Free Fire! Fire! by Stuart Hill

CHAPTER 1
    My name’s Tom Hubbard and I’m twelve years old… I think. At least that’s what my mother told me, but we hardly ever discussed unimportant things like when I was born. We were too busy trying to find enough food to live on to worry about details like that. But everything changed when I got a job in the household kitchens of Master Samuel Pepys. My mother was so happy knowing that I’d be warm, well-fed and safe.
    I even have my own room; although I’m the youngest of all the servants I can shut my door on everyone and have some space to myself. Most of the maids and serving men have to share with others in the attics or cellars, or sleep in whatever space they can find next to the kitchen fire.
    â€œI can die in peace now,” Mother said to me when she heard about my new job. And sadly, within a few months she did die, though not in peace. Like thousands of others in the summer of last year, she died horribly of the plague. I was working in the kitchens at the time so even now I don’t know where she’s buried. I was told that her body was taken away in a cart with dozens of others and thrown into one of the plague pits where hundreds of people were buried together. So many people died and so quickly, there just wasn’t time or even space to bury them individually. The only thing I could do was to go to the nearest plague pit that had been filled in and lay some flowers on the huge mound of earth that covered it. I hope that mother understood that I did my best to say goodbye to her properly.
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    My new master, Samuel Pepys (it’s pronounced ‘Peeps’), was one of the most important people in London. He worked as Secretary to the Navy. I didn’t know what that meant exactly, but I knew it had something to do with the warships that kept our country safe from enemies and that my new master was very good at his job.
    Of course that didn’t make much difference to me. Working all day in the heat and steam of the kitchens I never saw any of the important people who came to visit the house. I just had to help the cooks and kitchen maids get everything ready for the wonderful meals they ate. My day started early at five o’clock in the morning, and sometimes didn’t finish until the clocks were striking ten o’clock at night! I knew I was lucky to have a job in such an important household, but the work was hard. Things were made easier by my friend, Pip. He was the kitchen dog, a small black and white terrier whose job it was to kill any rats and mice that tried to steal food from the pantries and storerooms. He shared a sleeping space with me near the fires when I first arrived in the house and didn’t have my own room. Pip could always make me smile when I felt sad about my mother, and he’d growl a warning if anyone tried to steal our place next to the fire.
    But then came a day when everything changed.
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    I was scrubbing the kitchen floor and the noise of the stiff brush bristles on the flagstones meant that I didn’t hear Master Pepys come into the kitchen. He was talking to the head steward about a dinner he was planning for some important friends.
    â€œWill you stop that infernal noise!” a voice suddenly shouted and a hand pulled me roughly to my feet.
    When I realized it was Master Pepys I was terrified. I could easily lose my job if he got angry with me and then I could be thrown onto the streets with nowhere to live! I started to say sorry, but he waved me to silence while he straightened his wig which had slipped to one side when he’d grabbed me. All fashionable men wore these long wigs, including the king and his court. But as my master settled the hairpiece in place he suddenly stopped and stared at me.
    â€œWhat’s your name, boy?” he asked, his eyes narrowing.
    â€œTom Hubbard, sir,” I almost whispered, dreading what he might say next.
    â€œAnd are you