The Lost War Dog by Megan Rix

Author:Megan Rix [Rix, Megan]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780241455562
Publisher: Penguin Random House Children's UK
Published: 2020-08-20T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 19

Tilly’s compartment contained seven other children, from the youngest who was only four years old and sucked her thumb almost continuously, to the eldest, who was thirteen-year-old Tilly.

‘Don’t worry,’ Tilly told the other children, swallowing hard as she thought of Wuffly being left behind. ‘We are going on a wonderful journey.’

None of the children had been to England or knew any English, so Tilly taught them the few words that she knew: Hello, Goodbye, Please and Thank you.

‘I’m Horst. Do you know any jokes?’ one of the boys asked her.

Tilly nodded. ‘Can a kangaroo jump higher than a house?’ she asked.

Horst’s face wrinkled in thought and then his eyes opened wide as he got the answer. ‘Yes! Because a house can’t jump!’

Tilly grinned and nodded.

She soon discovered that some of the children on board the train had been on it for a lot longer than she had. Hamburg was one of the last stops on this trip.

‘Berlin?’ she asked, looking at the label round the neck of the little girl sitting opposite, sucking her thumb and holding a soft toy dog with floppy ears. The child nodded.

‘And what’s your dog’s name?’

‘Jodie.’

‘I have a dog,’ Tilly said, and her heart ached as she thought about Wuffly’s little face looking up at the train, wanting to come on board. In her head she could still hear the dachshund barking. ‘She’s called Wuffly because she likes to wuff.’

The little girl gave a half smile.

‘My name’s Lotte.’

‘I’m Tilly.’

Lotte looked very, very tired.

Other children held on to toys they had brought with them. Josepha had a doll wearing a striped knitted dress.

They hadn’t been going for long when the train came to a juddering halt. Out of the window Tilly saw more soldiers getting on board.

‘What’s happening?’ the children asked Tilly in a panic.

‘Are we going home now?’ Lotte asked hopefully. ‘I want to see my mummy.’

‘Just stay calm, everything will be fine,’ Tilly told the other children, although she really didn’t know if it would be or not.

She heard the sound of heavy boots coming down the corridor. Children started crying. The door of the next carriage to theirs opened and a soldier began to shout.

The next moment, Tilly’s carriage door opened and two black-booted soldiers, one of them wearing the SS insignia, came in. Tilly saw Horst’s face turn white with fear. He began to shake uncontrollably and even his teeth were chattering.

‘Good morning,’ Tilly said to the soldiers. Her voice only shook a little bit. It was morning, just … a little before one o’clock. But she needn’t have bothered because they just ignored her.

The SS soldier pointed to a small suitcase on the floor. There wasn’t enough room for all of the luggage to fit above the seats.

‘Open.’

Nobody moved and the suitcase remained closed.

‘Open!’ the soldier commanded.

It wasn’t Tilly’s suitcase, but the rest of the children just sat frozen with fear, so Tilly opened it and lifted the lid.

Once she’d done so, the other soldier picked up the open suitcase and dumped everything inside it on the floor.

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