‘What’s the point of that? I know you and my mother discuss me all the time. You’re worried about me.’ Again he was calmly but triumphantly malicious. Anna had never associated malice or spite with Tommy; and she felt as if there were a stranger in her room. He even looked strange, for his blunt dark obstinate face was twisted into a mask of smiling spite: he was looking upwards at her from slitted spiteful eyes and smiling.

‘What did your father want?’

‘He said that one of the firms his firm controls is building a dam in Ghana. He said would I like to go out and take a job looking after the Africans — welfare work.’

‘You said no?’

‘I said I didn’t see the point — I mean, the point of them is being cheap labour for him. So even if I did make them a bit healthier and feed them better and that kind of thing, or even get schools for the children, it wouldn’t be the point at all. So he said another of his company’s companies is doing some engineering job in North Canada, and he offered me a welfare job there.’

He waited, looking at Anna. The malicious stranger had vanished from the room; Tommy was himself, frowning, thoughtful, puzzled. He said unexpectedly: ‘You know, he’s not stupid at all.’

‘I don’t think we’ve said he is.’

Tommy smiled patiently, saying: You’re dishonest. He said aloud: ‘When I said I didn’t want those jobs he asked why, and I told him, and he said, I reacted like that because of the influence of the Communist Party.’

Anna laughed: I told you so; and said: ‘He means, your mother and me.’

Tommy waited for her to have finished saying what he had expected her to say, and said: ‘There you are. That’s not what he meant. No wonder you all think each other are stupid; you expect each other to be. When I see my father and my mother together, I don’t recognize them, they’re so stupid. And you too, when you are with Richard.’

‘Well what did he mean, then?’

‘He said that what I replied to his offers summed up the real influence of the Communist Parties on the West. He said that anyone who has been, or is, in the CP, or who has had anything to do with it is a megalomaniac. He said that if he was Chief of Police trying to root out communists somewhere, he’d ask one question: Would you go to an undeveloped country and run a country clinic for fifty people? All the Reds would answer: “No, because what’s the point of improving the health of fifty people when the basic organization of society is unchanged.” He leaned forward, confronting her, and insisted: ‘Well, Anna?’ She smiled and nodded: All right; but it was not enough. She said: ‘No, that’s not stupid at all.’