TO THE LIGHTHOUSEhead, or ran across the grass, or scolded Kennedy,the gardener? Who could tell her? Who couldhelp her?

Against her will she had come to the surface,and found herself half out of the picture, looking,a little dazedly, as if at unreal things, at Mr.Carmichael. He lay on his chair with his handsclasped above his paunch not reading, or sleeping,but basking like a creature gorged with existence.His book had fallen on to the grass.

She wanted to go straight up to him and say,"Mr. Carmichael!" Then he would look upbenevolently as always, from his smoky vaguegreen eyes. But one only woke people if oneknew what one wanted to say to them. And shewanted to say not one thing, but everything.Little words that broke up the thought and dis-membered it said nothing. "About life, aboutdeath; about Mrs. Ramsay"—no, she thought,one could say nothing to nobody. The urgencyof the moment always missed its mark. Wordsfluttered sideways and struck the object inches toolow. Then one gave it up; then the idea sunkback again; then one became like most middle-aged people, cautious, furtive, with wrinklesbetween the eyes and a look of perpetual appre-hension. For how could one express in wordsthese emotions of the body? express that empti-274

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