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Time Passes
Updated August 14, 1997d
Created August 14, 1997
Chapter 1
They all go to bed except for Mr. Carmichael.
Chapter 2
A down pouring of immense darkness begins and "little airs investigate the rooms" (126). Mr. Carmichael blows out his candle.
Chapter 3
The seasons change and we discover that Mrs. Ramsay has died (128).
Chapter 4
The "stray airs, advance guards" (128) begin to destroy the house. Part of Mrs. Ramsay’s shawl loosens and swings free from the skull. Mrs. McNab comes to air and dust the rooms.
Chapter 5
Mrs. McNab cleans the house.
Chapter 6
Spring arrives. Prue marries, but dies in the summer in childbirth. Another fold of the shawl loosens. Andrew dies in the war when a shell explodes. Mr. Carmichael has some of his poems published.
Chapter 7
Summer and winter come and go. In the Spring, the flowers are bright and beautiful with no one to look at them.
Chapter 8
Mrs. McNab takes some of the flowers home with her. She notices that the looking glass "had stood all these years without a soul in it" (135). The books and things have become mouldy. Moths have gotten to the clothes in the cupboard. The family has simply been sending money to her to clean. They never write or come. Mrs. McNab often thinks of Mrs. Ramsay. She has heard that the house will be sold. It is too much work for one person. She locks the house and leaves.
Chapter 9
The shawl is swinging to and fro. The house is deserted. The swallows are nesting in the drawing-room. Only the Lighthouse beam enters the house (138). Mrs. McNab receives a letter stating that the family may be coming for the summer (139), so she, Mrs. Bast, and Mrs. Bast’s son George begin to clean the house from top to bottom. Lily arrives in September.
Chapter 10
The Ramsay’s come back to the house with Lily, Mr. Carmichael, and Mrs. Beckwith.