9

Joseph had known some long, uncomfortable nights: nights wondering why his mum had done what she did, as well as what he must have done to cause it, but this night was different. It felt like it would never end. Time ceased to matter. The darkness of the cellar gave nothing away. It could’ve been morning, for all he knew, but inside his concrete bunker there were no clues to tell him when the bombers would no longer come.

Sleeping was out of the question, too, unless you were Tweedy, and the only reason the dog had snored for the last three hours was because he’d found some comfort on the boy’s lap. Joseph had thrown the mutt off the first few times he’d tried, but Tweedy was persistent, and eventually Joseph gave in. Having one part of his freezing torso warmed was preferable to none at all, though it did mean he had to sit bolt upright on his prison’s step, left with nothing but his thoughts, of which he had many.

He started in the obvious place, railing against why he was here in the first place, damning his mother, grandmother, even his dad, which was rare. But when even those thoughts grew tired of themselves, he was left with what he had just witnessed: Mrs F, the rifle, the cage.

It made no sense, no matter how many different angles he approached it from. If he wanted to know the truth he’d simply have to ask her.

But how should he approach that? She’d proven herself straightforward, blunt even, but without ever giving anything of herself away. So there in the darkness, he wrote himself a script that he wouldn’t deviate from until she cracked under the pressure.

‘Come on,’ he’d say. ‘In the two days I’ve been here, that ape’s the only thing you’ve been especially kind to. Like when it went for me. Calmed it down, you did, without shouting or being horrible. Then you fed it from inside the bloomin’ cage, and don’t say you didn’t, cos I saw you. It was like you were the best of friends. So why have you got a gun pointing at it now, eh? It doesn’t make sense!’

He nodded to himself, that would do nicely. Straight and fair. Even Mrs F couldn’t wriggle out of this one.

The all clear finally rang as dawn broke, sending Tweedy skittering up the steps in a frenzy. Joseph stood, trying to shake life and warmth back into his legs and hold the script in his head. It wasn’t easy: the lack of sleep had reduced his brain to what felt like trifle.

He emerged from the aquarium, mole-like. The morning was bitingly cold, with a sheen of dew underfoot and clearish skies above: though in the distance there stretched a long band of smoke, evidence of the Nazis’ big night on the town. He couldn’t help but wonder what he’d find if he followed the smoke to its source.

Mrs F wasn’t hard to track down. He found her by Adonis’s lair again, though her pose was markedly different from last night’s.

She was slumped on her haunches, forehead and hands resting on the rifle’s barrel. Any exposed skin carried a strange, blue tinge. As uncomfortable as that pose appeared, it looked to him like she might be asleep.

Not for long though. Joseph’s crunching footsteps soon startled her, the gun returning to her chin as she swung it upon him, eyes wild, yet vacant. Like she hadn’t a clue where she was.

If he’d been in the mood he might have thrown his arms up in surrender and said something like ‘Don’t shoot!’

Typically though, she got in first. ‘I am not happy with you, my lad,’ she spat, her daze as short as her temper.

‘Eh?’

‘What in the name of blazes were you doing out in the air raid? Did I not make it clear you were to stay with the Twyfords until I got back?’

‘It’s not my fault. Try blaming your little friend here.’ He pointed at Tweedy, now coiled between his mistress’s legs, looking him straight in the eye. If Joseph hadn’t known better, he’d have sworn the mutt just stuck his tongue out in defiance. ‘Soon as you left he got spooked and legged it. What was I supposed to do? Leave him to get blown up?’

‘Did the Twyfords not try to stop you? You could’ve been killed!’

‘Why would they? I don’t belong to them, do I?’

‘You should’ve stayed where you were. Done as you were told.’

‘What? And let Tweedy get blown up instead?’

‘If necessary, yes!’ she replied.

Joseph pondered this and made sure his expression was doing the same. ‘Makes sense I suppose, given what you were doing when I found you last night.’

‘And what’s that supposed to mean?’

‘Well, from what I saw, you’re not quite the animal lover you say you are.’ He allowed his gaze to move, obviously, to Adonis’s cage.

He wanted her to know that he hadn’t missed a thing. And he sensed a change in her as she bit back.

‘I don’t know what you mean, Joseph.’

It felt like a weak answer, delivered without her usual strength. And it galvanised Joseph further.

‘Yeah, you do. What was happening when I got here?’

Mrs F shrugged, leaning the rifle against her hip, as if to play down its significance. ‘None of your business, is what.’

‘Oh, right. Just struck me as strange, that’s all.’

‘What? Keeping everyone safe. That’s strange, is it?’

‘Safe? Looked to me like you were ready to put a hole in Adonis, not keep him safe.’

‘Yes well, it’s not as simple as that, is it? Nothing is, these days.’

‘Looked pretty simple to me. I thought you were here to look after the animals... not end them.’

He could see her colour rising: pink, amber, red, crimson. And he loved it.

‘Do you think I want to be stood here holding this, pointing it at anything?’ Her tone was shrill. ‘Well? Do you? You know nothing, child. No—’

Joseph had her. He’d done it. He allowed himself to enjoy it, holding his hands up in mock surrender. ‘No need to defend yourself to me. Though if you needed someone to end the big lump in there, all you needed to do was ask.’

If the home guard had been watching, they’d have been winding up the siren, as Mrs F was ready to blow. Her face was afire, even her hair burned brighter than normal against the early morning light.

Come on then, Joseph said to himself. Let’s see how much fight you’ve got in you. How hard do I have to push before you pack me off, like all the others?

But if the woman was going to explode, she wasn’t going to do it in front of him.

Instead, she swept past Joseph and out of sight.

The boy felt the force of her mood as it passed and then sat, looking at Adonis’s cage, pleased and surprised that he’d managed to get a rise out of her so quickly. But what was she actually doing with the rifle?

That remained between her and the ape, and he doubted, very much, that Adonis was going to tell him a thing.