Read Online The Good Terrorist by Doris Lessing - Free Book Online Page B

thinking it had not been worth taking it.
    “My advice is, keep it and enjoy it,” said the woman, going back to her desk, letting the dark glasses fall back into place, and drinking coffee.
    “No, I need the money,” said Alice.
    She took the three notes and, lingering to look at the rug lying there abandoned by her, went out of the shop.
    She bought food for Jasper and went back to the squat. The street had a morning look, no one out, people had gone to work and to school; inside the women would be cleaning or with the kids. She did not expect anyone to be up yet in her house; in squats no one got up early.
    But Pat was in the sitting room by herself, drinking coffee from the vacuum flask. She indicated with a gesture that Alice should help herself, but Alice was still full of her good breakfasts, and shook her head. She said, “I’ve got a bit of money, but not enough.”
    Pat said nothing. In this strong morning light she looked older, all loosened and used, not cherry-bright. Her hair had not been brushed yet, and she smelled of sex and sweat. Alice thought, Today we’ll tackle the bathrooms. There were two.
    Pat had still not said anything, but now she lit a cigarette, and smoked it as though she planned to drown in smoke.
    Alice had seen that Pat was one of those who needed time to come to in the mornings, and was not going to say anything. She sat quietly and surveyed the state of the room: The curtains were rags, and could not be expected to stand up to dry cleaning. Well, perhaps her mother … The carpet—it would do. A vacuum cleaner?
    She knew Pat was looking at her but did not meet the look. She felt Pat an ally, did not want to challenge this feeling.
    Pat said, coughing a little from the smoke, “Twenty-four hours. You’ve been here twenty-four hours!” And laughed. Not unfriendly. But reserving judgement. Fair enough, thought Alice. In politics one had to.…
    There was a sudden arrival of sound in the street, and the rubbish van stood outside. With an exclamation Alice ran out, andstraight up to two men who were shouldering up rubbish bins from the next garden: “Please, please, please …” They stood there, side by side, looking down at her, big men, strong for this job, confronted by this girl who was both stubbornly not to be moved, and frantic. She stammered, “What will you take to clear this garden …? Yes, I know.…” Their faces put on identical expressions of disgusted derision as they looked from the sordid mess to her, back to the mess, at her, and then steadily at the mess, assessing it.
    “You should call in the Council,” said one, at last.
    “You
are
the Council,” said Alice. “No, please, please … look, we’ve come to an arrangement. An agreed arrangement. We will pay the expenses. You know, an agreed squat.”
    “Here, Alan,” shouted one of them towards the great shaking, throbbing lorry, which stood there ready to chew up any amount of plastic cartons, tins, papers—the rubbish that crammed the garden of her house to the level of the windows.
    Out of the lorry came another large man in blue dungarees and wearing thick leather gloves. Alan, arbiter of her fate, yet another one, like Philip, like Mary Williams.
    She said, “What will you take to clear it?” This was both calmly confident, as befitted her mother’s daughter, and desperate; and they stared, taking their time, at that plump childlike formless face, the round anxious blue eyes, the well-washed but tidy jeans, the thick jacket, and the nice little collared blouse with flowers on it. And all, everything, impregnated with a greyish dust, which had been brushed and shaken and beaten off, but remained, obstinately, as a dimming of the colour.
    They shrugged, as one. Three pairs of eyes conferred.
    “Twenty quid,” said Alan, the driver.
    “Twenty pounds?” wailed Alice. “Twenty!”
    A pause. They looked, as one, uncomfortable. A pause. “You get that lot into plastic bags, love, and we’ll