Dance Floor Drowning

by Brian Sellars

  He peered out at the forbidden building, wondering what secrets it could possible hold. It looked perfectly innocent, its red brick façade generously piped with stone dentils, cornices, and pediments. Why had Flood warned him off it? What menace could it contain? It looked so inviting and friendly. What was it the Chief Superintendent was so keen to hide?

  In an instant, his thoughts switched, recharging his deflated spirits. Why shouldn't he go wherever he wanted? It's a free country! Flood had no right to stop him having a swim. The city council even encouraged it with posters of apple-cheeked families splashing each other’s perfect teeth with the sparkling water.

  Moments later, he had climbed the encircling wall of Notre Dame Girls' School. It was the swimming bath’s closest neighbour. From there he hoped he might see what secret Chief Superintendent Flood was hiding.

  He quickly realised it was pointless. Opaque glass filled every window in the art nouveau façade. He could see nothing, and such activity as there was around the building suggested no more than business as usual. Patrons were casually wandering in and out of entrances to the Turkish baths, or the respectfully segregated plunge pools. He swept his gaze along the walls wondering, with crumbling confidence, how he might get a look inside. Pipes from the slipper baths steamed and chugged. Bathers came and went – pale faced before their swim, pink faced afterwards. The only unusual thing he spotted was a notice posted on the double doors at the entrance to the large, mixed bathing pool. On closer inspection he found rain had washed almost all the ink from it. He could just make out the words "Closed for maintenance". Nothing particularly suspicious about that, he thought.

  Pulling up a pretend raincoat collar, he slowly walked the cobbles of Convent Walk, the narrow lane between the swimming baths and the girls-school. Inside his head, the sound of a zither playing the Harry Lime theme chimed up. He had recently seen the movie, and adopted its theme as the perfect accompaniment for stalking around in detective mode. Slinking into a door recess, he exhaled imaginary cigarette smoke and looked out from under the brim of his imaginary trilby hat. If there was something going on in the swimming baths that Flood wanted to hide, the only way to find out about it was to dive in for a closer look.

  The imagined zither music faded away. He set off home at a brisk pace, flicking his pretend cigarette over the wall of Notre Dame School. He was hungry. He had missed lunch. But it was still early afternoon, plenty of time left to get home, grab some bread and dripping, pick up his swimming trunks and get back to the swimming baths. There was just one snag. As usual, he was skint; stony broke, penniless, poorer than a church mouse's poor relation. He hadn't a penny towards the entrance fee or the tram fare. At a pinch, he could manage without the tram fare, but there was no way to get through the tines of the full length iron turnstile at the swimming bath’s entrance without buying a ticket. About a bob would be enough, twelve pence. That would even leave enough for a mug of Bovril after his swim. Somehow, he would have to raise the cash.

  He could start with a bottle search, his old standby. This involved checking out every dustbin, backdoor step, and forgotten corner of the neighbourhood, in the hope of finding discarded beer or pop bottles. Local beer-off shops would happily refund a deposit of tuppence on every one he returned to them. The trouble was, every other kid in Sheffield was doing the same.

  His granny Smeggs would gladly give him money. Unfortunately, his mother had placed her off limits, having discovered his over exploitation of granny's soft heart. She had already warned him, in blood chilling detail, of the horrific retribution that would follow any attempt to tap her up.

  That left only subterfuge and trickery. Old Pop Meason kept empty pop bottles in crates behind his sweet shop, awaiting collection by the soft drinks’ company. Billy knew he could easily pinch a few and run round to the front of the shop to return them for the deposit. Local scallywags often tricked the poor old boy with this ruse. Billy recalled, with shame, that he had once done it himself. It had made him miserable for weeks. Guilt eventually drove him to hand over four pennies to the old boy, which he pretended to have found on the floor of the shop. Old Pop Meason had been so pleased that he rewarded Billy with six-pennyworth of free sweets. Billy daren't go back to the shop nowadays, because the old man would insist on giving him treats. Even worse, he would crow to his other customers about what a wonderful honest young lad Billy was. Billy shuddered, he could not go through that again.

  It would be pointless asking his pals, Kick and Yvonne, for money. They wouldn't have any, and even if they did they wouldn't give it to him. There was nothing else for it; he would have to ask his mother for an advance on his Friday sixpence – plus a bit – quite a bit. The trouble was it was only Monday. He knew he’d be on a sticky wicket. Blood from stones didn’t come close.

  He found the door to his house thrown wide open. Steam puthered from inside where his mam was leaning over a washtub, pounding dirty clothes with a copper posher. Her hair hung in her eyes. Water slopped around her feet. Throughout the kitchen and living room, saucepans and kettles bubbled and simmered on the stove, the gas ring and the fireplace. She glanced up at him and wriggled her nose to stop her steamed up spectacles sliding off into the foaming washtub.

  Billy saw instantly that she looked less likely to give him an advance than any person he could imagine. He turned away miserably and headed for his usual perch in times of extreme gloom, a river smoothed rockery stone overlooking the Perks’ long, narrow garden.

  The Perks’ house was unusual in that at the bottom of the garden, next to the outside toilet, was a small brick built washhouse. It was equipped with a cold-water tap over a stone sink and a coal fired copper clothes boiler. It had room to store washtubs, scrubbing boards and the big cast iron mangle. It was perfect for scrubbing, boiling, and rinsing clothes. Using it saved considerable time and effort, not to mention household disruption. Why then, he wondered, was his mam doing the laundry in the house? The place was in chaos. She had moved all the furniture and rolled up the carpet. He realised she must have carried the two wash tubs, posher and rubbing board, all the way up from the washhouse. Why?

  He stepped back into the chaotic living room. 'What's up, mam? Why aren't you using the washhouse?'

  She looked up at him, flat-eyed, her face red and sweating. Running a hand over her forehead, she peeled back damp curls and threaded them behind her ears. 'Copper's leaking. It won't light. It just wets the kindling and puts it out.'

  Billy gazed round at the shambles that was his home. She had even banished the dog to a distant corner. The little wire haired terrier cringed in the unfamiliar surroundings, shivering from fear of the disruption all about him.

  Then, Billy had a brilliant idea - a super idea - an idea so brilliant and super that he almost fainted at the thought of his brilliance and superiority: the slipper baths!

  Along with steam rooms and swimming pools, Glossop Road Baths offered its patrons Slipper Baths; private bathtubs brimming with hot water. For a modest few pence, people who seldom saw more hot water than could be contained in a kettle, could have their own private bathtub and cubicle. They could bathe, right up to their chins, in clean hot water.

  He had been there several times with his mam, though he'd soon realised it was not just him she expected to scrub. It was her method of dealing with coal shortages. When she couldn't afford coal for the washhouse boiler, she would take Billy to the slipper baths. Dirty pants, vests, shirts and socks would be smuggled in with him, for a secret wash in the luxurious hot water.

  She would lock the cubicle door and wait as the attendant filled the bathtub from outside, using a variety of spanners and valve keys. The man would shout through the door; 'Don't be long – there's a queue outside.’- or - ‘Does tha want any more cold?’ Billy noticed they never asked if you wanted “more hot”. Asking for it was futile. He'd say something like, 'No, you can’t. You're not in bloody Hollywood tha knows!'

  With the bathtub brimming his mam would plo
p Billy in to it, and dump the smuggled dirty washing and soap powder on top of him. His job was to punch and kick it around while she rubbed at stubborn stains with a large block of carbolic.

  Slipper bath attendants seemed to be a notorious breed of humanity-hating individuals. They would bang on cubicle doors, grumpily urging people to hurry up. It seemed to Billy that their two greatest pleasures in life were emptying the bathtubs before people had finished, and exposing the illicit laundering of smalls. If you were not a favoured client, or a relative, a relaxing snooze in the tub was definitely out of the question.

  Customers had no control over water, either coming in or going out. When they deemed a bather's allotted time was up, attendants would ruthlessly drain the tub from outside the cubicle, using a special valve key. They would then crouch over the open sluice to inspect the water flowing out into the main drain. If it looked blue and scummy, from the use of washing soda, they would rant, rage, and threaten. This made illegal laundering a risky business.

  As he watched his mother slopping sheets from the poshing tub into the rinsing tub, Billy refined his plan. He knew he held a trump card, and would now play it with silky coolness.

  'Mam, I hate to see you struggling like this,' he said, his voice oozing concern. 'Why don't I take the clothes to the slipper baths and run them through for you. I know how to.'

  Missis Perks gaped at her son - the apple of her eye - the saviour of the day. 'Ooooooh, Billy love! Would you?'

  'Of course I will, Mam. Gi' me the money. I'll get me trunks. I might as well have a swim an' all, while I'm there.'

  Missis Perks beamed and wiped her glasses on her apron. 'Find me my purse, love.'

  *

  There was a queue outside the slipper baths. It strung along Convent Walk under the steaming pipes snaking in and out of the building. Billy was surprised to find so many people waiting. It was Monday. Friday was the usual day for a bath, but then, he realised, Monday was washday.

  As he joined the line, he noticed how podgy many of the women looked. Rather like him, they too appeared a bit thick around the waist. A few were already overheating under their extra layers of badly concealed washing. Billy sympathized, he was wearing several pairs of scruffy underpants and knickers, three of his dad’s shirts and something unmentionable of his mother's. Even the rolled up towel and swimming trunks, tucked under his arm, concealed intimate items of illegal laundry.

  He paid at the ticket office window and the cashier released the turnstile. He had a bit of a struggle getting through due to his lack of flexibility. He had so many socks stuffed up the sleeves of his coat, he couldn’t bend his arms. The woman following him struggled too. She leaked vests, knickers and three liberty bodices. Only quick thinking and surprising agility prevented her being discovered. Billy watched her kick her smalls through the gate, whilst telling the turnstile operator that a wasp was about to attack him. As the attendant wafted and spun around in panic, she squeezed through and winked at Billy.

  The slipper baths were up a flight of stairs. The attendant grunted, eyed him suspiciously and pointed to a cubicle. Once inside, Billy relaxed and stripped off his illicit layers. Soon he was floating in hot, scummy blue water and washing the family's smalls. When he was done, he put on his swimming trunks. His plan was to slip out of the tub as soon as it was safe, and take a quick look round. Frustratingly, the attendant clattered up and down the row of cubicles nonstop, turning taps, draining drains, and bullying his unseen customers with his constant recitation of council rules.

  Billy waited for things to quieten. Then, wearing just his swimming trunks, he climbed over the partition wall, dropped down to the duck boarded floor and headed for the stairs. He crept down unnoticed and slipped into a line of men and boys going into the men's pool. Nobody seemed concerned. Seconds later, he was swimming. After a quick splash about, he looked around to get his bearings. He suspected that the mixed bathing pool, with its closed for maintenance notice, was probably the centre of the mystery. Somehow, he had to get in there. A pair of anonymous doors in a far corner suggested a possible route. He swam towards them, climbed out onto the poolside, and waited for the chance to make a dash for them.

  It was not long before rowdy teenagers, bombing off the diving board, distracted the sour-faced lifeguard. Billy seized his chance and sneaked through the doors. Unexpectedly, he found himself in the Turkish bath. It was like stepping back in time. He closed the double doors gently behind him and tiptoed into a hot, steamy hall. His glasses had fogged up, blinding him. He wiped the lenses with his fingers and looked about in awe. Above him, a balcony, edged with ornate balustrade, swept around a large octagonal room. He saw men with towels wrapped around their waists ambling around it, others were sitting reading in the daylight from hidden skylights somewhere in the roof. Ceramic tiles covered the walls with geometric patterns of dove blue, lemon and white. In the middle of the floor, a large, mosaic star motif, radiated intricate patterns into shaded alcoves beneath the balcony. Behind curtains drawn haphazardly across the alcoves, elderly men, swathed in white towels and bathrobes, snoozed on narrow beds, their sonorous snoring borne aloft on the steamy gloom.

  Deeply engrossed in a sporting newspaper, a silver haired old chap with a sweating red face and spectacles on the end of his nose, ambled in to view from a side door. He stiffened with outrage as he saw Billy, and casting aside his Racing Times, marched towards him, as though on a parade ground, his loosely tied bathrobe flapping like a luffing spanker. 'What the damn-dicky-doodly are you doing here, boy?'

  Billy panicked and tried to retreat back through the double doors, but couldn't open them. 'Oh, er - sorry, sir. I must have taken a wrong turn.'

  'Bet your boots you did, old lad.' The man made a grab for him, but Billy ducked and jinked passed him. Stairs up to the balcony suggested an escape route. He took them two at a time. At the top he faced a row of elderly pink faces, all bearing the same look of startled outrage. Beyond them, he spotted a narrow door and made a dash for it. Crashing through, he found himself in a cold, empty darkness. Luckily, it felt ripe with the promise of escape, and, as his eyes accustomed to the gloom, he saw he was in a service area with a long flight of concrete steps down into a darker space smelling of heat, oil and fire. He looked round for something to bar the door behind him. In a pile of junk, he found old bathrobes, odd shoes, a gas mask, and a rusty umbrella. He grabbed the gamp and wedged it in the door handle.

  The gritty concrete steps hurt his bare feet as he picked his way down, fearful that his pursuers might appear at any moment. A door at the bottom of the steps opened into a cavernous subterranean room dominated by a great furnace. He peered around it. High in one wall was a grubby strip of window. He could see people’s feet tripping by on the pavement outside, heels clicking on metal grating as they passed. At the furnace, a man, stripped to the waist, was polishing a pressure gauge. Billy watched him tap it gently with his knuckles and then lean to peer into the fire through a small observation window.

  'What's up, son?' asked the man without turning from his work. 'Are tha lost?'

  Billy approached him slowly. 'I – err - … Somebody were chasing me. I don't know how I got here.'

  'Chasing thee - eh? Why, what's tha done?'

  'Nowt. I never did nowt.'

  The man turned and faced him. He was not much taller than Billy, but his shoulders were wide and muscular. His square, grimy face gleamed like oiled metal. Two bright blue eyes shone out from beneath sooty eyebrows. His mouth was wide with lips that were oddly clean against his soot-smudged skin. Billy smelled menthol as the man exhaled.

  The sounds of joyous, echoing shrieks and laughter suddenly burst into the great void of the boiler room. Evidently, a door from the swimming pool had been opened. The stoker looked at Billy with sudden concern. 'Tha'd better hide thee sen, lad.'

  Billy crouched, staring about wildly. 'Where?'

  'Get thee sen o'er theer, behind them chunter pipes, ' He pointed to a gently throbbin
g pump at the junction of four large pipes, two of which branched off into a duct in the wall.

  ‘Chunter pipes?’ Billy eyed them curiously and slid into the narrow space behind them. He waited, hardly daring to breath. His anxious gaze swept his surroundings. Several people had entered from behind a towering run of steel piping. The man from the Turkish bath led them, brandishing his rolled up racing paper like a swagger stick. At his shoulder was the glowering slipper bath attendant. A fat man in a brown overall and two admin types in suits followed.

  'Did you see anybody, Daniels?' boomed the officious military type.

  'No, sir. I've not got no time to see nowt,' said the stoker combatively. 'I'm too busy down here for gazing round looking at things. And what wi' Mike being off sick, it's even worse than usual.'

  The two suited types shot weary glances at each other and fiddled with the knots in their neckties.

  The stoker pressed on. 'They told me I was to have somebody to give me an 'and. Weer is he? I've not seen nobody. D'yer know that I've not even had my snap today. I've bin here sin' five this mornin'. I've not even had a mash yet. I bet they've all had theirs though, them in t'office.' He pointed an accusing finger at the admin guys. 'I've to keep this fire up. That pressure gauge moant drop more than five pounds. And that pump o'er theer needs a new impeller. When am I going to get one? Tell me that, will tha?' He stuck out his chin and took a step towards the military type. 'There's always folk with time to look round, but not me.'