The Exiles

a few minutes ago.’
    ‘She’s been drinking milk and swearing,’ said Rachel.
    ‘I’m fine,’ Big Grandma looked up and spoke for the first time as Mrs Brocklebank and a frantic Graham dashed into the kitchen, ‘What about … ?’
    ‘The girls are all here,’ reassured Mrs Brocklebank, with her arms round as many of them as she could hold.
    ‘What about my books?’ asked Big Grandma.

    The fire brigade came and soaked the smoking ruins of the garage with several hundred gallons of water (thus destroying any books that might possibly have escaped the blaze). ‘Looks like you got off lightly,’ they said, ‘Nobody hurt and the fire hasn’t touched the old house.’
    The police came, and, after hearing the story of how it had all started, one of them remarked, ‘Somebody must have been watching over you last night. You’ve been very lucky.’ He got in his car to drive away, and then remembered something and came back to Ruth.
    ‘Never, never open a door on a fire – it only fans the flames,’ he said. ‘Haven’t they taught you that at school?’ and when Ruth shook her head, ‘Well, I’m telling you now! Promise!’
    ‘Yes, promise,’ said Ruth humbly. He was a nice man, but Ruth had already learned his lesson earlier that morning and had no intention of doing it twice.
    The doctor said, ‘Might have been a tragedy.’
    ‘It is,’ said Big Grandma.
    ‘Rubbish!’ The doctor had seen real tragedies and knew the difference. ‘Nothing that a good night’s sleep and the insurance won’t cure! Do you want a sedative?’
    ‘Certainly not!’
    ‘You’ve got some smashing little lasses there,’ the doctor told her as he left.
    All that morning, while people from the village cleaned the house, aired the rooms, took away smoky sheets and curtains to be washed and replaced them with fresh ones (some even taken from their own homes), brewed endless cups of tea and brought huge supplies of food, Big Grandma had to listen to the same remarks.
    ‘Lucky the wind was off the sea.’
    ‘Chap that put that garage up put it up to fall down.’
    ‘Good job he did, bit of luck she hadn’t put the car in last night!’
    ‘And you little lasses got your gran out of bed and down the stairs! You saved her life there you know!’
    ‘And it was you rang for the fire brigade!’
    ‘And then the big ones went back to try and get the books she keeps on about!’
    ‘And the little ones went to help them!’
    ‘But it was us that started it!’ protested Rachel through her tears. ‘It was my candle!’
    ‘It was me that got the key.’ Phoebe could not look up for shame.
    ‘It was all of us,’ said Naomi.
    ‘And now we’ve burnt her books!’ and Ruth began sobbing again.
    Mrs Brocklebank had telephoned the girls’ mother to say they would not be home that day after all, but would come on the following morning’s train. Now she returned to hug the girls again and say, ‘Get a good night’s sleep tonight, and go home smiling tomorrow! I’ve never heard so much fuss about a few books! Where’s Graham’s grandad got to?’
    Graham’s grandad was telling Big Grandma comforting stories of great fires he had witnessed. They all invariably ended in far greater calamity than Big Grandma had experienced and were full of idiots who kept their life savings in sacks of pound notes stuffed behind the stove, lit lanterns in stables and then got drunk and kicked them over, stacked their hay green, and smoked pipes in bed. ‘Didn’t even find their bones,’ Mrs Brocklebank heard him say as she came to fetch him home.
    Graham lingered for a private farewell.
    ‘I’ll not be seeing you before you go,’ he said. ‘That Sunday train leaves right early, and Mum says there’s been enough fuss. I’ll keep an eye on your gran.’
    ‘Thanks.’
    ‘She should have let you have them books in the first place.’
    ‘Don’t say that, she might hear you.’
    ‘Not bothered if she does. And I’ll see you next year.’
    ‘She’ll never let us come back. She really does hate us now.’
    ‘Will you write to us?’ asked Phoebe.
    Graham, who would have cheerfully promised to rebuild the garage and bring Big Grandma to her senses, looked horrified at the proposal, but, as usual, found himself unable to refuse his friends’ unreasonable request.
    ‘I don’t know. I might. If you write first.’
    ‘Yes.’
    ‘If I can think of anything to put. If I get time.’
    ‘All right.’
    ‘Bye