Night and Day by Virginia Woolf (websites to read books for free .TXT) đ
- Author: Virginia Woolf
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âSalfordâs affiliated,â he said.
âWell done, Salford!â Mrs. Seal exclaimed enthusiastically, thumping
the teapot which she held upon the table, in token of applause.
âYes, these provincial centers seem to be coming into line at last,â
said Mr. Clacton, and then Mary introduced him to Miss Hilbery, and he
asked her, in a very formal manner, if she were interested âin our
work.â
âAnd the proofs still not come?â said Mrs. Seal, putting both her
elbows on the table, and propping her chin on her hands, as Mary began
to pour out tea. âItâs too badâtoo bad. At this rate we shall miss
the country post. Which reminds me, Mr. Clacton, donât you think we
should circularize the provinces with Partridgeâs last speech? What?
Youâve not read it? Oh, itâs the best thing theyâve had in the House
this Session. Even the Prime Ministerââ
But Mary cut her short.
âWe donât allow shop at tea, Sally,â she said firmly. âWe fine her a
penny each time she forgets, and the fines go to buying a plum cake,â
she explained, seeking to draw Katharine into the community. She had
given up all hope of impressing her.
âIâm sorry, Iâm sorry,â Mrs. Seal apologized. âItâs my misfortune to
be an enthusiast,â she said, turning to Katharine. âMy fatherâs
daughter could hardly be anything else. I think Iâve been on as many
committees as most people. Waifs and Strays, Rescue Work, Church Work,
C. O. S.âlocal branchâbesides the usual civic duties which fall to
one as a householder. But Iâve given them all up for our work here,
and I donât regret it for a second,â she added. âThis is the root
question, I feel; until women have votesââ
âItâll be sixpence, at least, Sally,â said Mary, bringing her fist
down on the table. âAnd weâre all sick to death of women and their
votes.â
Mrs. Seal looked for a moment as though she could hardly believe her
ears, and made a deprecating âtut-tut-tutâ in her throat, looking
alternately at Katharine and Mary, and shaking her head as she did so.
Then she remarked, rather confidentially to Katharine, with a little
nod in Maryâs direction:
âSheâs doing more for the cause than any of us. Sheâs giving her youth
âfor, alas! when I was young there were domestic circumstancesââ she
sighed, and stopped short.
Mr. Clacton hastily reverted to the joke about luncheon, and explained
how Mrs. Seal fed on a bag of biscuits under the trees, whatever the
weather might be, rather, Katharine thought, as though Mrs. Seal were
a pet dog who had convenient tricks.
âYes, I took my little bag into the square,â said Mrs. Seal, with the
self-conscious guilt of a child owning some fault to its elders. âIt
was really very sustaining, and the bare boughs against the sky do one
so much GOOD. But I shall have to give up going into the square,â she
proceeded, wrinkling her forehead. âThe injustice of it! Why should I
have a beautiful square all to myself, when poor women who need rest
have nowhere at all to sit?â She looked fiercely at Katharine, giving
her short locks a little shake. âItâs dreadful what a tyrant one still
is, in spite of all oneâs efforts. One tries to lead a decent life,
but one canât. Of course, directly one thinks of it, one sees that ALL
squares should be open to EVERY ONE. Is there any society with that
object, Mr. Clacton? If not, there should be, surely.â
âA most excellent object,â said Mr. Clacton in his professional
manner. âAt the same time, one must deplore the ramification of
organizations, Mrs. Seal. So much excellent effort thrown away, not to
speak of pounds, shillings, and pence. Now how many organizations of a
philanthropic nature do you suppose there are in the City of London
itself, Miss Hilbery?â he added, screwing his mouth into a queer
little smile, as if to show that the question had its frivolous side.
Katharine smiled, too. Her unlikeness to the rest of them had, by this
time, penetrated to Mr. Clacton, who was not naturally observant, and
he was wondering who she was; this same unlikeness had subtly
stimulated Mrs. Seal to try and make a convert of her. Mary, too,
looked at her almost as if she begged her to make things easy. For
Katharine had shown no disposition to make things easy. She had
scarcely spoken, and her silence, though grave and even thoughtful,
seemed to Mary the silence of one who criticizes.
âWell, there are more in this house than Iâd any notion of,â she said.
âOn the ground floor you protect natives, on the next you emigrate
women and tell people to eat nutsââ
âWhy do you say that âweâ do these things?â Mary interposed, rather
sharply. âWeâre not responsible for all the cranks who choose to lodge
in the same house with us.â
Mr. Clacton cleared his throat and looked at each of the young ladies
in turn. He was a good deal struck by the appearance and manner of
Miss Hilbery, which seemed to him to place her among those cultivated
and luxurious people of whom he used to dream. Mary, on the other
hand, was more of his own sort, and a little too much inclined to
order him about. He picked up crumbs of dry biscuit and put them into
his mouth with incredible rapidity.
âYou donât belong to our society, then?â said Mrs. Seal.
âNo, Iâm afraid I donât,â said Katharine, with such ready candor that
Mrs. Seal was nonplussed, and stared at her with a puzzled expression,
as if she could not classify her among the varieties of human beings
known to her.
âBut surely â she began.
âMrs. Seal is an enthusiast in these matters,â said Mr. Clacton,
almost apologetically. âWe have to remind her sometimes that others
have a right to their views even if they differ from our own⊠.
âPunchâ has a very funny picture this week, about a Suffragist and an
agricultural laborer. Have you seen this weekâs âPunch,â Miss
Datchet?â
Mary laughed, and said âNo.â
Mr. Clacton then told them the substance of the joke, which, however,
depended a good deal for its success upon the expression which the
artist had put into the peopleâs faces. Mrs. Seal sat all the time
perfectly grave. Directly he had done speaking she burst out:
âBut surely, if you care about the welfare of your sex at all, you
must wish them to have the vote?â
âI never said I didnât wish them to have the vote,â Katharine
protested.
âThen why arenât you a member of our society?â Mrs. Seal demanded.
Katharine stirred her spoon round and round, stared into the swirl of
the tea, and remained silent. Mr. Clacton, meanwhile, framed a
question which, after a momentâs hesitation, he put to Katharine.
âAre you in any way related, I wonder, to the poet Alardyce? His
daughter, I believe, married a Mr. Hilbery.â
âYes; Iâm the poetâs granddaughter,â said Katharine, with a little
sigh, after a pause; and for a moment they were all silent.
âThe poetâs granddaughter!â Mrs. Seal repeated, half to herself, with
a shake of her head, as if that explained what was otherwise
inexplicable.
The light kindled in Mr. Clactonâs eye.
âAh, indeed. That interests me very much,â he said. âI owe a great
debt to your grandfather, Miss Hilbery. At one time I could have
repeated the greater part of him by heart. But one gets out of the way
of reading poetry, unfortunately. You donât remember him, I suppose?â
A sharp rap at the door made Katharineâs answer inaudible. Mrs. Seal
looked up with renewed hope in her eyes, and exclaiming:
âThe proofs at last!â ran to open the door. âOh, itâs only Mr.
Denham!â she cried, without any attempt to conceal her disappointment.
Ralph, Katharine supposed, was a frequent visitor, for the only person
he thought it necessary to greet was herself, and Mary at once
explained the strange fact of her being there by saying:
âKatharine has come to see how one runs an office.â
Ralph felt himself stiffen uncomfortably, as he said:
âI hope Mary hasnât persuaded you that she knows how to run an
office?â
âWhat, doesnât she?â said Katharine, looking from one to the other.
At these remarks Mrs. Seal began to exhibit signs of discomposure,
which displayed themselves by a tossing movement of her head, and, as
Ralph took a letter from his pocket, and placed his finger upon a
certain sentence, she forestalled him by exclaiming in confusion:
âNow, I know what youâre going to say, Mr. Denham! But it was the day
Kit Markham was here, and she upsets one soâwith her wonderful
vitality, always thinking of something new that we ought to be doing
and arenâtâand I was conscious at the time that my dates were mixed.
It had nothing to do with Mary at all, I assure you.â
âMy dear Sally, donât apologize,â said Mary, laughing. âMen are such
pedantsâthey donât know what things matter, and what things donât.â
âNow, Denham, speak up for our sex,â said Mr. Clacton in a jocular
manner, indeed, but like most insignificant men he was very quick to
resent being found fault with by a woman, in argument with whom he was
fond of calling himself âa mere man.â He wished, however, to enter
into a literary conservation with Miss Hilbery, and thus let the
matter drop.
âDoesnât it seem strange to you, Miss Hilbery,â he said, âthat the
French, with all their wealth of illustrious names, have no poet who
can compare with your grandfather? Let me see. Thereâs Chenier and
Hugo and Alfred de Mussetâwonderful men, but, at the same time,
thereâs a richness, a freshness about Alardyceââ
Here the telephone bell rang, and he had to absent himself with a
smile and a bow which signified that, although literature is
delightful, it is not work. Mrs. Seal rose at the same time, but
remained hovering over the table, delivering herself of a tirade
against party government. âFor if I were to tell you what I know of
back-stairs intrigue, and what can be done by the power of the purse,
you wouldnât credit me, Mr. Denham, you wouldnât, indeed. Which is why
I feel that the only work for my fatherâs daughterâfor he was one of
the pioneers, Mr. Denham, and on his tombstone I had that verse from
the Psalms put, about the sowers and the seed⊠. And what wouldnât
I give that he should be alive now, seeing what weâre going to seeââ
but reflecting that the glories of the future depended in part upon
the activity of her typewriter, she bobbed her head, and hurried back
to the seclusion of her little room, from which immediately issued
sounds of enthusiastic, but obviously erratic, composition.
Mary made it clear at once, by starting a fresh topic of general
interest, that though she saw the humor of her colleague, she did not
intend to have her laughed at.
âThe standard of morality seems to me frightfully low,â she observed
reflectively, pouring out a second cup of tea, âespecially among women
who arenât well educated. They donât see that small things matter, and
thatâs where the leakage begins, and then we find ourselves in
difficultiesâI very nearly lost my temper yesterday,â she went on,
looking at Ralph with a little smile, as though he knew what happened
when she lost her temper. âIt makes me very angry when people tell me
liesâdoesnât it make you angry?â she asked Katharine.
âBut considering that every
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