<< First         < Previous  Next >         Last >>


these years; just sent her money; but never
wrote, never came, and expected to find things
as they had left them, ah dear! Why the dressing-
table drawers were full of things (she pulled them
open), handkerchiefs, bits of ribbon. Yes, she
could see Mrs. Ramsay as she came up the drive
with the washing.
    "Good-evening, Mrs. McNab," she would say.
She had a pleasant way with her. The girls
all liked her. But dear, many things had changed
since then (she shut the drawer); many families
had lost their dearest. So she was dead; and
Mr. Andrew killed; and Miss Prue dead too,
they said, with her first baby; but every one had
lost some one these years. Prices had gone up
shamefully, and didn't come down again neither.
She could well remember her in her grey cloak.
    "Good-evening, Mrs. McNab," she said, and
told cook to keep a plate of milk soup for her --
quite thought she wanted it, carrying that heavy
basket all the way up from town. She could see
her now, stooping over her flowers; and faint and
flickering, like a yellow beam or the circle at the
end of a telescope, a lady in a grey cloak, stooping
over her flowers, went wandering over the bed-
room wall, up the dressing-table, across the wash-
stand, as Mrs. McNab hobbled and ambled,
dusting, straightening.

Zoom on/off

Page 1

<< First         < Previous  Next >         Last >>