Alice Hartley‘s Happiness. Philippa Gregory

      Alice had turned her back on him. She was switching on the kettle and fetching a clean cup and saucer from the Welsh dresser.

      ‘She has a negative Life Force,’ she said quietly. ‘She needs help to be At One with her destiny – her move to another plane.’

      The kettle boiled. Alice picked up the tea caddy and spooned tea into the pot. She added boiling water. She put the teapot on the tray with the milk jug and the sugar bowl. Then she took a slim dark bottle and measured four precise drops of a clear odourless liquid into the teapot.

      ‘I’m giving her a nice herbal tea,’ she said.

      Michael leaped to his feet but became entangled with the table leg. By the time he was free of the furniture Alice was carrying the tray upstairs, her face Madonna-like in its serenity.

      ‘Please don’t, Mrs Hartley!’ he cried. ‘Please don’t give her a herbal tea, Mrs Hartley. It’s much better not! Please not a herbal tea, Mrs Hartley!’

      Aunty Sarah was sitting up in bed scowling at a handsome gold hunter watch when Alice and Michael tumbled into the room, Alice holding the tray and looking determined, Michael with a frightened grip on one of her trailing shawls.

      ‘Thought I’d told you to get lost,’ the old lady said acerbically. ‘What’s that?’ she demanded, pointing to the tray. ‘And where’s Daisy?’

      ‘Daisy’s not here today,’ Alice said in a confident tone. She put down the tray on the bedside table and nodded pleasantly at Aunty Sarah. ‘I’m a friend of Michael’s,’ she said. ‘Your doctor sent a message to say you weren’t well so we both came over to see you. I shall look after you until Daisy arrives.’

      ‘Oh,’ the old lady said, unconvinced. She shot a look at Alice’s flowing kaftan and the scarves with the glittery coins. ‘Not one of them Harry Krishners, are you?’

      ‘No,’ Alice said levelly. She reached over and poured the tea into the cup. ‘Milk? Sugar?’

      ‘No sugar,’ the old lady said, irritated at the suggestion. ‘Not one of the Mormons? Seventh Day Adventists? Quakers? Anarchists? Socialists?’

      ‘I have no god but the Great Earth Mother,’ Alice said calmly. ‘Drink your tea, Aunty Sarah.’

      ‘Miss Coulter to you,’ she replied instantly and with malice. She dipped her puckered old face towards the teacup. Michael held his breath, about to cry out, about to dash the cup from her hand.

      She paused. ‘Not from the Welfare?’ she asked sharply. ‘Housing? Social Services? Not one of those little-Miss-Nosey-Parker-social-workers come to see if I’m dying in my bed, are you?’

      ‘No,’ Alice said steadily. ‘Just a friend of Michael’s from the university.’

      ‘Don’t drink the tea,’ Michael said in a whisper too soft to be heard by anyone but his own quivering ears and feeble conscience.

      Aunty Sarah puckered up her dry pale lips, readying herself to drink. ‘Not a neighbourhood watch scheme?’ she said with sudden suspicion. ‘Not come to befriend me? Not Friends of the Aged? Not want to understand me?’

      ‘No,’ Alice said, her voice no less patient.

      ‘Senile Dementia Support Group!’ Aunty Sarah screeched. She pointed a quivering bony finger accusingly. ‘You’ve come to talk through my confusions with me!’

      ‘Not at all,’ Alice said. She gleamed at the old lady. ‘I’ve come to poison you with herbal tea so that Michael can inherit this house and he and I can live here forever.’

      ‘Noommmiiimmmmpppp!’ Michael moaned.

      Aunty Sarah cackled like an old witch. ‘That’s good!’ she said delightedly. ‘I love a good joke. I like you!’ She took a deep swig of tea. ‘I like you, Heidi! You’ve got spirit!’ She gulped swiftly.

      ‘DON’T DRINK THE TEA!’ Michael said clearly. He stepped into the centre of the room, from behind Alice’s cascade of skirts. He snatched the cup from Aunty Sarah’s hands with all the power of a young man who has found the deep secret source of potency inside himself. Michael had read D. H. Lawrence and he recognized the feeling welling up inside him. He was as male and as powerful as a bull in a meadow. He was strong like the dark primeval soil. He was thrusting like an oak tree reaching towards light. He was free of the pathetic chains of bourgeois society, his face glowed, he breathed deeply into his pouter-pigeon chest. He was a man who has faced a very great temptation and managed to spurn it. Hearing Alice speak of murder and hearing poor old Aunty Sarah laugh so trustingly had broken Michael’s reserve. His innocence had gone. In its place was strength.