Gents

Jason gave a bemused smile.

In the silence, Ez sipped his tea.

Later that afternoon, Ez was washing down a lower part of one tiled wall adjacent to the urinals. He was down on one knee. Around him men walked past. As he cleaned he observed their ankles and shoes go past him. After a while he raised himself on both his knees and pressed his back with the palms of his hands against the nagging pain that occasionally affected his lower trunk. Slowly he moved his shoulders from side to side.

He started to work again, kneeling on a small rubber mat, using the scrubbing brush on the floor tiles closest the wall.

He was at a place where he could see under the wooden side screens of the cubicles. A door slammed softly, and a pair of shoes appeared in the nearest cubicle. Ez went back to his scrubbing. Doors opened and closed as individuals came and went.

When Ez looked again there were two pairs of shoes in the nearest cubicle, facing each another. As he watched, one pair of shoes turned the other way.

Ez glanced around him. He could see Jason at the farthest end of the room. Reynolds was in his office.

Ez stood up. He walked to the end of the room, where Jason was washing the floor, taking long, even sweeps with the mop. Against the background noise of the urinals – water flushing, the occasional door banging – Ez could hear the echo in his temples.

He tapped Jason’s shoulder. Jason withdrew the earplugs from his ears.

“What matter?”

He said to Jason, “Two in de nearest cubicle.”

Jason nodded, as if he had been told the time of day. He removed his gloves and set them down on the sink. He stepped towards Reynolds’ office and knocked softly on the door. He waited for Reynolds’ call and entered, closing the door behind him.

Ez glanced at the cubicle. It seemed, in the fervent silence, that it was vibrating slightly, like a washing machine, as though various pieces of clothing were being thrown against the side. Then the machine seemed to switch itself off, to utter a soft sigh.

Ez glanced in the direction of Reynolds’ office. He tried to make out the faint sounds of Jason and Reynolds in discussion.

A few seconds later Jason emerged carrying the heavy walking-stick. Ez followed him.

Holding the stick in his left hand, Jason struck the side of the cubicle with the flat of his right palm, two big slow hits. He waited a few seconds in the silence that gathered around him. He thumped once again. Silence thickened around the cubicle.

After a few moments Jason handed Ez the walking-stick.

Jason knelt down, lined his eye along the floor, and raised a hand for the stick. Ez passed it to him. Jason observed the position of the ankles inside the cubicles. Taking careful aim, he thrust the stick under the partition.

Ez watched him, bracing himself with one arm, kneeling on the floor tiles, sighting the stick like a rifleman, swinging it back and forth against the ankles inside.

“Come on,” Jason said. He was speaking softly, almost to himself. “Come on ouda dere.”

After a few moments Jason stood up and gestured to Ez to stand back. The door swung open. A man rushed out and headed for the turnstiles, leaning forward as though against a wind. Ez was aware of a hefty body like a barrel, of hair slicked back, of an almost animal-like power as the man snapped down the turnstile bar and then took the outer stairs two at a time upwards into the sallow light.

Jason winked at Ez.

Without warning, a second man followed, thinner than the first, his hands in the pockets of his leather jacket, walking briskly through the turnstiles. He left behind the expensive odour of cologne. Ez turned back to Jason.

“Givin’ de reptile de escape route, man,” Jason said. “Dem go like frightened eel.”

Ez was too surprised to comment. He merely nodded.

Afterwards, when the three of them were eating their sandwich lunches, Reynolds, in between mouthfuls, addressed Jason.

“You use the stick today, man?”

“Rattle one cage. Two reptile out, swimmin’ downstream.”

Out of curiosity, Ez said, “Why you callin’ dem reptiles?”

Reynolds ate and considered. “They cold, man. Don’t speak. One on one. You can’t get them off, like a dog with a bone.” He paused, sipping his tea. “Ask Jason. He expert.”

Jason smiled to himself and continued to eat. After a while Jason said, “All aroun’ here, men in office, speakin’ on telephone, telling secretary, firin’, hirin’, doin’ accounts, makin’ money, man. Put down telephone, walk out sometime, come in here.” He indicated the direction of the cubicles with a gesture of his head. “Meet another one in there.”

Jason paused after his homily. He took a bite, then added cheerfully, “All time, man. Every day.”

Ez looked at him, shook his head, and concentrated on eating his own sandwich. The other two ate as though famished. Martha had given Ez banana and pilchards, his favourite filling. It struck him then how odd was this blend of domestic arrangements with the subject matter in hand.

“You learnin’, man,” Reynolds said quietly. “You learnin’.”

CHAPTER 6

In the course of the following weeks Ez began to appreciate the quality of silence. In between the slamming of doors, the pressed hush, it was as if the silence was a living force, was scratching against the walls.

He began to understand the grammar of the place, the movement of footsteps, the declension of doors, the patterns of approach to the urinals and the cubicles.

Some of the men seemed to drift down the stairs in a somnambulistic trance. Most of them had a single purpose – to relieve themselves – and then return to the day. In the chamber beneath the earth time itself seemed suspended. No one made eye contact because it could be misinterpreted. Ez learned never to look a customer in the eye unless he was directly addressed.

He became aware of the space around a person, and of the squares of space in which individuals moved. Each man’s grid seemed to move with him. Sometimes a particular man might hold his attention like a singer in a spotlight, but it was an indirect surveillance, by means of the senses of hearing and smell and vibration. Ez could hear the sound of a man’s footsteps across the floor, the creak of his clothes. He would listen for the speed and hesitancy of footfall, the faint squeal of rubber soles, the flatness of leather, the heel touching before the toe, the creak and slam of a cubicle door.

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