The Machine Gunners by Robert Westall

forward again, with a mane of red brick-dust, grasping for those running legs.
    One man fell as it touched him. Two of his comrades picked him up and ran dragging him, without stopping, while the red lion still pursued.
    And then it stopped, and Chas became aware of the rumbling and roaring and shouting. A group gathered round the fallen fireman, lifting him so his blackened face stared at the heavens. They forced some stuff from a little brown bottle down his throat. He began to walk about, doubled up, coughing.
    "He's all right," said Mr. McGill. "By God, he was lucky. He'll never be luckier. C'mon." They walked to the next street.
    "I watched Holy Savior's being built, as a kid," said Mr. McGill.
    "Will they build it again?"
    "God knows." But did God know?
    The next street was empty, normal. Except for one policeman, and a notice saying Unexploded Bomb. There was a little hole halfway down the street, surrounded by the kind of red and white barriers workmen use when they lay drainpipes. A cat was sniffing at the little hole. Chas would have been worried about the cat, if he hadn't already been worried about Nana.
    "It'll have to take its chance, that cat," said Mr. McGill.
    "I expect Saville Street will be open," said Chas. It was the most important street in the town with no less than three toyshops.
    But Saville Street no longer existed. It was just piles of bricks: the shops were piles of brick and the roadway was piles of brick. There was a green lorry at the near end, marked Heavy Rescue. A grimy man in a white tin hat marked R was sitting on the tailboard with a mug of tea. The mug was white and shiny, but it had black fingermarks all over it.
    "How do, Geordie," said his father, in a familiar sort of way. Heavens, the man was Uncle George, Cousin Gordon's father. Uncle George grimaced, showing perfect false teeth.
    "By God," he said, "I thought I'd seen it all in the trenches in the Last Lot, but I've seen nowt like this morning. There's bits of bairns under that. We'll be three days before we get the last of them out."
    "How many dead?"
    "Twenty-seven so far, and three out alive. We had to use our bare hands, brick by brick, we were that frightened the whole lot would come down on top of us." He pulled a sandwich out of a screw of greaseproof paper with those same bare hands and began to eat it. How could he be so heartless?
    "Your family all right, George?"
    "Aye, Rosie's gone to her mother's and young Gordon to his girlfriend's at Monkseaton."
    "Heard anything about Henry Street?"
    "They had it bad. Taking the young 'un down, are you?" He gave Chas a look. "Tek care!"
    He finished off his sandwich and licked his fingers. "Rudyerd Street's just about open now."
    Rudyerd Street was no worse than what Chas was used to. Slates off, ceiling down, windows gone. Every second house carried that silly notice Business as usual. The photographer from the Garmouth Evening Gazette was busy.
    The nearer they approached the corner of Henry Street, the more Chas's heart sank. Mr. McGill walked faster and faster, like a man going to have a fight. His steel heelcaps rang louder and louder. Chas found it harder and harder to breathe.
    They turned the corner. The wheel gate, the seashells, the flagpole were untouched. The Union Jack still flew. But the roof was a wooden, slateless skeleton, and sky showed through the bedroom windows.
    "We'll knock at the front door," said his dad. "Stand beside me, and if I say shut your eyes, you bloody shut them quick. Understand?" Chas gulped and nodded. Mr. McGill knocked.
    Nana opened the door in her flowered pinafore.
    "I knew you'd come. And the bairn! D'you see what Hilter and his bloody Jarmans have done!" Her blue eyes were snapping with fury, her brawny arms folded on her large bosom. She always called Hitler "Hilter" and spoke about him as if he was a personal enemy, a bloody-minded neighbour who did sneaky things like tipping refuse over your garden fence. "If I could get hold of that