Read Online To The Grave by Steve Robinson - Free Book Online

regular fire-watchers who patrolled the streets in shifts throughout the night would always check on them as they passed, and whenever there was an air-raid they had to come straight down and get to one of the shelters, which wasn’t so often lately.
    It was a cool night.  The clouds had moved out of Oadby by mid-afternoon and the stars and half-moon above the blacked-out streets were typically bright in the sky.  Both girls wore coats and scarves with their inseparable gas masks in a box that hung around their shoulders.  Their torches had cardboard over the lens with a hole cut in it to reduce the beam whenever they needed to use them and they each had a flask of hot soup to keep them going.  For the most part they just sat in the moonlight, listening to the world below them: the muted revelry from a nearby pub and the clack of heels on the streets.  That’s when they could hear anything at all over the sound of their own gossip.
    “Mary knows,” Mena said, once she’d told Joan all about her visit to Shady Lane.
    “You’re kidding me,” Joan said.  “How?”
    “I went back there today.  I wanted to make sure Danny got my note.  One of Mary’s friends must have recognised me and told.”
    “Thank God she didn’t tell your mother!”
    “I know.”
    Joan had been Mena’s best friend since either could remember.  She had shimmering chestnut hair that fell past her shoulders in long waves, big brown eyes that were wide-set, and she always wore make-up these days, even at home.  She produced a crumpled packet of American Chesterfield cigarettes, lit one up and drew on it, leaving her lipstick on the paper as she handed it to Mena between long scissor-like fingers.
    “And?” she said, her eyes growing with expectation as she spoke.  “Did he get the note?”
    Mena coughed and nodded.  “He wants to meet me,” she said.  “Next time he can get out of camp.”  She coughed again and handed back the cigarette.
    “And when’s that?” Joan said, smiling and fidgeting.
    “Next Friday night.  At St Peter’s!”
    Both girls began to giggle.
    “Great choice,” Joan said.  “Your mother won’t go anywhere near that place.”
    “I know,” Mena said.  “She’d sooner cross the street than risk bumping into an Anglican.” 
    Joan took a thoughtful pull on the cigarette.  “What about your sister?  How much does she know?   D’you reckon she’ll tell?”
    “I told her everything,” Mena said.  “She wasn’t happy about it, but I’m sure she won’t say a word.  She knows I’ll be in for it if she does.”  She shrugged like she didn’t care.  “Mary worries too much,” she added.  “I’m nearly seventeen, aren’t I?  Feels more like I’m still ten.”  She took the cigarette from Joan and puffed heavily on it as if to prove the point.  Then she rolled her head back with Joan’s and blew smoke at the moon.
    “You’ll have to pretend you’re fire-watching,” Joan said a moment later.  “It’s the only way you’ll be allowed out.”
    “It’s not my night for it,” Mena said.  “Can’t you call for me with some story?  Like we’re expecting a raid and they need all the volunteers they can get.”
    Joan gave a derisive laugh.  “You wouldn’t be allowed out at all if your mother thought there would actually be an air-raid.”  She sighed.  “I can’t anyway.  I’m supposed to be looking after my pain-in-the-backside brother.  Mummy and Daddy are going to a dance - some posh fundraiser in town I’d rather be going to myself.”
    Mena unscrewed the cap on her soup flask.  “Never mind, I’ll come up with something,” she said.  “Mary will be away again by then.  I’ll have to lie to Mother, of course.”
    Joan snorted, puffing smoke through her nose.  “That’s nothing fresh!”

 
      
      
      
    Chapter Eight
      
    B y the time Mena’s Friday night date with Danny Danielson came around, she had her mother believing that