THE WINDOWbird, gave her, naturally, this swoop and fall of thespirit upon truth which delighted, eased, sustained —falsely perhaps.(‘Nature has but little clay,’ said Mr. Bankes once,hearing her voice on the telephone, and much movedby it though she was only telling him a fact about atrain, ‘like that of which she moulded you.’ He sawher at the end of the line, Greek, blue-eyed, straight-nosed. How incongruous it seemed to be telephoningto a woman like that. The Graces assembling seemed tohave joined hands in meadows of asphodel to composethat face. Yes, he would catch the 10.30 at Euston.‘But she’s no more aware of her beauty than a child,’said Mr. Bankes, replacing the receiver and crossingthe room to see what progress the workmen were mak-ing with an hotel which they were building at theback of his house. And he thought of Mrs. Ramsay ashe looked at that stir among the unfinished walls. Foralways, he thought, there was something incongruousto be worked into the harmony of her face. She clappeda deer-stalker’s hat on her head; she ran across thelawn in goloshes to snatch a child from mischief. Sothat if it was her beauty merely that one thought of,one must remember the quivering thing, the livingthing (they were carrying bricks up a little plank ashe watched them), and work it into the picture; or ifone thought of her simply as a woman, one must en-dow her with some freak of idiosyncrasy; or supposesome latent desire to doff her royalty of form as if herbeauty bored her and all that men say of beauty, andshe wanted only to be like other people, insignificant.He did not know. He did not know. He must go to hiswork.)37
