Bombs and Butterflies

July 23^rd, 1938

It was a fine, peaceful sort of day. Most people in London were outside, enjoying the beautiful Sunday after weeks of fairly grim weather, and Bridget Walker was no exception.

She was lying on the grass of their back garden, frowning at a piece of blank paper that was supposed to be a letter to her brother John, currently stationed in Malta. Her sister Titty always seemed to find letter writing effortless, writing pages without any apparent effort whatsoever; Bridget, on the other hand, normally found that she lost the ability to form English when confronted with a blank sheet of paper. She had a tendency to sit and stare at the page for what seemed like hours, almost willing words to form there all by themselves.

Strangely enough, they had once...well, not exactly. She had been struggling with another letter, another time, when she had eventually tired of staring at the paper, and left the room. She had gone back ten minutes or so later, to find the words 'Dear Daddy, how are you? Everything is fine here' written on the paper, in what looked like her own handwriting. She had suspected Roger (the youngest of her two brothers), of course, but he had never owned up, unusually for him - normally when Roger played a joke, he could not manage to go more than an hour or so before confessing so that everyone recognised his genius.

Despite all her best efforts though, including turning her back on the letter for ten minutes at a time, words were failing to materialise out of nowhere, so she pushed the letter away with a sigh and turned over, lying on the grass with her hands behind her head.

The reason that this letter was so particularly difficult, she was ashamed to admit, was that she really had very little to tell John. The summer so far had been boring beyond belief; despite an invitation from the Blacketts to stay at Beckfoot, Bridget's mother had decided to stay in London and not visit the lakes, for grown up reasons of her own. Bridget knew it had something to do with all the complicated, political stuff that the adults kept talking about recently, and her father's position in the Navy, but she was a little in the dark when it came to the details. She did know that a lot of people were worried about some events that had been happening in Europe, but she didn't worry too much about it. After all, didn't they call the Great War, 'The War to End All Wars'? The adults were worrying in the way that adults do, but Bridget was sure that it was all for nothing; there was no way there would be another war like that in her lifetime.

No, her immediate concerns at the moment were not wars and peace treaties, but the fact that she was stuck in this house with little to do and no one to talk to except Roger (Titty was spending the summer with a friend, and Susan, her other sister, was away at nursing college). There were no other children in the neighbourhood that she knew of, and she didn't really have many friends in London. She missed her friends from school, and although she wouldn't admit it under threat of torture, she missed her sisters too. She still had over a month and a half of holiday until she went back to boarding school, and she was counting down every minute of it.

There had been some talk of sending her to the lakes on her own for a while, to stay with the Blacketts, but she doubted that would come to anything; her mother didn't seem too keen on the idea.

No, she appeared to be stuck here, and she was just going to have to make the best of it. On that note, she picked up her pen again, and attacked the piece of paper with renewed vigour.

She had just put pen to paper when she was startled by a shout, making her jump. She looked in dismay at the letter, which was now marred by a large ink blot, and put her pen down, listening for her name again.

'Bridget! Bridgie?'

She sat up, recognising the voice as belonging to Roger. 'I'm here!'

He rounded the corner of the house, saw her and bounded over, grinning mischievously. 'Mother wants you. She's in the drawing room. There's a man here to see you,' he added with relish.

'A man?' said Bridget, in surprise. 'Who is he?'

Roger shrugged, throwing himself full length on the grass and glancing with interest at Bridget's abandoned letter. 'Haven't the foggiest. All I was told was to get you inside at once.'

'All right,' she said, standing up and brushing bits of grass off her dress, still puzzled.

'Ahem.' Roger looked at her, disapproving. 'What was that?'

She rolled her eyes, but couldn't help grinning as she said, 'Aye, aye, sir.'

'Better.' He stretched out lazily, folded his arms under his head, and closed his eyes. 'Have fun, wake me up when it's time for dinner.'

Bridget paused, resisted the urge to put grass in his open mouth, and headed inside the house.

The cool, dark house was something of a relief after the glaring sunshine of outside, but it took a moment or two for her to adjust her vision to the relative dimness of the drawing room. When she had, she saw that there were two people sat at the table; her mother and a young man she did not recognise. He had short, fair hair and sticking out ears, and was, for some reason, wearing a black bowler hat with a grey morning suit. As she entered the room, he jumped to his feet, jogging the table as he did so, and gave her a slightly sheepish smile.

'Ah, there you are, Bridget,' said Mother, not looking terribly happy. 'This is Mr. Mackleby.'

'Nice to meet you, Bridget,' he said, walking over to her and holding out his hand. She shook it, feeling more puzzled than ever.

'Um...nice to meet you too.' She glanced over at Mother, who could only shrug, frowning slightly.

'Mr. Mackleby has a letter to give you, Bridgie, he insisted on giving it to you in person.'

'Yes, sorry,' he said hastily, 'you must be feeling a bit puzzled by all of this. Well, I'm here to answer any questions you may have - probably will have, in fact - but...well, this is why I'm here.'

Not understanding a word of this, she took the letter he was holding out to her, and, with another puzzled glance at her mother, slit it open, pulling out a piece of paper - well, it was more like parchment, really - that appeared to be a letter written in green ink.

'"Dear Miss Walker, we are pleased to inform you..."' she started to read, before collapsing into silence. She read the letter; then, beginning to smile, she looked back up at the young man. 'Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry?'

He nodded, looking nervous. 'Now, I know it may be rather hard to believe, but I can assure you...'

'Sounds like fun!' she interrupted him, grinning happily at the thought of the summer holidays finally livening up a little. 'What are they up to this time? Is it Nancy? Actually, no, this sounds more like one of Titty's ideas.'

'I'm sorry,' said Mackleby, looking very confused, 'I'm not sure what...'

Mother, meanwhile, had stood up and moved around the table to look at the letter. 'I assume this is the brainchild of my middle daughter?' she said, smiling and taking it off Bridget. 'Honestly, you'd think that university would knock some sense into her. You seem like a nice young man, I do hope you haven't been dragged into one of her schemes. I know she can be very persuasive when she wants to be...'

'I'm sorry,' he said again, now looking totally at sea, 'I honestly have no idea what you're talking about...I can assure you that this is completely serious, if you are thinking it's some form of practical joke.'

'Oh no, we understand,' Mother assured him, smiling indulgently. 'This is all completely real, of course.'

Bridget, who had been silent for a moment as she observed the young man, was beginning to have doubts. He did look very serious, and very genuine...

'So what exactly does this 'school' involve?' Mother was asking, picking up the letter again and glancing at it.

Mr. Mackleby, still looking a bit nonplussed, appeared to relax slightly. 'Well...um, I'm a little surprised that you're taking it all so calmly, but...well, the new school year will begin on September the first. Bridget will need to...'

'September the first?' Mother repeated, looking puzzled.

'Mother...' said Bridget, still looking at Mr. Mackleby, 'I think he's serious.'

'Sorry, dear?'

'I think he means it, that this is an actual school. I really don't think that he does know Titty.'

Mother hesitated; then turned to the young man, who looking very nervous and very lost by this point. 'Are you at university with my middle daughter, Titty Walker?' she asked.

'Um, no,' he said apologetically. 'I'm a Professor at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. I'm sorry, I should have said that before, but I got a bit confused...this is the first time I've done this, it's only my second year of teaching.'

Staring at him as though he were mad, Mother continued slowly, as if choosing her words with care. 'Done what, exactly?'

'Um...' He waved his arm around, gesturing to Bridget and Mother, and nearly knocking over a candlestick on the table in the process. 'This. Meeting a Muggle-born...' He replaced the candlestick, took a deep breath and appeared to get a grip on himself. 'I'm sorry, I'll start again. Hogwarts' - he took the letter out of Mother's unresisting fingers - 'is a real school for witches and wizards, where they learn magic. Most children who go to Hogwarts have at least one magical parent, but some, like Bridget here, are born into families with no history of magic at all. We refer to them as Muggle-born, you see, because 'Muggle' is our work for non-magic peo...'

'Wait,' interrupted Bridget, eager to get to the point. 'So you're saying I'm a wizard? I can do magic?'

'A witch, technically, and yes, you can.'

Bridget stared at him, momentarily lost for words, but her mother was looking upset.

'Listen, Mr. Mackleby,' she said, 'I'm not sure who you are or why you're here, but I don't exactly appreciate you coming here and filling my daughter's head with this kind of nonsense.'

Bridget expected him to be offended or upset by this; but instead, he just smiled gently and said, 'Can you tell me, Mrs. Walker, that nothing strange has ever happened around here? Nothing that you couldn't explain?'

Mother opened her mouth as if to speak...and then shut it again. A silence descended.

Bridget was the first to break it. 'Um...Mr. Mackleby?'

He jumped slightly and turned to her. 'Yes?'

'If all this is true,' she said slowly, 'can you prove it? I mean, can you show us some magic now?'

Professor Mackleby grinned suddenly, looking more relaxed than he had since the conversation began. 'Of course!' He took a small, thin stick out of his back pocket with a flourish, and twirled it in his fingers. 'Let's see, let's see...ah, I know. Orchideous!' he cried, and a bunch of flowers burst forth from the end of the stick.

There was a brief, shocked silence. Bridget, finding that words had failed her once again, breathlessly resorted to one of Nancy's sayings. 'Jibbooms and bobstays...'

Her mother seemed to be in shock. 'But...how did you...?'

'Magic,' said Mackleby simply, scooping up the flowers and handing them to her with a small bow. 'Rather a showy spell, not much point to it; most of the magic Bridget will learn at Hogwarts will be rather more useful. And there's more to it than just waving your wand and saying a few words, there's a lot of theory and a lot hard work to be done.' He turned to Bridget, smiling widely. 'So, Miss Walker, what do you say?'

Bridget looked pleadingly at her mother, her eyes shining. 'Please?'

'I don't know what to say,' said Mother, shrugging helplessly. 'We'll have to telegram your father...and I don't know what he's going to say. What about fees?' she asked Mackleby, and Bridget knew she was coming around.

'Oh, there are no fees,' he replied, 'though there are certain things you need to buy, robes and books and potion ingredients and so on...'

'Potion ingredients!' thought Bridget, a bubble of excitement welling up inside her.

'You can buy everything you need at a place called Diagon Alley,' he continued, 'right here in London. It's not terribly easy for Muggles to get there, so for your first visit, we suggest that you go with a Ministry-appointed official, like myself. There's a bit about it in the Guide...where is the blasted thing...?' He began to root around in the pockets of his coat. '...had it a minute ago...Aha!'

He produced a small leaflet, printed on the same sort of parchment as Bridget's letter. He handed it to Mother, and Bridget was able to read the lettering on the front - So Your Child's a Wizard: a Guide to Hogwarts for Muggles and Their Magical Offspring. 'Here we go. That should tell you everything you need to know, and there's a Muggle address on the back. Just send us a letter when you've decided - though you need to do it before the sixth of August - and we'll set up a date for someone to take you to Diagon Alley.'

He beamed at the pair of them, apparently having said everything he was going to say. Bridget remembered her manners and said, 'Thank you,' quickly.

'Yes,' said Mother slowly, still staring at the Guide in a daze. She shook herself, appearing to pull herself together. 'Yes, thank you, sorry. This is a bit of a shock! I will have to speak to my husband, of course, and that might take a while, but we should have an answer for you soon. This...is real, isn't it?' she added, hesitant.

Mackleby nodded. 'Completely.'

'What happens if we turn you down?' Mother asked, looking thoughtful.

'Mother!' said Bridget in horror. The adults both ignored her.

'Nothing, really,' said Mackleby, shrugging. 'We would erase your memories of the whole encounter and never contact you again. Bridget will always be magical, and odd events might continue to happen around her, but none of you would ever know why.'

Mother frowned. 'Erase our memories?'

He looked slightly guilty. 'Yes...you have to understand that secrecy is the most important thing. We can't let Muggles find out about our world. If Bridget chose to remain as a Muggle, we couldn't leave her with the knowledge that we exist. I'm sorry,' he added, 'I know it seems a little harsh, but it is necessary.'

'I'd never know I was a witch?' asked Bridget, upset at the thought.

He shook his head.

'What about my other children?' said Mother. 'Can I tell them about this?'

He hesitated. 'Um...yes, if it is necessary that they know. The fewer people that know, the better, really. Ideally, you would only tell people that would need to know; immediate family, yes, as else they might start to wonder about her schooling, others, no.'

'What about Nancy and Peggy?' Bridget wanted to know.

'Nancy and Peggy?'

'My eldest son's fiancé and her sister,' Mother explained. 'Can we tell them?'

'No. They don't need to know.'

'But they'd love this!' protested Bridget. 'Especially Nancy.'

'It makes no difference,' said Mackleby, smiling indulgently at her. 'The more people who know a secret, the less of a secret it becomes, yes?'

Bridget said nothing, beginning to revise her opinion of Mr. Mackleby; he was moving from nice and friendly into patronising. She resolved to tell Nancy and Peggy the truth at the first opportunity anyway.

Her mother and Mackleby continued to talk, but her attention drifted as her imagination went riot, trying to picture exactly what a school for witches and wizards would be like.

'Mr Mackleby, sir?' she said suddenly, breaking into their conversation as a thought occurred to her.

He jumped slightly, jogging the sideboard behind him and causing a blue and white vase to smash on the floor. 'Dammit!' he cried, exasperated.

Mother tutted loudly. 'Really, Mr Mackleby! I would prefer it if you wouldn't use language like that in front of my daughter.'

'Sorry,' he said, looking sheepish. He knelt down and took the wand out of his back pocket again. 'Reparo!'

The vase repaired itself, the cracks sealing over as if they had never been there, and Bridget and her mother stared, open-mouthed. Straightening up again and replacing the vase on the sideboard, Mackleby appeared to notice their expressions.

'That's one of the more useful spells I was talking about,' he said with a smile. 'Did you have a question, Bridget?'

'Um...' For a moment, she couldn't remember; then it came back to her. 'Oh, yes! Can I bring Sinbad?'

'Sin...?'

'The family cat,' said Mother, smiling. 'It's all right with me, if the school allows it. Glad to get rid of him.'

'Oh, Mother!'

Mackleby laughed. 'Yes, the school allows it. Didn't you look at the second piece of parchment with the letter?'

He picked the letter back off the table and handed it to Bridget, who took it and found the piece of parchment he was referring to. She skim read it, quickly finding the part about pupils being allowed a cat, an owl or a toad, but her attention was then caught by a word and her gaze was dragged back up to the top of the page.

'"Dragon hide"...' she read in disbelief. She looked back up at Mackleby, her mouth dropping open. 'Dragons are real?'

'Oh, yes,' he said. 'Yes, quite a few real magical creatures have found their way into Muggle legends, though they do tend to get the details a bit wrong, bless them!' He beamed happily.

Bridget's mother, who was now looking completely bemused, laughed slightly. 'Next, you'll be saying that fairies and unicorns are real...'

Mackleby bit his lip. 'Well...' he began. There was a thud. 'Oh dear. She's fainted.'