– And I put my head round the Mess door, and I said to my Commandant, “The war with Germany’s over!” – “Well,” he said, “I thought it must be something like that.” ’On VE-day the ATS, in common with the rest of the country, were off duty. Mary and her friends went down to the pub in Devizes for ‘a few drinkies’, followed by a greasy fry-up and an evening at the pictures.Verily Anderson and her two little girls were staying with her parents at their Sussex village rectory, yearning for the war to end so she could start her married life with Donald again. And then suddenly, on Marian’s fourth birthday, it did end:‘Marian,’ I said, ‘you must remember this all your life. It’s history.’They rummaged in a drawer for paper flags and carried them up the drive to deck the trees by the road. Warm weather had returned, and the village was planning high jinks for all on the green, but at heart Verily felt she was a Londoner. ‘ “I know where I’d like to be tomorrow,”
