The Good Terrorist by Doris Lessing Read Free Book Online

door opened. It was Theresa. For a moment Alice did not recognise 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 tight-closed, 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 cold contemptuous face.
    “I love Jasper,” Alice 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 stair 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.
    Meanwhile, back in the beautiful flat, they were discussing Alice. Anthony kept up a humorous quizzical look, until Theresa responded with, “What is it, my love?”
    “Some girl,” he said, the dislike he felt for Alice sounding in his voice.
    “Yes, yes, I know …” she said irritably—her exhaustion was beginning to tell.
    “A girl —how old is she now?”
    She shrugged, not wanting to be bothered with it, but interested all the same. “You’re right,” she said. “One keeps forgetting.”
    “Nearly forty?”