She had never known the tragedy of setting forth a dinner only to
have hurled at her that hateful speech beginning with, "I had that
for lunch." She had never seen a male, collarless, bellowing about
the house for his laundry. She had never beheld that soul-searing
sight--a man in his trousers and shirt, his suspenders dangling,
his face lathered, engaged in the unbecoming rite of shaving.
Her knowledge of the home habits of the male biped she gleaned from
the telltale hints of the inanimate garments that passed through
her nimble hands. She could even tell character and personality
from deductions gathered at heel and toe. She knew, for example,
that F.C. (in black ink) was an indefatigable fox trotter and she
dubbed him Ferdy Cahn, though his name, for all she knew, might
have been Frank Callahan. The dancing craze, incidentally, had
added mountainous stacks to Martha's already heaped up bins.
The Elite Laundry served every age and sex. But Martha's department
was, perforce, the unwed male section. No self-respecting wife
or mother would allow laundry-darned hose or shirts to reflect on
her housekeeping habits. And what woman, ultra-modern though she
be, would permit machine-mended stockings to desecrate her bureau
drawers? So it was that Martha ministered, for the most part, to
those boarding house bachelors living within delivery-wagon proximity
to the Elite Laundry.
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