The shop was just like any other charity shop, rows of second hand clothes on moveable racks, old books, toys, nick nacks, paintings, photographs, books, CDs, tools, cutlery, plates, musical instruments some vinyl records and cassette tapes although we no longer accepted them. No electrical goods either, but furniture, sporting goods, basically all unwanted junk and all donated to charity.
The window frames were sky blue once but the paint was flaking showing the green paint from when it was a greengrocers and general store and the diffusers on the strip lights were full of dead insects and the floor was filthy and the whole place had an air of genteel dereliction.
The clothes at least were reasonably clean, freshly laundered before being hung on the racks for the great unwashed British public to maul, but that didn't last and so the regular clientele developed a sixth sense about which items were fresh in and made a bee line for them, rushing to the changing room clutching several garments to emerge later either with garments secreted under their own clothes or to haggle and try to get a discount on the already ridiculously cheap prices.
Young and old came to browse, women mainly, some came to dump the sort of tat they couldn't shift on Freecycle or eBay, boxes full of the rubbish, you'll gather I loathed and detested the whole lot of them.
But next door the charity had our very successful drop in centre, we couldn't say so but it was for the local Afro Carribean youth or more specifically, young black men who we kept off the streets quite successfully.
Why did I work in this detestable hell hole you may ask?
Satisfaction, a job well done, oh and a hundred thousand pounds largely tax free in 2011/12, and you may well ask how did a volunteer on minimum wage make that much.
Diversification. Keeping people happy, giving satisfaction.
The key was the connecting door between the shop and the former warehouse now "The Warehouse" drop in centre known locally as "The Whorehouse."
There was one connecting door to begin with, now there were four, installed over a period of several week ends, concrete lintels cast with reinforcing steel in situ, cast by a team of unemployed black lads under the direction of a posh middle class chap in spirit of co operation.
Yeah, bring on the Violins.
So how did it work?
Take Marilyn, mid thirties, pass for fifty, quite a regular browser, worked part time in Woolworth until they closed, bored to tears, husband away a lot, probably impotent or shagging his secretary, frustrated, looking for excitement.
Then there was John, black, eighteen or so, frustrated, no money, no girlfriend, would shag anything given the chance, but how to get them together for their mutual satisfaction.
The mirror.
Marilyn came in on an ordinary grey Thursday afternoon, she selected a few garments and entered the number two changing room which unusually had a full height door with a working bolt instead of the customary curtain. Hooks and a towel rail were provided to hang clothes on and a rather tarnished full length mirror formed the rear wall.
Marilyn hung the collection on a hook and admired herself in the mirror. I watched her, not only was the mirror a two way mirror through which I could see her as she admired her reflection but it was fixed to the connecting door to "The Warehouse," behind which I stood quietly waiting.
She pulled her dress over her head, I checked the CCTV monitor to make sure no one was close enough to hear anything and flicked a couple of switches, the outer changing room door locked with a click as did the outside door while the cheap LED sign on the street door changed to "Closed."
She cupped her breasts and looked at her reflection, I swung the mirror open, "Very nice!" I agreed.
She stared open mouthed, "Wha?" she gasped, "I wasn't stealing!"
"No of course not, come through," I said, "Leave those," I said pointing to the clothes.
She stared into the pale red light illuminating the passage way, "If you please, Marilyn isn't it, I'm afraid I've had my little CCTV eye on you."
She tried the outer door, it was firmly locked, "It's locked, come through," I repeated, and when she just stared at me I added, "Come along please, I don't have all day."
She took that first fateful step into the warehouse, still in her underwear, "I wasn't stealing," she said.
"No, come through," I suggested and I shut the door behind her.
"You won't call the police!" she pleaded as she stepped into the red glow of the narrow oak board lined corridor .
"No, just sign the book," I suggested and I stepped through a narrow doorway to the left of the corridor and motioned for her to look through an unglazed window slightly further down.
A book lay on a desk within the window, "Just sign and date it and print your name and address, oh and land line phone number," I suggested.
"Look, really I wasn't," she said plaintively.
"No," I agreed, "Just sign," she found it awkward the window was rather narrow, she couldn't reach, she wriggled both arms through the narrow gap and as she did so the top of the window silently slid downwards on polished steel guides that had once graced the front of a Harley Davidson motorcycle controlled by hydraulic valves operated by the control unit in my hand.
"Ugh" she exclaimed as the panel gently slid into place across her back between her shoulders and hips, trapping her, "What's happening?"
Five interlocking panels of wood had descended, pinning her within the gap in the wall.
The locking mechanism prevented her lifting it away and she looked completely shocked as she looked up at me while taking her weight on her elbows.
"Doing our bit for charity Marilyn, helping our African cousins."
The corridor was an illusion, the back wall was itself a series of doors which closed the corridor off into a series of four cubicles each accessed from the main room of "The Warehouse" by an individual door.
I closed the doors behind her, "In a moment I shall open the doors and for the next hour you will be available for our young black gentlemen to use as they please, think of it as charity work."
"But, no please you can't!" she said even as I pulled her petticoat down revealing her boring big white knickers and her rather fetching suspender belt and stockings.
The panties had to go, "Do you find it rather exciting?" I asked as I pulled them down.
"No! let me go!" she protested, but a brief rub of my finger between her legs belied her denial, she was moist, a finger tip slipped within and she moaned, I stepped back, closed the side door and stepped into 'The Warehouse,' where several young lads were playing table tennis, bar billiards, watching porn or just hanging out.
"Number four open for business gentlemen," I announced, "Stephanie will take over at four."
"So who's this?" someone asked.
