Free Hannah & Emil by Belinda Castles Page B

stab of envy. Then a siren filled the shadowy space between the buildings and I thought: Oh Lord, what now? We looked at each other. The street was empty of people, traffic. The noise grew. We put our hands over our ears and tried to speak.
    â€˜We have to get to the tube,’ Geoffrey was shouting.
    â€˜It’s miles away,’ I replied.
    Suddenly there was a draft of warm air from a doorway, a hand was slapping down on my shoulder and we were all being pulled off the street and into a baker’s that I had never before noticed. It was not the one we used. Mother was particular, though Father told her it did not matter where you bought your bread. ‘Bread is bread , Maria. It is all the same. Go where it smells good.’ A woman with meaty hands and a lot of jewellery said, while the dozen or so people crowded into the shop stared at us, ‘You are the children of the tobacconist.’ She spoke slowly, as though we were hard of hearing, or simple. ‘Wait in here until the all-clear and I will come with you and explain to your father.’
    The baker gave us an iced bun each and we sat on the floor in a corner while the customers grumbled about the audacity of the Germans now with these daylight raids. I tore off and devoured large pieces of sweet bread while the boys did the same, Benjamin cramming his into his mouth so fast I was sure he would make himself ill. There was a movement in the earth somewhere close by, as close as I had ever felt it, and the people in the shop were quiet as a fire engine’s siren grew louder and louder and soon tore right by the boarded-up window, a flash of red just visible where the ply did not quite meet the frame at the top.
    â€˜My stars,’ murmured the woman who dragged us in here.
    â€˜Bit close for comfort,’ replied the baker, and they started up again, more quietly than before, speculating where it might have hit.
    â€˜Hope it wasn’t the tube,’ a man said. ‘We’ll have to walk to Warren Street. Pain in the you-know-what.’
    I grew drowsy among the feet, at least one pair of which were ripe I noticed now I had finished eating, and I leaned my head against the wall and tried not to breathe through my nose. Then Geoffrey was shaking my shoulder, the all-clear was sounding, and the woman insisted on walking with us to the shop, though it was only around the corner and we did it by ourselves every day.
    Once more the shop was empty when Father should be waiting for us, and we burst into the flat to find them silently contemplating a long, curved, jagged-edged piece of metal on the table. Mother jumped up and pressed us to her roughly. ‘Where have you been, you terrible children?’ The buttons of her blouse pressed into my cheek until I wriggled from her grasp so that I could take another look at what was on the table. There was nothing else on it. The usual teacups and ledgers and little heaps of change to be sorted had been cleared as though the piece of metal were some kind of exhibit.
    Geoffrey gasped. ‘Is that an anti-aircraft shell?’ He drew closer.
    â€˜Perhaps it’s part of a German bomb.’
    â€˜Can I touch it?’ Benjamin said.
    â€˜My God, no,’ said Mother.
    â€˜Where did you find it?’ I asked Father, staring at its deadly edge, allowing myself to imagine briefly it jutting out from Geoffrey’s head.
    â€˜On the front step,’ he told us. ‘Your mother has packed your bags. You are going to the country.’

    We saw when we reached the tube platform that all the adults in the area had conspired to banish their children. Around us parents bellowed instructions, as though their children were already on a train moving off from them. ‘Don’t eat your sandwich until you’ve changed trains. Mind your cousin.’
    Mother was silent and pale. Her strange light had grown more intense lately while the outline of her seemed to fade within it,