The Good Terrorist

by Doris Lessing

  Mrs. Whitfield sighed. Not from irritation, but because she knew it was a lie, and felt sorrowful because of Alice. She had lowered her eyes again. A second tricky little pattern was appearing beside the first on Alice’s form.

  She enquired mildly, “And your brother would be prepared to guarantee the electricity bills for ten people?”

  Alice said, “But he would know he wouldn’t have to pay them, wouldn’t he?” She hurried on, in case Mrs. Whitfield felt obliged actually to answer the question: “But I am sure he’ll say yes.”

  “When is he coming back from Bahrein?”

  “In about a month. But I’ll go up and see him about it, talk to him and explain. That’s where I went wrong with my father. I should have gone over and explained, instead of just assuming …” Her voice trembled. It: sounded pathetic, but hot red waves of murder beat inside her. I’ll blow that house of theirs up, she was thinking, I’ll kill them.

  “Yes, I do think that would be a good idea,” said Mrs. Whitfield.

  A long pause. Not because she was undecided: the decision had been made. She wanted Alice to say something more that would make the situation better, or seem better. But Alice only sat and waited.

  “Well,” said Mrs. Whitfield at last, sitting upright inside the corset of her strong, short-sleeved brown dress, with her fat arms and fat brown forearms, fat hands with the little rings twinkling on them, all disposed regularly about her, her feet—no doubt, though Alice could not see them—placed side by side. “Well, I’ll give you five weeks. That should be plenty of time to see your brother.” She was not looking at Alice. “And I’ll need more in the way of a deposit.”

  Alice took out a ten-pound note—not enough, she knew—and placed it in front of Mrs. Whitfield, who took it up, smoothed it flat, placed it in an old-fashioned cashbox in a drawer, wrote out a receipt. Then she said, “I’ll see you in five weeks,” and sighed again. “Good-bye,” said the kindly, decent woman, her distress at the ways of this wicked world written all over her. Almost certainly in her eyes, too, but she was not looking, would not look, at Alice; only said, “Ask the next one to come in.”

  Alice said, nonchalantly, so as not to make too much of it, though she was soft with gratitude and relief, “Thanks. ’Bye, then,” and went out. Five weeks was a lifetime, anything could have—would have—happened. But she was on a winning streak, a lucky wave; she would nip down to the Gas Board and fix things up.

  There, she said number 43 Old Mill Road was an agreed tenancy, Mary Williams of Belstrode Road would confirm; electricity was being supplied, Mrs. Whitfield of the Electricity Board would confirm; and her brother, now in Bahrein, would guarantee payments. She had waited until this sympathetic-looking man, elderly, fatherly, was free, and now she pleaded, “Can we have the gas on now, please, it is so cold … no hot water … it’s awful.…” His concerned, shocked face! This man could not easily imagine life without hot water, at least not for people like himself and Alice.

  A deposit?

  She laid down twenty pounds and fixed on him girlish, friendly eyes.

  He took up the money. Accepted. But he was unhappy about the situation. Like Mrs. Whitfield at the first interview, he was not sure why he was being compelled by Alice.

  “We do have to have a guarantor,” he remarked, as much to himself, and said, “Very well, you said your brother would be back in a month? Good.”

  It was done. Alice went off, demurely grateful.

  She was going to have to get some money. Had to. Where?

  Sobered, she went back home, told Philip that the gas would be on. If they could lay hands on a second-hand boiler, did he know enough to fix it?

  They squatted opposite each other on the top floor, on the landing, in the bright April light, which came, slightly dimmed by dirt, through the window on the stairs. He was smiling, pleased with her, with this house, with his place in it; ready to go on working. But, she knew, sorrow and resentment were there, only just subdued; and soon she must find more money for him. For the boiler. For new floorboards in the hall, in a corner where water had dripped from a leaky pipe. For … for … for …

  She said, “Philip, I know that if you had taken on this job on a business basis you would have had to charge hundreds. Well, don’t worry … but wait a bit. I’ll have it.”

  He nodded, he smiled, he went on with his work, sitting in a tangle of new black cable like some kind of leprechaun among urban roots. Frail—you could blow him away, thought Alice, her heart aching for him.

  And where was Jasper? He had not been in court that morning after all? Or he had been, had been silly, was bound over again?

  Worry, worry, worry; she felt bruised with it.

  She sat in a heap at the kitchen table. She thought, looking at the pleasant room: I’m taking it for granted already!

  Forcing herself, she worked for an hour or two on the great heap of stuff purloined from the skips that lay in a corner of the hall; fitting a curtain here, laying a rug there. Everything needed a good scrub! Well, she would take down all these curtains when there was time and get them to the laundrette, but meanwhile … She found a nice solid little stool, thrown away only because a leg was loose. She glued it back in, put the stool in the corner of the kitchen, went out into the garden to the forsythia bush, cut some branches. The old woman was asleep in her chair under the tree. Joan Robbins was only a yard away through the fence. She was glad to see Alice, began talking in a heavy tired voice about how the old woman had her running up and down the stairs, even got her up in the middle of the night. What was she to do? She was sick and tired of it.

  Alice, familiar with this situation from somewhere in her well-stocked past, knew there was little that could be done; in fact, it would get worse. She asked whether Mrs. Robbins knew about the services available for the old. Yes, but she didn’t like the idea of all these people in and out all day; who were they? She’d have no check on them.

  She went on and on, digging viciously into the soil of her border. For years the house had been civilised and orderly; she and her husband downstairs, with the garden; Mrs. Jackson, a widow, keeping herself to herself in the flat above. But now she might just as well be living with Mrs. Jackson! You’d think she was her daughter! The old woman certainly seemed to think so.

  Alice, with all the time in the world and nothing better to do, stood with the branches of forsythia blazing yellow in her arms, listening and advising. Surely it would be better to have Home Helps, Meals on Wheels, all that, and a social worker to advise and take on responsibility, than have to do it all yourself?

  Joan Robbins agreed that perhaps it might, she would think.… With a smile at Alice of real gratitude, neighbourliness, she said that she was glad Alice was there, glad that decent people were in poor Number 43 at last.

  Alice went in, stacked the forsythia in a jug on the stool in the corner of the kitchen, sat down.

  Where was Jasper?

  This was the night they were going spray-painting. She had the paint—two cans, in scarlet and black—ready in the corner of the hall.

  At the kitchen table, she pencilled slogans on an envelope.

  What was the message they wanted to convey? The full message, exact—that was where she must start.

  The Use of Supergrasses Unmasks the True Nature of British Democracy. One Law for England, Another for Northern Ireland, England’s Colony.

  That was it. Possibly they’d find a good space, like a bridge, or a long low wall, to get all that in.

  She must work out something shorter.

  Supergrasses Threaten Democracy!

  No, too abstract.

  Supergrasses—Unfair!

  Supergrasses a Shameful Blot on Britain!

  Supergrasses—Shame on Us!

  She sat still, with the blaze of the forsythia in her eyes. She shut her eyes, and the yellow blurred and danced on black. She was smiling, remembering the last time she and Jasper had gone out together. Only two weeks ago. In scarlet and
black they had written “Support the Women of Greenham Common” on the dull grey-green paint of a bridge two hundred yards from a police station. She had sprayed; Jasper kept watch, from the other side of the station. She had finished when she heard his signal, a yell he had perfected to sound like a car hooting. She had thrust the spray paint in her carrier bag. Not looking back, she strolled along the pavement, thinking that Jasper was sauntering past the police station. Between him and her, probably two policemen. But the footsteps that came up beside her were Jasper’s—light and urgent. That meant the police had gone up the other way—but could see them by turning. Jasper and she stood looking into each other’s faces, alive and tingling and delighted, knowing that anyone looking at them could guess, simply from the waves of energy that danced from them. Jasper’s eyes said, Let’s …

  She raced back to the smooth green paint that was evenly lit by a street lamp ten yards away. The policeman and a woman sedately progressed away from them. Jasper waited where he was. She took out the red spray and, in letters a foot high, began “Greenham Common Women …”

  She kept her attention half on what she did, half on Jasper, who suddenly raised his arms. Without looking round she sped toward him, hearing the heavy feet running behind her. Now she was spitting: Filthy beasts, fascists, pigs, pigs, pigs.… She had come up to Jasper, who caught her wrist in his bony grip, and they ran together up towards the Underground. But before they reached it, they turned into a side street and then, they hoped before the police reached that street, into another. They knew someone living in a house there. But their blood was racing, they were inspired, and she was not surprised that Jasper panted, “Let’s chance it.…” They tore down that street and into a main road that was crowded with people—fish-and-chip shops, take-aways, a disco, a supermarket, still open. Again, they could have gone into the supermarket, but they thought the police had had a good look at them, so they sprinted through the crowds, who took as little notice as they expected, and across the street just after the lights had changed, so that the traffic, beginning to move, hooted.

  Down they went into the Underground. They had not looked to see whether the police had come into the main road in time to see. Again, Jasper’s eyes demanded they chance it; they walked smartly up out of the Underground on the other side, and saw two policemen—different ones—coming towards them. Cool and indifferent, Alice and Jasper walked past. Then down again into the Underground. They went two stops, to where Alice had seen a long low bridge along a main road over railway lines. By then it was ten, and raining a little. Here the police station was a good way off. On the other hand, cars were passing regularly. On the bridge was already written, in white letters that had run and streaked, “Women Are Angry.”

  They stood arm in arm, backs to the traffic, as though looking over the railway lines, and Alice, holding the spray low down, wrote, “We Are All …,” which is as far as she could go without having to move. They moved on a few steps, again stood together, and wrote, “Angry. Angry About …” Another move. “Ireland. About Sexism. About …” They moved. Then they heard—their ears alert for the slightest changes in the grind of the traffic—a car slowing down just behind them. They both shot looks over their shoulders: not a police car. But two men sat side by side in the front seat, staring.

  “… Trident”—Alice finished. And they walked on, slowly, very close, knowing the car crawled behind. The intoxication of it, the elation: pleasure. There was nothing like it!

  Now, remembering, Alice craved and longed. Oh, she did so hope that Jasper would not be late, would not be tired, would want to go out. He had promised.…

  … They had walked, perhaps 150 yards. Luck! A one-way street! The car, of course, did not follow. At the end of that street, they went back to the bus stop and to Kilburn, where they had worked before.

  “No to Cruise! No to Trident!”

  No one had so much as noticed them there.

  Let down, their elation leaking away, they had decided to give up, and taken a taxi back to Alice’s mother’s house, where Alice made them both coffee and scrambled eggs.

  Now it was six-thirty.

  Mary came in, sat briefly with Alice, said she and Reggie were going to the pictures. She had had a word about this girl, Monica; there was really nothing, nothing at all. She had done her best, Alice must understand.

  “Never mind,” said Alice, “I’ve thought of something.”

  Mary saw the scribbled-over envelope, smiled, and said, “Reggie and I are going to the Greenpeace demo tomorrow.”

  “Good for you,” said Alice.

  “But it’s shocking, it’s terrible, the despoliation of our countryside.…”

  “I know,” said Alice. “I’ve been on some of their demos.”

  “You have!” Mary was relieved, Alice could see, that they shared this; but Reggie “hallo”ed from the hall, and, with a smile, Mary went.

  Where were Roberta and Faye? Probably at their women’s-commune place. Where Philip? He might have been thrown out by his girlfriend, but he was going round there still for meals and baths, so Bert had said. Jim? Now, that was a serious question, where was he? The smiling face, the jokey mellow voice—but what was going on, really?

  Apart from having his home, his place taken over like this.

  Worry, worry, Alice sat worrying.

  In came Jasper, smiling, jaunty, stepping like a dancer, and at once he said, “Oh, lovely,” at the forsythia. There: people said this and that about him, but no one knew how sensitive he was, how kind. Now he bent and kissed her cheek; it was a thin papery kiss, but she understood that; understood when—rarely—she simply had to put her arms around him out of an exuberance of love, the instinctive shrinking, as though she held a wraith, something cold and wailing, a lost child. And he would try to stand up to it, the sudden blast of her love; she could feel a brave little determination to withstand it, and even an intention to return it. Which, of course, he could not—not the physical thing; she knew that what she felt as a warmth of affection was experienced by him as a demand for that.

  He stood near her, beaming, positively dancing, with the excess of his pride and pleasure.

  “So it was all right.”

  “Thirty pounds.”

  “A lot, surely?”

  “They knew me,” he said with pride.

  “How was the cell?”

  “Oh, not bad. They fed us—not bad. But I was with Jack—though it’s an alias, you understand!”

  “Yes, of course,” she beamed back. “What I don’t know …”

  “… won’t hurt you.” He rubbed his hands, and began a light, smart quick-stepping about the kitchen: to the forsythia, which he touched delicately; to the window; and back to her. She put on the kettle, put coffee into a mug, and stood by the stove, so as to be standing, not sitting, while he moved so electrically and finely about.

  “Bert doesn’t know, either. Where is he? Bert?”

  “But he told you, he’s gone for the weekend with Pat.”

  “Oh yes … for the weekend—how long?” He was now standing still, threatened, frowning.

  “Sunday night.”

  “Because we’re going for a trip,” he said. “He knew we were going, but not so soon. Jack says …”

  “A fine Irish name,” said Alice.

  He chuckled, enjoying her teasing him. “Well, there are Jacks in Ireland.” He went on, “And how did you know … But you always do, don’t you,” he said, with a flash of acid.

  “But where else?” she wailed, humorously, as she always did when he was surprised by what to her was obvious. “You and Bert and Jack are going to Ireland, because Jack is IRA?”

  “In touch. In contact. He can arrange a meeting.”

  “Well, then!” said Alice, handing him a mug of black coffee, and sat down again.

  He stood silent, stilled a moment. Then he said, “Alice, I’ve got to have some money.”

  Alice thought: “Well, that’s that”—meaning, the
end of this delightful friendliness. She strengthened herself for a fight.

  She said, “I gave Bert the money he gave you for your fine.”

  “I’ve got to have my fare to Dublin.”

  “But you can’t have spent your dole money!”

  He hesitated. He had? How? She could never understand what he did with it, where it went—he had not had time for … that other life of his, he had been with Bert, with Jack!

  “I said I’d pay Jack’s fare—the fine cleaned him out.”

  “Was he fined thirty pounds, too?”

  “No, fifteen.”

  “I have been spending and spending,” said Alice. “No one chips in—only a bit here and there.” She thought: At least Mary and Reggie will pull their weight, at least one can say that of their kind.… To the exact amount, no more, no less.

  “You can’t have spent all that,” said Jasper. He looked as though she were deliberately punishing him. “I saw it. Hundreds.”

  “What do you suppose all this is costing.”

  Now—as she had expected—his hand closed around her wrist, tight and hurtful. He said, “While you play house and gardens, pouring money away on rubbish, the Cause has to suffer, do without.”

  His little blue eyes in the shallow depressions of very white, glistening flesh stared into hers, unblinking, as his grasp tightened. But long ago she had gained immunity from this particular accusation. Without resisting, leaving her wrist limp in his circle of bone, she looked hard back at him and said, “I see no reason why you should pay Comrade Jack’s fare. Or expenses. If he hadn’t met you, what would he have done for the fare?”

  “But he’s only going over for our sakes—so we can make contact.”

  She forced herself to fight him: “You picked up three weeks’ money this week. You had a hundred and twenty pounds plus. And I paid your fine. You can’t have spent more than at the most twenty pounds on train fares and snacks.”

  When she did this, let him know that she made this silent, skilled reckoning of what he spent, what he must be doing, he hated her totally, and showed it. He was white with his hatred. His thin pink lips, which normally she loved for their delicacy and sensitivity, were stretched in a colourless line, and between them showed sharp discoloured teeth. He looked like a rat, she thought steadily, knowing that her love for him was not by an atom diminished.