So Well Remembered

In may, 1945,

while the war on the

continent staggered to a close,

England waited.

In Lancashire, a

dismal rain was falling,

streaming off the quiet hills

and wetting down the slag

heaps in the smoky valleys.

In the mill town of

Browdley, as elsewhere,

the people heard Hitler's death rattle

in the throat of the wireless,

listened to each violent convulsion.

They would have preferred

one clean, dramatic note of triumph,

but they took what they

got and made the best of it,

as they had been doing for 6 years

and for years before that.

They came out to meet the new world,

glass in hand.

It arrived in Browdley, unofficially,

at midnight, the 7th of may.

There was no single announcement,

no real confirmation.

A force that could

no longer be contained

simply broke its bonds.

Come on, hurry up!

We've got the blues on the run

roll the barrel

for the gang's all here

roll out the barrel

we'll have a barrel of fun

roll out the barrel

we've got the blues on the run

zing, boom, tararrel

ring out a song of good cheer

now's the time to roll the barrel

for the gang's all here

roll out the barrel

we'll have a barrel of fun...

in time,

all men felt a solemn and

vaguely disturbing note

creep under the first exhilaration.

So much had passed, so

much was now to come.

But to no man in Browdley

was the knowledge of peace and victory

a more complicated sensation

than it was for George

Boswell, mayor and editor.

A stranger would have thought

him insensitive to the occasion,

for the preceding hours

had held the full meaning

of a quarter-century

of George Boswell's life

into violent focus.

The present crowded around him.

He walked through it into

his past and remembered.

He remembered a day in april 1919.

These points will come up in order

during the library committee's report.

Councilor Oldstock?

Item 4, page 10.

The committee opened and

voted to carry forward

its discussion of the

applicants for the post

of assistant librarian of

Browdley public library.

In order:
Elizabeth

Richardson, Eleanor Wwheatley...

and Olivia Channing.

Channing?!

We are considering the report

of the library committee.

This strong feeling

about the Channing family

is not in order,

unless it can be contained

in a suitable resolution.

Mr. Mayor-

Councilor Morris.

I move the full council

instruct the library committee

to remove from consideration

the name of Olivia Channing.

On what grounds?

May I ask if our radical

and somewhat tardy young councilor

is familiar with the

record of John Channing?

Aye, I'm familiar with that.

Then he's aware that Channing

is a distasteful name in Browdley.

And he will not deny

that in the reorganization

of the Channing mills in 1903,

John Channing's behavior

was reprehensible.

I deny that.

Mr. Mayor?

Councilor Boswell.

John Channing's behavior

was not reprehensible,

if that means what I think it does.

It was criminal.

John Channing was a crook.

There's no better word, however long,

for a man who would gamble

with the life savings of

a trusting, simple people.

Hear, hear.

But I fail to see

what that has to do with

the business at hand.

I may be young, I may even be radical.

But I fail to see what the fact

that John Channing spent nearly

20 years of his life in jail

has to do with the qualifications

of his daughter, Olivia Channing,

for giving out books at the library.

Unless, of course,

you consider it our duty here

to punish young women

for choosing to be born

into families with

more money than morals.

Mr. Mayor, I take it that

councilor Boswell has come here

prepared to urge the

appointment of miss Channing.

I've come to see justice done,

if possible.

Hear, hear.

I'm sure we respect

the councilor for that.

I'm sure we realize how

natural it is at times

for a young man to confuse justice

with a beautiful woman's smile.

Miss Channing is considered

beautiful, I've heard.

Aye, I've heard that,

but I have no firsthand knowledge.

My romantic association with her

has been confined to some 30 paces

as she crossed the marketplace.

From that distance, all I can

tell you is that she was carrying

what might have been a package of fish.

Although she has what

in my limited experience

I would call "a trim figure".

But as a member of

the library committee,

I am mostly interested in the fact

that she seems better qualified

than the other candidates.

Her schooling has included several years

in France, Switzerland, and America

following two years at Rodean, Brighton.

Rodean, Rodean needn't and how.

It's time we got up off

our knees before them

and did something

about our own schooling!

Aye, it's a trim figure, all right.

George.

Aye?

You can't say the sewage committee's

polluted with private interests.

Why not? It's true.

Aye, but it's slander.

And it'll still land us in the clink.

I'm resigned to that.

After two years mucking about,

one would think you were

ready for some honest work.

Put it right, please, spivey.

You'll end up throwing

it away, you know that.

Why don't you write things

down the way you talk?

I try to, Annie, but it's not easy.

Was it a good meeting?

Aye, lively one, anyway.

You'll need something more

substantial than paper.

Spivey, whose dog's this?

He's mine. His name's bBecky.

Oh.

I'm Olivia Channing.

Oh, I forgot.

You only know me by my trim figure.

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