to die for something other than a dream or a story?”
“No,” Julian says. “You are my dream. You are my story. I will die for you.” He gazes up at her. “I am your soldier, and you are my country. But first, will you please come down to earth, Ghost Bride? Come down from your cloud of dandelion, and marry me in the asphodel, please, will you marry me in London pride?”
She bends to him, he lifts his head to her, and they kiss.
They kiss and kiss.
“Well done,” Mia whispers into his ear, embracing him. “They’re all bloody weeping.”
“So I win, right?” With effort, he rises to his feet.
Robbie takes the job of fake minister as seriously as he takes learning French. He stands pin straight and instructs them to put the rings on their fingers. Then he speaks in deep and sonorous British. “Ghost Bride and Johnny Blaze, we sit around the fire and tell each other stories in order to live. This is the start of your story.” (If only. Julian squeezes Mia’s hand to keep his own from trembling.) “You are here to make a new life. And your marriage is not a declaration, just once, at the beginning. As a boxer, Johnny, you don’t say, I fought one fight and thus I’m always winning. Your marriage is a choice every day. You choose to love one another, to honor your friends, to play it for a new crowd. Your life is your ever-changing stage. Bring it every night, and leave nothing in the wings. Do not say, once upon a time in December, I was in a war wedding. Say it eight times a week, fifty-two weeks a year. To be faithful, you must first have faith—in the whole dang thing. That’s what love is. So go forth, and live your story, Ghost Bride and Johnny Blaze.”
After it’s over, Mia takes off her ring and returns it to Julian. She asks if she can keep the beret. Why not, he says. He lets her have it. After all, he is not going to need it anymore.
“Are you sure you don’t want to keep the ring, too?” he asks.
She laughs as if he is the funniest man in the Underground.
For his performance, Robbie gets more handshakes and compliments than either the fake bride or the fake groom. Two days later, a red double-decker bus gets caught in a bomb blast and stands motionless in the middle of Cannon Street with its passengers dead in their seats. One of those passengers is Peter Roberts, who was on his way to Victoria to take a train to Sussex to be reunited with his wife. He is found upright, open eyes staring ahead, the bowtie under his chin perfectly straight.
18
Deepest Shelter in Town
AFTER THEY LOSE ROBBIE, WILD SAYS TO HELL WITH IT. “Swedish, I will never forgive you and Folgate for getting fake married without me, but I’m not missing your wedding reception at the Savoy because of the fucking Krauts. Let’s go. No Oxford Street, no new clothes. Men, clean the damn suits you’ve got, ladies, shine your shoes, a little lipstick, a little perfume. Tomorrow is Friday. A great day for a celebration. Things can only improve.”
Mia puts on her Florence Desmond black velvet dress with red trim, in which she sang “The Deepest Shelter in Town.” She has two other dresses, she says, but she liked the way Julian ogled her when she danced in that one. They clean their faces, change their dressings, shave, and brush their hair. Mia takes her arm out of the sling. Julian tries not to limp. His brow is healing, the swelling has gone down, the black eye is yellow and purple. Phil was supposed to take out the stitches, but then he died. Julian pulls them out himself, probably a few days too soon. Duncan tries to walk like his back isn’t killing him. They all do their best to look worthy of the Savoy dining room. Unfortunately Nick has gone back to Dagenham; he heard that the Ford plant was reopening.
Julian makes a dining reservation for nine of them: himself, Mia, Wild, Liz, Duncan, Shona, Sheila and Kate, and Frankie. It is an understatement to say that the three boys are delighted to be outnumbered by the six girls. “This way, ’tis heaven,” Duncan says.
“Imagine the hell if ’tis was the other way,” Wild says. Liz does not look thrilled with the current arrangement. She would prefer Duncan take