Pat Barker - Noonday

That wind would carry sparks from building to building faster than a man could run. He was suddenly terribly afraid, and not ashamed of it either. A man who tells you he’s not afraid of fire is either a fool or a liar. He lit another cigarette from the stub of the first. There was a strange smell, very sweet. He couldn’t think what it was. If he’d had to guess, he’d have said: incense. It didn’t smell like war. He thought it might be wood, centuries old, seasoned wood from burning churches. He thought he’d caught a whiff of it just now as they were driving past St. Bride’s. He tried again to peer into the flame-lit darkness of the court. Where was she? The conviction that something terrible had happened to her was growing on him by the minute. He shouldn’t have let her set off like that, with only the old woman as a guide, but then what else could he have done? Who’d ever made Elinor do anything she didn’t want to do? And then the memory of that evening resurfaced, bobbed up like a turd in a sewer. He had — he’d made her do something she hadn’t wanted to do. Oh, given enough time he knew he’d remember the events of that evening differently, smooth over the raw edges, but at the moment he couldn’t bear it. At least, it goaded him into action. He’d leave the ambulance, he decided. Go and look for her.

He tried to speak to the fireman by the pump, so he’d be able to tell Elinor what had happened if she returned by another route, but he was signaling to the two men holding the branch. They’d backed away from the wall and seemed to be arguing about what to do. And then, with a great rush of relief, Neville saw her, standing at the other end of the court, waving to him. He started towards her. As the roar of the pump faded, he became aware of yet another sound coming from the burning building. Almost a groan. It sounded so human he thought somebody must be trapped. Was that what the firemen were arguing about? Trying to decide if it was safe to go in? But then he saw them look at each other, laughing, so he knew it was all right, and Elinor was still waving. Jumping up and down now, shouting, but he couldn’t hear anything above the roar of flames. She’d been joined by a young man in army uniform, who looked vaguely familiar, but couldn’t be, of course; it was just somebody Elinor had roped in to help carry the stretchers. Well, good girl. The more young, male muscle there was around, the better.

Whoever it was, he was waving too, or beckoning: Come on, come on. Hey, he wanted to say, I’m coming as fast as I can, but then, just as he drew level with the firemen, he heard the most stupendous crack, and the whole wall of the building bulged and loomed over him, hung motionless, and then, slowly it seemed, began to fall. He saw everything, in detail, without fear or emotion: the dark mass above him cutting slices out of the sky until only a sliver remained. He couldn’t move; he couldn’t speak. He heard silence, but then the roar came crashing back and red-hot bricks fell on his face and neck and dashed him to the ground. A cry struggled to his lips, but it was already too late — his mouth was full of dust. He thought: I won’t get to Elinor. And then he forgot Elinor. What finally crushed his heart, as the avalanche of bricks and mortar engulfed him, was the knowledge that he would never see Anne again, he would never again see his daughter, in this world or any other.

In Bloomsbury, Paul was having a quiet night. He’d played a game of darts, flipped through yesterday’s newspapers and then set out on patrol with Charlie. At the corner of Guilford Street, Charlie stopped to light a cigarette. Shaking the match, he gazed open-mouthed in the direction of the City. Billowing clouds of black smoke, showers of sparks whirled upwards, a broken skyline of buildings stark against furnace red. “By heck, they aren’t half copping it.”

Paul felt the first premonitory tweak of fear. Elinor could be in that. Would be, if she was on duty. Charlie threw away the match and they walked on, their footsteps echoing in the eerie silence. No guns now, no drone of bombers. The All Clear had sounded an hour ago, unusually early. “Don’t worry,” Brian had said. “They’ll be back.”

But they hadn’t been. Not yet. And all the time, over the City, that extravagant, melodramatic, stage-sunset grew and spread, and, with it, Paul’s fear.

Their patrol over, they decided to get a cup of tea and a pasty from the van in Malet Street. God only knew what was in the pasties — no substance previously known to mankind — but at least they were warm. Paul and Charlie joined the back of the queue, stamping their feet and blowing on their fingers in a vain attempt to keep warm. Three or four places ahead of them, a woman was talking about an ambulance driver who’d been injured. “Weren’t there two of them?” another woman asked. And then a third voice: “Are you sure they were just injured? I heard they were dead.”

Elbowing people aside, Paul seized her arm. “Who?” He was shaking her. “Who?”

She stared at him, her mouth a scarlet gash in the drained pallor of her face. He tried to calm down. “It’s just, my wife’s an ambulance driver.” For some reason the word “wife” stuck in his throat; it sounded like the sort of thing somebody else would say, and that strangeness, the sudden unfamiliarity of the word, ratcheted up his fear.

“They didn’t say. Just two ambulance drivers had been injured, one of them a woman, that’s all I heard.”

She was lying — he’d just heard her say they were dead. Of course, it might be another woman — Dana or Violet — but somehow, from the very first moment, he knew it was Elinor.

Tearing himself out of Charlie’s restraining grip, he ran all the way to the depot in Tottenham Court Road and down two flights of stairs to the basement, which was deserted, except for three telephonists who fell silent as he entered. They looked nervously at each other. A middle-aged woman, who seemed to be the supervisor, came out of the office and stood in front of them. If he had any doubt, that dispelled it. He’d become somebody to be frightened of, as the bereaved always are.

“We can’t be certain, we really don’t know who it is.”

He could tell from the way her gaze slithered down his face that she did. “Where?”

“Wine Office Court, but it’s no use going there,” she called after him. “They’ll have taken them to Bart’s.”

She followed him into the corridor, shouting something about an ambulance in the yard, so he veered abruptly to the left, burst through the swing doors into the parking area at the back. Sure enough, there was an ambulance about to leave. He ran along beside it, banging with his clenched fist on the door. The vehicle slowed and an elderly man with pouches under his eyes peered down at him.

“Can you give me a lift? My wife works here. Elinor? They’ve taken her to Bart’s.”

To his own ears, he was gobbling, gabbling, not making any sense at all, but the man nodded. “Oh, yes, I know Elinor. Hop in.” As Paul settled into the co-driver’s seat, the man added, “I’m off to Bart’s anyway. They’re evacuating. We’ve all got to go.”

The journey was a blur. Paul leaned forward, willing the driver to go faster, as they bumped slowly along, occasionally swerving to avoid craters in the road. With every mile, after the first, the orange glare grew until the sky was every bit as bright as noon. Everywhere, fires were raging, many of them out of control. Paul couldn’t take it in, street after street burning. Only the details registered. Once, he looked down and saw a pigeon flapping about in the gutter with its wings on fire.