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Monday night

March 22, 1915

To J. M. Murry

I AM sitting writing to you by the light of a candil, with the whole house so quiet and closed and all the people in the cellars. The trumpets sounded about an hour ago. All the lights are out, except one on the bridge, very far, and one by the police station at the corner. I have been standing at the open window. Searchlights sweep the sky; they are very lovely, lighting up one by one the white clouds. Now and then some one passes, or a cart all dark gallops by. When the alarm sounded, the sirens and fire-whistles and motors all answered. I was in the street and in a moment or two it was almost pitch dark—just here and there a flicker as someone lighted a cigarette. When I arrived at the Quai aux Fleurs and saw all the people grouped in the doorways, and when people called out, “N'allez pas comme ça dans la rue!” I was really rather thrilled. The concierge, all the house, and an obscure little old man who is always on the scene on every occasion, asked me if I would ‘descendre’ but I hated the idea and I came up—of course all the gas was turned off—and hung out of the window. It was extremely terrifying suddenly; in fact (prosaic !) I was nearly sick! But after that the wonderful things happening, and especially a conversation between a man at a fifth floor window and a thin man on the Quai got me over my mal d'estomac. Those two men talking—their voices in the dark and the things they said—are unforgettable. Also a fool who came along the Quai whistling, his hands in his pockets, and as big drops of rain fell shouted with a laugh “Mais ils seront mouillés—ces canailles d'oiseaux!” The rain—the dark—the silence—the voices of the two men—the beauty of the river and the houses that seemed to be floating on the water … Ah, Jack!

As I wrote that more bugles sounded. Again I ran into the bedroom with the lamp and again opened the window. A big motor passed, a man in front blowing a trumpet. You heard from far and near the voices raised. “C'est fini?” “Fini, alors?” The few people in the street ran blindly after the motor and then stopped.

I went on the landing with my big rusty key to put on the gas again, because it's cold and I wanted a fire. The little man came up the stairs, and of course, I couldn't find the letter or the number, and of course he knew all about it. “Attendez, attendez! Voulez-vous aller voir si le gaz prend?” He was a far greater fool than I. But I mercied him bien and managed it myself.

These raids after all are not funny. They are extremely terrifying, and one feels such a horror of the whole idea of the thing. It seems so cruel and senseless. And then to glide out into the sky like that and hurl a bomb n'importe oú is diabolic and doesn't bear thinking about. (There go the trumpets again and the sirens and the whistles. Another scare! All over, again.) At B.'s this afternoon there arrived “du monde” including a very lovely young woman, married, and curious, blonde …(Oh God, it's all off again! I opened the shutters; the motors flew by sounding the alarm.) I can't talk about the tea-party to-night. At any rate, it isn't worth it really. It ended in a great row. I enjoyed it in a way, but B. was very impossible; she must have drunk nearly a bottle of brandy, and when at 9 o'clock I left and refused either to stay any longer or to spend the night here, she flared up in a fury and we parted for life again. It seems such utter rubbish in the face of all this—now. A very decent and pleasant man saw me home, happily. Otherwise I think I might have been sitting in a Y.M.C.A. until this moment; it was so very dark—but a lovely evening, very soft, with rain falling. B. makes me sad to-night. I didn't touch anything but soda-water, and so I really realised how the other people played on her drunkenness, and she was so … half-charming, and such an utter fool.

It is raining fast now, on the shutters, a sound I love to hear. England feels so far away at this moment—oh, very far….