What does it mean then, what can it all mean?
Lily Briscoe asked herself, wondering whether,
since she had been left alone, it behoved her to go to the kitchen to fetch another cup of coffee or
wait here. What does it mean?-a catchword
that was, caught up from some book, fitting her thought loosely, for she could not, this first morning with the Ramsays, contract her feelings,
could only make a phrase resound to cover the
blankness of her mind until these vapours had shrunk. For really, what did she feel, come back after all these years and Mrs. Ramsay dead ?
Nothing, nothing-nothing that she could ex- press at all .
She had come late last night when it was all
mysterious, dark. Now she was awake, at her old
place at the breakfast table, but alone. It was
very early too, not yet eight. There was this
expedition-they were going to the Lighthouse,
Mr. Ramsay, Cam, and James. They should have gone already-they had to catch the tide or something. And Cam was not ready and James
was not ready and Nancy had forgotten to order the sandwiches and Mr. Ramsay had lost his
temper andbanged out of the room
.
What's
the
use
of
going
now?"
he
had stormed. Nancyhad vanished. There hewas, marching up and down the terrace in a rage. One seemed toheardoorsslammingandvoicescalling all over the house. Now Nancy burst in, and asked, looking round the room, in a queer half dazed, half desperate way, the Lighthouse? " as if she were forcing her- selfto do what she despaired ofever being able to do. " What does one send to
What does one send to the Lighthouse
so extraindeed! Atanyother time Lily could have sug- gested reasonablytea, tobacco, newspapers. But this morning everything seemed ordinarily queer that a question like Nancy's- Whatdoes one send to the Lighthouse?-opened doors in one's mind that went banging and swingingto and fro and made one keep asking, in a stupefiedgape, What does one send? What does one do? Why is one sitting here after
all?
Sitting alone
(for Nancy went out again) cut off from other people, and able only to go
on watching, asking, wondering. The house, the
place, the morning, all seemed strangers to her.
She had no attachment here, she felt, no relations
with it, anything might happen, and whatever did
happen, a step outside, a voice calling (" It's not
in the cupboard; it's on the landing," some one
cried), was a question, as if the link that usually
bound things together had been cut, and they
floated up here, down there, off, anyhow. How
aimless it was, how chaotic, how unreal it
was, she thought, looking at her empty coffee
cup. Mrs. Ramsay dead; Andrew killed ; Prue
dead too-repeat it as she might, it roused no
feeling in her. And we all get together in a
house like this on a morning like this, she
said, looking out of the window-it was a
beautiful still day.
Suddenly Mr. Ramsay raised his head as he
passed and looked straight at her, with his
distraught wild gaze which was yet so penetrating,
as if he saw you, for one second, for the first time,
for ever; and she pretended to drink out of her empty coffee cup so as to escape him to escape his demand on her, to put aside a moment longer that imperious need. And he shook his head at
her, and strode on (" Alone " she heard him say, " Perished " she heard him say) and like every227
TO THE LIGHTHOUSE
thing else this strange morning the words became symbols, wrote themselves all over the grey-green walls. If only she could put them together, she felt, write them out in some sentence,
then she would have got at the truth of things.
Old Mr. Carmichael came padding softly in, fetched his coffee, took his cup and made off to sit in the sun. frightening; but it was also exciting. Going to theLighthouse. But what does one send to the Lighthouse? Perished. Alone. Thegrey-green light on the wall opposite. The empty places.
Such were some ofthe parts, but howbring them together? she asked. As if any interruption would break the frail shape she was building the table she turned her back to the window lest Mr. Ramsay should see her. She must escape somehow, be alone somewhere. Suddenly she remembered. When she had sat there last ten years ago there had been a little sprig or leaf pattern on the table-cloth, which she had looked
at in a moment of revelation. problem about a foreground of a picture. Move the tree to the middle, she had said. She had neverfinished that picture. Ithad been knocking
about in her mind all these years. She would paint that picture now. Where were her paints,
she wondered? Her paints, yes.