For Love Alone by Christina Stead Page A

middle of it, Teresa saw the small figure of Mrs Percy trundling up and turning into the side gate.
    â€œShe came back.”
    â€œI’m glad of that. Nights of moon she worries, because lunatics get lively then and she thinks he will escape. She has probably been now to look down the street.”
    â€œDoes she want to see him?”
    â€œIt’s hard to say, but she is afraid for her daughter, though personally, I think, she frets without cause. Rose is quite normal, just a bit flighty. I should say Rose is a clever girl. You would notice nothing and I know you’re observant, as I am myself.”
    The back door slammed. “She always slams it so,” said Bea.
    Another door creaked. “That is the kitchen door, I know its song,” Bea remarked. “Oh, I tore that hangnail! Why doesn’t it shut? She must have wedged it, to make a draught I suppose. No wonder. Yes, there, she switched the lights on. What is she opening and shutting the drawers for? Did you girls wash up? No? What a pity! We are supposed to do it, but I forgot time was passing. Well, no use crying over spilt milk. I’ll put on my slippers and run out and do them. There, she’s closed the door again. Now I’ll run out. You go and get things ready, Terry dear, while Nana gets her slippers on. Put a towel round your pretty dress.”
    Terry went out and on her way down the short hall, looked into the bathroom, where the door was ajar and the light on. She heard a scuttling sound there. For a fleet second she saw nothing, then perceived that Anne had got on to the floor and was after something, stretching after something with her hands out cramped, but her head was sideways, resting on one ear on the tessellated floor. A fat tear dripped out of her closed eyelid. The steady bright light shone on her fair tendrilly hair and flushed plump face. Teresa went in and shut the door behind her. She whispered: “Anne!”
    â€œGo away,” said Anne.
    â€œAnne?”
    â€œGo away, go away,” said Anne, in a sob.
    Teresa stood looking at her, and as she did so, the girl’s body began to writhe, a powerful slow rhythm beginning with the pelvis and twisting the shoulders and the head; the body moved strongly and the head was tossed up and sideways alternately. Anne brought her head down and beat it on the floor. Teresa bent down and grasped her cousin’s left arm near the shoulder. Anne slowly brought her face close to the hand and bit it. “Let me go, go away and leave me.” She took her little teeth away. Teresa rose, looked at her forefinger, wiped it on her dress, and moved out of the bathroom, closing the door after her. She went into the kitchen and began scraping the plates. The door to the laundry opened and Mrs Percy entered with a disordered expression, her large eyes wide open and anxious. She came close up to Teresa and brusquely drew a small black book out of a fold of her skirt. It was the bible of a mumbo-jumbo religion widespread among women in small houses, but Teresa had never heard of it.
    â€œIf you read this,” said the woman earnestly, “you will be happier, you will find life worth living, you will not be so restless.”
    â€œI am not restless,” said Teresa, wiping her hands on the towel pinned round her waist and looking the woman full in the face.
    â€œDon’t leave home,” said Mrs Percy in an intimate tone. “Be careful of what you do, don’t leave home. I did. It is a great mistake.”
    â€œAll right,” the girl said, and politely opened the book and looked over a few pages.
    â€œRead it at home,” said the woman. “And now I will leave you. If I had known you were going to do it, I should not have left my plate and cup, but of course, I thought Mrs Broderick would do it. That is part of our covenant, you know.” She seemed cross.
    â€œYes, yes, I know.”
    â€œYes, otherwise—” the woman