Josie Under Fire Read Online Free PDF Page A

three camp beds made up with blankets and pillows. There was an old kitchen cupboard with the doors open, full of books and games. There were shelves of food: dried milk, orange juice, tins of baked beans, Spam and corned beef. And a basket of knitting, buckets of sand and water, a toolbox, a first-aid kit, candle holders, towels, a bowl to wash in… Aunty Grace was very thorough, Josie thought. She’d seen such rooms illustrated in her mother’s magazines, but Mummy had said no one would really do all those things.
    She felt safer now. People said a cellar wasn’t as safe as an Anderson, that you could be buried alive if the house collapsed, but it felt strong. And she knew there were sandbags all around the walls and the doors were reinforced. Best of all, it looked comfortable.
    “It’s like a whole separate house!” she said. “Our Anderson is horrible – all spidery and damp, and nowhere to move.”
    “There’s another room too,” said Edith. She showed Josie. “This used to be the laundry in the olden days, when they had servants.”
    She flashed the torch around and showed Josie a room full of junk: old bicycles, a pram, a decayed wicker chair, flowerpots. There was also a shallow stone sink and a fireplace and a big old tub that Edith said was once used for washing clothes.
    “Switch that torch off, Edith,” her mother said. “Come and drink your tea.”
    They sat down, and to Josie’s delight Biddy jumped onto her lap. She stroked the cat. “Don’t worry, Biddy. Hitler can’t get you here.”
    As if to prove her wrong, there came the crump of a distant bomb, followed by a series of loud bangs that caused Biddy to leap off Josie’s lap and vanish under a bed.
    They heard voices close by. Josie looked up, startled.
    “That’s the upstairs tenants,” her aunt said. She nodded towards a closed door on the other side of the stairs. “We’ve agreed to share the basement for the duration. They come down the outside steps into their half.”
    She stood up as someone knocked on the connecting door and a woman’s voice called, “Are you there, Mrs. Felgate?”
    Josie’s aunt opened the door. A woman came in: tall, with neatly rolled fair hair and a look of natural authority about her. She wore an air-raid warden’s uniform and was holding her tin hat.
    “Everything under control?” she asked. “No problems? Cat safe?”
    “We’re quite all right, Miss Rutherford, thank you. I didn’t think you were on duty tonight?”
    “I’m not, officially, but I phoned HQ to ask if they could do with any help. Seems Bertie Melford’s away, so I said I’d go in. I’m just off to do a check of the street.” Her glance took in Josie. “This must be your niece?”
    “Yes, this is Josie – Josephine Bishop.”
    Miss Rutherford shook Josie’s hand; she had a firm grip. “Pleased to meet you. Nice for Edith to have company.”
    She put on her tin hat and went back through the doorway.
    Then the other people came in: an elderly couple, the old man walking with the aid of a stick. There were more introductions.
    “You remember Mr. and Mrs. Prescott, don’t you, Josie?”
    Embarrassed by all this adult attention, Josie looked around for Edith, but her cousin was half under a bed, trying to persuade Biddy to come out.
    The Prescotts and Felgates were evidently in the habit of spending air raids together. Mrs. Prescott fetched her knitting and a thermos and the two women settled down to talk while Mr. Prescott read a newspaper.
    Mrs. Prescott turned to Josie. “I seem to recall that you had an elder brother, Josie?”
    Josie took a breath. “Yes,” she said – and braced herself.
    But before she could be asked any more, Edith erupted from under the bed. She grabbed at the cat, which leaped out of her arms, landed on the table, and skidded off, knocking over a cup of tea before disappearing under another bed.
    Both girls collapsed in giggles. Mrs. Prescott dabbed at the spilled tea with a handkerchief,