It’s not just Beverley that’s got big arms; it’s all the Bottomly girls.

Eccles said, “Look at the state of you lot, tha’s’ll never get any decent lads to look at you.”

Dil said, “Not unless they were gormless lads from the Funny Farm.”

And they all laughed. Then Eccles said, straight to me, “Ay, and you long lanky streak of nowt, keep your bloody hands off Cain. I’m watching thee.”

And then they went off to talk to some lads by the bar. Eccles really has got an enormous bottom.

I said to the girls, “I wouldn’t like to get involved with her bottom on a dark night.”

After a few minutes of looking at who was there (what I mean is noticing that Charlie wasn’t there) the disco stopped and the lights on the stage went dim. Then the big lad from The Blind Pig said into the microphone, “Ladles and jellyspoons, it’s what you’ve been waiting for, so go crazy as I give you our own local lads, the one, the only, The JONES!!!!!!”

Jack came shyly on first and Vaisey started clapping wildly. He looked at her and smiled. He is a sweet-looking boy, and it’s nice that he likes Vaisey. Unless he has a funny turn like he did when Cain told him that the band shouldn’t have regular girlfriends because it spoiled their image. God, he’s vile. Cain, I mean.

Next was Ruben Hinchcliff. He looked very annoyed and he was either wearing a lot of eye makeup or he had a black eye. When Jack sat down at his drums he waved his drumstick at Vaisey and she went all red. Aaaahhhh.

She said in my ear, “He’s waving with his new drumstick.”

I wish I had someone to wave at me.

Jack started rocking out on the drums and Ruben joined in on bass.

Then Seth Hinchcliff swaggered on. He had his guitar slung around his waist like a gunslinger. The girls went, “Oooohhhhh,” and Flossie said, “Oh yes, he’s the one for me.”

I looked at her. “Flossie, they are like wild animals in trousers, as I’ve said before, you …”

But she was smiling at him from underneath her fringe. And he caught her eye and winked at her. This is bad.

This will only end in tears.

And I wasn’t the only one who thought it was bad. The Bottomly sisters had noticed the looking thing between Flossie and Seth, and they were looking over at us. Uh-oh. We huddled closer together.

Then, after a long pause, Cain Hinchcliff, the Black Prince himself, strutted onto the stage. He looked at us, then turned his back, lit a fag, and stubbed it out. Then lit another one.

I whispered, “You see what he did. People don’t count stubbing cigarettes out as littering, but it is just the same thing, you know I—”

Flossie said, “Be quiet, Lullah. I am looking at Seth.”

The crowd was chanting, “The Jones, The Jones, The Jones!”