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Maddie was battling the control coluh it were alive In the brief phosphoric flashes her taut wrists hite with exertion She gasped with relief when she felt her passenger’s sap in the ar on?’ Queenie asked

‘Dratted anti-aircraft guns in Angers The tail’s been hit I think it was flak, not a night fighter, or we’d be dead We don’t stand a chance against a Messersch’

‘That was rimly ‘You just dive as fast as you can till the wind blows it out Like blowing out a candle! But the tailplane control’s coritted her teeth ‘We’re on course We’re still in one piece We lost a bit too ht in that dive, but all the dratted plane wants to do now is cliher the Jerries ht be able to see us on their Radar The plane’s still flyable, just, and we’ve ood time we’re not even behind schedule Only, I think you should know that it’s going to be – uht have to do another parachute juht too, I suppose’

Maddie had not ever practised ju broken planes more times than she could count – had, indeed, landed broken planes on plenty of occasions – both girls knew that if it happened a thousand tiht controls rather than trust in a blind plunge into darkness

Especially as, like most shot-down British airirl French and had no clever forged identity to fall back on in Nazi-occupied France

‘I ht drop you out and try to fly hoh clenched teeth

‘Letto do!’

‘Look for the landing site Less than half an hour to go They’ll flash at us when they hear us – Morse for Q That’s long-long-short-long’

The so

‘You’d better put your parachute on,’ Maddie reear’

There was a lot of crashing and cursing in the rear cockpit for a while After a few hter, ‘What are you doing?’

‘Tying everything down I’ain toled in electric wire And if I have to jump out before you try to land, I jolly well don’t want it trailing out afterShe was peering into the dark and flying the plane

‘Should be getting close,’ she said at last Her voice, faintly distorted over the crackling interco of either relief or fear in her tone ‘Descending to 700 feet now, all right? Look for those flashes’

Those last fifteen est Maddie’s ar back an avalanche She hadn’t looked at thewholly by memory and the coht place!’ she said suddenly ‘See the confluence of those two rivers? We land right in between’ She gave a shiver of excite her shoulder suddenly let go

‘There’

Queenie pointed How she’d spotted it through the page-sized gap in the bulkhead was a nal, a little to the left of theht flashes in fixed series – Q for Queen, long, long, short, long

‘Is that right?’ Queenie asked anxiously

‘Yes Yes!’

They both gave spontaneous yells

‘I can’t let go to give theot an electric torch?’

‘Inon – What’s the letter to answer the-short-short You’ve got to get it right or they won’t light up for us –’

‘I’ll get it right, silly,’ Queenie reminded her fondly ‘I can flash Morse code in my sleep Remember? I’m a wireless operator’

Ormaie 25XI43 JB-S

Hauptsturmführer von Linden says he has never known any educated person so foul-mouthed as I a his daughter’s na I am to have my mouth swabbed with carbolic – not carbolic SOAP, like they do in school, but actual carbolic ACID – phenol – which is the same stuff they use for lethal injections at Natzweiler-Struthof (according to Engel,source of Nazi loves to do the , as it is incredibly caustic But she won’t come near o everywhere Even with my arms tied behind etting it everywhere I a the whole situation will evaporate if we postpone it long enough and I think she is too

The catfight started over the heartbreaking French girl (I think she is the only other female prisoner here), who day and night all week, and she, just as stubborn and persistent as they are, refuses to answer their questions Last night she eeping noisily for hours, in between shrieks of genuine heart-stopping agony – I have actually torn out chunks ofto endure her shrieking At soht I broke – she did not, but I did

I jus (en français pour que la résistante malheureuse puisse me comprendre):

‘LIE! Lie to the such a da insanely with the iron stub where the porcelain door handle used to be (before I unscrewed it and threw it at Thibaut’s head), which is pointless, because of course the door handle and its attendant hardware are purely decorative and all the bolts and bars are fixed to the outside

‘LIE! LIE TO THEM!’