THE WINDOW

The words (she was looking at the window) sound-ed as if they were floating like flowers on water outthere, cut off from them all, as if no one had saidthem, but they had come into existence of themselves.And all the lives we ever lived and all the lives to beAre full of trees and changing leaves.

She did not know what they meant, but, like music,the words seemed to be spoken by her own voice,outside her self, saying quite easily and naturally whathad been in her mind the whole evening while shesaid different things. She knew, without looking round,that every one at the table was listening to the voicesaying:I wonder if it seems to youLuriana, Lurileewith the same sort of relief and pleasure that shehad, as if this were, at last, the natural thing to say,this were their own voice speaking.

But the voice stopped. She looked round. She madeherself get up. Augustus Carmichael had risen and,holding his table napkin so that it looked like a longwhite robe, he stood chanting:To see the Kings go riding byOver lawn and daisy leaWith their palm leaves and cedar sheaves,Luriana, Lurilee,and as she passed him he turned slightly towards herrepeating the last words:Luriana, Lurilee.131

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