The Orchard Girls

by Nikola Scott

Genres: World War II; Women's Fiction; Romance

Synopsis

London, 2004. Frankie didn't always have it easy. Growing up motherless, she was raised by her grandmother, who loved her - and betrayed her. For years, the rift between them seemed irreparable. But when their paths suddenly cross again, Frankie is shocked to realise that her grandmother is slowly losing control of her memory. There is a darkness in her past that won't stay buried - secrets going back to wartime that may have a devastating effect on Frankie's own life.

Somerset, 1940. When seventeen-year-old Violet's life is ripped apart by the London Blitz, she runs away to join the Women's Land Army. She wants nothing more than to leave her grief behind. But as well as the terror of enemy air raids, the land girls at Winterbourne Orchards face a powerful enemy closer to home. One terrible night, their courage will be put to the test - and the truth of what happened must be kept hidden, for ever . . .

PRAISE FOR NIKOLA SCOTT:

'Intriguing, twisting... I loved it' Dinah Jefferies, author of The Tuscan Contessa

'An atmospheric and gripping read.' My Weekly

'A well-written, intriguing read full of family secrets... Brilliant' Fabulous

'Characters you won't forget' Sunday Express

(P) 2021 Headline Publishing Group Ltd

Release date: July 1, 2021

Publisher: Headline

Print pages: 368

Sample

Fight or flight.

Violet had overheard Barker talking about it with another chauffeur a few nights ago, when she and her mother had come out of Sally Vaughn’s tea party. Violet had coughed loudly to warn Barker of their approach, because Lady Etherington didn’t like her staff being literate on odd subjects, and she certainly didn’t like them hanging across the bonnet of a car, gossiping. Which was vastly unfair because Barker was the most loyal of souls and if Mother didn’t watch out, she’d be making him fight or flight, flight right to the western front, most likely, and then what would she do?

Fight or flight was the body’s response to danger, Barker had said, when it had to choose between self-protection and escape. Uncannily, it gave words to exactly how Violet felt much of the time herself. Whether she was trooping down to the air raid shelter, practising her debutante curtsey or sitting in the drawing room at night, a piece of needlework slowly turning to felt between her hands, there was a buzzing restlessness inside her, something imprisoned that wanted to burst out and be free.

The fight part was difficult, with Mother breathing down her neck all the hours of the day, but the flight part – oh, to do exactly that, to kick off her stupid satin dance shoes and run without stopping until she’d reached the end of the world and could live in a cottage by the sea where no one cared if she didn’t appear promptly at nine o’clock for kippers and eggs.

She chuckled softly to herself.

‘Ooh, what?’ her cousin Romy said next to her, eager for diversion. St Mary’s Church was hot and packed on this beautiful September afternoon, the pews jammed with London’s upper class waiting for Harry McGregor, society scion and crusher of debutante dreams, to walk up the aisle with Lavinia Cooper, who had always seemed to Violet very nice, and entirely undeserving to be chained for life to someone like Harry McGregor.

‘Just thinking.’ Violet fanned herself vigorously with her hymnal and looked back to see if there was any sign of the bride. ‘About weddings and prisons.’

Romy giggled appreciatively. ‘Most girls would give their right arm to be Lavinia today. Your mother first in line.’

Violet glanced at her mother, who was clasping her gloved hands and gazing up at the torment of Job on the stained-glass window with an expression as close to dreamy as Violet had ever seen on her rather hard face.

‘Well, hope springs eternal, doesn’t it?’ She leaned back, tugging her gas mask bag into her lap. It had been a trying day already. Her mother had spent some of the morning arguing Cook out of signing up for the Women’s Voluntary Services – the butler and kitchen maid had joined the war already, lucky things – then mercilessly chivvied their one remaining maid, Daisy, to do something, anything, with Violet’s appearance. Violet had felt very badly when, after an hour’s ministrations, she looked exactly the way she had before: small and skinny, nose dusted with freckles, brown eyes round and hopeful under hair that refused to stay one colour but changed with the light, a shimmering mass of tawny browns shot through with gold. Romy always said Violet’s hair was her best feature, but Lady Etherington seemed to consider it her personal foe, which was why it was now pinned back so tightly that it had frozen Violet’s face in an expression of surprised pain.

‘Sit up straight,’ her mother snapped as Violet surreptitiously tried to extract a few of the worst hairpins. ‘And try not to wave your arms about too much.’

She surveyed Violet’s pale pink satin gown with displeasure. In the dim light of Violet’s bedroom, it had seemed the least worn out from the last few months of social gatherings, but in the daylight, the maid’s late-night stitching-on of beads to cover the worst patches was all too obvious. Being impoverished and trying to hide the fact from her cronies took up almost as much of Lady Etherington’s time as trying to launch her daughter into society.

‘You look nice, Vi,’ Romy supplied helpfully.

‘And the reception is at the Wentworth Hotel.’ Violet didn’t care at all what she looked like and was only trying not to get Daisy into trouble. ‘It’ll be dark inside; no one will notice. It’s just a party, Mother.’

‘Nothing is ever just a party,’ Eleanor Etherington said cuttingly. ‘Most especially this one.’

She paused, unusually dramatically, and Violet was filled with a dreadful sense of foreboding. There were only a few things in life that made her mother look this animated. Surely not . . . surely . . .

‘Edward will be there.’

‘No!’ Violet turned, as much as the cramped space in the pew allowed, and stared at her mother in horror.

The first year of the war had much curtailed London’s social season, with balls and court presentations cancelled and a lot of the eligible young men disappearing to fight the Germans. But somehow – and Violet wasn’t at all clear how this had happened, because she had certainly tried her best to avoid it – by the time the social circuit had wound down, she had found herself saddled with Edward Forester.

‘He’s away training,’ she said urgently. ‘He told me himself.’

She distinctly remembered their last bone-achingly dull conversation, which had taken her through Edward’s naval training in such detail she thought she was going to faint clear off her chair. She’d distracted herself by thinking of the new horse Romy was going to get, and whether her mother might ever let her go to a theatre production that Romy’s half-brother Duffy had invited them to, perking up only when Edward finally announced that he would be gone for a long time.

‘A very long time, Violet.’ Dolefully fixing his washed-out blue eyes on hers, he had clasped her hand, and Violet had nailed a commiserating smile on her face and resisted the urge to wipe her palms on her skirt.

‘I wish you’d calm down, Violet.’ The effort of infusing a discreet murmur with stridency was making a muscle jump in her mother’s cheek. ‘Anyone would kill to be in your shoes, anyone.’

‘I certainly know whom I’d kill first,’ Violet said darkly, and Romy vibrated with suppressed mirth.

‘It’s a big wedding, Vi,’ she said soothingly. ‘And the Wentworth’s rooms are cavernous, especially if we have to go down to their shelter. Chances are you might not even see him.’

‘Oh, she will,’ Eleanor Etherington said.

‘I’ll keep you company,’ Romy promised. ‘It’ll be fine.’

It was easy for her to say. Romy was only two years older than Violet, but she somehow managed to be everything Lady Etherington thought suitable in a young lady and yet had everything that Violet wanted, too, including freedom to go out and about in London, often spending whole days running errands like a grown-up. She was engaged already, but to a nice, normal man called William, who didn’t bore you stiff with vapid conversation about torpedo destroyers or promised to be gone for a very long time and then turned up out of the blue just when one felt let off the hook a bit.

Growing up, Vi had been desperate to have an older sister like Romy and to live in York Square. Her aunt and uncle weren’t much better off financially than Violet’s own parents, but they weren’t quite as dedicated to keeping up appearances. Consequently, their house was cheerfully shabby, noisy and . . . Violet was never quite sure how to put it . . . warm, she would settle on eventually. Comfortable. Free. The moment you stepped into the hall, it let you be the way you were.

Meanwhile, in her own house, Violet couldn’t even go up the stairs without being accosted in some way by her mother, and with coal doled out carefully and most paintings and extraneous furnishings in the upper floors sold off over the years, Cavendish Place was cold and dark and echoey. It had become even worse since Violet’s father had rejoined his old regiment six months ago. He had last been heard from ordering people about somewhere in the African desert, where Violet enviously imagined him striding around in his boots with a cup of tea, barking commands at people and generally having the time of his life.

Her father. Violet seized upon him with relief. ‘Papa doesn’t like Edward,’ she said to her mother’s profile. ‘He said, please never leave me alone with that fellow again, remember?’

‘Don’t be absurd,’ her mother snapped. ‘I’ve cabled your father already – just on the off chance that tonight’s the night, you know; we couldn’t possibly leave your happiness at the mercy of unreliable communication to Africa – and he sent back his consent.’

‘Consent?’ Violet said, truly alarmed now at how fast things had progressed in such a short time. ‘But I haven’t given my consent, Mother. I don’t want to marry anyone at the moment.’

‘Keep your voice down, Violet,’ her mother said icily when a woman in purple brocade turned to survey them interestedly. ‘Things are not always about what you want.’

‘But they never are,’ Violet wailed.

‘Choice will be a lot less plentiful when this war is in full swing,’ Eleanor Etherington continued. ‘I got married right out of the season – for heaven’s sake, Violet, do stop making that face. Ah, we’re starting, finally . . .’

At the back of the church, the wooden doors creaked. A slant of sunlight fell straight down the middle of the aisle, as if God himself had planned on making an entrance, then was extinguished when the doors clanged shut. The organ launched into a wheezy chord and whispering heads turned towards the bride, hanging off her father’s arm.

Fight or flight. Violet prayed desperately as she watched them shuffle up the aisle. Please God, let me be strong enough to do one of those, or else I’m going to wake up tomorrow engaged to Edward Forester.

‘It really is too sunny a day to be holed up inside a ballroom all afternoon,’ Romy sighed as they walked towards the grand glass doors of the hotel, criss-crossed with brown tape, sandbags piled up on both sides of the entrance. She looked at the cloudless blue sky longingly. ‘This would have been a perfect outdoor wedding. Blasted Germans.’

Daytime raids on London had been sporadic so far, just enough to numb the population into complacency. Still, Lavinia’s parents had deemed it wise to hold the reception at the Wentworth, which, with its steel and concrete structure, was said to be one of the safest places in London. Should air raid sirens interrupt the festivities, the guests would be able to wait it out in one of the vast cellar shelters expressly opened for the purpose.

The foyer – grand and glittering, with sweeping staircases leading to the upper floors – was heaving with people. Eleanor Etherington was almost immediately roped into a conversation, and Romy pulled Violet over to one of the big mirrors. Setting her gas mask case on the mantelpiece, she smoothed down her hair and settled the straps of her gown more securely across her shoulders. They stood next to each other, Romy slender and perfect, her hair gleaming sleekly in the low light, Violet slight and currently scowling, tawny curls straining against the pins.

‘I forgot to put on my pearls.’ Violet tapped her collarbone and gave mirror-Romy a mocking, shock-eyed gasp. ‘I think I’ll just have to nip back home for them and take a long time returning, long enough for Edward to find a nice, sweet girl to be his true love.’

‘You’ll be doing all of London a huge service by taking him off the market,’ Romy laughed, then she turned to Violet, more serious. ‘You know, Vi, you might just get used to the idea in time.’

‘Not you too,’ Violet said, aghast. ‘First Papa, and now you’re taking their side?’

Romy carefully tugged loose a few of Violet’s hairpins, then tucked a stray lock behind her ear, her fingers cool against Violet’s temple.

‘Here, take my necklace for tonight. It’s not pearls, but it’ll fill the space.’

She settled the silver disc against Violet’s clavicle. Violet touched the ring of diamonds set into the silver, still warm from Romy’s skin.

‘I’m always on your side, you know that.’ Romy nudged her gently. ‘But trust me, it’s a lot easier when you’re in charge of your own household and,’ she grimaced, ‘when you have a bit of money for a change. As Mrs Forester, rich Mrs Forester, you can do so much more than now. And it would get your mother off your back for a bit.’

‘Edward seems a steep price to pay.’ Violet shook her head.

‘He’s just your ticket there.’ Romy shrugged. ‘That’s how it works, a ticket, nothing more. You can’t fight the whole system and your mother single-handedly. Something will have to give—’

‘Ladies!’ A mop of tousled blond hair and a familiar grin loomed in the mirror behind them.

‘Duffy!’ Violet said joyfully. ‘I didn’t know you were coming! You said you were done with simpering debutantes.’

Duffy rubbed his hand ruefully across the top of his head, making his hair stand up even more. ‘Couldn’t miss Harry’s wedding, though, could I? Mate of mine. Got me out of an awful pickle a while back. We let a goat loose at the club and they thought it was an intruder. Constable chased me all the way down Hanbury Lane.’

‘Duffy!’ Romy said, shocked, but Violet grinned. Duffy was Romy’s half-brother from Amanda Etherington’s first marriage, which had left her widowed shortly after he was born, and Violet had practically grown up with him. Duffy was cheerfully entitled, always on the verge of doing something fun and full of stories of past capers.

‘Don’t go all prissy on me, you two. If you ask me, Harry just wanted an excuse for a last good party before he leaves. I’ll have to stay out of the limelight, though. Nothing like a wedding to get all the mothers worrying about who’s left on the plate. But the good thing is, it’s an early do – God bless wartime shaking things up a bit, eh? – so there’s plenty of time to nip over to the 400 later. Now, what have I missed?’ He rubbed his hands, looking around. ‘Why are we hanging about in the front hall?’

‘We’re hiding from Edward,’ Violet craned her neck to look around the lobby, then snatched up her gas mask case. ‘You haven’t seen him, have you?’

‘Not if I can help it. Shocking bore. But never you fear, Duffy is here. Things’ll be all right now.’ He offered each of them an arm and started towing them to the open doors of the ballroom. ‘With any luck, this will be a night to remember.’

‘You always say that,’ Romy reminded him.

‘But who’s to say that it won’t finally be true tonight?’ With a flourish, he stood aside and let them pass.

The ballroom was thick with perfume, cigarette smoke and the heavy scent of lilies. People were talking at the top of their voices; girls moved hopefully through the throng. Wallflowers skulked along walls and chaperones surveyed their charges with gimlet eyes. It seemed the same as every other party Violet had been to this year, and yet uniformed guests reminded everyone that there was a war on. Even the band couldn’t dispel the odd, slightly restless feeling in the air, which increased when the air raid sirens suddenly sounded at mid afternoon. Staff came in to move proceedings downstairs, where it got more crowded and louder by the time the last stragglers were inside.

Nerves mounted at the booming and crashing noises above them, seemingly more intense than usual, but Violet was only relieved that, for the moment, Edward was nowhere to be seen, even after the all-clear had sounded and they’d trooped back upstairs. She had just begun to cautiously exhale when Duffy materialised next to her.

‘Duck, Vi, I just saw him.’

Instantly Violet sagged down behind Duffy’s broad back.

‘Violet, whatever are you doing?’ Eleanor Etherington barked from behind her. ‘And Dudley,’ she fixed him with a suspicious stare, ‘how nice to see you.’

‘Wouldn’t have missed it for the world, Aunt.’ Duffy loomed over Lady Etherington’s hand, giving Violet a cheeky wink, then reached for his cigarette packet. Across the room, Edward Forester’s pale blue eyes had now homed in on their target.

‘Oh no,’ Violet moaned when he started moving, dipping his head with a polite smile here, a neat bow there.

‘God, he’s good at this,’ Duffy muttered. ‘There’s no way that man was born the way we all were, you know, with all the screaming and the blood—’

‘For heaven’s sake, Duff!’ Romy slipped her arm through Violet’s. ‘Remember, he’s your ticket,’ she whispered.

But watching his approach, Violet couldn’t remember why that was a good thing at all. Her future was right there, in the excited sheen on her mother’s face, the determined set of Edward’s pale features. They would dance, her mother nodding her benevolence in time with the music. There would be glasses of lemonade pressed into her hand, dances stood out if Violet appeared tired. And more. A wedding, much like this one. Exiting the church through a tunnel flanked by Edward’s naval chums. Children raised by Nanny, who’d already raised Violet and her father, and who would probably pass into nanny heaven while reaching for a stack of nappies from the airing cupboard. And then, twenty years from now, Violet would be standing exactly where Eleanor Etherington stood now, watching her own daughter do the whole thing all over again, if, God willing, they survived the war.

‘Violet, how very nice to see you.’ Edward bobbed a perfect bow.

‘Yes, lovely,’ she said dully. ‘I thought you were due for training . . .’

‘I was going to be, but we’ve had to relocate – oh, don’t press me, Hitler wants to know, wink wink, but it afforded me a few days’ stay in London. Would you like to dance?’

One of Edward’s more redeeming qualities was that he didn’t require her to say too much as they shunted in time with all the other couples crammed onto the smoky dance floor.

As a child, she’d had a music box with small ice-skating figures turning under a glass dome, white paper dots flurrying around them in make-believe snow. She had loved watching them, the tiny skirted figures with their hands in a muff, the men in long black coats, their feet stretched out behind, hands linked as they turned, always the same route, the small red gashes of their mouths open in endless silent merriment. Now, among the crowd of people jostling around her, she remembered the way the glass dome had distorted the garish putty faces and had to blink hard to dispel the sense of being trapped inside that globe herself, unfit for ever doing anything but stretching one leg behind her, holding hands with her putty man and turning on the blue-painted lake for all eternity.

She searched for Romy, saw her dancing, spotted Duffy by the door.

The door . . .

‘Actually,’ Edward said, ‘there is something I’d like to talk to you about, Violet.’ He dropped his voice to a throaty murmur and grasped her hand. ‘Maybe later, if we had a minute, we could slip away. And don’t worry, your mother knows you’re safe with me.’

Abruptly, she stopped, pulled her hand out of his.

‘Will you excuse me?’ she said. ‘Need to . . . powder my nose . . . the cloakroom . . .’ And without another word, she turned and pushed through the throng towards the door.

‘It’s not working, that ticket-to-freedom speech, Romy. It’s just not.’ Violet tugged at the bodice of her dress to give herself more room to breathe, tossing her gas mask on the ground. ‘Have a look and see if Mother’s coming.’

Romy obediently stuck her head outside the little nook Violet had dragged her into, but the lower floors of the hotel were vast, and people were rushing and agitated, talking in anxious voices. No one paid them the least attention. ‘The coast is clear,’ she said. ‘Oh no, wait, there’s Duffy.’

‘Hiding, are we?’ Duffy slid into their small space and expertly rearranged the folds of the drapes. ‘Can’t say I blame you. All that air of expectation, and Edward mooning about like a lovesick calf.’

‘You’re no help, Duffy,’ Romy said impatiently.

‘I’m not going back,’ Violet said wildly. ‘He’s asked me to talk.’

‘Can’t stay in here,’ Duffy said reasonably. ‘Bit of a tight squeeze, to be honest.’

Music drifted into their little nook. ‘ “I Hadn’t Anyone Till You” is my favourite tune,’ Edward had said just before. ‘What is yours, Violet?’ She saw herself sitting at a polished cherry-wood dining table with a greying Edward across from her. Charles Dickens is my favourite author. What is yours, Violet? And her mother, who’d got her into all this, who never listened, who would even now be disapprovingly scanning the room; her father, who’d abandoned her, along with all his promises . . .

Fight or flight.

‘Let’s go out,’ she said wildly. ‘Dancing. Drinking.’

Romy gaped. ‘Are you mad? Aunt would kill you. And where on earth would you even go? It’s only just gone half seven. I think—’

‘The 400, of course,’ Duffy said approvingly. ‘A drink first at the Colonial Bar. Make a night of it. I’ll take you.’

‘You would?’ Violet flung herself onto Duffy, who shrank back in alarm. ‘Thank you, oh thank you.’

‘Duffy, no,’ Romy said. ‘What if there’s another air raid? It’s all right for you, you can just pop into any shelter along the way, but Violet is barely seventeen.’

‘I’m sure there isn’t going to be another one. They’ve only just left,’ Violet said bracingly. ‘If anything, it’s safest now. Oh Romy, please? If you’re with me, Mother won’t be quite so cross.’

‘The 400 is totally safe, sissy, like here,’ Duffy threw in helpfully. ‘Underground, steel girders and all. Just think of it as a bomb shelter, only with music and dancing.’

Romy bit her lip. Her hair had lost some of its sleekness and her lovely brown eyes were troubled.

‘Come on, Romy,’ Violet urged. ‘Together for ever, you and me, remember?’

‘And Duffy, apparently.’ Romy sighed. ‘All right. Because I love you and I want you to be happy. But if we get into any trouble, I’m blaming it all on you. And Duffy, of course.’

Petrol had been rationed for a good year, but Duffy, who worked in the Foreign Office – to Violet, a nebulous occupation, with his main value being that he knew everyone and anyone – was still able to drive and had parked his small car a few paces down the road. Heart beating wildly, Violet hurtled towards it without looking left or right and dived inside.

‘Is she there? Has she followed us?’

‘No,’ Romy said uneasily, peering through the window as Duffy started the car. ‘But something strange is going on. I wish you hadn’t hustled me out so fast, Vi, they were all talking so worriedly when we left. And what is that glow over there, all that smoke?’

‘Maybe from the air raid. Or the last of the sunset.’ Violet gave a cursory glance out into the darkening street, then ducked out of sight again. ‘All it means is that we have plenty of time for you to teach me everything. Champagne drinking, dancing, and that thing you do with your eyelashes.’

Romy had to laugh, and settled back against the seat. ‘All in one night?’

The two girls were thrown around a lot, even though Duffy drove slowly through Kensington, his headlights thin strips beneath their slotted cover. Violet was busy imitating Edward’s horror, making Duffy double over with laughter at the steering wheel, but even though Romy laughed and threw in an occasional comment, her expression remained troubled.

Outside the car window, darkness had begun to settle on houses and trees. Except Romy had been right, it wasn’t really dark, was it? The sky to the east, whenever Violet caught a glimpse of it above the streetscape or between two houses, was a strange, smudgy orange. Cloud-like, blooming upwards and oscillating, the orange glow roiled amidst changing hues and levels of brightness.

‘Fire,’ she said involuntarily. ‘From the air raid this afternoon probably, but it’s all the way over to the east.’

‘You know, I think we should turn back, Duffy,’ Romy said, craning her neck to keep track of the glow. ‘With how bright that is, the fire must be enormous—’

A vehicle loomed out of the darkness, forcing Duffy to screech to a halt. Violet was thrown to the ground and Romy fell on top of her.

‘Goodness,’ Violet said breathlessly, as they settled back into their seats.

‘To Vi’s house.’ Romy’s voice was urgent now. ‘That way, Duffy.’

‘Oh Romy, we’ve come this far,’ Violet begged.

‘Let’s just try to get to the West End,’ Duffy said. But he soon fell silent, his eyes fixed on the eastern horizon whenever he stopped to let ambulances and lorries manoeuvre past in the near-darkness. There were a lot of them out and about. And even though Violet valiantly carried on the conversation, she eventually ran out of things to say, and without the sound of her voice, the inside of Duffy’s car shrank. She suppressed a sudden shiver as blacked-out windows, papered-over gas lights and closed doors stared back at her impassively.

No. She shook herself. This was her night, her one night of freedom. It was just unnerving going so slowly and not really being able to see or know what had happened. The moment they got to the Colonial Bar, there’d be a band, Duffy had said, with a black person singing, and champagne. Look, other people were out, walking. She tracked the progress of a couple holding bundles, gas mask cases dangling at their sides, and in between houses saw a man handing his family into an Anderson shelter.

‘Almost there,’ she said emphatically, although they were barely through Knightsbridge. ‘We’ll have so much fun.’

But suddenly, as if someone had turned on the sound, there was the long, rolling swell of the air raid sirens.

‘Again?’ Romy said, horrified.

Inside the Wentworth, Violet had been distracted by the thrum of voices and music and dodging Edward, but now the sound was very close. Rising in a wave-like crescendo that fell and rose, echoes thrown back from afar in different pitches, a strange, haunting harmony that pushed and pulled you with the urge to burrow deep underground . . .

‘It’ll be all right, Violet,’ Romy said as Duffy made an abrupt turn. ‘It’ll be fine.’ She kept repeating those words over and over again, breaking off abruptly when the car stopped at the next corner and a warden knocked sharply on the window.

‘Nearest shelter is the church crypt down at the end of the street,’ he barked when Duffy wound down the window. ‘Hurry now.’

‘What’s happening?’ Romy asked.

‘Where on earth have you been these last few hours? The Germans have finally done it. Hundreds of them. Thousands. The entire East End is on fire!’ Without another word, he hurried away.

Duffy inched around a bus, tapping his fingers impatiently when he was forced to stop to let two people across the street. In a window of a ground-floor flat, a dog was peering out forlornly.

The sirens had stopped wailing, but now, horrifyingly, there was something else.

The drone of aircraft. A puckering, rattling rat-tat-tat, terrifying in its relentless monotone, far away at first, but close at the same time too, splintering the insides of the car where Romy was chanting under her breath again and Duffy cursed in the front. Up ahead was the church the warden had indicated, but progress was agonisingly slow as the puckering above them grew louder, punctuated by ear-splitting cracks and booms.

‘Duffy, leave the car,’ Romy shouted. ‘We’ll have to run for it.’

Suddenly, a deafening boom on top of them, and then the front end of the car lifted, and they were thrown up and forward, riding a roaring wave of noise.

Violet had lost her bearings, the noise filling her up entirely. They had come to a crashing halt and yet it felt like they were still moving, upwards, towards the facade opposite them. Her eyes were wide open and she saw the church tower above, a spire, a cross – but no, she wasn’t moving, the tower was coming towards her, falling, almost in one piece, bricks and rubble flying away from it as it came straight at the car, the spike of the weathervane directed at her, about to run her through at any moment . . .

A hand reached across her and pushed open the door, and they fell out of the car, and then she was wrenched up hard and pulled forward into a stumbling run. As they ran, she looked back over her shoulder, once, twice, and each time her mind took a snapshot. The tower turning sideways. Snap. The beautiful swirly window at the bottom crashing into the nave of the church. Snap. Walls collapsing in a shower of bricks and glass. Rubble raining, a strange pattering sound amidst the cacophony. The car – Duffy’s car – crushed by an enormous stone pillar. Duffy’s round face next to her, his eyes wide and terrified. Romy a flash of silver at her side, her hand still clamped around Violet’s wrist. Violet scrabbled at the air, which seemed to solidify, become a wall of dust and grit she had to push against, and then Romy’s hand was ripped out of hers.

‘Romy!’ she screamed. She groped blindly into the dusty air, coughing and sobbing until she stumbled across something soft. Duffy loomed out of the dust and together they half carried, half dragged Romy away from th