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Back Sisters of Gold Save as PDF
Chapters (64)
  1. Cover
  2. Title page
  3. Dedication page
  4. A Week’s Work in Birmingham
  5. I
  6. One
  7. Two
  8. Three
  9. Four
  10. Five
  11. Six
  12. Seven
  13. Eight
  14. Nine
  15. Ten
  16. Eleven
  17. Twelve
  18. Thirteen
  19. Fourteen
  20. Fifteen
  21. Sixteen
  22. Seventeen
  23. Eighteen
  24. Nineteen
  25. Twenty
  26. Twenty-One
  27. Twenty-Two
  28. Twenty-Three
  29. Twenty-Four
  30. II
  31. Twenty-Five
  32. Twenty-Six
  33. Twenty-Seven
  34. Twenty-Eight
  35. Twenty-Nine
  36. Thirty
  37. Thirty-One
  38. Thirty-Two
  39. Thirty-Three
  40. Thirty-Four
  41. Thirty-Five
  42. Thirty-Six
  43. Thirty-Seven
  44. Thirty-Eight
  45. Thirty-Nine
  46. III
  47. Forty
  48. Forty-One
  49. Forty-Two
  50. Forty-Three
  51. Forty-Four
  52. Forty-Five
  53. Forty-Six
  54. Forty-Seven
  55. Forty-Eight
  56. Forty-Nine
  57. Fifty
  58. Fifty-One
  59. Fifty-Two
  60. Fifty-Three
  61. Acknowledgements
  62. Further Reading
  63. About the Author
  64. By the Same Author

I’m not going to let this beat me, she thought, clenching her jaw. If this is the first of God’s challenges, I must not fall at the first hurdle. She was sure there was something immense she was meant to do. And her competitive spirit did not want to be beaten by all these women around her, some not much different from her in age. A hundred and sixty a minute? It seemed beyond imagining. Even a hundred and twenty – two every second! But it had set light to her determination. All she had to do was get to seventy-five a minute, and she was damn well going to show them she could work as well as anyone!

Ten

Ten

‘How did she seem?’ Aunt Hatt asked when Margaret returned, having delivered a dish of stew to the entrance of Masters, Hogg & Co.

‘Well – she looked all right,’ Margaret said, doubtfully. ‘She was more interested in eating than talking.’

‘She won’t know what’s hit her in there,’ Aunt Hatt observed. She sounded concerned, but added with a laugh, ‘She’s a character, that one, I must say.’

Margaret gave a wan smile. ‘She’s that, all right.’

She was worried for her stubborn little sister, but Annie had not said much except that she was starving and that work finished at six. She looked pale and tense and Margaret saw that she had a lot of little nicks on her fingers, one or two even bleeding. Annie seized on the bottle of water and the plate of stew and potatoes that Margaret had carried to her, and ate it there and then, pressed against the wall of the factory, and not seeming to care who saw her as the seething dinner-time crowds jostled past.

In any case, they had other things to think about. Soon after Annie left that morning, Aunt Hatt had handed Margaret an envelope addressed to ‘The Misses Hanson’. With a jolt, Margaret saw their father’s handwriting. She ran up to the attic and read it perched on the side of the bed, tears running down her cheeks. Everything in her life that had seemed so certain had been shaken at its very foundations and the pain of it had crouched as an ache inside her all the morning. At dinner time, she brought the letter to show Annie. They stood out of the way, close to the wall of the factory while Annie read it.

‘My dear daughters,’ William Hanson had written. Even in that greeting Margaret sensed a stiffness, the way he had not used their names. She watched Annie’s face. The letter began calmly enough.