Sudbury #2
Margaret stood in wonder as her friend worked.
Lizzy was only five years older but seemed a dozen.
With each new set of stragglers, they rearranged the group with each person carrying or leading a younger child as large as they were capable of moving.
The smallest were passed to healthy siblings where possible or laid in the barrow if necessary.
She had two of the older lads take charge of the ladders, and kept the little procession from tangling itself into useless panic by moving people, trading places, and insisting—calmly, sharply—on obedience.
Within ten minutes, a few mothers and older sisters joined them, and Elizabeth seized the opportunity. She asked one woman to take charge. The matron was distracted by four children clinging to her skirts, but she nodded all the same, and that would do.
Elizabeth bade them go together, with the barrow and two more from various shops out to the orchard.
She hoped others would follow, for she did not know the village well enough to offer anything better, and no one she questioned could think of another refuge.
Mrs Wythe waited at the orchard with water, bandages, and clean air—which was more than they had in the village.
As the group departed, Elizabeth drew two of the oldest boys aside and bade them return with all haste with the barrows, ensuring they brought a full report from Mrs Wythe. Both promised, and the group moved out.
An ear-piercing scream snapped Elizabeth’s attention from the departing villagers.
She spun around looking frantically for the source, and her heart dropped to her boots.
Two floors above the street, a woman was busily smashing out a window with a chair leg, a screaming baby clutched in her other arm.
Smoke billowed from the windows below and fire was approaching from behind.
There was no chance the woman could escape alone, let alone with the child.
Elizabeth blessed the fortune that had found them the ladders, so she bellowed. “MARGIE! The ladder!”
They ran, seized the ladder, and rushed back towards the burning building.
Quite a few men stumbled out of other buildings, but most were either dragging the injured, coughing too violently to be of use, or both.
Some moved so poorly they might not even save themselves.
She paused beside an elderly man and thrust the remaining strips of petticoat into his hand to distribute.
When they arrived before the burning building, she cried, “Drop the bottom in that ditch.”
With the base anchored, Elizabeth did as she had seen field hands in Hertfordshire do.
She grabbed the top rung and started walking it hand-over-hand towards the bottom, pushing the top up with each rung.
Halfway up, the ladder grew too heavy to lift alone, but just as her strength gave out, Margie jumped in beside her.
By sheer luck, the top of the ladder landed a few feet beneath the window. Elizabeth could not say whether her unconscious mind was smarter than she credited, or fortune was smiling upon her. In the end, it did not matter. Without a second thought, she started climbing.
Halfway up, fear nearly drove her back down, for something in the first-floor window exploded, spraying glass splinters across her face.
A thick plume of smoke and heat smote her like an avenging god, and she started coughing ferociously.
Blood dripped from cuts on her forehead, but other than feeling like a half-roasted chicken, she remained serviceable.
Supposing that was the end of the excitement for the moment, she resumed climbing as fast as she could.
An instant later, she was just below the window, and the woman handed the baby down. Elizabeth reached for the child. The backs of her hands were bleeding, though not profusely enough to do more than annoy her.
The woman croaked rather than yelled, after coughing several times and spitting a great gob on the floor.
“Take the child, girl! She is your responsibility now, understand?”
“Of course! But you will let me help you?”
“GO NOW!”
Elizabeth obeyed. The love of a child was powerful, and the woman seemed sensible enough to know what she was about. She scrambled down the ladder as fast as she could without dropping the baby or slipping.
At the bottom, she handed the child to Margaret and turned to go back up, but a large hand on her arm brought her up short.
“Pardon my roughness; I will help my wife. See to the babe.”
Elizabeth leapt to the ground while the man scaled the ladder with double her speed. By the time he reached the top, his wife had cleared the rest of the glass and was climbing out.
He helped her to the top step, then they both scrambled down as if they did it every day. For all she knew, they did; she was mightily impressed anyway.
By the time the couple reached the bottom, the fire had moved to the upper floors, and the building was lost.
Elizabeth coughed furiously, as did most everyone in the area.
Her hands were bleeding, but she fancied she had seen worse from a fall from the hayloft in the barn.
Her face was likely a mess, but a quick swipe with her sleeve left it bloody rather than alarming.
Her work for the day might not be complete.
They had attracted attention; a dozen women and children gathered, while her two boys had returned with five more from the orchard.
Some of the women ran into unburned houses to rescue essentials to stack on the street, while others tried to put the frightened youngsters into some semblance of order.
“Do any of you ladies know aught about bandaging and nursing?” Elizabeth asked.
“Aye! Most of us do, but Millie here is the best—apothecary’s daughter, you see.”
The woman gestured to a young girl of Elizabeth’s age who blushed profusely.
“Where might he be, Millie?”
“He was attending a birth, so he will return when he returns. Babes have no notion of convenience.”
Everyone laughed, though it seemed unlikely they would have reliable medical help any time soon.
Elizabeth said, “I will not presume to instruct, but may I make a suggestion? This lady’s mother is in the orchard round the hillock there.
She has a few trunks of material for bandages but not much else.
She is tending to everyone as best she can, but she could use help.
Would you care to go, either to be treated or to assist? ”
The oldest woman in the group spoke decisively. “Of course; we thank you.”
“The smoke was not so strong there when we left, but I know not what it is like now. At any rate, Mrs Wythe will work with you to determine what to do.”
“A sound suggestion, and we thank you. LET'S GO!” she bellowed, and her ragtag group started organising themselves to leave.
Elizabeth stopped the young lady. “Millie, are your father’s concoctions still available?”
Millie's face fell. She pointed to one of the burning buildings without needing to say it was her home and shop.
Elizabeth glanced at Margaret, then at Millie; Margaret took the girl’s arm and started leading her away as the tears fell.
Elizabeth turned to two of the boys who had reliably made the trip twice before. “They will need a good deal of water at the orchard. Is there a stream?”
“Yes, ma’am. Not far from the edge.”
“Excellent. Can you find a few buckets to take back without endangering yourselves? Can you make a fire?”
The boy grinned, nodded, and was off running hard enough to make Elizabeth tired just watching him.
Without further discussion, the women organised the group, and within another minute, they were gone.
Once the group left towards the orchard, Elizabeth put them from her mind. Mrs Wythe was there, and the women she sent were more capable than she was, so they would not need her help. Most of the men worked with buckets of water and sand, trying their best to save what remained of the village.
One of the men who had observed the exchange watched the women and children leaving, then turned his gaze to Elizabeth and saluted her.
She curtsied in response, and he smiled grimly but waved her closer.
“I thank you for your quick thinking, miss. You saved lives, and it will not soon be forgotten. We must save as much of the village as we can. I fear it has more wood construction than is the fashion these days, for obvious reasons. Most villages are mostly stone, but that just means they had a big fire earlier.”
“How may I help, sir?”
“I am Mr Sutton. I own the stables you see burning there. We do not have much time. The fire is almost certain to burn everything from here to the post office. It is stone, as are a few buildings on the other side, so we hope we can stop it there, if we are prepared to fight it.”
Elizabeth, thinking he was not merely looking for agreement with his every utterance, looked at the fire and the post office, and had to hope the man knew his business.
“I have seen only two largish fires before—nothing remotely near this scale—so I cannot pretend to know. How can we help?”
“I hate to ask, but if you will walk down the street with your friend and see if there is anybody who needs your aid, it might save me from sending the men. Pray do not put yourself in any danger. Come running for one of us if you need help.”
“We will not let you down!”
Gathering Margaret, Elizabeth did as the gentleman suggested, walking down the street to seek signs of trouble. The women had made only a hundred yards when somebody yelled for help inside one of the buildings. Looking around, she saw the men prepared to fight the fire, so she ran closer.
Inside the smoking house, a young boy yelled for help between fits of coughing. Next to him lay another young boy, perhaps ten years old, who was unconscious. She could not know if he was alive or dead, so Elizabeth asked the other boy, “Are your parents, or someone else, upstairs?”
“No, ma’am. They's off seeing to the cattle.”