‘It does, yeah, but the buildin over the exit collapsed and blocked it a long while ago. Thank Gawd there’re others.’
‘No point in hanging ‘round then, right?’ I kept my voice calm – shouting would have only hurt my throat even more anyway.
‘You’re not. wrong there, son.’ He’d calmed down a little himself, but he still looked scared. Letting go of the rail he bustled round to the next flight of stairs.
‘Hey,’ I called after him, the stab to my throat making me wince. ‘What’s your name?’ I finished more quietly.
‘Potter. Albert Potter, ARP warden for the Kingsway and Strand area.’ He seemed proud of the title and I almost expected a smart salute. He started climbing again, but I just caught his added remark. ‘Can’t say I’m pleased t’meet you at last.’
My limp was getting worse as I followed him, but I knew I’d only bruised the ankle – anything more severe and I wouldn’t have been walking at all by this time. But tiredness was slowing us all down, I guess only our last reserves of adrenaline keeping us going. I’d learned a lot about that during the war, because flying a Hurricane at more than 300 miles an hour with a couple of superior Me 109s on your tail, it’s the old energy-juice that takes over, overrides the fatigue that comes with too many sorties and not enough sleep, keeps your brain razor-sharp, until maybe a Spitfire can get to you and cover your back. Even if you got shot up, it was the adrenaline pumping that got you through the shock, helped you function until you’d baled out. Yeah, I’d learned a lot about what adrenaline could do for you in times of crisis, and I also knew that eventually it dried up, it could only take you so far…
The German surprised me by drawing level and taking me by the elbow. ‘Do you need help?’ he asked. His face was black with dirt – hell, all our faces were black. ‘Cept the warden’s – his was just getting redder by the second.
I paused just long enough to pull my arm away. ‘Take care of the girl,’ I told him, my voice low and full of warning. I climbed on, leaving him there, but he was close to me again, this time with an arm around Muriel’s waist, her own arm over his shoulder. I let them go on past and then it was Cissie who was by my side.
‘You’re slowing down, Yank.’
‘It’s been a busy morning,’ I managed.
Her teeth flashed through the dirt, and I appreciated the smile.
‘If you need a shoulder to lean on…’
‘You’re not sore at me any more?’
‘Anyone can make a mistake. Besides, if those Blackshirts are as nasty as you say-’
‘You had a taste of ‘em.’
‘Trying to roast us alive wasn’t very civilized. As for wanting our blood, well, we only have your word for that. I mean, for all we know you could be a criminal of some kind and they could be the only law and order left.’
‘You got a point. When you see ‘em next, march right up and introduce yourself. Tell ‘em about your blood type. They’ll be pleased to get acquainted, wait and see.’
She gave me a long look, then grinned again. ‘I’ll take my chances with you – for the moment. Not that I have any other choice.’
The banter might have continued – we were both dog-weary and this was a way of keeping each other going – but the next explosion that ripped through the underground bunker was the fiercest yet.
Although the blast was somewhere deep within the complex, the walls around us shuddered violently and debris began to fall through the stairwell from above. Brickwork caught the rail and shattered, throwing out pieces like shrapnel. Cissie yelped as she was struck on the forehead and she fell back against the wall. I grabbed her when she staggered down a step, and pinned her there while rubble and dust rained down.
‘It’s the ceiling at the top!’ I heard Potter shout back at us. ‘The whole lot’s gonna break loose in a minute!’
With Stern and Muriel just ahead of us, we clambered up to the next landing, spitting dust and blinking grit from our eyes.
‘This way – quick!’ The warden was holding one side of a double door open and we scooted through, the deluge behind us increasing, becoming a cascade of bricks, masonry, timber and powder. Once inside the door we could barely see, even though there was another carbide lamp on the floor – the warden must have placed these lamps in strategic places along our escape route – because it was like running into one of those famous London fogs the guide-books told you about, ‘peasoupers’ I think they called them in those days. The fog was smoke, and it swirled everywhere, thicker in some parts than others.
Potter hurried past us, his tin helmet knocked askew, and we followed after him like lost souls, afraid of losing sight of his broad back. Luckily, the smoke soon thinned out and we were able to see our way more clearly, although every so often we had to wipe our blurred eyes with sleeves or knuckles. We found ourselves in a huge open room filled with desks and large tables with street maps set on them, the maps marking out various divisions of the city and outlying areas. There were more maps around the walls, coloured pins indicating what could only have been other Civil Defence centres and contact points; metal lightshades, disturbed by the eruptions, swung low over the desks and map tables. As well as a phalanx of telephones, still in neat formation along the desktops, I glimpsed a whole battery of radio transmitters against a side wall. Only one thing was missing, but now wasn’t the time to ask the warden.
We reached another set of doors on the far side of the room and beyond them was a broad hallway. But even as we staggered through, yet another blast rocked the floor, sending us stumbling forward. On my knees, I watched great cracks snake across the long expanse of concrete before us.
I had no idea what had gone up on the floor below this one – more ruptured gas pipes, drums of fuel stored there for emergencies, chemicals, who the hell could guess what was stored away in places like this? – but I realized this whole complex was now on self-destruct. Potter had been right about chain reactions. German bombs had inflicted the initial damage, but the demolition had continued long after the war had ended, a fault causing a fire in one building, which spread to the next, one explosion kicking off another, then another, a collapsing building bringing down its neighbour, that one in turn wrecking or weakening the building next to it. And so it went on, with no one left to contain the damage, or repair the faults. Like the man said, it was a wonder the whole city wasn’t in ruins by now.
I had a nasty feeling about that floor ahead of us, and I guess that was what made me hesitate while the others picked themselves up and sped on. I saw a whole section shift, kind of tilt, and I knew what was going to happen next. So I moved, I moved so goddamn fast I could have been shot from a cannon. But it wasn’t fast enough.
Even as I gained on the others, who by now were almost at the far door, I felt the ground beneath me start to give. For a second or two it was almost like racing downhill as the floor inclined, and I picked up speed, despite the limp. It was a curious sensation, the world falling away from me in slow motion, and I think I may have screamed or yelled or whined to showcase my terror as I began to slide. Then came a massive and sudden lurch and the section of floor I was on dropped away from me.
Instinct rather than calculation made me throw myself to one side, towards the nearest wall and the sturdy old iron radiator fixed to it. My hand caught the valve pipe at its base and my fingers wrapped around it. The pipe loosened in the wall, jerking out at least an inch, and for a moment I thought the whole thing was gonna dislodge itself; but it held and I hung there as the broad section of floor crashed down to the level below, sending up a huge cloud of smoke and dust and a sound like thunder.
Flames and sparks followed, licking at my heels as I dragged myself up, and someone far off was screaming. My hand curled over the top of the radiator, but I could feel my strength slipping away, the effort of holding myself there becoming too great. I groaned, too feeble to pull myself towards the jagged ledge where the others waited, their hands stretched towards me, their voices rais
ed over the crackle and fire rending noises.
I took a look down and didn’t like what I saw: if the fall didn’t kill me, the fire below would. Already I could feel the soles of my boots heating up and I guess the thought of a nasty death, one way or the other, encouraged a last burst of energy. I slid my left hand across the curved top of the radiator, taking the strain with my right. But when I tried to grip with my left hand again, the sweat on my palm caused it to slip, slowly at first, until it fell away completely, leaving me hanging there by one hand, my body swinging round helplessly.
Then Stern was peering down at me, his face only a couple of feet away, smoke billowing around him so that for a moment his head seemed disembodied, floating in space. I realized he was leaning forward from the ledge, one hand on the end of the radiator, the other reaching out for me. It was a dangerous move on his part, but I saw no fear in those colourless eyes of his. For a split second though, a moment gone by so fast I may have imagined it, I thought there was a shift in those eyes, a kind of cold mocking that vanished as soon as I’d noticed it His hand stayed just beyond my reach, then edged forward an inch or so as if he’d only been tormenting me. Maybe I’d got it wrong, maybe I’d misread his expression; that look might have been his own fear, because now he was risking his life even more by leaning closer. I just couldn’t be sure.
‘Take it,’ I heard him say over the roaring from below and the shouts from the others behind him. There were no hints in that gaze right then, only a blank – and equally as unnerving – coolness.
I hesitated. Would he let me go, pretend to the others I’d slipped from his grasp? There was no way of knowing and anyway, I didn’t have time to consider. My hand slapped into his.
Then he was pulling me up, the movement strong and smooth, as though it was hardly any effort at all for him. I managed to hook a heel over the ledge, and then other hands were dragging me to safety. I rolled over onto what was left of the floor at that end of the hallway, my rescuers shuffling back to give me room, and I lay there on my back, drawing in great lungfuls of filthy, broiling air. They wouldn’t let me rest though; I was pulled to my feet even as I choked on the smoke I’d sucked in, and the two girls stood on either side of me, steadying me until my head stopped reeling and some life returned to my arms and legs.
‘Yank, you’ve got enough lives to keep a dozen cats happy.’ Cissie was thumping my back, helping me get rid of some of that smoke.
‘Are you all right?’ Muriel’s touch was more gentle as she cleared soot from my eyes with her fingertips.
The warden had no patience for any of this. ‘Yer can make a fuss of him later, ladies. If we don’t leave right now all our gooses’ll be cooked, and I ain’t kiddin yer.’
He ushered us towards the door and when I gave one last glance back at the pit they’d hauled me from, it was filled with fire, the flames touching the ceiling above. Potter hauled open the iron door and we piled through into a welcoming coolness. The door made a satisfying clunk when the old warden pulled it shut behind us, and because of its metal flanges everything suddenly became hushed. The girls collapsed on the narrow concrete stairs that disappeared into the darkness above and the German went down on one knee, his shoulders heaving as he gasped in the cold dank air. It gave me some satisfaction to see he was as pooped as the rest of us, even if he’d disguised it a few moments ago. I watched those deadpan eyes, eyes that had seemed to be looking inwards rather than out, and wondered why I felt no gratitude.
Leaning back against the rough brick wall, I slowly sank to a crouch, wrists over my knees, eyes closed, taking deep breaths to control the trembling that ran through me.
Potter interrupted the moment of peace. ‘Sorry to disturb you folks, but we’re not in the clear yet.’
He sounded angry, as if he still blamed us for the destruction of the Civil Defence shelter, and when I opened my eyes again I saw his mouth was set in a grim line across his round reddened face. Then I understood.
‘You lived down here, didn’t you?’ I said.
‘What?’
‘I said, you lived in this shelter.’
“Course I bloody lived ‘ere. Safest place in London with you and those Blackshirts runnin all over the place, shootin off guns at each other. I just got on with me job and kept well away from lunatics.’
His job? I let it go for the moment. ‘Why did you rescue us today, then?’ I said, keeping my voice mild, just making conversation.
He gawked down at me in surprise, as if I’d asked something dumb. ‘You had those two ladies with you, didn’t yer? I couldn’t see them come to any ‘arm. What kind of bloke d’yer think I am?’
I liked that about the British. I’d learned a lot about old-style manners and chivalry from the English pilots I’d flown with, and I can’t say it’d come as too much of a surprise – I’d spent most of my life hearing stories about England and its people. Sure, much of it was romanticized, I knew that, but the person who taught me was someone you could believe in, someone who missed her home country but allowed nostalgia to colour her memories only a little. She was one of the reasons I’d come over at the beginning of the war, when England was crying out for trained pilots because the Krauts were kicking at the door. And if she’d still been alive at the time, she’d have been proud, proud as hell.
I didn’t realize it, but I was smiling at the warden.
‘Nothin funny about it, mister. Yer could’ve got these young ladies killed takin them down into the tunnels. The most precious things we’ve got left and you go riskin their lives.’
He was still riled, but his eyes had softened, become tear-blurred. I didn’t know what he was talking about and my expression must have shown it.
It was the German who put me in the picture. ‘Women are now the world’s most precious commodity, my friend,’ he said.
Vimmen and vorld. That just irritated me (and I noticed Potter giving him an odd, sideways look) but the ‘my friend’ bit really got me hopping. If I’d had the strength I would’ve been at his throat.
But it was Cissie who was really stomping. ‘Oh, sure we are! Who else is going to give birth to more chumps like you two so they can grow up and start a whole new war just to finish off what’s left of the human race?’ She’d been sitting upright on the stairs, stiff as a board, and now she pushed herself to her feet. ‘I don’t want to stay here any longer. I want to see sunlight again.’
The warden hurried over to her, his face big and anxious. ‘Don’t you worry, miss, we’ll get you out of here. Once we’ve climbed these stairs we’ll be safe.’ He stooped to help Muriel rise, but held on to her when she turned to climb. His other hand gripped Cissie’s wrist. ‘Look now, you ladies,’ he said almost apologetically. ‘You’re not goin to like what we’ll find up there, but try and close your minds to it. I had to put ‘em somewhere, y’see, and I couldn’t bury ‘em all. ‘Sides, there was others out there already, people who’d tried to get away from the poison. There’s hardly any smell now, so that won’t bother yer, and you can keep your eyes closed if yer like…’
‘What are you talking about?’ Muriel was shaking her head, too tired to understand.
I picked myself up and walked over to them, explaining as I went ‘He dumped the dead bodies from this place outside the back door. I wondered what was missing from inside the shelter.’
‘I had to, you can understand that,’ said Potter, appealing to me. ‘I had to make this place fit enough to live in.’
‘Listen, you did right,’ I reassured him. ‘And nothing could be worse than what we found inside the Underground station.’
‘At least there were no flies,’ he said as if it made a difference. ‘The bodies just rotted away, like. No maggots and not much stink after the first few weeks.’
Yeah, no flies and no maggots. In fact, hardly any insects at all. I suppose we had to at least be grateful for that small mercy. God knows what kind of diseases could’ve wiped out the rest of us in the aftermath.
Distant rumbling from beyond the iron door and dust drifting down from the stairway’s slanted ceiling got us moving again. Potter went first, lighting the way, and Cissie and Muriel followed close behind. I guess both were eager for that sunlight The German, who’d remained on one knee, stood erect, the motion almost fluid, as if his steam had already been restored. I let him go on ahead of me – enemy at my back, and all that – then got going myself. Something heavy slammed against the door behind us, but none of us bothered to look back.
Christ, it hurt to climb those stairs – every muscle in my body was now stiffening up – and I favoured my injured leg, using the rough wall to lean on. My shoulder didn’t bother me that much but the rest of my arm felt like a lump of lead. Nothing was broken though, I was sure of that, so considering the punishment I’d taken that morning, I figured I’d gotten off lightly. If these strangers hadn’t picked me up in the square when they did I’d’ve been not just dead, but dried meat, by now. And if the old guy, Albert Potter, hadn’t rescued us from the burning tunnel, we’d all be cooked meat – yeah, choked, smoked and goddamn coked.
At the top of the stairs Potter was dipping into his overalls pocket, the others squeezed up behind him, so I waited further down, rubbing some life back into my arm. I heard a clink as he drew out a large metal ring, at least a dozen keys attached to it. The one he chose unlocked the door immediately and he pulled it inwards so that a gust of air rushed through. He disappeared outside and I wondered why it was still dark up there. I soon knew the answer.
The almost pitch-black place we stepped out into was bigger, much bigger, than the Tube tunnels further below, and huge, monolithic shapes loomed over us in the gloom. When the light from Potter’s paraffin lamp fell on the nearest one, I realized those shapes were passenger vehicles, tramcars that ran on embedded iron tracks with electric cables overhead supplying the power, and the hangar-like place we’d escaped into was a large tunnel, a kind of under-passage beneath the city streets. It occurred to me as we stood there that those trams would be full of withered corpses.