Vanessa and Her Sister (35 page)

PART FOUR

V
ANESSA IN
P
AINT AND
I
NK

· ·

1910–1911

“If you came, as I think I have mentioned, you could marry Virginia, which would settle every difficulty in the best possible way. Do try it.”

(
LYTTON STRACHEY TO LEONARD WOOLF, 27 MAY 1909
)

A MEETING ON A TRAIN

Sunday 9 January 1910—46 Gordon Square (two am)

“I
t was splendid! He has the most magnificent mind,” Clive said, leaping up to refill Adrian’s glass.

We were in the chilly drawing room at Gordon Square, discussing our encounter with the art critic Roger Fry. We met him this morning on the 9.15 train from Cambridge. I recognised him standing near us on the platform. He remembered me and greeted me warmly and knew of Clive from his recent article for the
Athenaeum
. He and Clive struck up an animated discussion about modern French art. I stayed largely quiet and marvelled at the way Mr Fry listened. It was an active, thoughtful listening rather than the passive pause while one waits his turn to speak that you see so often in great men.

“You know, he is really serious about this exhibition of modern French art,” Clive said, coming to sit by me. “French art has moved beyond Impressionism. It is not relevant any more. It is no longer
modern
.”

“Who is he looking to show?” Desmond asked. I had forgotten how sincerely he cares about paintings.

“Manet, Cézanne, Gauguin, and Van Gogh primarily, although he may include newer paintings by Matisse and Picasso,” Clive said. “I hope he does—they are genius. You liked the Matisse we saw in Paris, Nessa, didn’t you?”

I looked at Clive. He knew I had adored it. The bright palette, the thick paint, and the unexpected perspectives were astonishing. He was trying to include me. He had noticed my reserve and was drawing me out. “Yes, I thought they were revolutionary and beautiful,” I said simply.

“Didn’t you meet him at our house, Nessa?” Desmond asked.

“Mr Fry? Yes,” I said. “At your dinner party, years ago. Before he left for New York. He was with his wife.”

“Sad business,” Desmond said, reaching out to squeeze Molly’s hand.

“Is she at home now?” I asked.

“Helen Fry? I think since her relapse a few years ago, they have tried their best to keep her home, but she has had to return to the mental hospital for long stays several times,” Molly said. “The last time we saw him, she was to spend Christmas with the children, so she may be at their home in Hampstead now.”

“Darling, don’t you remember, the Frys have moved,” Desmond said. “Roger designed and built that huge Arts and Crafts house in Guildford—tall ceilings, heat under the floorboards, modern kitchen. I found it weirdly spare, but it grows on you. It is called Durbins. I am not sure if Mrs Fry has yet lived there or not.”

“Terrible thing to live with such uncertainty,” Clive said, looking at me.

“We should invite him to speak at a Friday Club meeting,” Molly said.

“I already have,” I answered quietly.

And
—It seems that Lytton’s sister Dorothy and her husband, the artist Simon Bussy, have been corresponding with Mr Fry for years. Lytton did not seem impressed with our new acquaintance, but Lytton has been out of sorts lately.

Saturday 5 February 1910—Peppard Cottage, Oxfordshire

The trouble with a Saturday-to-Monday country house party in February is that it will probably rain. Since we arrived this morning, there
has been a steady grey Oxfordshire drizzle—depressing. But the indoor amusements are not to be sneezed at. Ottoline chose her guests well. Lytton and his sister Marjorie are here, Irene Noel and Tudor Castle, who are not officially engaged yet, as well as Desmond and Molly. (Like us, they left their baby, Rachel, at home with her nanny.) Duncan, Maynard, and Adrian arrive tomorrow. Ottoline and Henry Lamb circle each other discreetly—I have noticed that Ottoline is much more circumspect when she entertains at home. We have spoken several times, and I find myself warming to her. Roger Fry has also come along, and he and Ottoline have been chattering about art and friends in common and country houses they both know and like. It gives a particular kind of pleasure to introduce people who then become friends.

And
—Virginia has borrowed the name Rachel for her heroine. Now she has to come up with a surname. She says she wants something lean, slicing, and elegant, like a paperknife.

5 February 1910

Kandy, Ceylon

Lytton
,

I have such news, my friend! I have just secured a long leave to return to England. Charlie-the-dog and I will be arriving in April or May of next year and will be home for several months. My mind flops like a fish with excitement. I would come sooner, but last year I embarked on an ambitious education project and have now made primary school mandatory in the town. We are opening a government school to accommodate all the children, and it should be in hand by this time next year. It is one of the few things I have done here that feels like true good. I will sail for England as soon as it is up and running.

Do you think your beautiful Miss Stephen will agree to meet me again? Will she remember me? Do you think she will still be unmarried and unengaged? So many questions about a woman I have hardly met—forgive me. Please do not tell her this, but she is beginning to haunt my thoughts daily. Thank you, Lytton, for that, no matter where it leads. It will be wonderful to see you, dear man.

Yrs
,   

Woolf

Sunday 6 February 1910—Peppard Cottage, Oxfordshire (still raining)

“Nessa?” Ottoline lightly rapped on the door to my room. “Are you awake?”

“Yes,” I called. I was taking advantage of one of the few luxuries accorded married ladies in formal households and was enjoying a breakfast tray in bed. Unmarried ladies like Irene have their breakfast in the dining room. “Come in!” I said, realising that she was waiting for my invitation.

“Clive went walking early with Roger and Desmond,” she said. “He asked me to tell you that he would be back before luncheon.” Ottoline began to drift about the room, like a great paper bird. Her dark red hair floated around her angular, strong-featured face in airy curls. She is not pretty but it is impossible to look away from her. She looked, in truth, worn out. Her heavily hooded eyes were circled with delicate lavender saucers, and her shoulders sagged with exhaustion. Her clothes stood out in defiance of her weariness. She wore a cinched poppy-red morning dress and a striking amber choker at her throat.

“Ottoline,” I began, not knowing quite what I wanted to say. “Are you having a good time?”

My question caught her off guard. She abruptly sat down on the bed,
jostling the breakfast tray. I was startled. Sitting together on the bed changed the tenor of the conversation. The room became charged, intimate. “Not really,” she said frankly. “I tend to worry so when I give a house party.”

“Worry?” I asked, although I well understand the rankling, trivial worries of a hostess.

“About silly things. The food, the weather, the guests, the conversation …” she trailed off.

“And of course, there is the intrigue,” I said.

“Yes,” she laughed, plucking at the counterpane. “There is always the intrigue.”

And then it all spilled out. Her difficulties with Henry: his unpredictable temper and her easily wounded heart, their tentative reunions, his flirtation with other women and her devotion to him, his dissolving marriage and her unexpectedly successful arrangement with Philip, his art and her artistry, his talent and her fine sense of beauty, and their jealousy. This is not her first affair.

“Nine?” I repeated, making sure I had heard correctly. “Nine affairs?”

“While I have been with Philip?” she asked. “Yes, Henry is the ninth.”

There was a profound dignity in the way she said it. This is not a sordid nor a loose woman, but a woman searching for a particular brand of love. Love mixed with art and ideas. Love sketched in paint and ink. Love to share unreservedly with another human. She was not ashamed of her quest, only disappointed in her failure. And why should she be ashamed? I thought, reproaching myself for my instinctive disapproval. She was not betraying Philip. They had come to an agreement. I was surprised. I had not expected such a brutally large number. We all talked of setting aside the constricting confines of traditional marriage and society in favour of genuine connection. We all talked about the paramount importance of personal relationships—but so far my steps have been small and my life tightly seamed with convention. Ottoline has quietly lived her life outside such structures.

“And you?” she asked, prompting my confession.

“None,” I said quietly. “Until recently, I have found so much happiness in my marriage. And now Clive has been … distracted,” I said, hedging past the truth.

Ottoline looked at me with disappointment. I had met her honesty with evasion.

“Clive has become lovers with a Mrs Raven Hill,” I said with clear candour. “And he has fallen in love with my sister.” I felt flushed with truth—purged clean of the shadowy secrets. But there was also a loss of control, of discretion; a diminishment. But why should I have control? Why should I be discreet? These are not
my
misdemeanours. I was stating what was true. I do not owe the world a happy marriage, a perfect family. That is not my job.

“And Virginia?” Ottoline asked with a pragmatic clarity.

“Virginia loves that he is mine. I do not think she loves him for himself.”

“Does it really matter,” Ottoline asked, “why she loves him? Why she wants him? She is your sister. He is your husband. It is wrong. Does it matter
why
?”

“No,” I answered her. “I don’t think it does.”

HOAXING AT SEA

10 February 1910—46 Gordon Square (late)

“Y
ou
what
?” I asked, trying to understand what he was saying.

“It was terrific, Nessa,” Adrian said, rocking on his heels. He was too excited to sit down. “Just wait—Duncan and Ginia will tell you. They will be here in a moment. They walk so
slowly
.”

Adrian is six feet and five inches. To him, everyone walks slowly.

“Nessa!” Virginia called from the hall.

“She’s in here!” Adrian shouted back.

“Nessa, you should have come!” Virginia said breathlessly, hurling herself onto the sofa. She looked manic, agitated. “It was amazing. No, only the first bit was amazing. After a while I think I started believing it, and the whole thing began to feel quite ordinary.”