Free The Good Apprentice by Iris Murdoch

automatic relief, like crying. I think you should write something to her, just a few lines, it could change her scene a bit.’
    ‘Write what? She’d spit on it.’
    ‘Say you’re sorry, say you’re wretched, anything — it might do you good too.’
    ‘Oh go away, go to hell, you don’t understand. Anyway, I’m not a murderer, I didn’t intend it, or do you think I did — You can’t understand, you don’t know what it’s like to be where I am — ’
    ‘Ed, don’t go on like this,’ said Stuart, ‘try something. Sit still and try to make your mind quiet, breathe quietly, say words, aloud, quietly.‘
    ‘What words?’
    ‘Any words, like a prayer, or just “stop” or “help” or “peace” — ’
    ‘Words without thoughts never to heaven go.’
    ‘I’m not so sure,’ said Stuart, ‘you see what happened just now. If you’re sorry about what you did, suffer with some point. Don’t hate, put away resentment, say “stop” to some thoughts, keep your intent pure, live quietly in your pain, quietness is good, reach out and touch things gently, other things, innocent things — it may seem artificial, like a ritual — like when you wake in the morning and hear the birds singing, hold onto that after you’ve remembered, and just think “the birds are singing”, and hold that away from the blackness and keep it there, even for a second.’
    ‘What use is a second, it just makes the blackness more black.’
    ‘Find something good anywhere and hang onto it like a terrier. Try to sort of pray, say “deliver me from evil”, say you’re sorry, ask for help, it will come, it must come, find some light, something the blackness can’t blacken. There must be things you have, things you can get to, some poetry, something from the Bible, Christ if he still means anything to you. Let the pain go on but let something else touch it like a ray coming through from outside, from that place outside — ’
    ‘It’s no good,’ said Edward, ‘you’re talking to yourself, you’re intoxicating yourself with pious rhetoric. You live in some sort of blank childish place, you don’t know how terrible the world is, what it’s like for your whole mind to be taken over by hopeless darkness and corruption. It’s like cancer, what I shall probably die of soon anyway.’
    ‘Or look at something,’ said Stuart, ‘anything, any existing thing, that azalea for example — ’
    ‘Oh go away, go to hell, and take the bloody plant with you, I’m going to smash it up and trample on it! If you want it to survive you’d better remove it, take it away, and take yourself away, oh God, if I could only weep. Why do you come here to look at me?’
    ‘I’m your brother and I love you.’
    ‘You are not my brother, and you have never loved me, never, never, never, you’re a liar. You were always jealous, always watching and calculating — Go away, I loathe your presence, you suffocate me, and take that vile plant or I’ll kill it!’ Edward’s whole face was wrinkled now into a reddened grimace of hate and fury, like a primitive mask in a museum.
    Stuart got up. He went over to the bookshelves, and inspected Edward’s books. He pulled out a book, the Bible, and put it down on the chair beside Edward’s bed. Then he picked up the azalea. ‘All right, I’ll take this away now, but I’ll bring it back later. Don’t be angry with me. Forgive me. Goodnight, Edward.’
    As he closed the door he heard the flung Bible crash against it and fall to the ground.
     
     
    After Stuart had gone Edward lay back on his pillows for a few minutes, panting with exhaustion. His heart was beating violently and painfully, his head ached, and when he sat up he felt giddy. He got out of bed. Still breathing heavily and hunched up with weariness and spent fury he opened the window, which gave onto the darkened garden, and hurled Midge’s box of expensive chocolates out into the night. He turned round for the azalea, then remembered