The (acting) deputy assistant director, who had been commanded to make the presentation speech, wasn’t quite sure what it was that Miss Crowe and Miss Ivory did or had done during their working lives. The activities of their department seemed to be shrouded in mystery – something to do with records or filing, it was thought, nobody knew for certain, but it was evidently ‘women’s work’, the kind of thing that could easily be replaced by a computer. The most significant thing about it was that nobody was replacing them, indeed the whole department was being phased out and only being kept on
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