Simon Beckett - Where There's Smoke

There was a thud as he hit the floor below. Everything was suddenly dark again. Kate rushed down the stairs, not pausing to search for a light switch, and ran to the figure lying in the hall. Ellis had landed on the boxes by the cellar door, splitting them open and scattering paper over the carpet.

Some of the flames had been snuffed by the impact, but he was still burning. Fire was already beginning to lick at the surrounding paper and boxes, less dramatic in the light from the open lounge doorway. Kate flung the quilt over him and beat at the motionless body, but a sudden pain in her leg made her cry out and jerk back. One corner of the quilt had been trailing in a cluster of burning papers, and had caught fire. She snatched it away, trying to stifle the flames, before she saw it was starting to burn in other places as well.

Kate flung it against the floor, stamping and kicking at it, cursing Lucy for buying a cheap, non-retardant quilt.

Something stung her cheek. She brushed off a glowing piece of ash. Looking up, she saw the hall was full of them.

The stink of petrol from the lounge returned like a forgotten threat, and she turned in time to see burning scraps of paper drift like black leaves through the open doorway.

The light from it suddenly changed. Angus screamed.

“Oh, Jesus, no,” Kate breathed.

She dropped the smouldering quilt and ran past Ellis to the lounge. The heat struck her before she reached it. The room was full of fire. Flames clamoured from everything the petrol had touched. The carpet was awash with them. The curtains were blazing rags, while the stack of posters was a torch that sent waves of smoke and ash across the Victorian mouldings. Kate recoiled, but the children’s screams were a stronger spur. She could see beyond the flames that the area around the leather settee and chair was still clear, and without waiting she pulled her coat around her head and darted through the doorway.

Hot hands patted her back and nipped her legs, and then she was through. She kept to the side of the room away from the windows, where the fire had yet to reach, and ran to the settee. Jack was ducking forward, thrashing his head around, and she could see how the back of his hair was singed and smouldering. A yard or two behind him the remains of the petrol can was a roaring yellow beacon that flared to the ceiling. He had managed to pull Emily so she lay across his lap, shielded from the worst of it, and Kate slapped at his hair, feeling the bite of the sparks on her already burned hands. Across from her Lucy’s eyes were frantic as she sat bound and gagged in the leather armchair, protected so far by its high, winged back.

Jack pulled his head away, lifting his chin for Kate to remove the tape from his mouth.

“Get the kids out!” he gasped, when she yanked it off.

“What about you?”

“No time! For Christ’s sake, do it!”

Kate wavered, knowing she would never get back in for Lucy and Jack. It was already like trying to breathe in the open door of a furnace. The room was filling with smoke as the flames spread, crowding the enclosure formed by the chairs and settee. Kate looked across at Lucy. Her blue eyes were wide and tearful over the tape as she nodded.

Kate snatched Angus from the playpen and grabbed up Emily from Jack’s lap. Emily began screaming, “Mummy! Mummy!” as she carried them away. Kate saw Jack gnawing at the tape around his wrists, and suddenly she went back. Still holding the children, she awkwardly knelt in front of him.

“What the fuck are you doing? Get out!” Jack shouted, but she had already bent to take the tape binding his ankles between her teeth. She tugged and worried at it, then it ripped and with a jerk he pulled his legs free.

“Right, now go!” he shouted.

She stood up, hoisting Angus and Emily into better positions, her wounded arm throbbing under their weight.

Jack was on his hands and knees, biting at the tape binding Lucy’s feet, pulling at it with his still fastened hands as Kate struggled with the two children to the wall furthest from the flames. She flinched at a pop from overhead as the light-bulb burst, but its light was hardly needed now. Squinting against the heat, she pressed their faces into her coat as she edged passed the blazing petrol can, and then stopped.

Through the smoke, she saw that the doorframe and the carpet in front of it was engulfed.

“Jack!” she shouted.

She heard him swear, and then there was a sudden clatter.

She turned and saw him dragging the rug from the floor, his wrists free and bleeding now, tipping the coffee table from it. He lurched towards her, wincing and clumsy with the pain of returning circulation, while behind him Lucy hobbled and almost fell. Kate started forward to help, but hot smoke suddenly took the air from her lungs. Coughing and fighting for breath, she turned her face and buried her mouth and nose in her coat as Jack pushed past and began to lash with the heavy rug at the flames around the door.

Lucy made it to her and half collapsed on Kate’s shoulder, chest heaving as she struggled to draw in air and cough with her mouth still covered by tape. She tried to peel it off, but her wrists were also bound, and another choking spasm doubled her up. Kate supported her as best she could, unable to do anything more with the children clinging to her. The skin of her face felt tight as they staggered after Jack. She could smell her hair beginning to burn. It was becoming difficult to see through the heat and smoke. She ducked as a sudden bang from the far side of the room threw a punch of white-hot flame at them. It was followed straight away by two more as the aerosol cans exploded. Cowering against the wall, Kate could hear a metallic pinging even above the roar of the fire and remembered the tins of lighter fluid. So did Jack, because she saw him dart a glance towards that corner before turning to where she and Lucy were huddled.

“Come on!” he shouted, and swept the thick rug over them like a man sheltering under a jacket. “Move!”

They stumbled towards the door. The carpet in front of it was still on fire, but Jack had beaten it down enough to pass, and the tented rug shielded them from the burning doorframe. Kate felt the hot lash of flames on her legs, and then they were out in the relative cool of the hall.

Ellis still lay face down. His clothes had largely burned away, and most of the papers and boxes around him had now caught. Kate faltered, but Jack draped the rug between them and Ellis’s pyre, blocking it from view as he herded them past.

Further along the quilt was blazing where Kate had left it, lying across the width of the hall. Jack stepped forward and flung the rug over it. It landed with a heavy whumf, snuffing the quilt’s flames like a candle. They went over it to the front door. The smoke was suffocating as Jack struggled with the lock. Then it clacked free, and he pulled open the door and ushered them out into the night’s sweet, cold air.

They staggered down the path in a cluster, supporting each other, not halting until they reached the gate. Kate looked back. Smoke was billowing out through the open door, and without thinking what she was doing she set down the children and ran back to the house.

She heard Jack shout, then she was in the hallway and the thick heat and smoke closed around her again. Holding her breath, she ran to where Ellis lay, barely able to see as she kicked aside the flaming papers and took hold of his feet.

His raw ankles looked bony and pathetic above the scorched training shoes as she dragged him backwards. After a few steps she stopped, pulled her coat over her mouth and nose and took several quick breaths. She was reaching down for his feet again when the tins of lighter fluid exploded.

There was a noiseless flash, and a hot pressure knocked her sideways. The hall was instantly an oven. She felt the skin of her face flayed and knew her hair was on fire.