THE LIGHTHOUSE V:-

\/-Vj.Ł"

marry him. And she stepped slowly, quietly on ^
shore. Probably she said one word only, letting
her hand rest still in his. I will marry you, she
might have said, with her hand in his; but no
more. Time after time the same thrill had passed
between them—obviously it had, Lily thought,
smoothing a way for her ants. She was not
inventing; she was only trying to smooth out
something she had been given years ago folded
up; something she had seen. For in the rough
and tumble of daily life, with all those children
about, all those visitors, one had constantly a sense
of repetition—of one thing falling where another
had fallen, and so setting up an echo which
chimed in the air and made it full of vibrations.

But it would be a mistake, she thought,
thinking how they walked off together, she in her
green shawl, he with his tie flying, arm in arm,
past the greenhouse, to simplify their relationship.
It was no monotony of bliss—she with her
impulses and quicknesses; he with his shudders
and glooms. Oh no. The bedroom door would
slam violently early in the morning. He would
start from the table in a temper. He would
whizz his plate through the window. Then all
through the house there would be a sense of
doors slamming and blinds fluttering as if a
gusty wind were blowing and" people scudded
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