THE LIGHTHOUSE

10

[The sea without a stain on it, thought Lily
Briscoe, still standing and looking out over the
bay. The sea is stretched like silk across the bay.
Distance had an extraordinary power; they had
been swallowed up in it, she felt, they were gone
for ever, they had become part of the nature of
things. It was so calm; it was so quiet. The
steamer itself had vanished, but the great scroll
of smoke still hung in the air and drooped like
a flag mournfully in valediction.]

ii

It was like that then, the island, thought Cam,
once more drawing her fingers through the waves.
She had never seen it from out at sea before. It
lay like that on the sea, did it, with a dent in the
middle and two sharp crags, and the sea swept in
there, and spread away for miles and miles on
either side of the island. It was very small;
shaped something like a leaf stood on end. So
we took a little boat, she thought, beginning to
tell herself a story of adventure about escaping
from a sinking ship. But with the sea streaming
through her fingers, a spray of seaweed vanishing
behind them, she did not want to tell herself
T 289