Dead Heat - By Dick Francis & Felix Francis Page 0,84

eyes. At the last second I caught a glimpse through the glass of the light from the fire beneath and made a slight adjustment to my path.

I crashed the bedside table into the window. The window bent and buckled but didn’t move. I repeated the process and the window bent more and some of the small panes dropped out, but still the damn lead framework held.

I again dropped to my knees for a breath. The space beneath the smoke had diminished to just a few inches and I knew that this was it. Either I broke out now or I would die.

This time the table went right through the window and fell out of sight into the smoke and flames below, taking the remains of the window with it. There was no time to think or worry about what I was jumping into. I clambered through the opening and leapt, trying to jump away from the building, away from the fire.

One of the advantages of having such an old property is that the ceilings were very low and, consequently, the fall from my bedroom window to the lawn below was only about ten feet. Quite far enough, I thought. I landed with my knees together and my body moving forward, so I kept on rolling like a parachutist over the grass and into the road beyond. I got to my feet and moved to the far side of the road and looked back.

Flames were clearly visible through what was left of my bedroom window. I had jumped, literally, in the nick of time.

I gasped fresh air into my lungs, coughing wildly. I was cold. I stood shivering on the grass verge and only then did I realize that I was completely naked.

My neighbour, roused perhaps by my shouts, was outside watching and now walked towards me. She was a small elderly lady and I could see by the light of the flames that she was wearing a fluffy pink dressing gown with matching pink slippers, and her white hair was held neatly in place with a hairnet.

I looked for something to cover my embarrassment and ended up just using my hands.

‘That’s all right, dear,’ she said. ‘I’ve seen it all before. Three husbands, and a nurse for forty years.’ She smiled. ‘I’m glad you got out all right. I’ll fetch you a coat.’ She turned to go. ‘I’ve called the fire brigade,’ she said over her shoulder. She seemed totally unperturbed at finding a naked man on the side of the road in the middle of the night, next to a raging inferno no more than fifteen feet from her own bedroom window.

The fire brigade arrived with flashing lights and sirens but there was little they could do. My cottage was totally engulfed in flames and the firemen spent most of their time and energy hosing down my neighbour’s house to ensure the searing heat didn’t set that alight as well.

I sat out the rest of the night at my neighbour’s kitchen table wearing one of her ex-husband’s coats and a pair of his slippers. I didn’t ask her if he was ex by death or ex by divorce. It didn’t matter. I was grateful anyhow, and also for the cups of tea that she produced for me and the fire brigade at regular intervals until dawn.

‘Just like the Blitz,’ she said with a broad smile. ‘I used to help my mother provide refreshments for the police and firemen. You know, WRVS.’

I nodded. I did know, Women’s Royal Volunteer Service.

The morning brought an end to the flames but little other comfort. My home was a shell with no floors, no windows, no doors and nothing left within, save for ash and the smouldering remains of my life.

‘You were lucky to get out alive,’ said the chief fireman. I knew. ‘These old buildings can be death traps. Timber stairs and thin wooden doors and floors. Even the interior walls are flammable, plaster over wooden slats. Death traps,’ he repeated, while shaking his head.

We watched from the road as his men sprayed more water over the ruin. The stonework of the exterior walls had survived pretty well but it was no longer whitewashed as it had been yesterday. Great black scars extended upwards above every windowless void and the remainder was browned by the intense heat and the smoke.

‘Can you tell what caused it?’ I asked him.

‘Not yet,’ he said. ‘Still far too hot to get in there. But electrical, I expect.