The Factory Girl. Nancy Carson

      They entered the house and Donald stumbled on the first step as he went to climb the stairs. Quickly he righted himself and went on up with his bag while Henzey remained downstairs with Alice and Maxine.

      Henzey heard hushed voices upstairs again. Soon, Donald came down with Lizzie and Jesse. After a few minutes they heard him saying good night and Jesse thanked him over and over for coming out to his mother. Then they walked into the sitting room where the three girls were already sitting, waiting for news. They heard Donald’s motor car start up and move off.

      ‘How is she?’ Henzey asked.

      ‘She’s bad, poor soul,’ Jesse replied quietly. ‘She’s sleeping. Somehow, I don’t think she’ll pull through this as easy as she did the last one.’

      Lizzie said, ‘You can never tell with a stroke, Jesse. She might be as right as rain tomorrow.’

      Jesse shook his head. ‘But then again she might not.’ He sat down on the sofa and sighed heavily. ‘Fetch us a bottle o’ Guinness in, Lizzie. I could murder a drink.’

      ‘I’ll get it,’ Maxine said. ‘Mom, would you like one?’

      ‘Yes, go on then, our Maxi. It’ll help me sleep.’ She looked at Jesse. ‘This means we won’t be able to go to the Masonic do on Saturday. Had you forgotten it?’

      ‘Bugger me! You’m right, Lizzie. And I’ve really been looking forward to that. I don’t suppose they’ll be in a rush to ask me again if we don’t show up at this one.’

      ‘Oh, ’course they will,’ Lizzie consoled. ‘It can’t be helped, your mother being poorly. Anyway, you can always go without me.’

      ‘Don’t be daft, Lizzie. I couldn’t go there without you. Not on Ladies’ Night.’

      ‘There’s nothing to stop you both going, Jesse,’ Henzey said. ‘Billy and me could stay in and keep an eye on Ezme while you went out. If anything were to go wrong Billy could always drive down to Donald’s and fetch him.’

      Jesse and Lizzie looked at each other seeking consensus. Lizzie knew how much going to the Masonic Lodge on Saturday meant to him. He did not want to miss it, and if there was a way they could both attend he would take it gladly. Lizzie nodded and Jesse shrugged his consent.

      ‘I imagined you’d want to go dancing,’ Lizzie said.

      ‘Well we would normally, but it’s not important. Billy won’t mind.’

      In any case, after giving precedence to his family tonight, he could hardly complain if she made a similar appeal on Saturday. She was not motivated by vindictiveness, since she felt not one ounce of malice, but she thought that she could help Jesse and, in so doing, might feasibly make Billy realise that he had hurt her by dumping her at home so early. Perhaps he should be made to realise that.

      ‘Henzey, you’re a treasure,’ Jesse declared.

      ‘Well…as I’m such a treasure…can I go to the Town Hall and wait for the election result?’

      ‘Not on your own you won’t, madam,’ Lizzie answered. ‘And neither Jesse nor me can go now, on account of Ezme.’

      Jesse said, ‘Didn’t her Uncle Joe and Aunt May say they were going? She could go with them.’

      ‘She could, but then she won’t want to get up for work in the morning.’

      ‘I shall be up like a lark.’

      ‘As long as that’s a promise. If they’re not still at home, they’ll be up The Junction. Put your hat and coat back on.’

      Uncle Joe and Aunty May lived next door to number 48, where the Kites used to live before moving across the road to the dairy house. Henzey found them in The Junction as her mother had suggested. They were about to go to the Town Hall with Tom the Tatter, who had his best suit on with a grubby old cap and a dirty, white muffler. Phyllis Fat and her husband, Hartwell Dabbs, had decided to go too, as had Colonel Bradley, who was a woman, but cursed and drank like a navvy.

      ‘Ain’t yer courtin’ tonight, our Henzey?’ May asked.

      ‘I’ve done my courting tonight, Aunty May. Now I’m going out to enjoy myself.’

      May chuckled at Henzey’s apparent indifference to courtship.

      They walked steadily to the town, through the Market Place, where one or two revellers were sitting on the empty market stall trestles, some with their heads in their hands, the worse for drink. Others were singing noisily.

      By the time they reached the new Town Hall, all lit up with electric lights, a sizeable crowd had gathered. There were intense debates between some on the vices and virtues of the three main parties. Half a dozen constables broke up a brawl between a Labour supporter and a Conservative supporter and then their truculent wives, who were pulling each other’s hair out in handfuls. Others laughed at the political fervour of some of their fellow citizens.

      ‘Just look at them daft buggers,’ Tom the Tatter said from under his cap and unkempt hair, which always seemed as one single unit.

      ‘What they arguin’ about, I wonder?’ May said.

      Hartwell replied, ‘I ’eared ’em. The Labour chap was on about gettin’ rid o’ the peers.’

      ‘From Dudley?’ Phyllis asked.

      He shrugged. ‘From anywhere, I reckon.’

      ‘Why, the saft sod. There’s ne’er a pier in Dudley. Where’s ’e think ’e is? Soddin’ Blackpool? Yo’ can tell ’e ai’ a local mon.’

      The Town Hall clock struck midnight.

      ‘Shouldn’t be long now,’ Colonel Bradley commented, looking up at the sky as if the darkness might yield a clue as to any likely change in the weather. She took a hip flask out of her jacket pocket and took a slug of whisky. ‘Come and stand by me, young Henzey. You’ll get a better view here.’

      Henzey did as she was invited.

      ‘I shun’t get too excited yet,’ Phyllis Fat crowed. ‘There’s still some more dignit’ries what ai’ in yet. ’Ere’s some more on ’em now by the looks o’ things.’

      Three limousines pulled up. Henzey, standing on the steps of the art gallery opposite with Colonel Bradley, noticed the Mayor and his family alight from the first car. The second one disgorged Councillor Walter Dewsbury and his wife. Next out of the same car, to her surprise, came Andrew Dewsbury and she shuddered as she recalled his birthday party. She waited and craned her neck to get a look at Nellie, but Andrew was the last person to get out of the second motor car. Nellie obviously had better things to do. The third vehicle deposited somebody Joe maintained was Alderman Hickinbottom, and his wife.

      Another quarter of an hour passed before the Mayor, with Councillor Dewsbury, Alderman Hickinbottom and half a dozen others, stepped out onto the balcony above the Town Hall entrance. One man started to blow into the huge microphone in front of him. After they’d all shuffled into suitable positions, the returning officer looked round, nodded, blew into the microphone again, then announced the count. Oliver Baldwin had taken the Dudley seat for Labour and there was raucous cheering.

      Next day revealed how the general election had ended in stalemate. Labour had won most seats but the Conservatives had polled most votes. Stanley Baldwin remained at 10 Downing Street and it was hinted that he would reshuffle his cabinet. Because it was up to the Liberals to decide who should govern, it was far from over yet. Many reckoned that the lowering of the voting age for women from thirty to twenty-one, the ‘flapper vote’, had helped Labour.

      On Saturday evening, Billy arrived at the dairy house to collect Henzey. He wore a navy blue three piece suit, white shirt and Paisley tie. As Henzey opened the door to him he handed her a bouquet of roses and kissed her.

      ‘To say sorry for last Thursday night. Am I forgiven?’

      ‘You