Blitz Next Door Read Online Free PDF

Clydebank Blitz. Nearly a thousand people killed. And you,” Dunny swung the light into Pete’s face and held it there, “won’t even have heard of it, even though today’s the anniversary.”
    “Is it? Only heard of the London Blitz.” Pete tried to see the drawings again through the floaters the torch beam had set dancing before his eyes.
    “Don’t worry, Nigel. You’ll learn all about our Blitz in school here. Everybody does. Too right.”
    “Will I learn about her?” Pete traced the name on the wall. Beth Winters. “Was she one of the…?”
    “Well, she wasn’t in the house when she wrote this .” Dunny stared at the notebook. “So maybe she…”
    The boys looked at each other. Pete shivered. Heran his own finger under the date on the wall.
    “Hey,” Dunny tucked the notebook back under the bench, “fancy a bounce?”
    Pete didn’t need to be asked twice, though he decided he did need to check in with Mum first, and definitely eat his banana for energy.

Chapter 8
    The back door didn’t open when he tried it, so Pete hurried round to the front to try the bell. He was taking a shortcut through the bomb crater. It wasn’t just quicker, it was far more exciting, scrambling down. Pete had to watch his legs didn’t run away from themselves as he slithered over the uneven ground keeping tight hold of his banana.
    So he gasped and nearly lost his balance as he skidded to a downhill stop when a figure stepped out in front of him.
    Where did you come from? Pete might have said if his mouth hadn’t been full. Because this old woman. Well, she’d sort of just… appeared . And there she was, standing above Pete, peering down into the crater as though he wasn’t even there.
    “Hello,” Pete gulped, but the woman didn’t seem to hear, or if she did, ignored him. Her gaze lay beyond Pete, eyes darting here and there as if she was searching for something.
    Or maybe she was lost. Out of a home. Gone a-wandering in more ways than one. There’d been a few characters in Pete’s old block back in London like that. A couple in the flat above who collected stray cats and were always being brought back home by the community police. Before Jenny, Mum kept a check onthe pair of them, knocking on their door with home baking. This woman leaning over the crater – too far over to be safe – was about the same age. Pretty ancient, and a bit frail-looking too, Pete decided; a tiny body hidden beneath the floaty bluebell blue layers she was wearing.
    “Careful you don’t fall in! It’s slippy,” Pete called up to the woman. Now he was thinking she was deaf, because she carried on peering over his shoulder, bobbing her head to see round Pete. The tips of her feet were over the edge of the crater. She was sliding.
    “Oi!” Pete’s warning bounced off the steep walls around him.
    The woman stepped back, seemed to notice Pete for the first time. She didn’t say anything, though, just pointed down at his hand and nodded, a slow smile of delight lighting up her face.
    “What is it?” Pete looked at his banana, half eaten. Poor old lady, bananas herself .
    “D’you want a bite?” he asked, watching his footing as he started to clamber the side of the crater. “Don’t come down, I’ll come to you. It’s too steep,” he warned without looking up. This was definitely one of those situations when even Mum would have to admit having his own mobile phone would be handy. He’d text:
    Help. Woman about 2 fall in2 crater
    And Mum or Dad would be straight down to take over and make sure this poor old…
    Except she’d gone. Disappeared in the seconds it took Pete to scramble to the top on the crater.
    No way!
    Pete swung right and left, squinting through the garden for the bluebell colour of her clothes.
    A person doesn’t just vanish . “That’s plain spooky.” The sound of Pete’s own whisper admitting this was enough to set him sprinting to the front of his house.
    “MUM!”
    Pete thumped the door as well