To Room Nineteen

by Doris Lessing

  ‘Exactly,’ said Pat. ‘As I’ve been saying.’

  Silence again. Alice saw it was up to her. She said, ‘One problem. In this borough they need someone to guarantee the electricity and gas. Who is in work?’

  ‘Three of the comrades who left last night were.’

  ‘Comrades!’ said Bert. ‘Opportunistic shits.’

  ‘They are very good honest communists,’ said Pat. ‘They happen not to want to work with the IRA.’

  Bert began to heave with silent theatrical laughter, and Jasper joined him.

  ‘So we are all on Social Security,’ said Alice.

  ‘So no point in going to the Council,’ said Bert.

  Alice hesitated and said painfully, ‘I could ask my mother…’

  At this Jasper exploded in raucous laughter and jeers, his face scarlet. ‘Her mother, bourgeois pigs…’

  ‘Shut up,’ said Alice. ‘We were living with my mother for four years,’ she explained in a fine breathless, balanced voice, which seemed to her unkindly cold and hostile. ‘Four years. Bourgeois or not.’

  ‘Take the rich middle class for what you can get,’ said Jasper. ‘Get everything out of them you can. That’s my line.’

  ‘Yes, yes,’ said Alice. ‘I agree. But she did keep us for four years.’ Then, capitulating, ‘Well, why shouldn’t she? She is my mother.’ This last was said in a trembling painful little voice.

  ‘Right,’ said Pat, examining her curiously. ‘Well, no point in asking mine. Haven’t seen her for years.’

  ‘Well then,’ said Bert, suddenly getting up from the chair and standing in front of Pat, a challenge, his black eyes full on her. ‘So you’re not leaving after all?’

  ‘We’ve got to discuss it, Bert,’ she said, hurriedly, and walked over to him, and looked up into his face. He put his arm around her and they went out.

  Alice surveyed the room. Skilfully. A family sitting-room, it had been. Comfortable. The paint was not too bad, the chairs and a sofa probably stood where they had then. There was a fireplace, not even plastered over.

  ‘Are you going to ask your mother? I mean, to be a guarantor?’ Jasper sounded forlorn. ‘And who’s going to pay for getting it all straight?’

  ‘I’ll ask the others if they’ll contribute.’

  ‘And if they won’t?’ he said, knowingly, sharing expertise with her, a friendly moment.

  ‘Some won’t, we know that,’ she said, ‘but we’ll manage. We always do, don’t we?’

  But this was too direct an appeal to intimacy. At once he backed away into criticism. ‘And who’s going to do all the work?’

  As he had been saying now for fourteen, fifteen years.

  In the house in Manchester she shared with four other students she had been housemother, doing the cooking and shopping, housekeeping. She loved it. She got an adequate degree, but did not even try for a job. She was still in the house when the next batch of students arrived, and she stayed to look after them. That was how Jasper found her, coming in one evening for supper. He was not a student, had graduated poorly, had failed to find a job after half-hearted efforts. He stayed on in the house, not formally living there, but as Alice’s ‘guest’. After all, it was only because of Alice’s efforts that the place had become a student house: it had been a squat. And Jasper did not leave. She knew he had become dependent on her. But then and since he had complained she was nothing but a servant, wasting her life on other people. As they moved from squat to squat, commune to commune, this pattern remained: she looked after him and he complained that other people exploited her.

  At her mother’s he had said the same. ‘She’s just exploiting you,’ he said. ‘Cooking and shopping. Why do you do it?’

  ‘We’ve got four days,’ said Alice. ‘I’m going to get moving.’ She did not look at him, but walked steadily past him, and into the hall. She carried her backpack into the room where Jim was drumming and said, ‘Keep an eye on this for me, comrade.’ He nodded. She said, ‘If I get permission from the Council for us to live here, will you share expenses?’

  His hands fell from the drums. His friendly round face fell into lines of woe and he said, ‘They say I can’t stay here.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘Oh shit, man, I’m not into politics. I just want to live.’ Now he said, incredulously, ‘I was here first. Before any of you. This was my place. I found it. I said to everyone, Yes, come in, come in, man, this is Liberty Hall.’

  ‘That’s not fair,’ said Alice, at once.

  ‘I’ve been here eight months, eight months, Old Bill never knew, no one knew. I’ve been keeping my nose clean and minding my own business, and suddenly…’ He was weeping. Bright tears bounced off his black cheeks and splashed on the big drum. He wiped them off with the side of his palm.

  ‘Well,’ said Alice, ‘you just stay put and I’ll get it on the agenda.’

  She was thinking as she left the house: All those buckets of shit up there, I suppose Jim filled them, nearly all. She thought: If I don’t pee I’ll…She could not have brought herself to go up and use one of those buckets. She walked to the Underground, took a train to a station with proper lavatories, used them, washed her face and brushed her hair, then went on to her mother’s stop, where she stood in line for a telephone booth.

  Three hours after she left home screaming abuse at her mother, she dialled her number.

  Her mother’s voice. Flat. At the sound of it affection filled Alice, and she thought, I’ll ask if she wants me to do some shopping for her on the way.

  ‘Hello, Mum, this is Alice.’

  Silence.

  ‘It’s Alice.’

  A pause. ‘What do you want?’ The flat voice, toneless.

  Alice, all warm need to overcome obstacles on behalf of everyone, said, ‘Mum, I want to talk to you. You see, there’s this house. I could get the Council to let us stay on a controlled squat basis, you know, like Manchester? But we need someone to guarantee the electricity and gas.’

  She heard a mutter, inaudible, then, ‘I don’t believe it!’

  ‘Mum. Look, it’s only your signature we want. We would pay it.’

  A silence, a sigh, or a gasp, then the line went dead.

  Alice, now radiant with a clear hot anger, dialled again. She stood listening to the steady buzz-buzz, imagining the kitchen where it was ringing, the great warm kitchen, the tall windows, sparkling (she had cleaned them last week, with such pleasure), and the long table where, she was sure, her mother was sitting now, listening to the telephone ring. After about three minutes, her mother did lift the receiver and said, ‘Alice, I know it is no use my saying this. But I shall say it. Again. I have to leave here. Do you understand? Your father won’t pay the bills any longer. I can’t afford to live here. I’ll have trouble paying my own bills. Do you understand, Alice?’

  ‘But you have all those rich friends.’ Another silence. Alice then, in a full, maternal, kindly, lecturing voice, began, ‘Mum, why aren’t you like us? We share what we have. We help each other out when we’re in trouble. Don’t you see that your world is finished? The day of the rich selfish bourgeoisie is over. You are doomed…’

  ‘I don’t doubt it,’ said Alice’s mother, and Alice warmed into the purest affection again, for the familiar comforting note of irony was back in her mother’s voice, the awful deadness and emptiness gone. ‘But you have at some point to understand that your father is not prepared any longer to share his ill-gotten gains with Jasper and all his friends.’

  ‘Well, at least he is prepared to see they are ill-gotten,’ said Alice earnestly.

  A sigh. ‘Go away, Alice,’ said Alice’s mother. ‘Just go away. I don’t want to see you. I don’t want to hear from you. Try to understand that you can’t say the things to people you said to me this morning and then just turn up, as if nothing had happened, with a bright smile, for another hand-out.’

  The line went dead.

  Alice stood, in a dazzle of shock. Her head was full of dizzying s
hadow and light. Someone behind her in the queue said, ‘If you’ve finished…’, pushed in front of her, and began to dial.

  Alice drifted off on to the pavement and wandered aimlessly around the perimeter of that area, now fenced off with high, corrugated iron, where so recently there had been a market, full of people buying and selling. She had had a pitch there herself last summer, and first she sold cakes and biscuits and sweets, and then hot soup, and sandwiches. Proper food, all wholemeal flour and brown sugar, and vegetables grown without insecticides. She cooked all this in her mother’s kitchen. Then the Council closed the place down. To build another of their shitty great enormous buildings, their dead bloody white elephants that wouldn’t be wanted by anyone but the people who made a profit out of building them. Corruption. Corruption everywhere. Alice, weeping out loud, blubbering, went stumbling about outside the enormous iron fence, like a fence around a concentration camp, thinking that last summer…

  A whistle shrieked. Some factory or other…one o’clock. She hadn’t done anything yet…Standing on the long shallow steps that led to the Public Library, she wiped her face, and made her eyes look out instead of in. It was a nice day. The sun was shining. The sky was full of racing white clouds, and the blue seemed to dazzle and promise.

  She went back to the telephones in the Underground and rang her father’s office on the private number.

  He answered at once.

  ‘This is Alice.’

  ‘The answer is no.’

  ‘You don’t know what I was going to say.’

  ‘Say it.’

  ‘I want you to guarantee our expenses, electricity and gas, for a squat.’

  ‘No.’

  She hung up, the burning anger back. Its energy took her to the pavement, and walked her up the avenue to a large building which was set back a bit, with steps. She raced up them and pressed a bell, holding it down until a woman’s voice, not the one she expected, said, ‘¿Sí?’

  ‘Oh, fucking Christ, the maid,’ said Alice, aloud. And, ‘Where’s Theresa?’

  ‘She at work.’

  ‘Let me in. Let me come in.’

  Alice pushed open the door on the buzzer, almost fell into the hall, and thumped up four flights of heavily carpeted stairs to a door, where a short dumpy dark woman stood, looking out for her.

  ‘Just let me in,’ said Alice, fiercely pushing her aside, and the Spanish woman said nothing, but stood looking at her, trying to find the right words to say.

  Alice went into the sitting-room where she had so often been with her friend Theresa, her friend ever since she, Alice, had been born, kind and lovely Theresa. A large calm ordered room, with great windows, and beyond them gardens…She stood panting. I’ll tear down those pictures, she was thinking, I’ll sell them, I’ll take those little netsukes, what are they worth? I’ll smash the place up…

  She tore to the telephone, and rang the office. But Theresa was in conference.

  ‘Get her,’ she commanded. ‘Get her at once. It is an emergency. Tell her it’s Alice.’

  She had no doubt that Theresa would come, and she did.

  ‘What is it, Alice, what’s wrong, what is the matter?’

  ‘I want you to guarantee expenses. For a squat. No, no, you won’t have to pay anything, ever, just your signature.’

  ‘Alice, I’m in the middle of a conference.’

  ‘I don’t care about your shitty conference. I want you to guarantee our electricity and gas.’

  ‘You and Jasper?’

  ‘Yes. And others.’

  ‘I’m sorry, my dear. No.’

  ‘What’s the matter with Jasper? Why are you like this? Why? He’s just as good as you are.’

  Theresa said, calm and humorous, as always, ‘No, Alice, he is not as good as I am. Far from it. Anyway, that’s it. No, but I’ll give you fifty pounds if you come round.’

  ‘I am around. I am in your flat. But I don’t want your shitty fifty pounds.’

  ‘Well, then, I’m sorry, my dear.’

  ‘You spend fifty pounds on a dress. On a meal.’

  ‘You shared the meal, didn’t you? This is silly. I’m sorry, I’m busy. All the buyers are here from everywhere.’

  ‘It’s not silly. When have you seen me spend fifty pounds on a meal? If my mother wants to spend fifty pounds on food for all her shitty rich friends, and I cook it, that doesn’t mean…’

  ‘Listen, Alice, if you want to come round and have a talk tonight, you are welcome. But it will have to be late, because I will be working until eleven, at least.’

  ‘You…you…are a lot of rich shits,’ said Alice, suddenly listless.

  She put down the receiver, and was about to leave when she remembered, and went to the bathroom, where she emptied herself, again carefully washed her face, and brushed her hair. She was hungry. She went to the kitchen and cut herself a lavish sandwich. Lisa followed her and stood at the door to watch, her hands folded around the handle of a feather duster, as if in prayer. A dark patient tired face. She supported her family in Valencia, so said Theresa. She stood watching Alice eating her salami and her pâté on thick bread. Then watched while Alice peered into every corner of the refrigerator, and brought out some leftover spiced rice, which she ate with a spoon, standing up.

  Then she said, ‘Ciao,’ and heard as she left, ‘Buenos días, señorita.’ There was something in that voice, a criticism, that again lit the anger, and she ran down all the stairs again and out on to the pavement.

  It was after two.

  Her thoughts whirled about. Jasper, why did they hate him so? It was because they were afraid of him. Afraid of his truth…She realized that she had walked herself to a bus-stop, and the bus would take her to the Council. She got on, suddenly cold, concentrated, and careful.

  She was rehearsing in her mind her previous successful negotiations. A great deal would depend, she knew, on whom she saw…luck…Well, she had been lucky before. And besides, what she was suggesting was reasonable, in the best interests of everybody, the ratepayers, the public.

  In the great room filled with desks and people and telephones, she sat opposite a girl, younger than she, and knew at once that she was lucky. On Mary Williams’s left breast was a ‘Save the Whales!’ button, and the sprightly shape of the animal made Alice feel soft and protective. Mary Williams was a good person, like herself, like Jasper, like all their friends. She cared.

  Alice gave the address of her house confidently, stated her case and waited until the official turned to press a button or two, and the information arrived, to be set on the desk between them.

  ‘Scheduled for demolition,’ said Mary Williams, and sat smiling, nothing more to be said.

  This Alice had not expected. She could not speak. It was grief that filled her, transmuting, but slowly, to rage. The face that Mary Williams saw swelled and shone, and caused her to say uncomfortably, even stammering, ‘Why, why, what is the matter?’

  ‘It can’t be demolished, it can’t,’ stated Alice, in a toneless empty voice. Then, rage exploding, ‘It’s a marvellous house, perfect! How can you demolish it? It’s a bloody scandal.’

  ‘Yes, I know that sometimes…’ said Mary Williams swiftly. She sighed. Her glance at Alice was a plea not to make a scene. Alice saw it, saw that scenes not infrequently occurred at this desk.

  She said, ‘There must be a mistake. Surely they aren’t entitled to destroy a house like this…Have you seen it? It’s a good house. A good place…’

  ‘I think they mean to put up flats.’

  ‘Naturally! What else?’

  The two young women laughed, their eyes meeting.

  ‘Wait,’ said Mary Williams, and went off to confer, in her hand the sheet containing the vital statistics of the house. She stood by the desk of a man at the end of the room, and came back to say, ‘There have been a lot of complaints about the state of the houses. The police, for one.’

  ‘Yes, it’s a disgusting mess,’ agreed Alice. ‘But it’ll be cleare
d up in no time.’

  Here Mary nodded, Proceed! and sat doodling, while Alice talked.

  And talked. About the house. Its size, its solidity, its situation. Said that, apart from a few slates, it was structurally sound. Said it needed very little to make it liveable. She talked about the Birmingham squat and the agreed tenancy there; about Manchester, where a slum scheduled for demolition had been reprieved, and became an officially recognized student residence.

  ‘I’m not saying it couldn’t happen,’ said Mary.

  She sat thinking, her biro at work on a structure of cells, like a honeycomb. Yes, Alice knew, Mary was all right, she was on their side. Although Mary was not her style, with her dark little skirt and crisp little blouse, with her bra outlining the modest breast where the whale cavorted, tail in the sky, black on blue sea. All the same, Mary’s soft masses of dark hair that went into curls on her forehead, and her plump white hands, made Alice feel warm and secure. She knew that if Mary had anything to with it, things would go well.

  ‘Wait a minute,’ Mary said; and again went to confer with her colleague. This man now gave Alice a long inspection, and Alice sat confidently, to be looked at. She knew how she seemed: the pretty daughter of her mother, short curly fair hair nicely brushed, pink and white face lightly freckled, open blue-grey gaze. A middle-class girl with her assurance, her knowledge of the ropes, sat properly in the chair, and if she wore a heavy blue military jacket, under it was a flowered pink and white blouse.

  Mary Williams came back and said, ‘The houses are coming up for a decision on Wednesday.’

  ‘The police gave us four days to clear out.’

  ‘Well, I don’t see what we can do.’

  ‘All we need is a statement, in writing, that the case is being considered, to show the police, that’s all.’

  Mary Williams did not say anything. From her posture, and her eyes – that did not look at Alice – it was suddenly clear that she was after all, very young, and probably afraid for her job.

  There was some sort of conflict there, Alice could see: this was more than just an official who sometimes did not like the work she had to do. Something personal was boiling away in Mary Williams, giving her a stubborn, angry little look. And this again brought her to her feet and took her for the third time to the official whose job it was to say yes and no.