Chapter XXV

by Virginia Woolf

　　At a quarter-past three in the afternoon of the following SaturdayRalph Denham sat on the bank of the lake in Kew Gardens, dividing thedial-plate of his watch into sections with his forefinger. The justand inexorable nature of time itself was reflected in his face. Hemight have been composing a hymn to the unhasting and unresting marchof that divinity. He seemed to greet the lapse of minute after minutewith stern acquiescence in the inevitable order. His expression was sosevere, so serene, so immobile, that it seemed obvious that for him atleast there was a grandeur in the departing hour which no pettyirritation on his part was to mar, although the wasting time wastedalso high private hopes of his own.His face was no bad index to what went on within him. He was in acondition of mind rather too exalted for the trivialities of dailylife. He could not accept the fact that a lady was fifteen minuteslate in keeping her appointment without seeing in that accident thefrustration of his entire life. Looking at his watch, he seemed tolook deep into the springs of human existence, and by the light ofwhat he saw there altered his course towards the north and themidnight. . . . Yes, one's voyage must be made absolutely withoutcompanions through ice and black water--towards what goal? Here helaid his finger upon the half-hour, and decided that when theminute-hand reached that point he would go, at the same time answeringthe question put by another of the many voices of consciousness withthe reply that there was undoubtedly a goal, but that it would needthe most relentless energy to keep anywhere in its direction. Still,still, one goes on, the ticking seconds seemed to assure him, withdignity, with open eyes, with determination not to accept thesecond-rate, not to be tempted by the unworthy, not to yield, not tocompromise. Twenty-five minutes past three were now marked upon theface of the watch. The world, he assured himself, since KatharineHilbery was now half an hour behind her time, offers no happiness, norest from struggle, no certainty. In a scheme of things utterly badfrom the start the only unpardonable folly is that of hope. Raisinghis eyes for a moment from the face of his watch, he rested them uponthe opposite bank, reflectively and not without a certain wistfulness,as if the sternness of their gaze were still capable of mitigation.Soon a look of the deepest satisfaction filled them, though, for amoment, he did not move. He watched a lady who came rapidly, and yetwith a trace of hesitation, down the broad grass-walk towards him. Shedid not see him. Distance lent her figure an indescribable height, andromance seemed to surround her from the floating of a purple veilwhich the light air filled and curved from her shoulders."Here she comes, like a ship in full sail," he said to himself, halfremembering some line from a play or poem where the heroine bore downthus with feathers flying and airs saluting her. The greenery and thehigh presences of the trees surrounded her as if they stood forth ather coming. He rose, and she saw him; her little exclamation provedthat she was glad to find him, and then that she blamed herself forbeing late."Why did you never tell me? I didn't know there was this," sheremarked, alluding to the lake, the broad green space, the vista oftrees, with the ruffled gold of the Thames in the distance and theDucal castle standing in its meadows. She paid the rigid tail of theDucal lion the tribute of incredulous laughter."You've never been to Kew?" Denham remarked.But it appeared that she had come once as a small child, when thegeography of the place was entirely different, and the fauna includedcertainly flamingoes and, possibly, camels. They strolled on,refashioning these legendary gardens. She was, as he felt, glad merelyto stroll and loiter and let her fancy touch upon anything her eyesencountered--a bush, a park-keeper, a decorated goose--as if therelaxation soothed her. The warmth of the afternoon, the first ofspring, tempted them to sit upon a seat in a glade of beech-trees,with forest drives striking green paths this way and that around them.She sighed deeply."It's so peaceful," she said, as if in explanation of her sigh. Not asingle person was in sight, and the stir of the wind in the branches,that sound so seldom heard by Londoners, seemed to her as if waftedfrom fathomless oceans of sweet air in the distance.While she breathed and looked, Denham was engaged in uncovering withthe point of his stick a group of green spikes half smothered by thedead leaves. He did this with the peculiar touch of the botanist. Innaming the little green plant to her he used the Latin name, thusdisguising some flower familiar even to Chelsea, and making herexclaim, half in amusement, at his knowledge. Her own ignorance wasvast, she confessed. What did one call that tree opposite, forinstance, supposing one condescended to call it by its English name?Beech or elm or sycamore? It chanced, by the testimony of a dead leaf,to be oak; and a little attention to a diagram which Denham proceededto draw upon an envelope soon put Katharine in possession of some ofthe fundamental distinctions between our British trees. She then askedhim to inform her about flowers. To her they were variously shaped andcolored petals, poised, at different seasons of the year, upon verysimilar green stalks; but to him they were, in the first instance,bulbs or seeds, and later, living things endowed with sex, and pores,and susceptibilities which adapted themselves by all manner ofingenious devices to live and beget life, and could be fashioned squator tapering, flame-colored or pale, pure or spotted, by processeswhich might reveal the secrets of human existence. Denham spoke withincreasing ardor of a hobby which had long been his in secret. Nodiscourse could have worn a more welcome sound in Katharine's ears.For weeks she had heard nothing that made such pleasant music in hermind. It wakened echoes in all those remote fastnesses of her beingwhere loneliness had brooded so long undisturbed.She wished he would go on for ever talking of plants, and showing herhow science felt not quite blindly for the law that ruled theirendless variations. A law that might be inscrutable but was certainlyomnipotent appealed to her at the moment, because she could findnothing like it in possession of human lives. Circumstances had longforced her, as they force most women in the flower of youth, toconsider, painfully and minutely, all that part of life which isconspicuously without order; she had had to consider moods and wishes,degrees of liking or disliking, and their effect upon the destiny ofpeople dear to her; she had been forced to deny herself anycontemplation of that other part of life where thought constructs adestiny which is independent of human beings. As Denham spoke, shefollowed his words and considered their bearing with an easy vigorwhich spoke of a capacity long hoarded and unspent. The very trees andthe green merging into the blue distance became symbols of the vastexternal world which recks so little of the happiness, of themarriages or deaths of individuals. In order to give her examples ofwhat he was saying, Denham led the way, first to the Rock Garden, andthen to the Orchid House.For him there was safety in the direction which the talk had taken.His emphasis might come from feelings more personal than those scienceroused in him, but it was disguised, and naturally he found it easy toexpound and explain. Nevertheless, when he saw Katharine among theorchids, her beauty strangely emphasized by the fantastic plants,which seemed to peer and gape at her from striped hoods and fleshythroats, his ardor for botany waned, and a more complex feelingreplaced it. She fell silent. The orchids seemed to suggest absorbingreflections. In defiance of the rules she stretched her ungloved handand touched one. The sight of the rubies upon her finger affected himso disagreeably that he started and turned away. But next moment hecontrolled himself; he looked at her taking in one strange shape afteranother with the contemplative, considering gaze of a person who seesnot exactly what is before him, but gropes in regions that lie beyondit. The far-away look entirely lacked self-consciousness. Denhamdoubted whether she remembered his presence. He could recall himself,of course, by a word or a movement--but why? She was happier thus. Sheneeded nothing that he could give her. And for him, too, perhaps, itwas best to keep aloof, only to know that she existed, to preservewhat he already had--perfect, remote, and unbroken. Further, her stilllook, standing among the orchids in that hot atmosphere, strangelyillustrated some scene that he had imagined in his room at home. Thesight, mingling with his recollection, kept him silent when the doorwas shut and they were walking on again.But though she did not speak, Katharine had an uneasy sense thatsilence on her part was selfishness. It was selfish of her tocontinue, as she wished to do, a discussion of subjects not remotelyconnected with any human beings. She roused herself to consider theirexact position upon the turbulent map of the emotions. Oh yes--it wasa question whether Ralph Denham should live in the country and write abook; it was getting late; they must waste no more time; Cassandraarrived to-night for dinner; she flinched and roused herself, anddiscovered that she ought to be holding something in her hands. Butthey were empty. She held them out with an exclamation."I've left my bag somewhere--where?" The gardens had no points of thecompass, so far as she was concerned. She had been walking for themost part on grass--that was all she knew. Even the road to the OrchidHouse had now split itself into three. But there was no bag in theOrchid House. It must, therefore, have been left upon the seat. Theyretraced their steps in the preoccupied manner of people who have tothink about something that is lost. What did this bag look like? Whatdid it contain?"A purse--a ticket--some letters, papers," Katharine counted, becomingmore agitated as she recalled the list. Denham went on quickly inadvance of her, and she heard him shout that he had found it beforeshe reached the seat. In order to make sure that all was safe shespread the contents on her knee. It was a queer collection, Denhamthought, gazing with the deepest interest. Loose gold coins weretangled in a narrow strip of lace; there were letters which somehowsuggested the extreme of intimacy; there were two or three keys, andlists of commissions against which crosses were set at intervals. Butshe did not seem satisfied until she had made sure of a certain paperso folded that Denham could not judge what it contained. In her reliefand gratitude she began at once to say that she had been thinking overwhat Denham had told her of his plans.He cut her short. "Don't let's discuss that dreary business.""But I thought--""It's a dreary business. I ought never to have bothered you--""Have you decided, then?"He made an impatient sound. "It's not a thing that matters."She could only say rather flatly, "Oh!""I mean it matters to me, but it matters to no one else. Anyhow," hecontinued, more amiably, "I see no reason why you should be botheredwith other people's nuisances."She supposed that she had let him see too clearly her weariness ofthis side of life."I'm afraid I've been absent-minded," she began, remembering how oftenWilliam had brought this charge against her."You have a good deal to make you absent-minded," he replied."Yes," she replied, flushing. "No," she contradicted herself. "Nothingparticular, I mean. But I was thinking about plants. I was enjoyingmyself. In fact, I've seldom enjoyed an afternoon more. But I want tohear what you've settled, if you don't mind telling me.""Oh, it's all settled," he replied. "I'm going to this infernalcottage to write a worthless book.""How I envy you," she replied, with the utmost sincerity."Well, cottages are to be had for fifteen shillings a week.""Cottages are to be had--yes," she replied. "The question is--" Shechecked herself. "Two rooms are all I should want," she continued,with a curious sigh; "one for eating, one for sleeping. Oh, but Ishould like another, a large one at the top, and a little garden whereone could grow flowers. A path--so--down to a river, or up to a wood,and the sea not very far off, so that one could hear the waves atnight. Ships just vanishing on the horizon--" She broke off. "Shallyou be near the sea?""My notion of perfect happiness," he began, not replying to herquestion, "is to live as you've said.""Well, now you can. You will work, I suppose," she continued; "you'llwork all the morning and again after tea and perhaps at night. Youwon't have people always coming about you to interrupt.""How far can one live alone?" he asked. "Have you tried ever?""Once for three weeks," she replied. "My father and mother were inItaly, and something happened so that I couldn't join them. For threeweeks I lived entirely by myself, and the only person I spoke to was astranger in a shop where I lunched--a man with a beard. Then I wentback to my room by myself and--well, I did what I liked. It doesn'tmake me out an amiable character, I'm afraid," she added, "but I can'tendure living with other people. An occasional man with a beard isinteresting; he's detached; he lets me go my way, and we know we shallnever meet again. Therefore, we are perfectly sincere--a thing notpossible with one's friends.""Nonsense," Denham replied abruptly."Why 'nonsense'?" she inquired."Because you don't mean what you say," he expostulated."You're very positive," she said, laughing and looking at him. Howarbitrary, hot-tempered, and imperious he was! He had asked her tocome to Kew to advise him; he then told her that he had settled thequestion already; he then proceeded to find fault with her. He was thevery opposite of William Rodney, she thought; he was shabby, hisclothes were badly made, he was ill versed in the amenities of life;he was tongue-tied and awkward to the verge of obliterating his realcharacter. He was awkwardly silent; he was awkwardly emphatic. And yetshe liked him."I don't mean what I say," she repeated good-humoredly. "Well--?""I doubt whether you make absolute sincerity your standard in life,"he answered significantly.She flushed. He had penetrated at once to the weak spot--herengagement, and had reason for what he said. He was not altogetherjustified now, at any rate, she was glad to remember; but she couldnot enlighten him and must bear his insinuations, though from the lipsof a man who had behaved as he had behaved their force should not havebeen sharp. Nevertheless, what he said had its force, she mused;partly because he seemed unconscious of his own lapse in the case ofMary Datchet, and thus baffled her insight; partly because he alwaysspoke with force, for what reason she did not yet feel certain."Absolute sincerity is rather difficult, don't you think?" sheinquired, with a touch of irony."There are people one credits even with that," he replied a littlevaguely. He was ashamed of his savage wish to hurt her, and yet it wasnot for the sake of hurting her, who was beyond his shafts, but inorder to mortify his own incredibly reckless impulse of abandonment tothe spirit which seemed, at moments, about to rush him to theuttermost ends of the earth. She affected him beyond the scope of hiswildest dreams. He seemed to see that beneath the quiet surface of hermanner, which was almost pathetically at hand and within reach for allthe trivial demands of daily life, there was a spirit which shereserved or repressed for some reason either of loneliness or--couldit be possible--of love. Was it given to Rodney to see her unmasked,unrestrained, unconscious of her duties? a creature of uncalculatingpassion and instinctive freedom? No; he refused to believe it. It wasin her loneliness that Katharine was unreserved. "I went back to myroom by myself and I did--what I liked." She had said that to him, andin saying it had given him a glimpse of possibilities, even ofconfidences, as if he might be the one to share her loneliness, themere hint of which made his heart beat faster and his brain spin. Hechecked himself as brutally as he could. He saw her redden, and in theirony of her reply he heard her resentment.He began slipping his smooth, silver watch in his pocket, in the hopethat somehow he might help himself back to that calm and fatalisticmood which had been his when he looked at its face upon the bank ofthe lake, for that mood must, at whatever cost, be the mood of hisintercourse with Katharine. He had spoken of gratitude andacquiescence in the letter which he had never sent, and now all theforce of his character must make good those vows in her presence.She, thus challenged, tried meanwhile to define her points. She wishedto make Denham understand."Don't you see that if you have no relations with people it's easierto be honest with them?" she inquired. "That is what I meant. Oneneedn't cajole them; one's under no obligation to them. Surely youmust have found with your own family that it's impossible to discusswhat matters to you most because you're all herded together, becauseyou're in a conspiracy, because the position is false--" Her reasoningsuspended itself a little inconclusively, for the subject was complex,and she found herself in ignorance whether Denham had a family or not.Denham was agreed with her as to the destructiveness of the familysystem, but he did not wish to discuss the problem at that moment.He turned to a problem which was of greater interest to him."I'm convinced," he said, "that there are cases in which perfectsincerity is possible--cases where there's no relationship, though thepeople live together, if you like, where each is free, where there'sno obligation upon either side.""For a time perhaps," she agreed, a little despondently. "Butobligations always grow up. There are feelings to be considered.People aren't simple, and though they may mean to be reasonable, theyend"--in the condition in which she found herself, she meant, butadded lamely--"in a muddle.""Because," Denham instantly intervened, "they don't make themselvesunderstood at the beginning. I could undertake, at this instant," hecontinued, with a reasonable intonation which did much credit to hisself-control, "to lay down terms for a friendship which should beperfectly sincere and perfectly straightforward."She was curious to hear them, but, besides feeling that the topicconcealed dangers better known to her than to him, she was reminded byhis tone of his curious abstract declaration upon the Embankment.Anything that hinted at love for the moment alarmed her; it was asmuch an infliction to her as the rubbing of a skinless wound.But he went on, without waiting for her invitation."In the first place, such a friendship must be unemotional," he laidit down emphatically. "At least, on both sides it must be understoodthat if either chooses to fall in love, he or she does so entirely athis own risk. Neither is under any obligation to the other. They mustbe at liberty to break or to alter at any moment. They must be able tosay whatever they wish to say. All this must be understood.""And they gain something worth having?" she asked."It's a risk--of course it's a risk," he replied. The wordwas one that she had been using frequently in her arguments withherself of late."But it's the only way--if you think friendship worth having," heconcluded."Perhaps under those conditions it might be," she said reflectively."Well," he said, "those are the terms of the friendship I wish tooffer you." She had known that this was coming, but, none the less,felt a little shock, half of pleasure, half of reluctance, when sheheard the formal statement."I should like it," she began, "but--""Would Rodney mind?""Oh no," she replied quickly."No, no, it isn't that," she went on, and again came to an end. Shehad been touched by the unreserved and yet ceremonious way in which hehad made what he called his offer of terms, but if he was generous itwas the more necessary for her to be cautious. They would findthemselves in difficulties, she speculated; but, at this point, whichwas not very far, after all, upon the road of caution, her foresightdeserted her. She sought for some definite catastrophe into which theymust inevitably plunge. But she could think of none. It seemed to herthat these catastrophes were fictitious; life went on and on--life wasdifferent altogether from what people said. And not only was she at anend of her stock of caution, but it seemed suddenly altogethersuperfluous. Surely if any one could take care of himself, RalphDenham could; he had told her that he did not love her. And, further,she meditated, walking on beneath the beech-trees and swinging herumbrella, as in her thought she was accustomed to complete freedom,why should she perpetually apply so different a standard to herbehavior in practice? Why, she reflected, should there be thisperpetual disparity between the thought and the action, between thelife of solitude and the life of society, this astonishing precipiceon one side of which the soul was active and in broad daylight, on theother side of which it was contemplative and dark as night? Was it notpossible to step from one to the other, erect, and without essentialchange? Was this not the chance he offered her--the rare and wonderfulchance of friendship? At any rate, she told Denham, with a sigh inwhich he heard both impatience and relief, that she agreed; shethought him right; she would accept his terms of friendship."Now," she said, "let's go and have tea."In fact, these principles having been laid down, a great lightness ofspirit showed itself in both of them. They were both convinced thatsomething of profound importance had been settled, and could now givetheir attention to their tea and the Gardens. They wandered in and outof glass-houses, saw lilies swimming in tanks, breathed in the scentof thousands of carnations, and compared their respective tastes inthe matter of trees and lakes. While talking exclusively of what theysaw, so that any one might have overheard them, they felt that thecompact between them was made firmer and deeper by the number ofpeople who passed them and suspected nothing of the kind. The questionof Ralph's cottage and future was not mentioned again.