The Great Fire

by Ann Turnbull

  “I know the way!” André was impatient to be gone.

  The banging from the blocked door was growing louder and louder.

  “Stay together,” his father said urgently. “It’s no distance, and well away from the fire. Deliver the casket and come straight back.”

  Both boys nodded.

  A crash, followed by screams and yells, told them that the door had been forced open.

  Paul Giraud sprang up.

  “Go now,” he whispered. “And remember – come straight home!”

  4

  Firefighters

  Sam and André took Budge and went out through the back gate. They hurried along the alley. From the street came shouts and sounds of fighting.

  “Papa will see them off,” said André fiercely. But Sam could tell he was anxious for his family.

  To Sam’s relief, no one took any notice of the two of them. The necklace was not heavy, but when he thought of its value – not only the gold and diamonds, but Paul Giraud’s exquisite workmanship – it became a weight he wished he didn’t have to carry.

  He was glad when André said, “There it is!” and he saw, ahead of them, a grand house with a lion’s head carved above the door.

  They walked up to the entrance.

  André knocked and turned to Sam. “Give me the casket!” he commanded.

  I wasn’t going to keep it! Sam thought indignantly. But he said nothing, and handed it over.

  “You and Budge can wait outside,” said André, as the door opened.

  Sam moved away, but not before he’d seen that the grand hall of Master Harrington’s house was piled high with boxes, chests and crates. Everyone is leaving the city, he thought. We’ll all be camping in the fields together soon – even Mistress Harrington in her beautiful necklace.

  “Did he like the necklace?” Sam asked, when André came out. He wished he could have seen the man’s face when he opened the casket.

  “Yes,” replied André. “He was very pleased, and thanked me. I told him about the rioters in our street and he sent a man to summon the militia.”

  A distant crash and a sound like thunder caused cries of alarm in the street. The boys stared, awestruck, at the black smoke billowing up to the south.

  “We’ll go down to the Exchange,” said André. “We might see more from there.”

  Sam knew he should protest. Master Giraud had told them to come straight back. And yet it wasn’t far out of their way, and he too wanted to see what was happening.

  “Come on, Budge,” he said.

  They went down Bartholomew Lane and past the back of the Royal Exchange. They knew this area. The family’s church was nearby.

  “Down here!” called André. And instead of taking the way home through Poultry and Cheapside, he turned down one of the lanes that led south, towards the river.

  Here the smoke was thicker. It stung their eyes. Budge strained at the lead and whimpered.

  “We should go back,” said Sam. “We’ll be covered in soot and your father will know.” And André will make sure I get the blame, he thought.

  Suddenly flames sprang up into the sky ahead, followed by a tower of smoke that rolled down over the boys, black and choking. Shouts of alarm mingled with the crunch and crackle of the fire.

  Then they heard screams: “Help! Help me!”

  They stared through the thinning smoke. At the far end of a passageway a tall house was on fire. A woman with a baby in her arms was shouting from an upstairs window, and down below people had begun to gather.

  “What can they do?” gasped André.

  The boys hurried closer.

  Now several people were holding up a large sheet. The woman hesitated, then – with a shriek – flung the baby out of the window. Sam saw it land in the sheet and be lifted up by a bystander.

  By the time the woman had jumped down, and was holding the wailing baby, Sam and André were in the thick of the crowded street, among the firefighters.

  “Don’t just stand there!” a man shouted at Sam. He passed him an empty bucket.

  “Stay, Budge,” commanded Sam. He took the bucket, handed it to a woman beside him, and seized the next one as it came along. André joined in on his other side.

  Now they were part of a double chain of firefighters. Some men had dug into the street and opened a water pipe. From there water was passed quickly along the line, emptied, and the buckets sent back to the pipe. Everyone was busy.

  “Keep going! Faster! Faster!”

  Those at the front threw bucket after bucket of water into the burning house. But they were losing. Flames burst from the upper windows, where the water couldn’t reach.

  Sam was tired. They were getting nowhere. Then, just as he felt like giving up, a cheer rose from the firefighters. Some militia men had appeared, shouting, “Make way! Make way!” Sam saw that they were pulling a cart with a water squirt on it.

  Three men operated the squirt. Sam watched as it sucked up water from the pipe, and was then swivelled around to squirt a jet of water that went straight in through one of the blazing upper windows.

  Buckets of water continued to be passed along, the squirt was refilled, and soon the fire was almost under control.

  At last there were no more flames to be seen, although they could hear the never-ending roar of the fire all around. But the house – wet, blackened and smoking – was saved.

  The men with the squirt moved on, and the firefighters threw down their buckets and cheered and hugged one another. Sam picked up Budge’s lead as people began walking away.

  André said, “We must get back. My father will be angry.”

  They turned to go. At that moment flames shot from the windows of a house in front of them. Sam saw green and gold embroidered hangings flare up, blacken and fall.

  “It was a fireball!”

  A man and woman rushed out of the front door, the man shouting, “The room burst into flames around us! There was no fire in our house before that. A fire-raiser has done this!”

  The people in the street looked around, and Sam suddenly felt frightened. These people suspected arson – and foreigners.

  “It’s him!” a woman exclaimed. She pointed at André. “That French boy! I saw him! He threw something!”

  “I didn’t!” protested André. “I’ve been helping!” He looked terrified.

  “He’s lying! Arrest him!”

  A man moved to seize André, but Sam sprang in front of him and shouted, “Leave him alone! We were firefighting! You saw us. We were in the chain!”

  He turned to the others. “You know it wasn’t him. You saw us passing buckets!”

  It made no difference. They wanted a culprit. A foreigner. And André looked the part. Sam pushed past the man, grabbed André’s arm, and pulled him out of reach.

  “Quick!” he shouted. “Run, André! Run!”

  5

  Escape

  “Keep together!”

  “I can’t – “

  Crowds of people surged up the road, separating the two boys. Sam, with Budge’s lead wound around his wrist, caught only an occasional glimpse of André’s red doublet. Sam glanced over his shoulder. Were those their pursuers back there? Yes! That man, glaring, calling to others behind him – he was one.

  “Come on, Budge!” Sam seized the chance to duck and weave through the throng and shake the man off.

  But now where was André? Sam could no longer see the red doublet anywhere. Had their enemies caught him? Or was he hiding?

  “André!” he called. But there was no answer.

  Smoke filled the street, and Sam realised for the first time that in their hurry to escape they had run downhill, towards the fire. Ahead of him was a whole row of blazing houses. No one was trying to put out the flames any more. Instead, people were intent on escaping with their possessions. The flow of refugees was all uphill – against him.

  And still he could not see André.

  “I’ve lost him,” he told Budge. “And I w
as supposed to be looking after him. ‘Two will be safer’, Master Giraud said.”

  Two would also be company. He felt frightened, alone in the burning city.

  He looked around. An alley led off to the left. Could André have gone that way? He turned down it, saw an open doorway, and peered into the dark interior.

  “André?” he shouted.

  “Sam! Is that you?” The faint voice came from deep inside the building.

  “Yes!” Sam felt a huge sense of relief.

  He led Budge into the empty shop. It was even darker in there than in the smoky street outside. He trampled on broken glass and bumped into overturned furniture.

  Sam realised that this place had been ransacked by looters and for the first time he wondered what might have happened to the Girauds, back in Foster Lane.

  “Where are you, André?” he called.

  “Down here!”

  In the dim light Sam noticed some steps leading to a storage room.

  As he hurried down, Budge bounded ahead of him, and the dog’s lead slipped out of Sam’s hand and caught around his ankles as it fell to the ground.

  Sam tripped and fell off the unguarded side of the steps, landing in a heap on the floor with Budge. Pain shot through his left arm. He cried out. Budge whimpered and nuzzled him.

  André’s concerned face came into view. “What have you done?”

  “My arm – I think it might be broken.” Sam felt sick and faint.

  “Try moving it,” said André.

  “Aaargh! I can’t! It hurts.”

  “We’ll need a bone-setter, if it’s broken.”

  Sam winced. “Maybe it isn’t.”

  “Are they still following us – those people?”

  “I don’t think so.”

  “I’m sorry – I should have come up the steps to you,” said André. “But I was so frightened. I felt safer down here.” His voice wobbled. “You were good to speak up for me. I’m glad you’re here, Sam.”

  Sam nodded. “Me, too. But we need to get out. There are houses on fire up the road.”

  “Could I make a sling for you? I could tear a strip off my shirt…”

  It hurt to bend the arm, but Sam gritted his teeth and allowed André to put it into the makeshift sling.

  “That should keep it steady,” said André, “till we can get it set.”

  “Thanks.” Sam felt faint again.

  Budge licked him, and he cuddled the dog with his good arm.

  He was struggling to his feet when a whoosh and roar shook the building, sending a cloud of dust down onto them from the ceiling.

  “What was that?” cried André.

  “I don’t know. But we should get out – now!”

  6

  Trapped

  They rushed up the steps to the ransacked shop. Budge ran ahead – then ran back, whimpering.

  Smoke was pouring into the shop through the open doorway, and in the smoke they saw the flicker of flames.

  The boys stared at each other, and Sam saw his own terror reflected in André’s eyes.

  They ran frantically to and fro, blinded by the smoke. The front of the shop began to smoulder, and across the street the wooden overhang of the house opposite came crashing down in flames.

  “Help!” they both shouted but there was no one in the street to hear them.

  “Get down low. Crawl,” said Sam. He remembered his old master, William Kemp, telling him to do this if he were ever caught in a fire.

  But it was difficult to crawl with one arm in a sling. And crawl where? The doorway was now ablaze and the upper floor would trap them.

  He heard Budge barking from below in the storeroom. The barking went on and on.

  Had the dog found something?

  “Budge wants us!” he gasped.

  He reached out to André, and they stayed close together as they crept back down the stairs to the storeroom.

  Budge was still barking. Through the smoke Sam could just see him by the far wall. He crawled towards the dog. Budge caught Sam’s sleeve in his teeth and tugged.

  “What? What is it?”

  And then he saw.

  “It’s a window! André – it’s a window!”

  The window had been hidden behind a rough curtain of sacking. Sam wrestled, one-handed, with the catch.

  “Let me!” said André. He managed to open the catch, but the wood of the window frame was warped and stuck. He couldn’t shift it.

  Sam banged it with the heel of his good hand. He couldn’t move it either.

  Through the small grimy panes of greenish glass they saw a yard with a midden and privy, and thick smoke but no fire.

  “Break it!” gasped Sam.

  “The panes are too small – we wouldn’t get out,” said André.

  He grabbed a block of wood from the floor and rammed the stiff frame, over and over again.

  Budge barked. Flames crackled in the shop above, and smoke rolled down the stairs and engulfed them in choking fumes.

  Sam felt dizzy and about to fall when, with one last push from André, the window flew open. Air rushed in, and the storeroom burst into flames behind them.

  “Budge – out!”

  The dog leapt through the window.

  “You next!” said André. He helped Sam to climb up onto the sill.

  Sam dropped quickly down on the other side, a fierce pain shooting through his injured arm.

  The next minute André landed beside him. “Quick! Let’s go!”

  They stumbled away from the blazing building.

  Budge ran down the length of the yard and turned right along the passage at the end. The boys followed him blindly. Sam had lost all sense of direction.

  “Budge will know the way,” he said. “Animals do…”

  He broke off in a fit of coughing. It was hard to breathe. He could feel smoke inside his body but could not seem to cough it out.

  The dog led them on through alleyways and small streets. Sam knew they were moving gradually uphill, taking mostly lanes that led westward, away from the fire. He put his trust in Budge to get them home.

  Budge’s lead was trailing. It seemed better to let him run, and to follow him. When they stopped, overcome by fits of coughing, the dog waited for them.

  They saw few people on these streets. Most had already escaped, Sam supposed. All around, he heard the hungry voice of the fire and saw flames licking up.

  Suddenly the fire seemed to leap. Budge was waiting at the top of an alley when a building nearby exploded in flames. Debris showered down – wood, paper, plaster dust – and smoke rolled between the boys and the dog.

  “Quick!” cried Sam.

  The two of them ran through the smoke up the alley ahead of them. Budge had been standing, waiting, at the top of it, but he was not there now.

  “Budge!” Sam’s voice cracked. “Where are you?”

  “Budge!” cried André.

  The stricken house was blazing, and the flames drove them away, across a road and along another narrow passage. It led uphill – but was that where Budge had gone?

  “Budge! Budge!” they called desperately.

  Had he been caught in the explosion? They could not stay and search. The fire drove them on, and as they went the smoke thinned and then Sam recognised the Stocks Market, and knew where they were.

  “Along here,” he croaked. “Poultry, then Cheapside…”

  Once again they were among crowds of people and carts. They called for Budge, but he didn’t come.

  “Perhaps he’s gone home,” suggested André.

  “Yes, of course! That’s what he’d do.”

  They hurried back to Foster Lane.

  7

  We Must Go!

  “Where have you been?”

  “We’ve been so worried…”

  “Sam! What’s happened to your arm?”

  Everyone was staring at the boys. Sam and André stared back. Sam was horrified to see that Master Giraud had a cut below one eye and
a great bruise on his cheekbone. His shirt was torn and, around him, the room was in a mess: a broken window, damage to the door, smashed plates, hangings pulled down.

  Sam and André could only croak and cough in reply to all the questions. Sam’s eyes smarted, his face felt sore and his arm hurt. And where was Budge?

  André’s mother poured weak beer and gave them a cup each. Sam sipped his gratefully. The beer tasted cool and soothed his parched throat.

  He whispered, “Is Budge here?” but no one heard him because Mistress Giraud was fussing around André, mourning the state of his new doublet.

  “Your good clothes, André! Where have you been, the two of you?”

  André croaked, “Is Budge here?”

  “I don’t know!” cried his mother. “I don’t care! You stand there in that condition and ask about a dog?”

  “We haven’t seen him,” said Marie.

  The two boys looked at each other.

  “Lost, then…” said Sam, his chin trembling. André nodded, and his eyes filled with tears.

  “Never mind the dog. Where did you go?” demanded Paul Giraud angrily. “There is no fire in Lothbury. You went exploring, didn’t you? After I told you to come straight home.”

  They both lowered their eyes and nodded.

  “You’ll get a beating for this.”

  “It was my fault,” said André. “Not Sam’s. He said we shouldn’t – “ He broke off and began coughing again.

  Mistress Giraud intervened. “There is no time for punishment now. We must leave the city. But first I must look at Sam’s arm.”

  Sam flinched as she examined it, but she reassured him. “It’s only a fracture. I’ll make a splint and bind it, and it will soon heal.”

  Later, with a new sling and a firm splint on his arm, Sam felt better, and would have enjoyed showing it off and telling the girls about their adventures, if it hadn’t been for the loss of Budge.

  “Budge saved us,” he said. “He found the window.”

  “And he knew the way home,” said André.

  “He may still come back,” Thérèse said. “He could be frightened and hiding somewhere.”