He quietly slips Frances back into her cot, then slides himself back into bed. He lays staring at the ceiling for quite a while before falling asleep.

Tom is playing the pub when the sirens go off; he stops playing straight away and gets his helmet out and puts it on his head. Everyone stops what they are doing and listen to the bombs going off around them.

“Turn the lights out!” he says sternly to the landlord.

All the lights go out and Tom turns his torch on. Suddenly the pub shakes and bits of plaster come down. He goes round checking the curtains and tries to reassure people. After twenty minutes the planes have gone and the sirens give the all clear. He goes outside and looks around the street, the houses across the road are demolished.

He picks up a bucket of sand and walks over. Some people are running around in a panic.

“There’s a bomb, it’s going off” they shout

Someone had a bucket of water poised and ready to be thrown over the fire.

“Stop!” shouts Tom “that’s an incendiary device. You’ll make it worse”

He guides the man away, walks over to the device that flashed with a white flame. He pours the sand out of the bucket over the small bomb.

“Will it go off?” asks the man

The sand covered the burning bomb and the flame died down.

“No” replies Tom “it just burns with a white flame. It’s to give the bombers something to aim for”

He put the bucket down and starts to push bits of wood away. The fire brigade have turned up; with the help of locals many bodies had been found. Tom sits on a pile of bricks in despair while more firemen and ambulance men arrive and are milling around, he is in deep despair and puts his head in his hands.

“Tom”

He looks up and there is his Grandfather standing on a pile of bricks with his walking stick.

“What are doing?” he asks Tom

“What?”

“Did you not listen to my words? You’re sitting there moping again. So what if someone’s died?”

“But…”

“No buts, the dead can’t worry. Forget them; it’s the living you need to help. Pull yourself together”

He lifts up and points his walking stick towards Tom.

“Yes Grandfather”

One of Tom’s friends comes up to him.

“Who are you talking to Tom?” he says “are you alright?”

“I’m fine” Tom stands up “we need to get these bodies out”

The two men shift brick after brick and pull a dead woman clear and lay her on the ground.

“Ssh” says Tom

Both men stand and listen.

“There!” he points to the area they had just removed the woman from; they can hear a child’s voice. They both simultaneously grab bricks and a child’s hand appears from under a wooden beam, they keep digging until they expose a little girl crying. They pull her out and immediately she throws her hands around Tom’s neck.

“It’s alright love” he says “you’re alright now”

“I want my Mummy” she wails

“Sorry love” says Tom “but your….Mummy’s gone to heaven”

“That’s not my Mummy” she cries

Tom stops in his tracks, he hands the girl to the other man “here, look after her”

He frantically starts digging again, throwing bricks out behind him. He suddenly comes across a hand, then an arm. Soon a face appeared, and the woman splutters.

“Alright missus, you’ll be alright” as he carries on moving bricks, by now some fireman had come to Tom’s aid.

“Where’s my little girl?” says the woman.

“Don’t worry, she’s safe” replies a fireman

Eventually the woman is hauled out and is re-united with her daughter. They sit in an ambulance together, the doors close and they are on their way to the hospital.

The bodies of several people lay covered up on the ground, lights have been set up as police, firemen and ambulance men are frantically working to bring order back to the area. A police officer comes over to Tom.

“Thank you for your help Mister Lane. We can carry on from here, go home now”