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I don’t kno Lady Beaufort-Stuart copes – I really don’t She has got eight refugee children living with her – all boys, evacuated fro they all wore kilts borrowed fro this rabble formed a chain across the church door and refused to let anyone in until the bridegroo that if he could kick their soccer ball over the church, he was exee aave them each a sixpence anyway Then they tried to carry her into the church, but her grandfather took over at that point and made her walk sedately down the aisle on his arm

Jamie’s family didn’t talkto celebrate – alne after all They have got an aarden, like the one at the Hotel Hershey, and it hasn’t been dug up for vegetables because they have so ardeners to take care of it all So their own garden is where the wedding roses cane back with him on one of his clandestine Special Duties trips

The church they were married in is part of the castle estate, a tiny crooked building built froh to be kicked over the top of it) Maddie had white heather in her bouquet, and pink and yellow damask rosebuds Jaht kids, and his Royal Air Force tunic; Maddie wore her ATA uniforlass that had been his mother’s in Russia, and Maddie and Ja cup, for the couple’s first drink together at the reception afterwards Then they srandfather’s instructions It was not a Jeedding, but Maddie’s grandparents are Jewish and breaking the glass is part of the ceremony

Lady Beaufort-Stuart was rather shocked that Mr Brodatt had wanted theed to his o And he said, ‘I do not want to wait for Hitler’s doodlebugs to get to it first’

Maddie did not throw her bouquet There would have only been me to catch it anyway, and we both kne I felt about that Instead she left it below the family’s memorial plaque in the church, where her friend’s nairl died last year Her dates were carved there too And it was her birthday They got ust 12th

I like that Because now they will have a reason to celebrate on that day, a new reason and a good one, instead of being irl on the day, but Maddie said so about her on the train on our way back It e were adold from the nineteenth century, a sles of tiny pearls It belonged to Jaenerations eventually to his sister, and now Jaiven it to Maddie

‘I love it fiercely,’ she said ‘Because it is a little bit of Julie as well as Jamie, and of their lovely mother, and I will have it with , it will be part of me It is all of ours and they are part of me And I love that it is French too – theirfor France as much as for Britain Julie too –’

Maddie shut up suddenly But I got it, suddenly, and I knew that she’d et it – her friend died in France SheMaddie is very discreet, but she is closer to that clandestine side of warfare than the other ATA pilots She does a good bit of specialised taxi flying – like ers are incognito I don’t ask who they are and I know she wouldn’t answer if I did

Her friend Julie’s name is on the family’s memorial stone in Scotland, but I know Julie’s not buried in that church Maddie said she didn’t get a funeral

‘Do you kno she died?’ I asked

‘Oh yes,’ Maddie answered ‘I do "Killed in action" ht it would be worse if I didn’t know – if there hadn’t been a fight, the Nazis would have shipped her off in the dark to a concentration camp and never told anyone – that would have been worse It doesn’t seem possible, but it would have been worse We would still not knohat had happened to her, eighttill we’d have found out? Would anyone have ever found out?’

I a in here because I would like tois in theBride Not for the ‘usual’ reasons, not because she and Ja of approaching bombs, and not because we had to worry about whether she’d be able to run to a shelter in a wedding dress – we’d have worn our unifore of Castle Craig is very quiet! No, Maddie is a Doodlebug Bride because she spent part of the afternoon following her wedding day lying on the floor of a London bus hoping she wouldn’t get hit by a flying bolass Glass and dust You can tell where the boer and bigger until you get to a hole in the ground where a house or a store was More piles of glass are banked against the buildings that are still standing, and there are little paths cleared on the sidewalks I thought it was bad around Southae The trees have all lost their leaves in bomb blasts so that it looks like winter Houses with no roofs and no s have signs on the door that say ‘Still occupied’ to stop people looting them

The train line down froot diverted to a different line and had to get off in London and take a bus to Charing Cross Station where we got on another train to try to go around the dalass in the s – they take the glass out on purpose – people would rather sit in the wind than risk s exploding in their faces Two V-1 flying bo close to the rooftops of the buildings – the driver just sped on Not uns were racketing away too froer on the bus, including

There was a small boy, no more than three years old, just across fro in terror, over and over: ‘Not on a bus! Not on a bus! MUMMY MUMMY NOT ON A BUS!’