THE LIGHTHOUSEspace, while she modelled it with greens andblues.

Charles Tansley used to say that, she remem-bered, women can't paint, can't write. Coming upbehind her he had stood close beside her, a thingshe hated, as she painted here on this very spot."Shag tobacco", he said, "fivepence an ounce",parading his poverty, his principles. (But the warhad drawn the sting of her femininity. Poordevils, one thought, poor devils of both sexes,getting into such messes. He was always carryinga book about under his arm—a purple book.He “worked". He sat, she remembered, work-ing in a blaze of sun. At dinner he would sitright in the middle of the view. And then,she reflected, there was that scene on thebeach. One must remember that. It was awindy morning. They had all gone to thebeach. Mrs. Ramsay sat and wrote letters by arock. She wrote and wrote. "Oh," she said,looking up at last at something floating in thesea, “is it a lobster pot? Is it an upturned boat?"She was so short-sighted that she could not see,and then Charles Tansley became as nice as hecould possibly be. He began playing ducks anddrakes. They chose little flat black stones andsent them skipping over the waves. Every nowand then Mrs. Ramsay looked up over her247
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