Everywhere she looked, people were busy, painting posters, building floats on trucks, carrying armfuls of cardboard signs. Children wearing animal costumes scurried in and out of the action. She walked to the back of the old brick town hall and found a door leading to the kitchen. As she stepped inside she saw Jenny, dressed in a white apron, brandishing a knife. ‘Hi Erin,’ Jenny called across the army of women clustered round the long tables. ‘Great to see you. Come on over. Meet Mavis — chief cook and bottlewasher. She’ll give you a job.’ ‘Mmm,’ Mavis, white-haired, ample of figure, and not a day under seventy, looked Erin over. ‘Had a bit of experience at sandwiches, have we, darl?’ ‘Well, no. Not since I made my own school lunches. Quite some years ago.’ ‘I see. Well then, darl. P’raps you could start cutting up the meat. Go over and see Thelma. There, by the freezer.’ Thelma, a carbon copy of Mavis, smiled as Erin reached her. ‘Hullo love,’ she beamed.
