‘Madame Sauvelle?’ he called out from the porch.
The sound of his voice was lost inside the house. Cautiously, Ismael entered the building and examined the scene, Irene peering anxiously over his shoulder.
What greeted them was nothing short of devastation. Ismael had never seen the effects of a tornado, but he imagined they must be something like this.
‘My God . . .’
‘Mind the glass,’ Ismael warned Irene.
‘Mum!’
Her shout echoed through the house, like a spirit wandering from room to room. Without letting go of Irene’s hand, Ismael moved to the foot of the stairs.
‘We have to go up,’ she said.
They climbed the stairs, examining the trail that some invisible force had left behind. The first to notice that Simone’s room no longer had a door was Irene.
‘No!’
Ismael hurried over to the threshold and looked in. Nothing. One by one, they searched all the rooms on the first floor. All empty.
‘Where are they?’ asked Irene, her voice shaking.
‘There’s nobody here. Let’s go downstairs.’
From what they could see, the fight or whatever it was that had taken place there, had been brutal. Ismael made no comment, but a dark suspicion concerning the fate of Irene’s family crossed his mind. Irene wept quietly at the foot of the stairs, still in shock. Ismael’s mind was racing through their options, each more useless than the last, when they both heard someone knocking.
Irene looked up, tearful. Ismael nodded, lifting a finger to his lips. The knocks were repeated; dry with a metallic ring, they seemed to travel through the structure of the house. It took Ismael a few seconds to realise what the dull, muffled sounds were. Metal. Something or someone was banging against a piece of metal somewhere in the house. Ismael could feel the vibration beneath his feet and his eyes paused on a closed door in the passage that led to the kitchen.
‘Where does that door go?’
‘To the cellar,’ Irene replied.
Ismael put his ear on the wooden panel and listened carefully. The knocks were repeated again and again. He tried to open the door, but the handle wouldn’t turn.
‘Is someone in there?’ he shouted.
They could hear the sound of footsteps, coming up the stairs.
‘Be careful,’ whispered Irene.
Ismael moved away from the door. A faint voice could be heard on the other side. Irene hurled herself at the wooden panel.
‘Dorian?’
The voice muttered something.
Irene looked at Ismael.
‘It’s my brother . . .’
Ismael quickly realised that to break down a door was much more difficult than Hollywood films led you to believe. It was a good five minutes before the door finally yielded with the help of a metal bar they found in the larder. Covered in sweat, Ismael moved back and Irene gave the door a final pull. The lock – by now just a tangle of wooden splinters and rusty metal – fell to the floor.
A second later, a pale boy emerged from the darkness, his face rigid with fear. Dorian sheltered in his sister’s arms like a frightened animal. Irene glanced at Ismael. Whatever it was that Dorian had seen, it had left its mark on him. Irene knelt down and cleaned the dirt and tears off his face.
‘Are you all right, Dorian?’ she asked calmly, feeling his body for wounds or broken bones.
Dorian nodded.