'You're tired; you must go home. Tommy is all right.'
She said:
'I want Tommy. Help me, please, to find Tommy.'
He walked at her side, through the rain of the dust, which lay thick on the streets and gritted underfoot as they walked. Neither ever forgot that harsh gritting, or the sulphurous breath of that dim dawn. It hurt them both in memory for always.
There is a narrow alley which leads up out of the Strada San Biagio, climbing a little. They went up it—Betty neglected no street—and there they found Tommy.
Some scaffolding had fallen, tossed down by the storm or the earthquake, in a corner where no one passed. Tommy lay with his face to the street, his sketch-book clutched in the hand of one flung-out arm, the other arm pinned to his side, with a twelve-foot plank across his back and two poles across his legs. Tommy and the scaffolding both wore a coat an inch deep of black dust.
Venables lifted away the plank: it took most of his strength; then he moved the poles. Then he turned Tommy over very gently, and the black dust drifted down on to the upturned face. Betty raised it on to her lap and shielded it with her two hands, saying always, and not knowing what she said:
'Tommy—Tommy—Tommy.'
Venables said:
'I will fetch help. I will be as quick as I can.'