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comfortable. There was silence outside in the street now, but the earlier violence had left her feeling on edge and unable to sleep, even though she was bone tired. Right from being a little girl, Rosie had been afraid of the dark. Then she had been able to creep into her parents’ bed when her father was at home, seeking reassurance. She couldn’t do that now, of course, but no matter how much she tried to rationalise away her fears, the blackout was something she hated.
    Further up the street she heard footsteps and then the sound of a knock on a neighbouring door. Silence followed, suddenly broken by a woman’s screams of anguish. Quickly Rosie slipped out of bed and hurried over to the window, easing back the blackout curtain.
    Several doors down from them she could see four burly policemen marching seventy-odd-year-old Dom Civeti away from his front doorwhilst his wife pleaded with them not to take him.
    Rosie couldn’t believe her eyes. Everyone knew and loved Dom Civeti, who was the kindest and most gentle man you could imagine. He trained the singing birds that so many Italian families liked to keep, and he was also famous throughout Liverpool for his accordion playing. Rosie could remember how Dom had always had barley sugar in his pockets for the street children, and how he would patiently teach the young boys to play the accordion.
    As her eyes accustomed themselves to the darkness, she saw that there were other men standing at the end of the street under the guard of the unmistakable bulk of Constable Black, a popular policeman from Rose Street police station. Having escorted Dom to where Constable Black was standing, the other policemen turned back down the street, heading, Rosie recognised with a lurch of her stomach, for the Grenellis’.
    She let the blackout drop and raced to pull on her dressing gown as she hurried into her parents’ bedroom, switching on the light and demanding urgently, ‘Mum, wake up.’
    When there was no response from the sleeping figure, Rosie gave her mother a little shake.
    ‘What the…Turn that ruddy light off, will you Rosie?’ Christine objected grumpily, rubbing her eyes and leaving streaks of mascara on her face. Christine claimed that it was a waste to clean her mascara off every night when she was only going to haveto put fresh on in the morning, and she often derided Rosie for her insistence on thoroughly removing nightly what little bit of makeup she did wear.
    ‘It’s the Grenellis,’ Rosie told her mother. ‘I’ve just seen the police going to their door.’
    ‘What?’ Christine was properly awake now, pushing Rosie away and sitting up in bed, the strap of her nightgown slipping off her shoulder. Several of the rags she had tied in her hair had come out whilst she had been asleep, leaving tangled untidy strands hanging round her face. The air in the room smelled strongly of cheap scent and, despite her anxiety for their friends, Rosie was guiltily aware of how much she wished that her mother was different and more like other girls’ mothers.
    ‘Are you sure it was the Grenellis’ they were going to?’ Christine demanded.
    ‘Yes…’ Rosie tensed as they both heard the sound of angry male voices outside in the street.
    ‘Pass us me clothes then, Rosie. We’d better get dressed and get over there to find out what’s going on,’ Christine asserted. ‘No, not that thing,’ she refused when Rosie handed her her siren suit, as the unflattering all-in-one outfit everyone was urged to keep to hand to wear in case of an air raid in the night, was called. ‘Over my dead body will I go out in that. You’d better go and get summat on yourself,’ she added, when Rosie had handed her the discarded skirt and twinset Christine had been wearing before going to bed and which she had simply left lying on the floor.
    Five minutes later they were both dressed and on their way to the Grenellis’.
    There was no question in Rosie’s mind about any risk to their own