Free Cold Light by Frank Moorhouse

towards Fabian socialism. Or rather, a dreamy Spanish anarchism. In the meantime, I’m a pragmatic kind of democrat.’
    Janice shrugged.
    Edith went on, ‘I knew the anarchist leader Ascaso, just before the Spanish war began.’
    ‘You were in Spain during the civil war?’
    ‘I met him when I went down to Spain in 1936 to do a small report on something, maybe telephone systems. Oh dear, all the small reports and recommendations I have made – all now dust. A life of small reports. I went down again with the League Commission in 1938. He was dead by then. Shot.’
    Janice was interested. ‘What was he like, Ascaso?’
    Edith considered what to say – after all, Janice had slipped into the conversation that she was sleeping with Frederick. She dived in, ‘Ascaso was by far the most dangerous man I have slept with. It was just an amourette .’
    ‘ Amourette . Mrs Westwood – Edith. I’ll use that – amourette . The word would make some of my early fumbles in the dark sound more exotic, even charming. We weren’t taught that word in French lessons at SCEGGS.’
    ‘I do remember wishing that he would shave more closely. And more often.’
    Janice laughed loudly. ‘I sometimes wish Fred would, too. Some days he thinks some stubble is working class, other days he shaves and sees himself setting an example of hygiene and self-responsibility. As a good communist.’
    She looked at Janice and risked a further revelation, feeling that this was the way forward between them. Lowering her voice, she said, ‘I also always washed Ascaso’s privates before we had sex. He seemed to be unconcerned with the duties of hygiene. I fantasised that he had just come to me, muddy from battle.’ She coloured at her candour. In for a penny, in for a pound. ‘He liked having his privates washed in warm water. And dried.’
    Janice laughed and also blushed. ‘Did you meet Durruti?’
    ‘I would have liked to. If we are to exchange such secrets, Janice, put down that duster and make us a cup of tea – there’s some black Ceylon there, and some fresh milk that came up this morning. And you will find the last of our Belgian chocolate there somewhere – let’s finish it.’ She heard the bossiness in her voice and, in contrition, sprang up and went to help with the chocolate and tea. ‘I didn’t mean to boss you.’
    ‘I’m accustomed to being bossed. That is why I do this job – to get to know what most people have to put up with all their lives: being bossed.’ Janice stopped herself, as if she feared becoming preachy, and shifted the conversation. ‘You know, you’re the only guests who have ever rearranged the furniture. And you brought in some of your own furniture.’
    ‘We were trying to make the suite more liveable.’
    The slow electric jug was becoming noisy as it approached boiling.
    Edith went on. ‘At the League, I rather liked being a subaltern in administration. I suppose, though, that was the pleasure of carrying out orders while being something of a colleague. And it’s part of being young, being a trainee. That’s not really being bossed around, because the subaltern often gets to run her boss, and the boss leaves more and more to the good subaltern. But I do rather like to have an . . . ancillary role. Perhaps it has to do with being a woman – the way we are brought up – but I think not. I think there’s a type of personality that performs best at that role. The best work I did with the League was as a lieutenant, I think. Not the captain. Then in UNRRA, organising refugees, I was equivalent to the rank of major, but I still reported to a colonel.’
    Edith did not put into words that sometimes there had also been a dreadful pull towards the silent offering of herself to superior men, a wishing to be taken over and to serve – utterly. She had always resisted that urge. Yet, paradoxically, the two men in her married life – Robert and Ambrose – had also been, oddly enough, disposed to