An Old Fashioned Family Tradition of Service – Part Five

The uniformed officer manning the tape recorder abruptly stood, said, “Fuck this,” and left the room. The Captain watched him go, but never said a word of reprimand. He simply slid the tape recorder over to the Sergeant.

If Al Taylor noticed the byplay, he never let on.

“The problems of running a shelter are threefold: First, room. You have to have a minimum amount of space per person or per family, so – in order to accommodate the numbers we were expecting – we built along the lines of a high-rise hotel. The ground floor was the mission and the kitchen, the second floor – accessible only by private entrance – was the administrative offices, the third floor housed the clinic, and and the remaining nine floors was dedicated to the homeless, seven for individuals and two for families. The individual housing was strongly segregated for the protection of the women (Laura never forgot her boon companion) and contained a communal shower slant restroom slant laundry facility at each end.

“The basement was divided neatly in half for both storage of extra beds and linens on one side and a massive meat locker on the other.” Al Taylor paused to peer at the Sergeant in amused alarm. “Uh, uh, uh! No anticipating, now!”

“As I was saying, the second problem to running a shelter is security. We side stepped most of the problems faced by other shelters by requiring everyone who wished to use the shelter to undergo a thorough search during a mandatory physical exam, which ensured that no drugs or weapons were brought in, as well as making sure that the shelter did not become a breeding ground for the latest bugs. Members who were ill were given a room in the ward, located across from the clinic, and nursed back to health.

“In addition, we hired a private security firm to patrol the hallways and communal areas, to ensure that there was no roughhousing or hanky-panky going on. Finally, we locked each floor at night, so nobody could wander from floor to floor, primarily for the protection of any children on the top floors, but also for the protection of any women in residence.

“Only the ill and the families were permitted to be in the building during the daylight hours. Everyone else was required to go out, hopefully to seek employment, but it wasn’t mandatory. While everyone was out, the shelter was given a good cleaning, top to bottom, ending with a sanitizing mist that was dispensed from an automated system. By six at night, when we permitted individuals to return, the rooms were as pristine as we could make them.

“Finally, there was the problem of feeding those who stayed with us. The kitchen was open from five in the morning and stayed open until seven at night, serving wholesome and filling (if not fancy) fare whenever needed. Frankly, even with specializing in stews and hearty soups, it was rather expensive.

“Then, one fateful night, Laura and I attended the most inspirational musical we’d ever seen. It was as if a higher power anticipated our difficulty and provided an elegant and simple solution, set to charming music no less!

“Before that night, the routine was as follows: A homeless individual would walk in and be shunted up to the clinic for a physical and to be searched. Those who were either armed or carrying drugs were given the choice between surrendering the contraband for destruction or walking back out of the shelter, spending the night elsewhere.

“Following getting a clean bill of health, they were issued a set of clean pajamas, a robe, and disposable slippers. Then they were assigned a bed, shown where the restroom slant laundry was located (encouraged to utilize both), and left to their own devices. The only requirements were that they couldn’t leave the shelter after checking in, nor – as I’ve already mentioned – could they wander between floors.

“Outer doors locked at nine and lights out at ten.

“At two in the morning, the sanitizing jets would spray a floor with knock-out gas and, moments later – wearing masks – Laura and I would come up in our private elevator with carts and transfer the occupants of that night’s floor to the meat locker, where, with a minimum of fuss, we dispatched them onto their makers, bled their corpses into the sewer system, and prepared them for transport across town. I have a rather good sized factory located on the far side of Boston, one powered by steam and with massive furnaces. That’s where we’d dispose of the bodies.

“Well,” he grinned sheepishly, looking at the table, “we did save one or two for ourselves, removing them from the carts and securing them in our private labs, but that’s neither here nor there. They eventually made the trip to the furnaces as well.

“It was all as close to automated as we could manage. A conveyor belt transferred the carcasses to the delivery truck parked in the alley behind the shelter and another fed them into the furnace at the factory. An ecological solution at last! Reduces the homeless footprint in our fair state and the carbon footprint at my factory!

“Then, as I said, we saw this marvelous musical in New York and realized that the solution was Swift-ly upon us!” He flashed a proud grin around the room, then shrugged and sighed, “Not a literary group, then? Oh, well …

“The name of the musical, of course, was Sweeney Todd, The Demon Barber of Fleet Street. The Cariou and Landsbury original, of course, although we also greatly enjoyed the Hearn/Landsbury version as well.

“After that, feeding the homeless was a simple matter. As a matter of fact, we had enough of a surplus that we were able to donate stews and meaty soups to various orphanages and missions throughout the city. As of a year ago, we also started sending the excess to the cat food processing plant out by Winthrop. Laura and I feed our own cats on their food, being that it’s the only brand on the market that we are sure contains meat.”