The Steamie

by Tony Roper

  ‘Can she?’ Doreen's eyes widened at the thought. ‘Lucky thing,’ she said, enviously.

  ‘No' really,’ replied Magrit. ‘She's got a face like an elephant's airse.’

  ‘That's a shame,’ said Doreen genuinely. ‘Have you ever seen Tony Curtis?’

  Magrit shook her head, ‘Naw – I've heard o' him, though.’

  ‘Oh! He … is … beautiful,’ Doreen gasped. ‘And he's got a fantastic haircut and beautiful eyes and a dead low voice.’

  Magrit studied Doreen. Her enthusiasm stirred memories of being that age. She was sure she must have been like that at one time too, but too much had happened and now numbness had taken precedence in her heart.

  Andy strolled between the stalls. He had finished in the basement checking the pressure levels for the furnace-fuelled main boiler that serviced the entire washhouse and, now that that was out the way, his next duty was to inspect the steamie stalls and make sure everything was in order. Andy could usually manage all this without ever taking his hands out of his overall pockets. As he strolled along, he whistled the Nat King Cole hit ‘Because You're Mine’. A woman with the complexion of an alcoholic beetroot winked and smiled at him with a mouth that had not contained teeth for many a year. Andy smiled back and subconsciously changed to whistling the Roy Rogers' hit ‘A Four-Legged Friend’.

  Doreen was still enthusing about Tony Curtis. ‘He wears smashing suits as well but it's his eyes – they go right through you. John and I went to see a picture he was in. It was the first time I'd seen him. I'm no' kiddin' you, Magrit, I was actually droolin' … my insides were all goin' … see when the lights went up, I was dead embarrassed. John says to me, “Are you all right? You're all flushed. What's the matter?”’

  ‘What did you say?’ Magrit asked, with the glint of a smile playing round the corners of her eyes.

  ‘I just told him it was women's troubles. Well, so it was – in a way,’ laughed Doreen. Magrit, caught up in Doreen's vitality, joined in.

  Dolly's voice mingled with their chortling, ‘Am I missing something?’ She had made sure that Mary Culfeathers was safely in line for the next shot at the wringer and was now about to tackle the blankets that had been steeping in the low sink provided for this purpose.

  ‘Have you ever seen Tony Curtis, Dolly?’ asked Magrit.

  ‘Naw. Does he come from roond here?’

  Magrit shook her head as Doreen went into another fit of merriment. ‘He's an actor. Doreen says he's a right fine boy.’

  Dolly dismissed the question as the current crop of romantic leading men held no interest for her. ‘I've no' been to the pictures for years. We used tae go before we were married. My hero was George Raft – he was a marvellous dancer.’

  ‘I thought he was a gangster?’ Doreen said, her face registering puzzlement.

  ‘Aye, he was. But he was a marvellous dancer too. The tango was his speciality – it was mine as well. I was good at it when I was younger.’ Dolly's eyes were alight, full of happy memories. ‘I was never away frae the dancin'. We used tae got to the Playhouse, the Albert and the Barrowland. That's where I met Boab.’

  ‘John and I met there,’ said Doreen.

  ‘So did Peter and me,’ Magrit pronounced darkly. ‘It's got a lot tae answer for, that place.’ Then she added, ‘I liked the quickstep and the foxtrot.’

  ‘Of course, they don't dance noo, Magrit,’ Dolly declared. She shook her head at the bizarre behaviour of the younger generation. ‘It's that jitterbuggers they dae just noo. Naw there was nothin' tae beat the tango. My partner was always Big Agnes Gillespie,’ she said proudly.

  ‘Did you no' dance wi' men?’ Doreen asked, puzzled again.

  ‘Aye – what I meant was Big Agnes and I always palled each other to the dancin'.’

  ‘To get a lumber,’ said Doreen, using the Glasgow slang word for an escort of the opposite sex.

  ‘We never bothered wi' that. We went for the dancin' – no' for a click,’ Dolly stated emphatically, using an even older Glasgow slang word for the same escort. ‘There was plenty o' time for a' that nonsense later on. Andy McGhee always got me up for the tango.’ She paused while the memories flooded back before adding wistfully, ‘He used to say I was good 'cause I had the bowly legs.’

  ‘You should have warmed his jaw for him,’ Magrit snapped.

  ‘Naw,’ Dolly said impatiently. ‘He meant they came in handy when I leaned back.’

  Magrit looked at Doreen for enlightenment. There was none so she looked back at Dolly. ‘How do you mean?’

  ‘Well, it meant, when we were doin' the lean-back, he could get his legs in between mine faster than usual,’ was Dolly's reasoned reply.

  ‘No fool, Andy McGhee, eh?’ was Magrit's summation of Andy McGhee's ability to seize the moment.

  Dolly reasoned the lassies didn't know that, during the tango, for dramatic effect, there was a bit where the female leaned right back, held by the male's arms. The ultimate objective for the female was to lean as far back as she could and, if possible, touch the dance floor with the back of her head. In order to make this happen the male would prop her up with his leg so they could hold the position while their heads darted left and right in a staccato movement. Dolly also reasoned it was quicker to show them. ‘C'mere and I'll show you what I mean, Doreen.’

  Doreen recoiled. ‘I don't know how to do a tango,’ was her only defence.

  Dolly was not in the mood for negative responses. It was a character trait that she'd had all her life. ‘Come on,’ she urged. ‘You'll enjoy it.’

  Doreen backed further into her stall as if being attacked by a rabid animal. Dolly grabbed her arm and began to pull her out. Doreen was starting to panic.

  Magrit was getting fed up with it all, but didn't want to leave Doreen to fend off Dolly by herself so she tapped Dolly on the back and said, ‘I've got a rough idea how to do it. Show us what you mean.’

  Dolly beckoned Magrit eagerly towards her, her eyes aglow with the excitement of dancing the tango.

  It has to be acknowledged that it did not take a lot to get Dolly excited but a chance to dance would do it every time. The fact she was in a steamie dressed in a rubber apron and an old pair of boots and her partner was not George Raft but a woman in wellies mattered not a jot. She assumed the stance for the dance and began the lesson.

  ‘Right, Magrit, gie's your hands.’

  Magrit joined Dolly with her left hand clasping Dolly's right, both held aloft, while their other hands held their respective waists – or, in Dolly's case, what used to be her waist.

  Dolly's face was now a study of concentration as she nodded silently to Magrit to confirm that her partner was ready to commence. Magrit nodded back. Dolly counted, ‘One, two, three,’ and began to ‘da-dum’ the tango.

  ‘Da dum dum dum dum – da da da dum dum – da dum dum dum dum – da da da dum dum,’ she sang while gliding over the Palais de Steamie.

  Despite herself, Magrit was enjoying the moment. This was Dolly's natural gift, lifting you out of yourself and finding that you were joining in with her enthusiasm. If the fates had so decreed that she be born into another perhaps more affluent stratum of society, she could easily have been a successful socialite, holding the best parties in town, for people who liked that sort of thing.

  ‘Right, Magrit,’ she said in between the da-dum-dums. ‘Brace yourself. When I nod tae you, we'll dae the lean back.’

  Magrit nodded that she was ready whenever Dolly was. They danced in unison across to where Doreen was watching in rapt attention. They came to a dramatic halt directly in front of her and Dolly called out, ‘OK, Magrit, I'm gonnae lean back. Hold me tight and stick your leg in between mine.’

  ‘Overheard in a back close at midnight,’ thought Magrit, in a flash of temporary distraction, before bracing herself to hold Dolly's not inconsiderable bulk as she bent backwards from the waist and tried to relive her youth by touching the floor with her hair.

  In reality, her head did not get
within two feet of the floor. However, reality, unlike enthusiasm, was not uppermost in Dolly's mind. She was convinced that her head was a mere inch or two above the floor as she hung with her head upside down and looked at Doreen with a smile that was telling her a round of applause would not be inappropriate.

  Doreen did not disappoint. ‘That was rare, Dolly – you as well, Magrit. Youse were brilliant,’ she enthused as she put her hands together.

  ‘You're a great partner, Magrit,’ complimented Dolly graciously. ‘I can still pick up a hankie off the floor wi' my teeth,’ Dolly informed Doreen, once she had straightened up and extricated herself from Magrit's grip of steel.

  ‘Can you? I'd love to see that,’ Doreen said, with a mischievous look at Magrit.

  ‘C'mon, Magrit, we'll show her,’ said Dolly, now totally carried away with the success of the moment.

  Magrit stood with her hands on her hips. ‘I'm supposed to be doin' a washin' here. My name's Magrit McGuire no' Cyd Charisse.’

  ‘Ach, tae hell. It'll soon be Hogmanay – c'mon,’ was Dolly's totally illogical reason for Magrit to abandon her washing chores in favour of dancing the night away.

  Magrit shook her head in resignation. ‘A' right, ye daft wee bugger.’

  ‘I'll get a hankie oot the washin',’ said Dolly hurrying into her stall.

  Doreen and Magrit exchanged looks of ‘what the hell’, before Dolly called out, ‘I cannae find a hankie – this'll have to dae.’ She emerged from the stall brandishing one of her husband's undervests.

  ‘Zat no' a semmit?’ Doreen asked incredulously.

  ‘Aye,’ Dolly agreed as she swept past Doreen to the centre of the washhouse floor. ‘But he's hardly worn it. This is actually easier than a hankie,’ she explained, plumping up the semmit so that it rose in a peak that would be easier for her to reach. ‘But it'll give ye an idea.’

  She stood up from the semmit, which now resembled Mount Everest after a particularly heavy avalanche, and placed herself again in front of Magrit.

  Magrit stared at her unbelievingly before bowing to the inevitable. ‘I must be aff my head. Come on then.’

  Dolly counted up to three and away they went once more. As they danced the prelude to the picking up of the hankie/ semmit, Andy turned the corner that led to where Mrs Culfeathers' stall began the row of women that da-dum'd instead of washed. He stood watching them – unlike Mary Culfeathers, who was so wrapped up in getting the doctor's washing dried in the wringer to the high standards that befitted his station in the community that she was totally unaware of what was going on further up the washhouse.

  As they approached the vital moment of picking up the vest between her teeth Dolly got herself mentally attuned. ‘Are you ready, Magrit?’

  Magrit nodded back in assent and prepared to take Dolly's weight once more.

  ‘Right.’ She leaned backwards as before. This time, however, by introducing the vest, she had unwittingly made her task a lot harder as the only way to prove that she could still reach it was, in fact, to rise with the vest between her teeth. She leaned back as far as she could but was some way short of attaining her goal.

  ‘Let me doon a bit further, Magrit,’ she instructed.

  ‘I'm as far as I can go,’ Magrit threw back at her, her jaws clenched with the effort. ‘My back's near broke in two tryin' tae hold on to you.’

  Dolly could see defeat looming. In desperation, she reached down with a hand, snatched the vest from the floor and stuffed it into her mouth. ‘Tarraa,’ she mumbled in an attempt at a fanfare as her arms flew apart – a gesture that proved just too much even for Magrit's powerful grip. Dolly tumbled from her grasp and crumpled in a heap on the floor.

  Andy walked over to the dancers

  ‘Not the Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers,’ he said sarcastically as Dolly picked herself up and Magrit rubbed her back.

  ‘She should have done it wi' a hankie,’ Doreen elucidated.

  ‘From whit I saw, she should have done it wi' a Yankee. You know there's no drunks allowed in here,’ he informed them wittily.

  ‘How did you swing it then?’ countered Magrit, with no conscious attempt to top him but doing so anyway.

  ‘Whit the hell are youse doin?’ was his not unreasonable retort.

  ‘We were showin' Doreen the tango,’ Dolly explained. ‘Can you dae it Andy?’

  ‘Aye, but I never knew you had to eat a semmit during it. When did you two discover youse were attracted to each other and where have you got all the drink stashed?’ he continued, doing a mock search of their stalls, hoping the women would find his antics amusing and, despite their reactions, somehow convinced that they did.

  Mrs Culfeathers appeared with a worried look on her face at the side of the stall that Andy was doing the mock search in.

  ‘Andy, son,’ she said apologetically, ‘There's something wrong wi' the wringer. It's no' goin' right, son.’

  ‘Andy smiled indulgently at her. ‘I'll away and sort it oot. Do you know where they're getting all the drink from Mrs Culfeathers?’

  ‘What drink's that, son?’ Mary replied, mystified.

  ‘Pay no heed to him, Mrs Culfeathers,’ advised Magrit.

  ‘Did you know Magrit and Dolly are havin' a wee affair, Mrs Culfeathers?’ Andy asked, mischievously.

  Mary nodded. ‘Aye, Dolly asked me up to it but I'm too tired. I'm just gonnae have a quiet night in the hoose,’ she replied.

  Andy stared at her, disbelievingly. ‘I think I'll come back and start again,’ was the only solution he could come up with.

  TWENTY-TWO

  The family album lay opened on Harry Culfeathers' lap. It was an expensive one that had been given to them as a present from both their parents to remind them, when their first-born had arrived, that family values were precious. Leather-bound, it was very extensive with thick vellum pages that contained photographs – some so old they were in tin plate. The first pages were devoted to severe men and women who stared out from images frozen in a technology that was new to them. Dignified and unsmiling, the men in their Sunday-best suits, complete with walking sticks and pocket watches, posed beside women in dark, heavy and forbidding dresses. From the past, they stared suspiciously as they emerged to us in a future they had no knowledge of. Perhaps they were right to be suspicious.

  These gave way to the next generation, then to Harry and Mary's wedding and finally to the boys as babies, then toddlers and schoolboys. Of course, eventually, the boys' weddings were recorded in film also. They were bright and relaxed, in marked contrast to their ancestors. They were smiling confidently as they mingled with aunts and uncles and best men and bridesmaids. The last pages were given to the children of the two boys. The boys posed, as proud of their children as Harry and Mary had been of them.

  Harry and Mary's grandchildren, they were the only ones in the past ninety years of the album that they had never met. They were, at the present time, the only ones that Harry and Mary wanted to meet.

  Harry had been wading through their past, as he often did lately, and had fallen asleep, as he also often did lately. He awoke slowly, his eyes red and hot with the recent strain of reading the informative notes that were written under the photographs in the album. He took off his glasses and placed them on the table beside his favourite chair. He rubbed at his eyes hoping this act would relieve him of the burning sensation in them. It never did.

  He felt a bit chilly as well. Glancing at the fire, he saw that it had faded in the hearth and needed tending. He rose with difficulty, noticing that, as always, this simple act was now accompanied by groans of effort from him.

  ‘You're soundin' like an old man,’ he admonished himself, as he reached for the poker to give the fire a rummle up. Searching for some suitable small lumps of coal, he placed these on the now glowing embers. The consequence of doing this, however, caused the fire to smoke and it set Harry into a fit of coughing. Breathing heavily, he sought refuge in his chair and, grasping it by the arm, he lowered himself down
to safety. Picking up the album, he opened it and tried to take up from where he had left off. The pictures were hazily unfamiliar and indistinct – they seemed to drift away from his gaze. His brain chased after them. ‘Come back,’ he whispered. Harry was confused and frightened. He began to panic that he was not in control. An unspoken fear that he was losing his mind caused the panic to well up inside him and this made his breathing even harsher, as the gulps of air he was now snatching at bounced around inside his lungs. He stared wildly away from the album at the kitchen walls that were also as if enfolded in a hazy muddle of what should have been familiar surroundings. He thought he was about to plunge into the strangely comforting dark pool of insanity when a thought drove through the mire and entered his consciousness. Raising his hand he stretched out his middle finger; closing the surrounding digits he lifted it till it was directly in front of his face. Then he brought it in towards his face until he could feel his clenched fist touch the damp patch that was recently omnipresent on the tip of his nose. Lowering the finger he placed it gently on the bottom part of his nose and then slid his finger up towards the bridge on which rested his spectacles. His fingers registered that his nose was a spectacle-free area. ‘Nae wonder everything's blurred,’ Harry sighed in relief.

  As the wave of panic subsided and his breathing returned to its normal uneasy state, Harry decided that a cup of tea would be the thing to settle him. Putting on his spectacles, he lifted the kettle from the top of the cooker and crossed to the sink and turned on the tap. As the kettle filled up, he gazed round for his matches. ‘I've lost the bloody matches noo,’ he complained to himself.

  He became aware that the kettle was now full and brimming over. ‘Tae hell wi' it,’ he swore, as he turned off the tap and emptied some of the water back out the kettle.

  Once more he sought out the box of Swan Vestas matches kept for lighting the gas rung – nowhere to be seen. ‘She'll have hidden them,’ was his solution to that mystery.

  After placing the kettle on the gas rung, he crossed to the mantelpiece and treated himself to a fag. He needed a light of course but could not find the matches. This problem, however, was easily solved. Harry tore a strip of paper and folded it into a taper. Tentatively he knelt down on one knee in front of the fire and lit the taper. He removed the taper and offered it to his cigarette. Without removing the cigarette from his mouth, Harry lit it and then, raising himself up, he crossed to the cooker. Turning on the gas, he took a deep satisfying draw from his cigarette. The inevitable coughing fit followed but Harry deemed it was worth it for the satisfaction and calm that settled over him.