the outside her mother approached the glassless front window. “Stay here and start sweeping the house. Be careful; there's glass everywhere. I don't want any of you picking it up with your fingers. If you need me, I'll be nearby.”
“Is your friend going to be all right?” asked Mary.
“I don't know.” Sympathy invaded Lynne's eyes before she walked away into the mayhem right outside their home.
Beth looked around at the blanket of fine rubble that covered the floor, dreading the enormous task ahead.
“Where do we start?” asked Mary.
“I'll get the broom,” said Beth, but before she could step back toward the kitchen she heard another yell. This time it was her father shouting for help. Beth responded immediately. “Mary, look after Ollie.”
Beth ran out into the scene. An ambulance was parked outside the house, and next to it was the edge of the rubble that had spread across the road. Following its fringe, Beth made her way toward her father. He'd managed to stumble his way up on top of what was left of the house on the other corner of Royston Street. His crutches were laid down beside him and as he sat he shifted lumps of ruin.
“What's wrong, Dad?”
Her father snapped his head up at her voice. “Elizabeth. This is no place for a young girl like you.”
“But I can help,” she pleaded, making her way up to him and starting to shift bricks and bits of wood.
“Elizabeth.”
Beth carried on digging regardless. She couldn't understand what the fuss was about after having seen a couple of boys helping out further up the road. Before her father could say anything else, a burly rescue worker in a dusty uniform and tin hat clambered up.
“You found something?” he asked, not waiting for the answer while another rescue worker approached.
“I heard something moving under this lot,” said Bill.
Beth could sense his stern eye before he carried on helping. She could see that his limited movement prevented him from helping as much as he wanted. With the four of them working around an ever growing hole in the rubble, Beth suddenly put the back of her hand up to her mouth and nose.
“Ew!”
“What is it?” her father asked. The two workers kept digging.
Beth leant a little closer to her father. “I just got a really bad whiff of something.” She lowered her voice further. “I don't think it was a person moving around … I think he's dead.”
“He?” asked her father.
“Yes. I got a whiff of blood, but it wasn't fresh. He doesn't smell very good.”
Suddenly there was a commotion.
“There!” shouted the worker opposite them. The two of them, with a burst of adrenaline, threw out more bits of rubble before their determination turned into frustration. “Damn it!” said the other.
As the surrounding rubble was removed, Beth and her father looked down into the man-made hole at the gray body of a middle-aged man. His eyes were wide open and dried, black blood was strewn across his head and clothes. There was no sign of the rats that Beth suspected had made the faint sounds of movement that her father had heard. They would've been long gone, scared off by the ruckus. The two workers continued to dig out the deceased man, their urgency replaced with silent respect. He would be buried decently like every body found without life.
It wasn't the first dead body Beth had seen, and unless the war ended tomorrow it was unlikely to be the last. But that didn't stop her from stiffening up slightly. Beside her, Bill started to struggle up to his feet and she forced herself out of her faint mortification to help him up, and then guided him down to the road.
“Come here,” her father said under his breath, leading her to the other side of a rescue truck. “You could smell his blood?”
“It was quite strong. Couldn't you smell anything?”
“No. It'll take another few hours before he starts to noticeably smell. And how did you know it was a he?”
Beth shrugged. “He smelled like one.”
Her father limped a couple of steps away, turning his back and rubbing his chin. Beth knew were it not for his leg he'd have been pacing around in circles. As it was, he just stood still until he thought through whatever was on his mind and then turned back to face her.
“Do you really want to help?”
Beth nodded.
“This is a crucial time for anyone left alive who's trapped under that lot.” He gestured to the expansive bombsite. “The sooner we find them, the better the chance they'll still be alive. Do you think you might be able to …” he paused to find the right word “… locate them?”
Beth took a deep breath and nodded.
“Are you sure?”
“I'll try.”
“One more thing. This is going to sound horrid, but we can't afford to waste time on those who are already gone.”
“I understand, Dad.” It did sound mean, but Beth was relieved that she didn't have to go through what had just happened again. The smell on its own was bearable, but when accompanied with the sight of a battered and pummeled body, it was too much too soon. Her father looked around, trying to see through the dust and smoke that still rose from various spots around the site. The expanse of the destruction was massive. Beth knew that even the biggest bomb couldn't have caused this much destruction on its own.
The full terrace of houses running from the junction with Royston Street down to Gawber Street—the next street over—were gone. As was half the terrace on the other side of Royston Street, opposite Beth's house. From the look of it, the first ten houses on both sides of Royston Street were not much more than rubble, and so were the first five or
so on Gawber. It must've been the work of two or three of the bigger bombs grouped together.
“Over there,” said her father, pointing down the road to the corner of Gawber Street. “We need to keep away from the masses. Be discreet.”
The two of them walked to the comparatively vacant area at the southern end of their street. Rubble spilled out everywhere, blocking vehicular passage on Gawber Street, too. On the opposite side, the closed Globe Street School stood relatively untouched.
Beth began wandering over the rubble, subtly smelling the air and listening out for telltale signs of struggle, whimpers, or anything that might suggest life. Gentle breezes infrequently glided through the streets and over the flattened houses. On one of those breezes Beth could smell sweat. She turned into the light gust and clambered over some debris, surprising herself with her balance on the erratically uneven and loose ground. From just in front of her, somewhere beneath her feet, there came a whimper.
The wind offered Beth a faint whiff of fresh blood.
Beth's insides flipped and twisted with a strong craving. With her increased need of the past few days her thirst was already a constant passenger. The thirst was supposed to have been quenched the previous day, but there hadn't been a suitable time for Bill to go and fetch her supply.
Beth closed her eyes and wondered if this was such a good idea after all. People need me, she reasoned, convincing herself that she'd had more than enough blood not six days prior. She focused on the task at hand, visualizing the people trapped and in need. She was in need, too, but nowhere near as much. With an iron determination she opened her eyes, turned to where her father had hobbled and called him over.
Within seconds he'd alerted rescue workers, and minutes later Beth was helping two of the uniformed men lift out the remains of a table, under which an unconscious mother and her sobbing infant daughter had been trapped.
“Step back, young lady,” one of the workers said to Beth, before he and his colleague pulled the woman and girl up to safety. Carrying the mother and helping the girl down to the road, they called for medical attention and a nurse rushed over to tend to them.
No Shelter from Darkness Page 17