“It’s a wonderful thing. I thank the Lord that this place is here.”

It was dark and quiet in Elysian Valley, that hidden neighborhood between the Golden State Freeway and the S-curve of the L.A. River, when a bus stopped on a street corner and 40 men filed out.

Some were somber, some almost breezy, some rumpled, some neat.

A stooped man with gray whiskers, dirty clothes and a smell of alcohol paused on his short march to explain what it was all about.

“They take us out of the rain, and they put us back in the rain,” he said, waving at the rain that wasn’t there. Then he moved along.

The man behind him, sprightly of step and easy with a smile of missing teeth, saw it differently.

“It’s a wonderful thing,” he said. “I thank the Lord that this place is here.”

They took their places in a line that moved efficiently through the big double doors of the Elysian Valley Recreation Center. They signed a list, received meal tickets and were admitted onto the brightly lighted gymnasium floor. They reported to a storeroom, where each was handed a folded military cot and a government-green wool blanket. They aligned their cots carefully beside others already set up.

Other buses had arrived before theirs. More would follow. Only half full so far, the room was already redolent of dirty clothes and alcohol. The only amenity they had sacrificed when they left the streets of downtown Los Angeles was fresh air.

Their night in Elysian Valley was arranged by the city of Los Angeles, under a simple set of rules. If rain or a temperature of 40 degrees or less is forecast, the buses run. They pick up people at stops on Skid Row. They drop them off at four recreation centers, including Elysian Valley. In the morning they do the reverse. There are no questions asked.

“As long as you’re not completely intoxicated and obnoxious, you can get on the bus,” said Bob Mortimer, a support services supervisor with the Community Development Department. Mortimer was one of almost a dozen city employees working overtime Tuesday night, the fourth night in a row the shelter was open.

Four of the workers were security officers. One was Elysian Valley’s recreation director, Tony Caubet, who has had that job since August, 1968. Outside supervising the unloading were four park rangers. A mental health worker also dropped in to check for anyone who looked mentally incompetent.

Several men out on the floor didn’t look too well. But the guidelines were liberal. If they could make it through the night without causing trouble, OK.

About 8:30 there was a ripple of trouble. Voices got loud on the stage, an area reserved for the few couples who show up each night. A hefty security guard turned on his heels and rushed out the door, shouting:

“Got two females. One has an old man. The other is single. I got three guys saying that they’re married to the other one. I got to get some backup.”

The four rangers--two men and two women wearing green flight jackets--followed him back in and observed as the guard went nose to nose with the married woman’s “old man.”

“Talk to me like I’m a man!” the man shouted, adding a few obscenities.

“Act like one!” the guard shouted back.

It turned out that guard was trying to make the man sleep on the floor, with the single men.

Just loud enough for everyone in the room to hear, senior ranger Tom Cotter advised the guard to back off.

“If they say they’re together, they’re together,” Cotter told him. “We’re not looking for wedding bands here.”

That ended the problem. “Usually, if there’s any trouble starting, they solve it themselves,” Mortimer said. “They know if they act up they’re definitely going to go out.”

The law of the shelter, he said, is mutual respect.

“They’re gracious and say, ‘Thank you, you’re welcome,’ and we do too.”

Mortimer, who wore an Army surplus jacket, was not technically in charge but carried authority in his unrestrained enthusiasm for the work.

“I’ve got a certain love for, or involvement with, the homeless, from the days they opened the old print shop building downtown,” he said. “I was there when Ted Hayes walked in two years ago.” Hayes is a noted homeless advocate.

Mortimer’s role has evolved along with the city’s emergency shelter program into a routine. Whenever the buses roll, he shows up at Elysian Valley, because it’s near his home in Atwater.

Three people, all working on their usual days off, stay through the night.

Mortimer stays only until the cots are set up, the Salvation Army sack lunches are distributed and the boarders are snug under their blankets.

He has to be at work in the morning. He doesn’t mind the hours.

“I’d be watching TV right now anyway,” he said.

His duty ended simply. About 10:15 he put out half the lights, a signal for the last few men chatting in groups, reading newspapers or writing on legal pads to bed down.

At 10:30 he cut the rest of the lights.

“Thank you,” a voice said from the darkness.