here with no means of support.
VIRGINIA
I was chortling with pleasure at the nerve of this woman. I loved the fact that she could talk about money. So many women are incapable of doing so. Brazen, yes, but invigorating. All the same – did she think they’d been sending me cheques?
ANGELA
I blushed with shame. She was definitely laughing. I wanted her to think me intelligent. For one second I almost felt – hatred.
‘So you don’t have any money at all, Virginia?’ (Why should I pussyfoot around with the ‘Mrs’?) ‘That’s rather – inconvenient.’ I snickered, mirthlessly. Two could play at that game.
I poured myself another cup of tea, without looking to see if she needed a refill.
VIRGINIA
She had gone too far. She was a vulgar woman. But I could wipe the smile off her face. ‘I didn’t take any money with me – on my last day.’
ANGELA
I did feel bad.
‘Sorry, Virginia.’
VIRGINIA (
severely
)
‘Mrs Woolf!’
ANGELA (
taken by surprise
)
‘Sorry.’
No, it was absurd, I would not – kow-tow. ‘But you know, we are in the twenty-first century.’
VIRGINIA (
not understanding
)
‘Surely good manners are still important.’
ANGELA
‘Yes. My name is Angela. Just in case you want to use it.’
(
Pause
.)
‘Wait a minute … what’s that in your pocket?’ (
Disappointed
) ‘Oh I suppose it’s just a
stone
.’
VIRGINIA
‘There is nothing of interest to you in my pockets.’
ANGELA
I saw from her face she was
lying
to me!
Hauteur punctured by childish guilt, a smidgin of fear mixedwith laughter – she looked like Gerda aged one and a half, hiding her banana under the sofa. Which must explain what happened next. Looking back on it I can hardly believe it, but this is what happened. We had a fight!
‘There
is
.’ I reached for the bulges in her jacket, she tried to turn her back on me – we had a brief tussle.
I was tussling with Woolf
. I was stronger, of course – she had been dead for a while! – yet something had changed since she first arrived, when I had touched her hand and there was nothing there. Her body no longer felt liquid, boneless. She was panting a little. No, she was laughing.
There was a hard object in each pocket, straining the frayed tweed of her suit.
VIRGINIA
‘They’re books, that’s all. I like to keep them with me.’
(Oddly, the struggle made me giggle. I had not been touched for such a long time. I played with my brothers, long long ago. When I was a child, and things were easy, before Mother died and the house went dark.)
‘I mean, they are mine. I did write them. I even published them. I have a right.’
(Why was I justifying myself to
her
? She was becoming a parent figure. Poor Dr Freud would have something to say, in his flickering, subtle, shrunken way –
– How very late I came to love him. Like fathers, only after they die … I loved my father, but the noise, the groaning, the hurricane that shook the doors. Then, when he’d gone, I could think, in the silence, I could feel for him, I could dare to love him. After Freud died, I began to read him.)
ANGELA
‘My God.
To the Lighthouse
. What a glorious copy.’
I could hardly believe what I saw on the bed. As she pulled it out it had fallen open. I gazed at the print, the Hogarth typeface, the fresh, dense cream of the pages. And then I closed it, and it really sank in.
‘Virginia! It’s a first edition.’
There it was, Vanessa’s lovely design, the grey swirls of the waves below, the few plain strokes to denote the lighthouse, the black dots swarming in different densities to show the light blazing up in a fan. All around it, the lighthouse wall. ‘It’s worth a fortune. What’s the other one?’
VIRGINIA (
stays silent, lost in thought
)
ANGELA
‘Virginia! Show me the other one! I am excited! It’s incredible!’
VIRGINIA (
starting, and staring hard at the book before handing it over
)
‘Somehow my books came to find me.’
(
Angela opens some pages,
VIRGINIA
I was chortling with pleasure at the nerve of this woman. I loved the fact that she could talk about money. So many women are incapable of doing so. Brazen, yes, but invigorating. All the same – did she think they’d been sending me cheques?
ANGELA
I blushed with shame. She was definitely laughing. I wanted her to think me intelligent. For one second I almost felt – hatred.
‘So you don’t have any money at all, Virginia?’ (Why should I pussyfoot around with the ‘Mrs’?) ‘That’s rather – inconvenient.’ I snickered, mirthlessly. Two could play at that game.
I poured myself another cup of tea, without looking to see if she needed a refill.
VIRGINIA
She had gone too far. She was a vulgar woman. But I could wipe the smile off her face. ‘I didn’t take any money with me – on my last day.’
ANGELA
I did feel bad.
‘Sorry, Virginia.’
VIRGINIA (
severely
)
‘Mrs Woolf!’
ANGELA (
taken by surprise
)
‘Sorry.’
No, it was absurd, I would not – kow-tow. ‘But you know, we are in the twenty-first century.’
VIRGINIA (
not understanding
)
‘Surely good manners are still important.’
ANGELA
‘Yes. My name is Angela. Just in case you want to use it.’
(
Pause
.)
‘Wait a minute … what’s that in your pocket?’ (
Disappointed
) ‘Oh I suppose it’s just a
stone
.’
VIRGINIA
‘There is nothing of interest to you in my pockets.’
ANGELA
I saw from her face she was
lying
to me!
Hauteur punctured by childish guilt, a smidgin of fear mixedwith laughter – she looked like Gerda aged one and a half, hiding her banana under the sofa. Which must explain what happened next. Looking back on it I can hardly believe it, but this is what happened. We had a fight!
‘There
is
.’ I reached for the bulges in her jacket, she tried to turn her back on me – we had a brief tussle.
I was tussling with Woolf
. I was stronger, of course – she had been dead for a while! – yet something had changed since she first arrived, when I had touched her hand and there was nothing there. Her body no longer felt liquid, boneless. She was panting a little. No, she was laughing.
There was a hard object in each pocket, straining the frayed tweed of her suit.
VIRGINIA
‘They’re books, that’s all. I like to keep them with me.’
(Oddly, the struggle made me giggle. I had not been touched for such a long time. I played with my brothers, long long ago. When I was a child, and things were easy, before Mother died and the house went dark.)
‘I mean, they are mine. I did write them. I even published them. I have a right.’
(Why was I justifying myself to
her
? She was becoming a parent figure. Poor Dr Freud would have something to say, in his flickering, subtle, shrunken way –
– How very late I came to love him. Like fathers, only after they die … I loved my father, but the noise, the groaning, the hurricane that shook the doors. Then, when he’d gone, I could think, in the silence, I could feel for him, I could dare to love him. After Freud died, I began to read him.)
ANGELA
‘My God.
To the Lighthouse
. What a glorious copy.’
I could hardly believe what I saw on the bed. As she pulled it out it had fallen open. I gazed at the print, the Hogarth typeface, the fresh, dense cream of the pages. And then I closed it, and it really sank in.
‘Virginia! It’s a first edition.’
There it was, Vanessa’s lovely design, the grey swirls of the waves below, the few plain strokes to denote the lighthouse, the black dots swarming in different densities to show the light blazing up in a fan. All around it, the lighthouse wall. ‘It’s worth a fortune. What’s the other one?’
VIRGINIA (
stays silent, lost in thought
)
ANGELA
‘Virginia! Show me the other one! I am excited! It’s incredible!’
VIRGINIA (
starting, and staring hard at the book before handing it over
)
‘Somehow my books came to find me.’
(
Angela opens some pages,
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