For the next five days (Dec 12th – 16th) "Gang Loyalty" by Peter St. John is free in digital format from Amazon Kindle.
There is consternation in Widdlington village when the girls, fed up with constantly playing second fiddle to the boys, decide to set up their own gang. The new gang is called the "Go-Getter Girls".
Its leader believes that anything boys can do, girls can do better.
The boys, alarmed at this threat to their formerly secure superiority, do not intend to stand idly by while the girls usurp their traditional supremacy.
Will the girls succeed in imposing a new-found authority, or can the boys overcome this impudent challenge to their masculinity?
The gauntlet is flung down by the girls in the wartime summer of 1941. Britain is facing an epic challenge launched by those who sought to impose a repressive regime aimed at world domination. The two challenges are not entirely unrelated.
We know now the outcome of the Second World War, but what was the result of the contemporaneous conflict of loyalties that went on in Widdlington?
Its leader believes that anything boys can do, girls can do better.
The boys, alarmed at this threat to their formerly secure superiority, do not intend to stand idly by while the girls usurp their traditional supremacy.
Will the girls succeed in imposing a new-found authority, or can the boys overcome this impudent challenge to their masculinity?
The gauntlet is flung down by the girls in the wartime summer of 1941. Britain is facing an epic challenge launched by those who sought to impose a repressive regime aimed at world domination. The two challenges are not entirely unrelated.
We know now the outcome of the Second World War, but what was the result of the contemporaneous conflict of loyalties that went on in Widdlington?
Just before the bridge was a cattle gate. It was closed. At the very last moment we both broadsided to a stop. But there wasn't enough room. The carts touched. Locked one to the other, they slid off the path and overturned. Thrown off, Jenno and I rolled together down the grassy slope to the edge of the river.
‘You all right?’ I asked breathlessly. I could feel Jenno laughing. ‘What're you laughing at?’
‘Oi won,’ panted Jenno.
‘You cheated. You didn't give me a fair start.’
Jenno rolled over and knelt astride my stomach. She grinned down into my face.
‘But Oi won. Oi told yew moi cart, Emmeline P, was good.’
I grinned back. ‘You cheated.’
‘Oi did wot?’
‘You cheated.’
Jenno pummelled my shoulders.
‘Emmeline P's good— an' so am Oi.’
‘You're a cheat.’
Jenno pummelled some more. I caught her by the wrists.
‘Wot is Emmeline P?’
‘Emmeline P is good.’
‘That's better. Wot am Oi?’
‘A cheat.’
Jenno twisted her wrists free and pummelled me some more.
‘Wot am Oi?’
‘You're pretty good too— but you're still a cheat.’
I caught her wrists again and we rolled over, wrestling in the grass.
Suddenly, as I tried to pin Jenno's shoulders down, I caught sight of somebody on the bridge. There were two people. They each had a cart. It was Winnifred and Molly!
Jenno must have sensed something was wrong. She stopped wrestling, and sat up. I sat up too.
‘Come on, Molly,’ said Winnifred. ‘There's too much of a rough crowd here.’
She and Molly turned and stalked off the bridge. They went back up in the direction of the Manor Lodge at the top end of The Street.
I thought of calling after them to explain, but I knew it wouldn't have been any use. I watched them go. My exhilaration slid out of my boots, slipped into the river, and sank like springtime out of sight. It was replaced by darkest gloom and doom.
‘Cripes,’ said Jenno.
‘Cripes is right,’ I said.
Website: http://www.peterstjohn.net/
