The Silent Hours Read Online Free PDF Page A

everywhere, swirling about the room, rising in panic, punctuated only by short, sharp shots from outside the walls.
    I know that I, too, am crying out that they mustn’t hurt them. They mustn’t hurt my boy.
    I am ushered to a chair by the table, my eyes are unfocused – the carrots a blur of colour. I am made to sit down and drink water.
    Recently it feels that all my memories are shuffling inwards, rattling at the door, refusing to stay hidden in the corners. Maybe it is the talk of moving me, the numbness lifting; or simply time marching on with no empathy, no pause to mark anything, just the steady tick tock of the seconds: the sun rising, a new day; its middle, no matter; its end.
    And that day, played out in parts: a few moments repeated, or a minute new and clear.
    The mother of the house is looking at me as if I have offended her – she wants us out of her home, everything about her posture shouts it. She tucks the hand of her youngest in hers, enveloping it. Sister Marguerite is making hasty goodbyes.
    As we step back through the door the full midday sun dazzles me. The past is obliterated in the glare; the crowd, the shots, the soldiers – gone in a burst. It is as if I have stepped into another place, a heaven: objects and landscape are nothing but bright yellow, white shades, and, before my eyes adjust, before I can make out the fields, the fences, the cottage, I allow myself to think that I have arrived and it is over.

TRISTAN
    ‘We should have left earlier,’ Papa says for the millionth time. ‘Why didn’t we leave earlier? This is hopeless.’ He drums his fingers on the steering wheel. He looks enormous, all folded over in the driving seat.
    ‘How were we to know, David? We couldn’t really have known,’ Maman says.
    We have hardly moved anywhere all day and I am all bunched up. Eléonore is staring out of the window at the thousands of people on the streets of Paris all carrying bags, boxes, children. Every now and again her ponytail twitches. We are in a jam, a never-ending queue of people.
    Dimitri is watching too, then he turns to me. ‘How long till we l eave Paris?’ he asks in a quiet voice, his eyes enormous behind his glasses.
    I shrug. He’s ten, one year older than me, but he is always asking me questions.
    Papa honks his horn and Maman snaps at us to be quiet so they can think.
    Luc fell asleep in the first minute of being in the motorcar. He can sleep anywhere. My legs are scrunched in and the leather of the seats makes my clothes slip around. Luc’s head is angled funny and his blonde fringe lifts every time he breathes out. His mouth is slightly open, just wide enough that I can see his missing front tooth. Maybe I could stick my finger in there to wake him – anything to give us something to do.
    I’ve only ever been out of Paris two times and once I was only a baby so I don’t remember it. Last time we went to the seaside to stay with an aunt. Now we are going to people called the Villiers. I’m not sure where they live and Papa doesn’t like lots of questions. I hope they live near the sea too, and that we are going to eat ice pops and build enormous sandcastles that you can throw yourselves on to before the tide comes in and washes them all away. This time I might dig a big hole as Arnette in my class told me that if you dug a hole deep enough, you’d be able to get to Australia. Arnette is quite clever and her father is a professor at the university so you can’t just dismiss her, even if she is a girl.
    I would probably have to dig a long way; I imagine I’d have to get other people to help me. Eléonore would probably refuse because she hates getting sand in her hair or on her clothes, but Luc and Dimitri would be keen. It would be so exciting to be digging down into the wet, cold sand that smells of the sea, and see a pinprick of light below my feet. I would dig harder and faster until the pinprick of light was about the size of my yo-yo and the rays of the sun