Produced by Judy Boss
NIGHT AND DAY
By Virginia Woolf
TO VANESSA BELL BUT, LOOKING FOR A PHRASE, I FOUND NONE TO STAND BESIDE YOUR NAME
NIGHT AND DAY
CHAPTER I
It was a Sunday evening in October, and in common with many other youngladies of her class, Katharine Hilbery was pouring out tea. Perhaps afifth part of her mind was thus occupied, and the remaining parts leaptover the little barrier of day which interposed between Monday morningand this rather subdued moment, and played with the things one doesvoluntarily and normally in the daylight. But although she was silent,she was evidently mistress of a situation which was familiar enough toher, and inclined to let it take its way for the six hundredth time,perhaps, without bringing into play any of her unoccupied faculties. Asingle glance was enough to show that Mrs. Hilbery was so rich in thegifts which make tea-parties of elderly distinguished people successful,that she scarcely needed any help from her daughter, provided that thetiresome business of teacups and bread and butter was discharged forher.
Considering that the little party had been seated round the tea-tablefor less than twenty minutes, the animation observable on their faces,and the amount of sound they were producing collectively, were verycreditable to the hostess. It suddenly came into Katharine's mind thatif some one opened the door at this moment he would think that they wereenjoying themselves; he would think, "What an extremely nice houseto come into!" and instinctively she laughed, and said something toincrease the noise, for the credit of the house presumably, since sheherself had not been feeling exhilarated. At the very same moment,rather to her amusement, the door was flung open, and a young manentered the room. Katharine, as she shook hands with him, asked him,in her own mind, "Now, do you think we're enjoying ourselvesenormously?"... "Mr. Denham, mother," she said aloud, for she saw thather mother had forgotten his name.
That fact was perceptible to Mr. Denham also, and increased theawkwardness which inevitably attends the entrance of a stranger into aroom full of people much at their ease, and all launched upon sentences.At the same time, it seemed to Mr. Denham as if a thousand softly paddeddoors had closed between him and the street outside. A fine mist, theetherealized essence of the fog, hung visibly in the wide and ratherempty space of the drawing-room, all silver where the candles weregrouped on the tea-table, and ruddy again in the firelight. Withthe omnibuses and cabs still running in his head, and his body stilltingling with his quick walk along the streets and in and out of trafficand foot-passengers, this drawing-room seemed very remote and still;and the faces of the elderly people were mellowed, at some distance fromeach other, and had a bloom on them owing to the fact that the air inthe drawing-room was thickened by blue grains of mist. Mr. Denham hadcome in as Mr. Fortescue, the eminent novelist, reached the middle of avery long sentence. He kept this suspended while the newcomer sat down,and Mrs. Hilbery deftly joined the severed parts by leaning towards himand remarking:
"Now, what would you do if you were married to an engineer, and had tolive in Manchester, Mr. Denham?"
"Surely she could learn Persian," broke in a thin, elderly gentleman."Is there no retired schoolmaster or man of letters in Manchester withwhom she could read Persian?"
"A cousin of ours has married and gone to live in Manchester," Katharineexplained. Mr. Denham muttered something, which was indeed all thatwas required of him, and the novelist went on where he had left off.Privately, Mr. Denham cursed himself very sharply for having exchangedthe freedom of the street for this sophisticated drawing-room, where,among other disagreeables, he certainly would not appear at his best. Heglanced round him, and saw that, save for Katharine, they were all overforty, the only consolation being that Mr. Fortescue was a considerablecelebrity, so that to-morrow one might be glad to have met him.
"Have you ever been to Manchester?" he asked Katharine.
"Never," she replied.
"Why do you object to it, then?"
Katharine stirred her tea, and seemed to speculate, so Denham thought,upon the duty of filling somebody else's cup, but she was reallywondering how she was going to keep this strange young man in harmonywith the rest. She observed that he was compressing his teacup, so thatthere was danger lest the thin china might cave inwards. She could seethat he was nervous; one would expect a bony young man with his faceslightly reddened by the wind, and his hair not altogether smooth, tobe nervous in such a party. Further, he probably disliked this kind ofthing, and had come out of curiosity, or because her father had invitedhim--anyhow, he would not be easily combined with the rest.
"I should think there would be no one to talk to in Manchester," shereplied at random. Mr. Fortescue had been observing her for a moment ortwo, as novelists are inclined to observe, and at this remark he smiled,and made it the text for a little further speculation.
"In spite of a slight tendency to exaggeration, Katharine decidedlyhits the mark," he said, and lying back in his chair, with his opaquecontemplative eyes fixed on the ceiling, and the tips of his fingerspressed together, he depicted, first the horrors of the streets ofManchester, and then the bare, immense moors on the outskirts of thetown, and then the scrubby little house in which the girl would live,and then the professors and the miserable young students devoted to themore strenuous works of our younger dramatists, who would visit her,and how her appearance would change by degrees, and how she would fly toLondon, and how Katharine would have to lead her about, as one leads aneager dog on a chain, past rows of clamorous butchers' shops, poor dearcreature.
"Oh, Mr. Fortescue," exclaimed Mrs. Hilbery, as he finished, "I had justwritten to say how I envied her! I was thinking of the big gardens andthe dear old ladies in mittens, who read nothing but the "Spectator,"and snuff the candles. Have they ALL disappeared? I told her she wouldfind the nice things of London without the horrid streets that depressone so."
"There is the University," said the thin gentleman, who had previouslyinsisted upon the existence of people knowing Persian.
"I know there are moors there, because I read about them in a book theother day," said Katharine.
"I am grieved and amazed at the ignorance of my family," Mr. Hilberyremarked. He was an elderly man, with a pair of oval, hazel eyes whichwere rather bright for his time of life, and relieved the heaviness ofhis face. He played constantly with a little green stone attached to hiswatch-chain, thus displaying long and very sensitive fingers, and hada habit of moving his head hither and thither very quickly withoutaltering the position of his large and rather corpulent body, so that heseemed to be providing himself incessantly with food for amusement andreflection with the least possible expenditure of energy. One mightsuppose that he had passed the time of life when his ambitions werepersonal, or that he had gratified them as far as he was likely todo, and now employed his considerable acuteness rather to observe andreflect than to attain any result.
Katharine, so Denham decided, while Mr. Fortescue built up anotherrounded structure of words, had a likeness to each of her parents, butthese elements were rather oddly blended. She had the quick, impulsivemovements of her mother, the lips parting often to speak, and closingagain; and the dark oval eyes of her father brimming with light upona basis of sadness, or, since she was too young to have acquired asorrowful point of view, one might say that the basis was not sadness somuch as a spirit given to contemplation and self-control. Judging by herhair, her coloring, and the shape of her features, she was striking,if not actually beautiful. Decision and composure stamped her, acombination of qualities that produced a very marked character, and onethat was not calculated to put a young man, who scarcely knew her, athis ease. For the rest, she was tall; her dress was of some quiet color,w
ith old yellow-tinted lace for ornament, to which the spark of anancient jewel gave its one red gleam. Denham noticed that, althoughsilent, she kept sufficient control of the situation to answerimmediately her mother appealed to her for help, and yet it was obviousto him that she attended only with the surface skin of her mind. Itstruck him that her position at the tea-table, among all these elderlypeople, was not without its difficulties, and he checked his inclinationto find her, or her attitude, generally antipathetic to him. The talkhad passed over Manchester, after dealing with it very generously.
"Would it be the Battle of Trafalgar or the Spanish Armada, Katharine?"her mother demanded.
"Trafalgar, mother."
"Trafalgar, of course! How stupid of me! Another cup of tea, with a thinslice of lemon in it, and then, dear Mr. Fortescue, please explain myabsurd little puzzle. One can't help believing gentlemen with Romannoses, even if one meets them in omnibuses."
Mr. Hilbery here interposed so far as Denham was concerned, and talkeda great deal of sense about the solicitors' profession, and the changeswhich he had seen in his lifetime. Indeed, Denham properly fell to hislot, owing to the fact that an article by Denham upon some legal matter,published by Mr. Hilbery in his Review, had brought them acquainted. Butwhen a moment later Mrs. Sutton Bailey was announced, he turned to her,and Mr. Denham found himself sitting silent, rejecting possible thingsto say, beside Katharine, who was silent too. Being much about the sameage and both under thirty, they were prohibited from the use of a greatmany convenient phrases which launch conversation into smooth waters.They were further silenced by Katharine's rather malicious determinationnot to help this young man, in whose upright and resolute bearing shedetected something hostile to her surroundings, by any of the usualfeminine amenities. They therefore sat silent, Denham controlling hisdesire to say something abrupt and explosive, which should shock herinto life. But Mrs. Hilbery was immediately sensitive to any silencein the drawing-room, as of a dumb note in a sonorous scale, and leaningacross the table she observed, in the curiously tentative detachedmanner which always gave her phrases the likeness of butterfliesflaunting from one sunny spot to another, "D'you know, Mr. Denham, youremind me so much of dear Mr. Ruskin.... Is it his tie, Katharine, orhis hair, or the way he sits in his chair? Do tell me, Mr. Denham, areyou an admirer of Ruskin? Some one, the other day, said to me, 'Oh, no,we don't read Ruskin, Mrs. Hilbery.' What DO you read, I wonder?--foryou can't spend all your time going up in aeroplanes and burrowing intothe bowels of the earth."
She looked benevolently at Denham, who said nothing articulate, andthen at Katharine, who smiled but said nothing either, upon which Mrs.Hilbery seemed possessed by a brilliant idea, and exclaimed:
"I'm sure Mr. Denham would like to see our things, Katharine. I'm surehe's not like that dreadful young man, Mr. Ponting, who told me that heconsidered it our duty to live exclusively in the present. After all,what IS the present? Half of it's the past, and the better half, too, Ishould say," she added, turning to Mr. Fortescue.
Denham rose, half meaning to go, and thinking that he had seen all thatthere was to see, but Katharine rose at the same moment, and saying,"Perhaps you would like to see the pictures," led the way across thedrawing-room to a smaller room opening out of it.
The smaller room was something like a chapel in a cathedral, or agrotto in a cave, for the booming sound of the traffic in the distancesuggested the soft surge of waters, and the oval mirrors, with theirsilver surface, were like deep pools trembling beneath starlight. Butthe comparison to a religious temple of some kind was the more apt ofthe two, for the little room was crowded with relics.
As Katharine touched different spots, lights sprang here and there, andrevealed a square mass of red-and-gold books, and then a long skirtin blue-and-white paint lustrous behind glass, and then a mahoganywriting-table, with its orderly equipment, and, finally, a picture abovethe table, to which special illumination was accorded. When Katharinehad touched these last lights, she stood back, as much as to say,"There!" Denham found himself looked down upon by the eyes of the greatpoet, Richard Alardyce, and suffered a little shock which would have ledhim, had he been wearing a hat, to remove it. The eyes looked at him outof the mellow pinks and yellows of the paint with divine friendliness,which embraced him, and passed on to contemplate the entire world. Thepaint had so faded that very little but the beautiful large eyes wereleft, dark in the surrounding dimness.
Katharine waited as though for him to receive a full impression, andthen she said:
"This is his writing-table. He used this pen," and she lifted a quillpen and laid it down again. The writing-table was splashed with old ink,and the pen disheveled in service. There lay the gigantic gold-rimmedspectacles, ready to his hand, and beneath the table was a pair oflarge, worn slippers, one of which Katharine picked up, remarking:
"I think my grandfather must have been at least twice as large as anyone is nowadays. This," she went on, as if she knew what she had to sayby heart, "is the original manuscript of the 'Ode to Winter.' The earlypoems are far less corrected than the later. Would you like to look atit?"
While Mr. Denham examined the manuscript, she glanced up at hergrandfather, and, for the thousandth time, fell into a pleasant dreamystate in which she seemed to be the companion of those giant men, oftheir own lineage, at any rate, and the insignificant present moment wasput to shame. That magnificent ghostly head on the canvas, surely, neverbeheld all the trivialities of a Sunday afternoon, and it did not seemto matter what she and this young man said to each other, for they wereonly small people.
"This is a copy of the first edition of the poems," she continued,without considering the fact that Mr. Denham was still occupied with themanuscript, "which contains several poems that have not been reprinted,as well as corrections." She paused for a minute, and then went on, asif these spaces had all been calculated.
"That lady in blue is my great-grandmother, by Millington. Here is myuncle's walking-stick--he was Sir Richard Warburton, you know, and rodewith Havelock to the Relief of Lucknow. And then, let me see--oh, that'sthe original Alardyce, 1697, the founder of the family fortunes, withhis wife. Some one gave us this bowl the other day because it has theircrest and initials. We think it must have been given them to celebratetheir silver wedding-day."
Here she stopped for a moment, wondering why it was that Mr. Denham saidnothing. Her feeling that he was antagonistic to her, which had lapsedwhile she thought of her family possessions, returned so keenly thatshe stopped in the middle of her catalog and looked at him. Her mother,wishing to connect him reputably with the great dead, had compared himwith Mr. Ruskin; and the comparison was in Katharine's mind, and ledher to be more critical of the young man than was fair, for a young manpaying a call in a tail-coat is in a different element altogether froma head seized at its climax of expressiveness, gazing immutably frombehind a sheet of glass, which was all that remained to her of Mr.Ruskin. He had a singular face--a face built for swiftness and decisionrather than for massive contemplation the forehead broad, the nose longand formidable, the lips clean-shaven and at once dogged and sensitive,the cheeks lean, with a deeply running tide of red blood in them. Hiseyes, expressive now of the usual masculine impersonality and authority,might reveal more subtle emotions under favorable circumstances, forthey were large, and of a clear, brown color; they seemed unexpectedlyto hesitate and speculate; but Katharine only looked at him to wonderwhether his face would not have come nearer the standard of her deadheroes if it had been adorned with side-whiskers. In his spare buildand thin, though healthy, cheeks, she saw tokens of an angular and acridsoul. His voice, she noticed, had a slight vibrating or creaking soundin it, as he laid down the manuscript and said:
"You must be very proud of your family, Miss Hilbery."
"Yes, I am," Katharine answered, and she added, "Do you think there'sanything wrong in that?"
"Wrong? How should it be wrong? It must be a bore, though, showing yourthings to visitors," he added reflectively.
"Not if the visitors like them."
"Isn't it difficult to live up to your ancestors?" he proceeded.
"I dare say I shouldn't try to write poetry," Katharine replied.
"No. And that's what I should hate. I couldn't bear my grandfatherto cut me out. And, after all," Denham went on, glancing round himsatirically, as Katharine thought, "it's not your grandfather only.You're cut out all the way round. I suppose you come of one of the mostdistinguished families in England. There are the Warburtons and theMannings--and you're related to the Otways, aren't you? I read it all insome magazine," he added.
"The Otways are my cousins," Katharine replied.
"Well," said Denham, in a final tone of voice, as if his argument wereproved.
"Well," said Katharine, "I don't see that you've proved anything."
Denham smiled, in a peculiarly provoking way. He was amused andgratified to find that he had the power to annoy his oblivious,supercilious hostess, if he could not impress her; though he would havepreferred to impress her.
He sat silent, holding the precious little book of poems unopened inhis hands, and Katharine watched him, the melancholy or contemplativeexpression deepening in her eyes as her annoyance faded. She appeared tobe considering many things. She had forgotten her duties.
"Well," said Denham again, suddenly opening the little book of poems,as though he had said all that he meant to say or could, with propriety,say. He turned over the pages with great decision, as if he were judgingthe book in its entirety, the printing and paper and binding, as wellas the poetry, and then, having satisfied himself of its good or badquality, he placed it on the writing-table, and examined the malaccacane with the gold knob which had belonged to the soldier.
"But aren't you proud of your family?" Katharine demanded.
"No," said Denham. "We've never done anything to be proud of--unless youcount paying one's bills a matter for pride."
"That sounds rather dull," Katharine remarked.
"You would think us horribly dull," Denham agreed.
"Yes, I might find you dull, but I don't think I should find youridiculous," Katharine added, as if Denham had actually brought thatcharge against her family.
"No--because we're not in the least ridiculous. We're a respectablemiddle-class family, living at Highgate."
"We don't live at Highgate, but we're middle class too, I suppose."
Denham merely smiled, and replacing the malacca cane on the rack, hedrew a sword from its ornamental sheath.
"That belonged to Clive, so we say," said Katharine, taking up herduties as hostess again automatically.
"Is it a lie?" Denham inquired.
"It's a family tradition. I don't know that we can prove it."
"You see, we don't have traditions in our family," said Denham.
"You sound very dull," Katharine remarked, for the second time.
"Merely middle class," Denham replied.
"You pay your bills, and you speak the truth. I don't see why you shoulddespise us."
Mr. Denham carefully sheathed the sword which the Hilberys said belongedto Clive.
"I shouldn't like to be you; that's all I said," he replied, as if hewere saying what he thought as accurately as he could.
"No, but one never would like to be any one else."
"I should. I should like to be lots of other people."
"Then why not us?" Katharine asked.
Denham looked at her as she sat in her grandfather's arm-chair, drawingher great-uncle's malacca cane smoothly through her fingers, while herbackground was made up equally of lustrous blue-and-white paint, andcrimson books with gilt lines on them. The vitality and composure ofher attitude, as of a bright-plumed bird poised easily before furtherflights, roused him to show her the limitations of her lot. So soon, soeasily, would he be forgotten.
"You'll never know anything at first hand," he began, almost savagely."It's all been done for you. You'll never know the pleasure of buyingthings after saving up for them, or reading books for the first time, ormaking discoveries."
"Go on," Katharine observed, as he paused, suddenly doubtful, when heheard his voice proclaiming aloud these facts, whether there was anytruth in them.
"Of course, I don't know how you spend your time," he continued, alittle stiffly, "but I suppose you have to show people round. Youare writing a life of your grandfather, aren't you? And this kind ofthing"--he nodded towards the other room, where they could hear burstsof cultivated laughter--"must take up a lot of time."
She looked at him expectantly, as if between them they were decoratinga small figure of herself, and she saw him hesitating in the dispositionof some bow or sash.
"You've got it very nearly right," she said, "but I only help my mother.I don't write myself."
"Do you do anything yourself?" he demanded.
"What do you mean?" she asked. "I don't leave the house at ten and comeback at six."
"I don't mean that."
Mr. Denham had recovered his self-control; he spoke with a quietnesswhich made Katharine rather anxious that he should explain himself, butat the same time she wished to annoy him, to waft him away from her onsome light current of ridicule or satire, as she was wont to do withthese intermittent young men of her father's.
"Nobody ever does do anything worth doing nowadays," she remarked. "Yousee"--she tapped the volume of her grandfather's poems--"we don'teven print as well as they did, and as for poets or painters ornovelists--there are none; so, at any rate, I'm not singular."
"No, we haven't any great men," Denham replied. "I'm very glad that wehaven't. I hate great men. The worship of greatness in the nineteenthcentury seems to me to explain the worthlessness of that generation."
Katharine opened her lips and drew in her breath, as if to reply withequal vigor, when the shutting of a door in the next room withdrew herattention, and they both became conscious that the voices, which hadbeen rising and falling round the tea-table, had fallen silent; thelight, even, seemed to have sunk lower. A moment later Mrs. Hilberyappeared in the doorway of the ante-room. She stood looking at them witha smile of expectancy on her face, as if a scene from the drama ofthe younger generation were being played for her benefit. She was aremarkable-looking woman, well advanced in the sixties, but owing to thelightness of her frame and the brightness of her eyes she seemed to havebeen wafted over the surface of the years without taking much harmin the passage. Her face was shrunken and aquiline, but any hint ofsharpness was dispelled by the large blue eyes, at once sagacious andinnocent, which seemed to regard the world with an enormous desire thatit should behave itself nobly, and an entire confidence that it could doso, if it would only take the pains.
Certain lines on the broad forehead and about the lips might be taken tosuggest that she had known moments of some difficulty and perplexity inthe course of her career, but these had not destroyed her trustfulness,and she was clearly still prepared to give every one any number of freshchances and the whole system the benefit of the doubt. She wore a greatresemblance to her father, and suggested, as he did, the fresh airs andopen spaces of a younger world.
"Well," she said, "how do you like our things, Mr. Denham?"
Mr. Denham rose, put his book down, opened his mouth, but said nothing,as Katharine observed, with some amusement.
Mrs. Hilbery handled the book he had laid down.
"There are some books that LIVE," she mused. "They are young with us,and they grow old with us. Are you fond of poetry, Mr. Denham? But whatan absurd question to ask! The truth is, dear Mr. Fortescue has almosttired me out. He is so eloquent and so witty, so searching and soprofound that, after half an hour or so, I feel inclined to turn out allthe lights. But perhaps he'd be more wonderful than ever in the dark.What d'you think, Katharine? Shall we give a little party in completedarkness? There'd have to be bright rooms for the bores...."
Here Mr. Denham held out his hand.
"But we've any number of things to show you!" Mrs. Hilbery exclaimed,taking no notice of it.
"Books, pictures, china, manuscripts, and thevery chair that Mary Queen of Scots sat in when she heard of Darnley'smurder. I must lie down for a little, and Katharine must change herdress (though she's wearing a very pretty one), but if you don't mindbeing left alone, supper will be at eight. I dare say you'll write apoem of your own while you're waiting. Ah, how I love the firelight!Doesn't our room look charming?"
She stepped back and bade them contemplate the empty drawing-room, withits rich, irregular lights, as the flames leapt and wavered.
"Dear things!" she exclaimed. "Dear chairs and tables! How like oldfriends they are--faithful, silent friends. Which reminds me, Katharine,little Mr. Anning is coming to-night, and Tite Street, and CadoganSquare.... Do remember to get that drawing of your great-uncle glazed.Aunt Millicent remarked it last time she was here, and I know how itwould hurt me to see MY father in a broken glass."
It was like tearing through a maze of diamond-glittering spiders' websto say good-bye and escape, for at each movement Mrs. Hilbery rememberedsomething further about the villainies of picture-framers or thedelights of poetry, and at one time it seemed to the young man that hewould be hypnotized into doing what she pretended to want him to do,for he could not suppose that she attached any value whatever to hispresence. Katharine, however, made an opportunity for him to leave, andfor that he was grateful to her, as one young person is grateful for theunderstanding of another.