“Yes,” I said.
“Do lend me them, you see, this is a man who bends bars on his forehead.”
I gave him what I had. He threw them all with a clatter onto the pavement, and the man picked them up like a sparrow hopping for crumbs. Then he held them up warily to the light and examined them. “Like a five pound note,” Peter said: “What an extraordinary man!” The man had thrown his cap down on to the ground and was jumping up and down on it, and all the time he was gasping out his thick unintelligible patter when suddenly, with no change in his voice, he picked up a large iron bar, rolled up his shirt sleeve, and began beating the bar heavily against his forearm. The flesh on his arm turned yellow, and then blue, and gradually the bar became bent. He was now making a noise like a boiler before it bursts. Then he stopped, just as suddenly, rolled his sleeve down, put his cap on his head, picked up the assortment of bars, mostly bent, which were on the pavement beside him, pushed his way hurriedly through the crowd, and disappeared down the steps of a gentlemen’s lavatory. I could see a policeman coming sauntering towards us.
“But his forehead!” Peter said. “He didn’t do it on his forehead!”
“Does he beat it on his forehead?” I said.
“No,” Peter said. The crowd was shuffling away before the policeman’s advance. “Do you think he can beat it on his forehead?”
“I don’t suppose so,” I said.
“He just bends it, you see.” Peter was standing scratching his head, and the policeman was viewing us suspiciously. “But we must find him,” Peter said. “You can’t possibly go away without seeing his forehead.” He moved towards the lavatory.
I followed him. A desire to laugh was like an itch in my throat. Going down the damp stone steps Peter said, “he must bend them back again, I suppose, sometime, unless he has a great many bars.” Inside the lavatory the cubicles were spaced out along one wall like a row of miniature loose-boxes. There was no sign of the man. “He’s engaged,” Peter said. We stood in the middle of the floor peering at the notices on the doors. The lavatory attendant came out from his room and stood watching us over his spectacles. He was a small bald man in a dirty white coat. “Perhaps he lives here,” Peter said. “Perhaps he stays here and bends all these pipes.” The attendant came forward and stood behind Peter, his head coming up to Peter’s elbow. “Here he is,” Peter said: “He’s at home.” We went up to one of the doors and knocked.
“’Ere,” said the attendant.
“I want him to bend them back,” Peter said.
“Who?” the attendant said.
“I will give him ten bob,” Peter said.
“You will?”
The attendant worked his spectacles up and down on his nose with a movement like someone eating spaghetti. Then he went over to the door and banged on it loudly. “’S all right Charlie,” he said. “’S not the cops. Bloke ‘ere wants to give yer ten bob.” A cautious utter came from inside the door.
“Ten bob to bend ‘em back again,” said the attendant. “Take it or leave it.” He strolled back to his room by the entrance. There was a noise of an exploding boiler again and then the man emerged defensively from his cubicle with a cluster of bars in each hand. He looked like a prehistoric plumber. He was a savage square man whose neck was about twice as thick as the top of his head, like the hero of a strip-cartoon. The veins on his forehead stood out softly. Peter tried to explain what he wanted, while the man stood opposite us whistling through his nose. Then he took the ten shilling note that Peter offered him, stuffed it into his pocket, and selected a bar about half an inch thick. He handed this to Peter, who took it and tried it out once or twice on his knee without making any impression on it and handed it back politely. The man braced himself, threw his head back, raised the bar ceremoniously and placed it on his forehead. The veins bulged horribly. He clasped and clasped his hands several times on the end of the bar like a mountaineer feeling for a hold on a rock, and then he jumped with both feet off the floor, uttered a muffled grunt, and heaved. The bar straightened considerably. He paused, jumped again, and heaved; and this time the bar slipped coming scraping down the front of his face and taking skin off his nose. Peter said, “Good heavens!” and the man stared stupidly in front of him. He hit the bar once or twice like a petulant child, and then smacked a hand on to his face sending blood splashing in drops around his ears. He held his hand up staring at it. Then he smacked his hand on to his face again, and finally uttered a tremendous bellow. The attendant came hurrying out of his room.
“Did ‘e ‘it yer Charlie?” the attendant said. “Did ‘e ‘it yer on the nose?”
“Good heavens no,” Peter said, backing away nervously.
“This is a convenience,” shouted the attendant. “A respectable convenience!”
“I’m sure it is,” Peter said, stumbling over a mop and pail.
“Wot’s up?” yelled the attendant, putting his mouth about an inch from Charlie’s ear. “Wot’s up with yer face, Charlie?”
Charlie muttered into an enormous brown handkerchief that he had produced from his pocket and was now holding clasped upon his nose.
“The bar slipped,” I explained. “It slipped and scraped his nose.”
“It did, did it?” yelled the attendant. “Slipped and scraped his nose, did it, slipped and scraped his nose?” He repeated this at the top of his voice.
“That’s right,” Peter said, but was unable to make himself heard.
“I’ll give yer slip and scrape yer nose,” reiterated the attendant.
Just then Charlie removed his bloodstained handkerchief from his face and uttered another great bellow. Peter was walking round him patting him anxiously on the back, but the attendant sprang forwards and this time really let himself go. “ ‘Ush it up, Charlie,” he roared: “For Christ’s sake ‘ush it. We’ll ‘ave the cops down with all this bloody noise.” The sound of his voice in the enclosed space was like a landslide.
And then, as the echoes cleared, there was the sound of heavy boots descending the steps. The attendant acted with speed. He pushed the bleeding Charlie back into his cubicle, slammed the door on him, and turned to us, saying, “In you go, quick, I don’t want no trouble in this convenience.” Propelled by his whisper we made a rush for two locked doors and pushed against them futilely. “No pennies,” Peter said. “Charlie’s got the lot.” The attendant whirled us round and pushed us into a cubicle at the end which was unlocked. “Into the free,” he whispered viciously. “It’s the free that’s good enough for some.” He slammed the door on us. “And others too,” we could hear him adding, repeatedly, as the policeman or whoever it was arrived at the bottom of the steps.
I was laughing so much I couldn’t breathe. I leant against the wall and Peter pulled out a handkerchief to mop his face, but he seemed to remember Charlie’s, so he put it away again hurriedly. We could hear the policeman’s footsteps going sedately along outside, and I was holding my breath so tightly that I thought the wall would fall down. After a long pause I let my breath out quickly, and then couldn’t get it in again. Peter leant over and whispered very seriously, “I say, what’s a free?”
I couldn’t answer. I sat on the seat and wondered if I should ever get my breath back and then Peter whispered again, more loudly, “What did he mean by a free?”
I tried to speak, but after a few syllables my whisper cracked into a squeak but I was able to go on laughing. “What a wonderful idea,” Peter said. “Why doesn’t everybody come here?” He was peering round trying to read the writing on the walls. From somewhere on our right I could hear Charlie’s interminable mutter; but the sound, all steam and rumblings, seemed to be in keeping with the place. I was more concerned with my laughter, which seemed liable to explode again at any moment. Outside, the policeman was talking to the attendant: we could hear his boots creaking as if he was standing still. The attendant was putting him off cleverly, uttering high-pitched grunts of innocence. I was beginning to breathe more easily when Peter leaned over towards me again. “I say,” he said, “do you realize that it is a criminal offence for two Englishmen to be found together in a lavatory? It is the only thing the public cannot stand.” And then we were both laughing.