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‘There’s hens all over the grounds,’ Haet to eat every egg we find’

‘Keeps ’em busy too, lookin’ for ’e off with her spoon The hot, bright yolk was like a suh cloud, the first daffodil in the snow, a gold sovereign wrapped in a white silk handkerchief She dipped her spoon in it and licked it

‘You lads,’ she said slowly, looking around at the grubby faces, ‘have been evacuated to a etting she was an officer He gabbled at her in Glaswegian

‘Speak slowly,’ Jaot the gist of it ‘There’s a ghost that sits at the top of the tower stairs You go all cold if you walk through hius proudly

‘Aw, ye hav’nae,’ mocked Wullie with deep scorn ‘An’ ye sleep wi’ a teddy, ae There’s nae ghostie’

They broke into an incohost Jamie sat down across from Maddie and they beamed at each other

‘I feel dead outnureed

--

He wasin the kitchen and the sulars mostly lived outside They slept three to a bed in our ancestral four posters The laddies were happy to crowd in together as that’s what they were used to at ho Ross and Jock to share on their own (Ross being Jock’s wee brother) Jamie had them all wash up and brush their teeth military-style (or school-style) at the four kitchen sinks, 2 boys per sink, very efficient Then he literally marched them all up to bed, installed Maddie in his fox’s den of a library on the way, and ca silver coffee pot

‘It’s real coffee,’ he said ‘From Jamaica Mother hoards it for special occasions, but it’s starting to lose its flavour now’ He sank into one of the cracked leather arh ‘How did you ever get here, Maddie Brodatt?’

‘Second to the right, and then straight on till ,’ she answered promptly – it did feel like Neverland

‘Crikey, ahed ‘The Lost Boys give it away’

Jamie studied his hands ‘Mother keeps the s open in all our bedroo, just in case we co us’ He poured Maddie a cup of coffee ‘My ’s closed just now I’ at the minute’

He spoke without bitterness

Maddie asked a question she’d wanted to ask hie

‘How did you ever ers in my mouth,’ Jamie answered readily ‘I swapped hands over every thirty seconds or so Couldn’t fit any ht I’d better concentrate on the ones I’dbrothers and little sister have all started to call me The Pobble Who Has No Toes, which is a very silly poe to concentrate on probably saved ator, who caave up, only about an hour after we’d been in the water Just let go Didn’t want to think about it’

‘You going back?’

He hesitated a little, but when he spoke it ith deterh he had a puzzle to solve ‘My doctor says they ot a chap with one arht take me Ancient and Tattered Airmen, isn’t that what they call you?’

‘Not me,’ Maddie said ‘I’m one of the Always Terrified Airwohed ‘You, terrified! My eye’

‘I don’t like guns,’ Maddie said ‘Soo down in fla scared to fly the plane’

Jah

‘Must be awful,’ Maddie said quietly ‘Have you flown at all – since?’

He shook his head ‘I can though’

Froht he probably could