The Burning Summer

by Claire Rayner

  “I’ll have to. Look, Ruthie, go ask Mrs Fleischer to let me have some milk for the baby—tell her this has gone off, will you? And be quick.”

  So Ruthie went and asked Mrs Fleischer, but she hadn’t any to spare, and she asked Black Sophie, too, and she only had some tinned milk, and the baby wouldn’t take that.

  Her mother muttered under her breath when Ruthie came back and told her no one had any milk to spare, so Ruthie said, “I’ll go to the dairy, shall I? I’ll buy some for you.”

  Ruthie’s mother looked at her, her face worried and said, “It’s getting late—there may be a siren soon….” There often were sirens at this time of day.

  “I’ll run all the way,” Ruthie said. “I’ll be quick.” The dairy was in Commercial Road, past the beginning of Festival Street, quite a long way away.

  “I don’t think …” Ruthie’s mother said, then frowned again when Leon began to cry in the bedroom. “Look, you’ll have to—but God help you if you dawdle, you hear me? Run all the way …”

  “I could go across Mrs Levy’s,” Ruthie said, trying to be helpful. “That would be quicker.”

  The gap across the street where Mrs Levy’s house had been made a quick way through to the bottom of Festival Street, to Commercial Road, and some of the women who lived in the street did climb awkwardly over the piles of stones and bricks when they wanted to get to Commercial Road in a hurry. But Ruthie’s mother had been furious the only time Ruthie had gone over there herself, had promised to give her the hiding of her life if she ever went there again.

  “No!” she said now, very angrily. “No—that’s dangerous. You dare to put foot on that way, and I’ll kill you, you hear me?”

  Leon was crying very loudly now, so Ruthie nodded quickly and said, “I won’t then, I promise, God’s honour, I won’t. I’ll go the proper way, and I’ll run.”

  So her mother gave her a shilling, and Ruthie ran down the stairs to go to the dairy. She ran all the way to the end of Aspen Street, because she knew her mother was watching her from the window, even without turning her head to look. She even ran part of the way along Commercial Road, too, but then she had to stop and walk because she got breathless.

  She loved Commercial Road. It was so wide, so full of huge buses and cars and lorries, so full of people rushing about. And there were so many shops to look at, bakers, and grocers, dress shops, and toy shops. There had been a Woolworth’s once, before the really big raid that afternoon when the docks got a hell of a pasting. She had heard Lenny Fleischer talking about that day, telling the women how so many people had been in Woolworth’s that afternoon that they hadn’t been able to get them all out. They had sealed up the place, Lenny said, leaving all the bodies there till they could try to get them out another time. Ruthie had thought then that the people in Woolworth’s that afternoon had been very lucky, to be locked in, to be able to take anything they wanted from the counters, until she remembered they were dead, and would be lying down, and couldn’t take things from the counters after all.

  She didn’t stop to look at any of the shops, now. She had promised, and anyway, her mother would be sure to know if she did stop, because she would be a long time. So she went to the dairy as fast as she could.

  There was an old man in the dairy, buying milk, and he took a long time to get the money for it from his pocket, so Ruthie stood and waited, enjoying the coolness of the blue and white tiled walls, the thick milky smell, the way the big square of butter at the back of the counter was ridged and bumpy with patterns on it. She wished she was buying butter, so that she could watch the woman in the dairy cut a piece off the big lump with her wooden butter patters, slap the lump from side to side till it was a little square with ridges on it too, from the ridges on the wet wood of the butter patters.

  At last the old man went off, holding his bottle of milk close in his hands in front of him, muttering under his breath the way old men always did, like Mr Lipshitz from Aspen Street did whenever Ruthie saw him.

  “A pint of milk, please,” Ruthie said, and took the big bottle carefully, holding it from the bottom, not round the top where the stopper with its metal pieces to hold it in place was. If you held it there, it could slip out of your hands.

  The woman gave her the change. And then, as Ruthie turned to go, the faint sound of the siren started, coming into the cool dairy from the sunny street outside like a soft wind.

  “’Ere.” The woman behind the counter leaned over and tried to catch at Ruthie. “’Ere, ducks, you’d better stop along of me—come on, ducky, come down the shelter …”

  “No.” Ruthie evaded her clutching hand. “No—I got to go home—Mummy says I got to hurry …”

  “The siren’s gone, for Chrissake! Come on—your mum’ll know you’ve gone down a shelter.” The woman was grabbing at things from behind the counter, her handbag and gas mask, and heading for the back of the shop, but Ruthie shook her head.

  “No,” she said. “Leon’s waiting for the milk—he was crying already when I came out—I got to run all the way …”

  In the street outside, people were running, and already there weren’t many left, already most of them had disappeared. Ruthie ran as fast as she could, feeling a lump in her neck because she was frightened. The siren had gone, and her mother would be so angry because she had dawdled, because she hadn’t got home before the siren went, so she ran as fast as she could, till her chest felt full and very tight.

  One or two people tried to catch her as she ran past them, tried to take her to shelters they were going to, but Ruthie dodged past them and ran on.

  And then, as she reached the bottom of Festival Street, she had to stop running because her chest felt so tight. She could see, along the curve of Festival Street, the gap that was the back of where Mrs Levy’s house had been, could just see the tops of the houses in Aspen Street, almost see her own house. It would be much quicker to go that way, she thought, almost crying with the pain in her chest from running so fast, but Mummy said I mustn’t—and I promised God’s honour …

  And then there was a sudden rumble and crump from behind her, the sort of rumble that made the ground shake, and now Ruthie got really frightened, knowing how angry her mother would be because she hadn’t got home sooner, and without thinking about it any more she plunged along Festival Street for the gap where Mrs Levy’s house had been.

  The crumps and rumbles got louder, the pavement shaking under her feet more than she had ever known it to, so that she almost fell, but she clutched the milk tighter, and ran on.

  The stones were piled higher on this side of the gap than on the Aspen Street side, and Ruthie nearly dropped the milk as she clambered up them, her sandals slipping on the loosely piled bricks catching her toes as she struggled over them.

  And then, just as a really huge crump came, sounding as though it was right underneath her feet, she tripped. She wasn’t sure whether she tripped, or whether it was the crump and the trembling of the ground, but she fell headlong, hitting her head on a big piece of wood as she fell, scraping the side of her leg from knee to ankle so that it felt as though she had burned it.

  She rolled as she fell, still clutching the milk with one hand, terrified it would break while she tried to catch at the big piece of wood that had hit her head. But the wood only came with her and she landed heavily on a sharp piece of stone with the wood across her middle. Stones and bricks and dust came tumbling down on top of the wood, clattering round her head, filling up the sides of the little cleft she had fallen into, and still loud roars and crumps came crashing from all round, so that everything shook and trembled furiously.

  And then, gradually, it stopped, the crumps and noises, the trembling, seeming to move further away, coming only as distant rumbles of thunder, and Ruthie opened her eyes, which she had shut because all the dust was getting in them, and tried to see what had happened.

  She was lying on her back in the hole, the big piece of wood still across her middle, with stones and bricks on eac
h side of her head, over her face, balanced on each other. She could just see, out of one eye, the sky above her, but on the other side she could see nothing. Her leg hurt where she had scraped it, and she tried to move it, to pull herself up, but the piece of wood was too heavy for her. And then she discovered that there were stones and bricks all round her arms as well, all over the bottle of milk, all round her neck so that she couldn’t move at all, except for opening and closing her eyes.

  She was stuck in a hole on the gap where her mother had said she mustn’t go, and the baby was waiting for his milk, crying all the time, and Ruthie had dawdled so that she hadn’t got home in time. And she was very frightened indeed, just as frightened as she had been the day the market woman had caught her taking an apple and had threatened to tell her mother about it.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  THE high wail of the all-clear woke her up. For a moment she couldn’t think where she was, what had happened to her bed, and she lay blinking her eyes, looking upwards, trying to remember.

  The sky that she could see with one eye was a softer deeper blue, now, and as she looked at it, she suddenly remembered and all her fright came bubbling back into her neck. She was in a hole on the gap where she had said she wouldn’t go, God’s honour, and that meant something awful would happen. Her mother would be so angry when she got home, would nearly kill her for being so long, and Leon would be crying and crying because he wanted his milk. Ruthie felt the tears run out of her eyes as she thought of what her mother would say when she got home.

  It was funny she had fallen asleep, there in her little hole with a piece of wood and bricks for a blanket. The thought of this was so funny that for a moment she forgot how frightened she was and laughed a little bit.

  She thought again. I’ve got to go home. I’d better go home. She’ll be mad, but I’ve got to go home. So she tried to move, but the piece of wood was so heavy, had her pinned down so firmly that she couldn’t wriggle out at all. She tried to move her hands, and felt the smooth glass of the bottle of milk just as a piece of brick tumbled again, and landed against the side of her face where she could just see the sky out of one eye. So she kept still again. Bad enough to be where she was, without breaking the bottle as well. It would make her dress all wet and milky if that happened, and make her mother even angrier.

  So she lay still and wondered what would happen. Would her mother come and look for her? She couldn’t—not leave Leon alone in the house, and come out. And she wouldn’t send anyone else to look, not here in the gap where Mrs Levy’s house had been, because Ruthie had been told not to go there, and her mother wouldn’t guess Ruthie had gone there—not after she had promised, God’s honour, not to.

  So there was nothing to do at all. Ruthie would just lie still and see what would happen. The sky she could see got bluer and darker, and for a little while she fell asleep again, dreaming about the train journey the day they had come back from Ireland, and when she woke again, it was just as though she was still in the train, because she was cold, and her legs felt all prickly and sore where she was lying on them, and she could hear people on the station talking.

  Only of course it was only a dream. But she could still hear people talking. She lay very still and listened. Men’s voices, shouting, calling to each other.

  “Not here …” One of them sounded very close, almost on top of her, and a brick slithered over her face so that she couldn’t see the sky any more.

  “Not here, Joe. This patch went ages ago—nothing new here.”

  Ruthie thought for a moment. She wasn’t supposed to talk to strange men, and she didn’t know the voice so near to her, so perhaps she oughtn’t to say anything. But then she remembered how cross her mother would be if she didn’t get home soon, and perhaps this man would be a nice one, and help her get out of her hole.

  So she called out, not too loudly. “Mister?”

  She could hear the man’s feet scrabbling on the stones, going away from her, back towards where there were other voices calling out, and she called again, louder.

  “Mister! Mister!”

  The scrabbling stopped, and the man’s voice came suddenly very thin and high.

  “Here—hold on a bit, Joe—there’s someone here.”

  “I tell you, this patch went weeks ago—there can’t be no one here. Come on, feller.”

  “There’s someone here, I tell you….”

  Ruthie called out again. “Hey, mister—it’s me, Ruthie!”

  The stones scrabbled again, and the first voice came closer.

  “There you are—didn’t I tell you? Did you hear that?”

  “Please, mister,” Ruthie called again. “I’m stuck. Can you help me out? The wood’s too heavy for me—and I might break the milk …”

  “Hold on, ducks—hold on. Give us another shout, will yer? Come on, ducks …”

  Ruthie thought for a minute. She didn’t know just what to shout, and wondered if she should shout words or just noises.

  “Come on, ducks.” The stones beside her head shifted as the man above her slithered on the bricks. “Can’t find yer if yer don’t shout—come on, ducks.”

  So Ruthie shouted what they shouted at school on Empire Day. “Hip, hip hooray!” and then she stopped, because you only shouted that three times on Empire Day.

  Suddenly, one of the stones over her eye, the one she hadn’t been able to see through, went away, just like that, and Ruthie could look up and see the soft deep blue of the sky above. She looked at the sky and was very glad to see it again—it hadn’t been nice when it had disappeared before. And then the patch went dark suddenly, and Ruthie wondered if the man had put the stone back.

  “Hip, hip, hooray?’ she called, not so loudly this time, and the dark patch moved, and glinted, and Ruthie could see it was a tin hat.

  “Right, ducks….” The man’s voice was much louder now. “Got yer—hold on now—have you out in two shakes, we will. Hang about a bit, now….”

  And quite quickly the stones that were balanced on each other over her face were moved, so that she could see out of both her eyes really properly, and the eye that had been covered all the time could see things brighter than the other one, and Ruthie opened and shut them both in turn, enjoying the different way things looked out of each one.

  The big piece of wood was moved, very slowly, and Ruthie was so glad to get rid of it, she tried to sit up, only a lot of stones came tumbling down round her, and the man said sharply, “Keep still, ducks—just leave it to us, now. Don’t you go wriggling around, now …”

  So she kept still.

  And then a pair of hands got round her shoulders and she was lifted up and outwards, to be held high in the air above her hole.

  “Just a kid,” the man who was holding her said. “Just a kid—poor little bugger. You all right, ducks—you all right?”

  “Yes, thank you,” Ruthie said politely. “Thank you for getting me out—I got to go home now …”

  “What’s your name, ducks? Where do you live then?” the man said.

  Ruthie looked at him, at another man standing close beside him, their tin hats glinting in the soft blueness of the evening, and at the piles of stones and bricks that were all over the place, and said, “I’ve got to go home now,” again, because she knew you mustn’t tell strange men about yourself—if they talked to you, you had to run home very quickly. But the man was holding her.

  She wriggled, and tried to get down from his arms.

  “I got to go home,” she said again, beginning to feel frightened all over again. “Please—Mummy’ll be so cross—let me go home.”

  “I’ll take yer ducks. Come on, now, where do you live?”

  But Ruthie struggled harder, feeling her leg sore against the cloth of his jacket, and as she wriggled, the bottle of milk she was still clutching close against her slid from her stiff fingers and crashed against the stones below.

  Ruthie stared down at the glinting glass, at the spreading pool of whiteness in the dim li
ght, stared in sick horror at the milk that Leon was waiting for running down between the stones and bricks, and felt the tears come up again.

  “Now look what you done!” she wailed. “Look what you done! My mummy’ll kill me—look what you done!”

  The two men looked at each other, and then the one who was holding her said wheedlingly, “Well, I tell you what—you let me take you home, and I’ll tell your mum it was me what broke it, eh? And I’ll give her the money for it, eh? Then she won’t be mad at yer—what you say?”

  Ruthie snivelled softly, and tried to think. It was bad to talk to strange men, but perhaps it was worse to break the milk, and money was always very important. If the man would tell Mummy it wasn’t Ruthie who’d broken the milk and give her the money for it, perhaps it would be all right.

  So she said, “I’m Ruthie Lee. I live at number nine Aspen Street, London, E.I.”

  “Right, ducks,” the man said. “Get you there in two ticks, we will. Your mum’ll be that glad to see you, you see—she won’t be mad at you over the milk …”

  “She will,” Ruthie said with dreary conviction. “I said, God’s honour, I wouldn’t go over by Mrs Levy’s and I did. She’ll be mad at me …”

  But the man only laughed, as he climbed over the stones and bricks, holding Ruthie high on his shoulder.

  She turned her head as soon as she felt him start to walk on smooth ground, looking apprehensively for her mother at the window.

  But she wasn’t at the window. There were a knot of people round the street door, though. Black Sophie, and Mrs Fleischer and Mrs Coram, and Mrs Cohen, and Mr Levine and even old Mr Lipshitz. Ruthie stared at them all, standing there in a circle with their backs to her, and wondered what was the matter. Was her mother there, too, telling them all how naughty Ruthie was, not to have come home sooner with Leon’s milk?