He looked around, feeling guilty. He was in the right, but it felt wrong.
He threw the stone. It went wide. Now he was glad nobody had been watching.
He hunted for more stones – stocked up with a few. But the next throw hit the target. The light went out instantly.
A car crunched on broken glass, and Frankie took cover behind the rubble, still feeling like he’d done something wrong.
It was a black car, with writing on the side. Big letters in white, like they’d been made with some kind of sticking paper.
ARP
The car door opened, and Frankie slid further behind the debris. It was Reynolds.
Frankie felt a pang of fear. He knew it was wrong to feel like that about his own father, but he couldn’t help it.He’d never actually seen his father hurt anyone, but every time he was near him it felt like something bad was going to happen.
Reynolds lifted a wooden box from the passenger seat of the car, and carried it into the warehouse. The metal sliding door screeched behind him, until it clanged shut.
23
The ARP headquarters was in the church cellar. A musty storage space in peacetime, an ancient, iron door separating the room from the crypt proper, where they buried the former priests, or so everyone said. Not a place anyone would choose to spend any time in, but a place presumed safe from the worst of the bombs. Enough space for a camp bed, so whoever was manning the station could get some sleep when things were quiet. A large-scale map of the district was pinned to the wall, not that anybody ever looked at it. Everyone who’d grown up on the island knew every street.
Most of the space on the desk was taken up by the wireless set. Transmitter and receiver. There’d be a message every fifteen minutes when things were quiet. And things had been quiet for almost a year. Then, suddenly, they weren’t.
Beaumont had put up with a year of abuse. Tinpot dictator, he’d been called, all for doing his job, making sure people were obeying the blackout. When his team of volunteers had shut down the high street for a rehearsal of a gas attack, half the people ignored them, walking through their war game as if they knew better. Beaumont had lain awake that night, praying for a gas attack. Put them in their places. Everyone had been given the gas masks, shown how to use them, but most of them still didn’t believe in the threat.
But that was all changed now. Now the bombers had arrived, Beaumont was a man whose time had come. Tonight,as the bombs rained down, he was the most powerful man on the island, just because he’d raised his hand a year and a half ago when they’d asked for volunteers.
The radio squawked. Kathleen, one of Beaumont’s more competent volunteers, picked up the receiver and listened, noting down the message.
‘Two high explosives, Limehouse.’
Useless information. Out of their jurisdiction. As if they didn’t have enough to worry about already. Half the island was burning.
Beaumont knew, on a purely theoretical level, that he should be out there. The training had been very clear. See and be seen. But what good could he do? The volunteer fire wardens were doing what they could. He could do more here, co-ordinating. Keeping things under control.
There was a commotion at the door. Beaumont looked up from his desk. It was the farmer. The one who’d brought the cricket bat.
‘That shelter in the park,’ Cook said. ‘It’s not safe.’
‘Course it’s safe,’ Beaumont said. ‘Only built a few months ago. Government specification.’
‘You’ve got to close it,’ Cook said. ‘Get people out.’
‘Get them out of the shelter?’ Beaumont asked, as a shower of dust fell from the ceiling and a bomb fell nearby.
‘It’s going to come down,’ Cook said. ‘You need to put a sign up. Boards across the door. I’ll do it if you’ve got the lumber.’
The phone rang. Kathleen picked it up, listened.
‘They want to lower the bridge at Shadwell,’ she said. ‘Get more fire engines onto the island.’
Beaumont was aware all eyes were on him. It was his decision. But it was an impossible one to make. Not enough information, and conflicting priorities. Keep the waterways open,the latest bulletin from the government had made very clear. But that had been before the island had been turned into a target for the whole of the Luftwaffe.
‘What shall I tell them?’ Kathleen asked.
‘The bridge stays up,’ he said.
Kathleen relayed this order. There was shouting from the other end. Beaumont leant over and cut the line.
