Free The Good Terrorist by Doris Lessing Page B

“Against stupidity the gods themselves.”
    “What’s that?” Alice had asked.
    “Against—stupidity—the gods—themselves—contend—in vain,” her mother had said, isolating the words, presenting them to Alice, not as if she had expected anything from Alice, but reminding herself of the uselessness of it all.
    The bitterness Alice felt against the Council, the workmen,the Establishment now encompassed her mother, and she was assaulted by a black rage that made her giddy, and clenched her hands. Coming to herself, she saw Philip looking at her, curious. Because of this state of hers which he was judging as more violent than the vandalising workmen deserved?
    She said, “I could kill them.” She heard her voice, deadly. She was surprised by it. She felt her hands hurting, and unclenched them.
    “I could, too,” said Philip, but differently. He had set down grimy bags of tools, and was standing quietly there, waiting. He was looking at her with his by now familiar and heart-touching obstinacy. The murderess in Alice took herself off, and Alice said, giving him the promise he had to have before he did any more work, “It’s only fair, if you do the work.”
    He nodded, believing her, and then transferred that obstinacy of his to the attention he gave the mangled wall. “It’s not so bad,” he said at last. “Looks as if they smashed the place up in a bit of a fit of temper: they didn’t do much of a job of it.”
    “
What
?” she said, incredulous; for it seemed to her the kitchen, or at least two walls of it, was sprouting and dangling cables and wires; and the creamy plaster lay like dough in mounds along the bottom of these walls, which were discoloured and scurfy.
    “Seen worse.” Then, “I’ve got to have the floorboards up; can’t work with that down there.”
    The fallen plaster had gone hard, and Alice had to smash it free. The kitchen was full of fine white dust. She worked at floor level, while Philip stood above her on the big table he had dragged to the wall. Then the plaster and rubbish were in sacks, and she swept up with the handbrush and pan, which were all she had. She was irritable and weepy, for she knew that every inch of the ceiling, the walls should be washed down, should be painted. And then the house, the whole house, was like that, and the roof—what would they find when at last they got that horrible upper floor free of its smelly pails? Who was going to replace slates, how to pay for it all? She was brushing and brushing, and each sweepscuffed up more filth into the air, and she was thinking, I’ve got to get to the Electricity Board; how can I, looking like this?
    She stood up, a wraith in the white-dust-filled air, and said, “Your friend—is she at home, would she give me a bath?”
    Philip did not reply; he was examining a cable with a strong torch.
    She said, furious, “There were public baths till last year, nice ones, not far, they were in Auction Street. Friends of mine used them—they are in a squat in Belsize Road. Then the Council closed them. They closed them.” She felt tears hot on her chalky cheeks, and stood, spent, looking imploringly at Philip’s slight, almost girlish back.
    He said, “We had a rare old row when I left.”
    She thought, She threw him out.
    “Never mind,” she said. “I’ll manage. I’ll get cleaned up and I’m going to the Electricity Board. So be careful, in case they switch it on.”
    “You think you can get them to do that?”
    “I’ve managed it before, haven’t I?” At the thought of this and other victories, her depression lifted and she was popping with energy again.
    In the hall, the two desperadoes were just about to go out into the world of the streets, gardens, neighbours, cats, cars, and sparrows.
    They looked just like everybody, thought Alice, seeing them turn round, the pretty fair Faye, delicate inside the almost tangible protective ambience of swarthy Roberta, as strong as a tank—as strong as I am,