“I still think you should take it back to headquarters,” Binnie said.

“There isn’t time,” Eileen said, and ran upstairs to change out of her uniform. She put on a summer frock and her green coat and then rang up Mrs. Owens and told her the good news.

“We only just heard,” Mrs. Owens said. “Theodore’s mother just telephoned,” and Eileen could hear Theodore in the background saying, “I don’t want the war to be over!”

Of course not, Eileen thought.

Binnie came out wearing her white dress. Alf was carrying the parrot in its cage. “Can Mrs. Bascombe go with us?” he asked.

“Of course not, you noddlehead,” Binnie said.

“She’s really glad about us winning. She ’ated the war.”

“No, she can’t go with us,” Eileen said and sent Alf back to his room.

When he came out, he had his Union Jack and a box of matches, three Roman candles, and a long string of squibs. “Where did you get those?” Eileen demanded.

“I been savin’ ’em up for the victory celebration,” he said, which wasn’t an answer, but it was growing late, and they still had to get to Trafalgar Square.

“You can take the squibs and one Roman candle,” she said, trying to ignore Binnie’s look of disapproval. “And no setting them off when there are people nearby. Come along.”

She hurried them out the door and down to Russell Square—another ordeal. The streets and the station were jammed, and they had to wait through several trains for one there was room enough to squeeze onto.

It was eight by the time they reached Leicester Square. “Off,” she ordered Alf and Binnie.

“Why’re we gettin’ off ’ere?” Alf asked. “We ain’t to Piccadilly Circus yet.”

“We’re not going to Piccadilly Circus,” Eileen said, leading them through the crowd to the Northern Line platform. “We’re going to Trafalgar Square.” She herded them onto the train, which, fortunately, was too crammed to permit further conversation.

The station at Trafalgar Square was even worse, a wall-to-wall mass of shouting, jostling people and noisemakers and paper streamers. “You could nick lots of stuff ’ere,” Alf said.

“No one is nicking anything,” Eileen said, grabbing his and Binnie’s arms and propelling them up the escalator and the stairs and out onto the street.

There were people everywhere—cheering and singing and waving Union Jacks. Church bells were ringing wildly. A BEF soldier was moving through the crowd kissing every woman he saw, and none of the women—including two elderly ladies in flowered hats and white gloves—seemed to mind at all.

A double-decker bus with a hand-lettered banner reading, “Hitler Missed the Bus!” crept past, honking its horn nonstop and parting the crowds in front of it, and Eileen and the children were able to cross the street before the mob closed in again.

But the moment they reached the other side, they were engulfed. “We shoulda gone to Piccadilly Circus instead,” Alf said.

“We’re going to Trafalgar Square,” Eileen said firmly. “We’ll be fine. We just need to keep together.”