Doris Lessing - The Good Terrorist

‘Why not? We’ve got to start,’ said Alice, fierce. In her voice sounded all the intensity of her need. They heard it, recognized it, gave way. ‘It’s not going to be nearly as difficult as you think now. I’ve looked at the lavatories. If the cisterns had been filled with concrete, it would be different, they’d have cracked, probably, but it isn’t difficult to get it out of the bowls.’

‘The workmen concreted over the tap from the main,’ said Bert.

‘Illegal,’ said Alice bitterly. ‘If the Water Board knew. Are there any tools?’

‘No,’ said Bert.

‘You said you have a friend near here? Has he got tools?’

‘She. Felicity. Her boyfriend has. Power tools. Everything. It’s his job.’

‘Then we could pay him. He could get the electricity right, too.’

‘With what do you pay ‘im,’ said Faye, singing it. ‘With what do we pay ‘im, dear Alice, with what?’

‘I’ll go and get the fifty pounds,’ said Alice. ‘You go and see your friend.’ She was at the door. ‘Tell him, plumbing and electricity. Plumbing first. If he’s got a big chisel and a heavy hammer we can start on this lavatory here in the hall. We really need a kango hammer. I’ll be back,’ she cried, and heard Jasper’s ‘Bring in something to eat, I’m starving.’

On the wings of accomplishment Alice flew to the Underground, and on the train she thought of the house, imagining it clean and ordered. She ran up the avenue to Theresa. Only when she heard Anthony’s voice did she remember Theresa would be late.

‘Alice,’ she said into the machine. ‘It’s Alice.’

‘Come in, Alice.’

Anthony’s full, measured, sexy voice reminded her of the enemies that she confronted, and she arrived outside their door wearing, as she knew, her look.

‘Well, Alice, come in,’ said Anthony, heartily but falsely, for it was Theresa who was her friend.

She went in, knowing she was unwelcome. Anthony had on a dressing-gown, and there was a book in his hand. An evening off was what he was looking forward to, she thought. Well, he can spare me ten minutes of it.

‘Sit down, do. A drink?’

‘No, Anthony, I never drink,’ she said, and went straight on, ‘Theresa said this morning I could have fifty pounds.’

‘She’s not here. She’s got one of her conferences.’

‘I thought, you could give it to me. I need it.’ This was fierce and deadly, an accusation, and the man looked carefully at the young woman, who stood there in the middle of his sitting-room, dressed in the clothes he thought of as military, swollen with tears and with hostility.

‘I haven’t got fifty pounds,’ he said.

A lie, Alice recognized, and she was staring at him with such hate that he murmured, ‘My dear Alice, do sit down, do. I’m going to have a drink if you won’t.’ He was trying to make it humorous, but she saw through it. She watched, standing, while the big dark bulky man turned from her, and poured himself whisky from a decanter. All her life, it seemed to her, she had had moments when she thought that he, and her friend , Theresa, were naked at nights in bed together, and she felt sick.

She knew from her mother that the sex life of these two was vivid, varied and tempestuous, in spite of Anthony’s heavy humorous urbanities, Theresa’s murmuring, smiling endearments. Dear Alice, darling Alice, but at night …She felt sick.

And she thought, as she had done when she was little, And they are so old! Watching the man’s broad back, grey thick silk, his smooth head, dark as oil, small for that body, she thought, they have been sexing all night and every night for all those years.

He turned to her in a swift movement, glass in his hand, having thought what he should do, and said, ‘I’ll ring Theresa. If she’s not actually in conference…’ And he went swift and deadly to the telephone.

Alice looked around the big expensive room. She thought: I’ll take one of those little netsukes, and run out, they’ll think it was the Spanish woman. But just then he came back and said, ‘They say they’ve called it a day. She’s on her way home. Well, I’ll get some supper on then. Theresa’s too tired to cook at conference times. Excuse me.’ Glad to be able to turn his back, she thought, and as he disappeared into the kitchen, the door opened. It was Theresa. For a moment Alice did not recognize her, thought it was some tired middle-aged woman, and then thought, But she looks so worn out.

Theresa stood heavily, her face in dragging lines, and she wore dark glasses, which left her eyes blinking and anxious when she took them off.

‘Oh Alice,’ she said, and walked fast to the chair near the drinks and collapsed. She fumbled as she poured herself a drink, and sat nursing the glass on her bosom, breathing slowly. Eyes shut. ‘Just a minute, Alice, just a minute, Alice dear,’ and as Anthony came in, moving his large bulk quickly to kiss her, she lifted her cheek to his lips, eyes shut, and said, ‘Thank God we closed early. Thank God, one more evening till eleven, and I’d be done for.’

He laid his hand on her shoulder, and pressed down. She smiled, with small pouting kissing movements, eyes tightclosed, and he went back to the kitchen, saying: ‘I’ve done some soup and a salad.’

‘Oh darling Anthony,’ said Theresa, ‘thank you – soup – it’s just what I need.’

What Alice felt then was a slicing cold pain – jealousy; but she did not know it was that, and she said, to be rid of the scene, rid of them, ‘You said I could have fifty pounds. Can I have it, Theresa?’

‘I expect so, darling,’ said Theresa vaguely. And in a moment she had sat up, had opened her smart bag, and was peering inside it. ‘Fifty,’ she said, ‘fifty, well, have I got it? Yes, just…’ And she fished out five ten-pound notes and handed them to Alice.

‘Thanks.’ Alice wanted to fly off with them, but felt graceless; she was full of affection for Theresa, who looked so tired and done, who had always been so good to her. ‘You are my favourite and my best, and my very best auntie,’ she said, with an awkward smile, as she had, when she was little, and they played this game.

Theresa’s eyes were open and she looked straight into Alice’s. ‘Alice,’ she said, ‘Alice, my dear…’ She sighed. Sat up. Stroked her deep-red skirt. Put up a white little hand to smooth her soft dark hair. Dyed, of course. ‘Your poor mother,’ said Theresa. ‘She rang me this morning. She was so upset, Alice.’

‘She was upset,’ said Alice at once. ‘ She was.’

Theresa sighed. ‘Alice, why do you stick with him, with Jasper, why – no, wait, don’t run off. You’re so pretty and nice, my love – ‘ here she seemed to offer that kind face of hers to Alice, as if in a kiss. ‘You are such a good girl, Alice, why can’t you choose yourself someone – you should have a real relationship with someone,’ she ended awkwardly, because of Alice’s coldly contemptuous face.

‘I love Jasper,’ she said. ‘I love him. Why don’t you understand? I don’t care – about what you care about. Love isn’t just sex. That’s what you think, I know…’

But the years of affection, of love, dragged at her tongue, and she felt tears rushing down her face. ‘Oh Theresa,’ she cried, ‘thank you. Thank you. I’ll come in to see you soon. I’ll come. I must go, they are waiting…’ And she ran to the door, sobbing violently, and out of the door, letting it crash. Down the stairs she pounded, tears flying off her face, into the street, and there she remembered the notes in her hand, in danger of being blown away or snatched. She put them carefully into the pocket of her jacket, and walked fast and safely to the Underground.