TO THE LIGHTHOUSEdrain-pipe looking up at her; but he felt it necessaryto assert himself.

He was really, Lily Briscoe thought, in spite ofhis eyes, but then look at his nose, look at his hands,the most uncharming human being she had ever met.Then why did she mind what he said? Women can’twrite, women can’t paint—what did that mattercoming from him, since clearly it was not true tohim but for some reason helpful to him, and that waswhy he said it? Why did her whole being bow, likecorn under a wind, and erect itself again from thisabasement only with a great and rather painfuleffort? She must make it once more. There’s thesprig on the table-cloth; there’s my painting; I mustmove the tree to the middle; that matters—nothingelse. Could she not hold fast to that, she asked her-self, and not lose her temper, and not argue; andif she wanted revenge take it by laughing at him?

"Oh, Mr. Tansley," she said, "do take me to theLighthouse with you. I should so love it."

She was telling lies he could see. She was sayingwhat she did not mean to annoy him, for somereason. She was laughing at him. He was in his oldflannel trousers. He had no others. He felt veryrough and isolated and lonely. He knew that she wastrying to tease him for some reason; she didn’t wantto go to the Lighthouse with him; she despised him:130

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