by Stan Mason
Croup sat on one of the tables staring vacantly at the ceiling as if the answer lay there. He bent his knee and held it with his fingers locked round his shin whiling away his time in a kind of distant daydream. All that could be heard was the whirring of the washing-machine which poured out clouds of steam to saturate the basement area. Suddenly, his body jerked slightly and became erect, and his forehead wrinkled as his face took on a frown. ‘I know. Let’s wash a couple of towels, squeeze them as hard as we can and then put them in the Hoffman press to dry them to perfection.’
‘O.K. go ahead and do that,’ agreed Perch, ‘although I don’t think it will work. I’m going out for five minutes for some fresh air. It’s all this damned stress. I don’t seem able to cope with it these days... .especially not with you around!’
As he walked out, Croup went over to one of the small sinks and washed out two bath-towels. As he began to squeeze them dry he noticed a full carton of starch on a ledge. Peering at the directions he read the instructions written in very small letters which declared that starch also assisted the drying of materials. It is said that the road to hell is paved with good intentions and, indeed, good intentions were all that clouded the young man’s mind at that moment. Leaving the two bath-towels for a moment, he took the carton of starch, opened the door of the washing-machine, and threw all the contents of the packet inside. He was positive that Perch would be delighted with him for helping to progress the process. Then he returned to his own task and placed the towels under the Hoffman press, pulling down the canopy which poured steam through them at a rapid rate. When Perch returned fifteen minutes later, the two towels were limp and damp, unsuitable for use by anyone. They were turfed into the tumble-drier which was almost obsolete; one could count themselves fortunate if it worked on half-heat. This meant the drying process would take at least half and hour... perhaps more.
‘I know,’ said Croup, coming up with a new spurious idea. ‘Why don’t we go to the next hotel along the promenade and ask them to lend us a couple of towels as it’s an emergency? I mean, we can return them tomorrow or the next day.’
‘Do you think that’s a good idea?’
‘Yeh, I do. It’s a great idea.’
‘Then you go along there and ask them. Go on! And be quick about it. They’ll have my guts for garters if those towels aren’t ready soon.’
His assistant pulled a face and then leapt off the table. ‘O.K. I’ll be back in two shakes of a tiger’s tail.’
‘Lambs!’ corrected Perch.
‘Pardon?’
‘Lambs. Two shakes of a lamb’s tail!’
‘Oh,’ said Croup continuing to wonder what Perch was talking about as he left the basement.
It was a further twenty minutes before the young man returned and it was evident he had failed in his task.
‘What happened?’ asked Perch in a dull tone, already becoming immune to expectation and false hopes.
‘Hey, they’ve got a gorgeous-looking chambermaid over there! Thirty-six, twenty-four, thirty-six.’ His eyes lit up at the thought of the attractive young lady.
Steam appeared to pour out of Perch’s ears. ‘I’m not interested in your miserable love life, you sleazy excuse for a human-being! Where are the towels?’
‘Ah, that’s the problem. You see, the Imperial Hotel has its name printed on every towel front and back so they said it would be inapprop... .inapprop...
wrong for them to lend us any. I mean, we’re not the Imperial Hotel, are we?’
‘I know we’re not the Imperial Hotel!’ snapped Perch. ‘All I can say is that you’d better come up with something positive or your life won’t be worth living!’ At that moment the telephone rang again. ‘Yes!’ shouted the laundryman into the receiver.
‘I’m not hearing from you, Mr. Perch,’ returned the clerk at reception calmly. ‘What’s going on down there with the towels for Room 312?’
‘We have a washing-machine full of towels and some are being bleached. We even have two on the Hoffman Press. But you’ll just have to wait! My hands are tied! In any case, the management haven’t replaced most of the old towels. How am I supposed to deal with a situation like that?’
‘I’m not interested in your problems, Mr. Perch,’ continued the clerk in an even calmer tone. ‘I have problems of my own. And one of them is for you to satisfy Room 312 with fresh towels. Will you kindly get on with it!’
‘And what about Mrs. Crowe... ... ?’ responded Perch vainly because the line had gone dead. He replaced the receiver and returned to Croup. ‘All right, genius, what next?’ Then he threw his hands into the air. ‘Why am I asking you? The most useless, senseless person within fifty miles of this hotel! I must be out of my mind!’
‘You say that,’ replied his assistant, taking no offence whatsoever at the insult, ‘but I’ve come up with another good idea.’
‘What’s it this time?’ cut in Perch sarcastically. ‘Getting some material and knitting them?’
‘No, of course not! What we do is to go to a couple of rooms and remove a towel here and there which hasn’t been used. I mean, many people don’t have showers... well not every night anyway. And there are guests who go to breakfast but don’t get back to their rooms again until late in the afternoon. By that time, fresh towels are provided. Well, if we take those not used now we can put them in Room 312. I mean, you’ll have lots of clean towels later on today.’
Perch stared at him with disbelief. ‘Good Lord! From the mouth of babes and sucklings. That’s great! What made you think of it?’
‘I dunno,’ returned Croup inanely. ‘I sat on a nail over there and it gave me inspiration. Maybe you’re right. Perhaps I am a genius after all.’
‘Well off you go then!’ urged Perch, believing he could finally see light at the end of the tunnel. ‘Off you go!’
Croup clapped his hands eagerly and left the room ever hopeful of succeeding in his task this time. It was ten minutes later when Mrs. Crowe rang again.
‘What the hell do you think you’re playing at, Perch?’ she scolded furiously.
‘I’m not with you, Mrs. Crowe,’ he replied.
‘I know that!’ she snarled. ‘Nothing changes in relation to you! I’m talking about your lunatic assistant!’
‘What’s he done now?’
‘He’s charging into hotels rooms at random upsetting the guests. We’re getting complaints all over the place. In Rooms 215 and 219, he stormed in asking if they were going to use their bath- towels. In both cases, a woman guest was lying naked in the bath. In Room 224, he had a tug-of war with one guest who wouldn’t let go of his towel. It would appear that he’s charging into all the rooms on the second floor willy-nilly trying to steal towels. Did you authorise him to do that because if you did your head is well-and-truly firmly on the block!’
‘Where is Croup now?’
‘We’ve locked him in a room behind the reception area. He’s wittering on that you insisted he went into the guests’ rooms to steal towels.’
‘Will you send him down here? I want a word with him!’
‘Mr. Collins, the assistant hotel manager, also wants a word with him... and with you!’ she went on. ‘We’ve never had so many complaints in this hotel before. And we certainly don’t want a maniac charging into all the rooms upsetting the guests. And another thing ... ... ’
This time Perch hung up the receiver. What an idiot he was? He had to be out of his mind to send Croup on a sensitive issue such as taking unused towels out of the guests’ bedrooms. It needed great care, sensitivity and stealth to succeed in a task of that nature. How could he have been so stupid to assign it to Croup! Now they would both have to face the wrath of the assistant hotel manager, and he was a nasty, vicious man when it came to the employees.
When Croup returned to the basement Perch waded into him in no mean term
s. ‘What kind of an idiot are you?’ he demanded angrily. ‘Don’t you have any sense of diplomacy? We agreed you could take any unused towels from the rooms. But you barged in fighting the guests for them while they were in the bath or taking a shower! Are you out of your mind?’
‘It wasn’t my fault!’ claimed the young assistant weakly. ‘How was I to know where people were? Most of the rooms were in darkness.’
‘Two women were naked in the bath!’
‘Well I didn’t see them. I didn’t see any naked women.’
‘Didn’t you realise you had to be extra careful, you twerp. Now we might both get the sack.’
Croup sat on a table quietly nursing his ego for a while. Then his face lit up and he threw his hands in the air. ‘I’ve got it!’ he shouted. ‘I’ve got it!’
‘Well keep away from me!’ warned Perch. ‘I don’t want to catch it!’
‘No, you don’t understand. I’ve got another idea.’
‘Oh no!’ winced the laundryman. ‘Not another one!’ The washing-machine slowed and came to a halt. Perch opened the door and pulled out some of the towels. ‘What the hell’s happened here?’ he exploded.
‘Are they dry?’ asked Croup innocently.
‘They’re dry all right, and they’re as stiff as boards!’ He lifted up a small bundle of towels tightly fitted together in a knot and knocked on it with his knuckles to make a hollow sound.
‘I did that,’ boasted his assistant.
Perch felt the blood run cold in his veins. ‘You did what?’
‘I put the packet of starch in the machine so that they could dry quicker.’
‘You what?’ the echo reverberated throughout the basement.
‘I put the starch in the machine.’
‘You idiot! How am I going to make these towels usable? They’re supposed to be soft and fresh!’
‘You haven’t heard my idea. Why don’t we go to a shop and buy two towels for Room 312 and get the hotel to pay for them? We’ll have the receipt.’
‘Have you got any money?’ demanded Perch angrily.
‘No,’ replied Croup, shrugging his shoulders.
‘Well nor have I! So much for your brilliant idea! Now put that clever mind of yours into gear and think of a way to get the starch out of these towels or we’re in very deep water. Deeper than we are now.’
‘Put them back in the washing-machine and start again.’
‘And what is Mrs. Crowe going to use for towels this afternoon because they won’t be washed and dried by then. In fact, they’ll be so stiff the chambermaids will have to lean them against the bathroom wall.’
The telephone rang again and the voice of the clerk at reception could be heard. ‘Hallo, is anyone there, Mr. Perch. We’re still waiting. And so is Mr. Collins, the assistant hotel manager. We’re all waiting. The guests in Room 312 have telephoned reception again. They’re threatening to take their showers and come down to reception in the nude waiting for the towels to dry themselves off, so I suggest you bring them soon. Does anyone ever do any work down there?’
Perch let out a mighty roar and threw the receiver against the wall in anger. He returned to the washing-machine which refuse to comply when he turned on the programme button. He kicked it twice but it didn’t respond so he carried on kicking it in vain.
Croup watched him in silence then, when his superior gave up, he walked over to it and gave it a slight tap with the edge of his hand. The machine roared into action with the sound of water pouring inside and steam emerging from a pipe at the rear. The sweat poured off Perch as he looked in the window of the tumble-drier. It was sounding very rough, as though all the parts inside were grinding each other down. He gave the machine a slight tap with his hand and it seemed to resent his action. Within a few seconds, sparks began to fly from the electric point and suddenly all the lights went out in the basement short-circuiting the washing-machine and the tumble-drier.
‘Hell’s bells!’ exclaimed Croup in abject wonderment. ‘I think you’ve blow a fuse. What are we going to do now?’
Perch went over to the telephone receiver only to discover he had smashed it by throwing it at the wall at the end of the last call. ‘Go upstairs and tell the electrician what’s happened,’ he ordered. ‘And make it quick. We haven’t any time to lose. There’s the sheets to be done as well!’
Croup disappeared into the darkness but he never returned. He found the atmosphere in the basement extremely unpleasant and very stressful. He also recognised he would be stricken with arthritis as a result of all the steam and dampness there and, as a result, would suffer greatly in his later years. In any case, he considered himself to be an ‘ideas’ man rather than a laundryman. After all, he was the one who came up with all the ideas, not Perch. If he could find himself a nice little job where he just had to think up ideas it would suit him perfectly. He sat down on a set of steps a short distance away from the hotel not intending to return and continued to daydream in his usual fashion.
Perch, on the other hand, bounced up and down with frustration. His position was becoming more untenable every month. First the freeze in wages, then the reduction in the number of towels and sheets, followed by the refusal by the management to renew the washing-machine or the tumble-drier, and the longer hours imposed upon him for the job because they rid themselves of two full-time laundrymen and replaced them with Croup, a young inexperienced daydreamer. He sat quite still in the dark for about ten minutes and then decided to attack the tumble-drier by levering open the door with a screw-driver. To his surprise, the towels were almost dry. Sighing with relief, he made his way upstairs and caught the lift to the third floor. It view of what had happened, it was a job he intended to do himself without informing Mrs. Crowe or any of the chambermaids. He arrived outside Room 312 with the towels over his arm and knocked on the door. There was no answer. He rapped on the door again placing his ear to the key-hole. He could barely hear the Pilkington’s talking softly to each other inside.
‘I feel dirty,’ cooed the newly-wed Mrs. Pilkington.
‘And I’m going to talk dirty to you,’ declared her husband.
‘Then let’s forget the towels and make love,’ continued the two of them simultaneously, bursting into laughter.
Perch threw the towels on the floor in the corridor and jumped on them time and time again with his dirty boots so that they were completely unusable by any of the guests. He was not to know that Mr. Collins, the assistant hotel manager, and Mrs. Crowe, the senior housekeeper, were just around the corner making their way towards him? Sometimes one could be absolutely certain it was going to be a rotten day. One could count on it!
Together
In the old days, it was difficult to overcome the shock of losing a parent. In modern times, accelerated by automation and fast-moving activities, members of families often live far from each other, visiting parents is a rarity, while some offspring can’t wait to get their hands on their parents possessions, to spend the lifetime savings of a father or mother impulsively. In effect, there are many who can hardly wait for them to die to obtain the benefit they do not deserve. The act of oppression on a helpless person is sad to witness especially when domination if effected by a child on parents. It is more likely to occur where one parent has died and the other is extremely unwell and vulnerable. The motive is always strong... money and material possessions... because the love of the child is usually overwhelmed by other elements of human nature... .the ambitions of greed and materialism. All too often the wicked offspring wins the one-sided battle. However, there are some exceptions to the rule where a aged person entitled to justice decides to fight back.
There were twenty-two in-mates of Jeremiah Lodge, a residential home for the elderly. The average age was eighty-six. They were all old people, shadows of their former selves, suffering from senility, disease and other medical problems, u
nable to function or cope with the normal routines of daily life, either mentally or physically. Some of them had severe regular memory lapses, others were unable to walk without some kind of aid, while many of them had difficulty preventing themselves from shaking as a result of their condition. Except for one bachelor and a spinster, they were all widows or widowers unable to tend to themselves or undertake the daily routine in their own homes, such as cooking and cleaning. In the first half of the twentieth century, residential homes were few in number. Invalid mothers or fathers were looked after by members of their family and many daughters devoted their lives to an ailing parent. By the end of the century, many residential homes for the elderly sprouted quickly and became highly successful. As far as the modern family was concerned, an unwanted parent hanging round the house all day was an inconvenience to all. There could be no better arrangement than to place them in a suitable residential home... to farm them out for someone else to look after them! It appeared to be a very humane way of allowing an old person to spend the rest of their lives in comfort... to get them out of the way! The children readily convinced themselves it was all for the benefit of the unwanted parent who would be well-looked after by professionals. This feature was enhanced by the British Government who willingly paid enormous sums of money each year to residential home owners for looking after the elderly when the family of such unfortunate elderly people should have been responsible. Consequently, unwanted parents were sent packing as soon as they showed signs of mental or physical disability. After all, in cases where they had insufficient funds to afford it, the Government paid the bill for them each month. Indeed, there were rules set out by Westminster for old people to pay some part of the cost from the wealth they had accumulated over the years, but this was often easily by-passed by cunning children as a result of so many loopholes in the legislation.
One morning, Jacob Crompton entered the communal lounge of Jeremiah Lodge to watch television. He didn’t particularly want to sit through yet another boring programme with the usual disinterest but there was nothing else to do. Days hardly mattered because they all ran into one another in a long line of months and years. He was aware of the date only twice each year. Firstly, in June, when summer arrived and they were able to sit in the garden to enjoy the sunshine. Secondly, at the end of the year when a Christmas tree appeared in the corner of the room bedecked with coloured lights and some people received presents. Not that he ever got one. His daughter simply sent him a card. The rest of the year was relatively all the same... .getting up, watching television, a short stroll outside, a series of short naps, more television, tea with the others, television again, short naps, and the retreat to his room for the night. It was a kind of purgatory for everyone in the Lodge.