The Exiles

the fire was hot enough to burn cardboard, and then books.
    Big Grandma’s sleep grew deeper and deeper as the smoke curled through the cracks around the door which Ruth had very fortunately closed as they left. Except for an occasional quiet crack as the new timbers of the garage split and burnt, the house was silent. Even the snoring had stopped.
    By the time Ruth reached the door there was a blue haze of smoke hanging across the floor of Big Grandma’s room and Big Grandma herself, despite being leapt upon, shaken, and screamed at by her eldest granddaughter, only muttered in her sleep and refused to wake up.
    ‘Is she dead?’ Naomi arrived coughing at the doorway, fending off Rachel and Phoebe who crowded behind her.
    ‘Doped by smoke, I think,’ panted Ruth, and together she and Naomi, taking an arm and a leg each, bumped Big Grandma out of bed and tugged her unceremoniously out onto the landing where Rachel and Phoebe, in the mistaken apprehension that she was on fire, poured tooth-mugs of water on her until she revived.
    ‘Get her and the kids downstairs,’ ordered Naomi, ‘while I phone for the fire brigade,’ and she closed the bedroom door and flung herself down the stairs, followed more slowly by Ruth, struggling to keep Big Grandma upright without losing sight of Rachel and Phoebe.
    ‘What on earth is going on?’ asked Big Grandma as they lowered her onto a kitchen chair.
    ‘The house is on fire,’ Phoebe told her gravely, but rather tactlessly under the circumstances. Big Grandma promptly complicated the situation by passing out.
    ‘Is she dead?’ It was Rachel who asked the question this time.
    ‘Fainted, I think. Help me prop her against the wall. Look, she’s coming round. Look after her while I find Naomi.’ Ruth dashed out of the kitchen again leaving Rachel trying to force Big Grandma to drink milk out of the milk jug while Phoebe reassured her by saying, ‘It’s all right – only the upstairs is on fire. Ruth and Naomi are sorting it out.’

    ‘Are they coming?’ Ruth bumped into Naomi in the hall.
    ‘Be there any minute,’ Naomi replied. ‘It was awful. At first I couldn’t remember the address or anything. Is Big Grandma okay? Where are the kids?’
    ‘They’re all in the kitchen. Rachel and Phoebe are looking after Big Grandma.’ Ruth spoke as she ran back up the stairs and Naomi followed after her, knowing what she was going to do.
    Ruth paused for a second at Big Grandma’s bedroom door. ‘I’m just going to try and get some of her books. You stay here. You’ve got a broken arm.’
    ‘So what?’
    ‘So keep out.’ Ruth plunged through the blue smoke to the storeroom door and yanked it open. There was a bang like an explosion as the sudden rush of air fanned the slow fire into roof high orange flames, and for a fraction of a second Ruth stared into a glare that was to stay in her nightmares for years, before, with Naomi’s weight behind her, she crashed the door shut again and heard the floor of the storeroom fall through into the garage, and felt the old house shake as the garage roof tumbled down on top.
    Down in the kitchen Rachel and Phoebe felt the crash and rushed to the foot of the stairs, calling for their sisters.
    ‘Something awful’s happened,’ said Rachel, as if something awful had not already been in progress for some time.
    ‘I’m going up to see,’ Phoebe started to move away and Rachel grabbed her arm.
    ‘Wait for me!’ and ‘Do you think we’ll die?’ asked Rachel as they reached the landing and met Ruth and Naomi walking very slowly along the corridor.
    The sight of their little sisters stirred Ruth and Naomi back in to action.
    ‘You’re supposed to be looking after Big Grandma,’ yelled Naomi, turning Rachel round and running her back down the stairs.
    ‘What about her books?’ screamed Phoebe, trying to dodge under Ruth’s arm. ‘You know it’s all my fault!’ Ruth grabbed her round the waist and carried her, loudly protesting, back into the kitchen.
    The village arrived before the fire brigade, and even before they got there the fire was out, extinguished under the weight of the garage roof. Mr Brocklebank, up before dawn to start the milking, had seen the glow of fire on the hillside, and arrived with Mark and Peter at the kitchen door at the same moment as the girls staggered wearily in from the hall.
    ‘I don’t think she’s dead or anything,’ Ruth said as she saw them go to Big Grandma. ‘She wasn’t