TO THE LIGHTHOUSEto her)—after all, she had not generally anydifficulty in making people like her; for instance,George Manning; Mr. Wallace; famous as theywere, they would come to her of an evening,quietly, and talk alone over her fire. She boreabout with her, she could not help knowing it,the torch of her beauty; she carried it erect intoany room that she entered; and after all, veil it asshe might, and shrink from the monotony ofbearing that it imposed on her, her beauty wasapparent. She had been admired. She had beenloved. She had entered rooms where mournerssat. Tears had flown in her presence. Men, andwomen too, letting go the multiplicity of things,had allowed themselves with her the relief ofsimplicity. It injured her that he should shrink.It hurt her. And yet not cleanly, not rightly.That was what she minded, coming as it did ontop of her discontent with her husband; the senseshe had now when Mr. Carmichael shuffledpast, just nodding to her question, with a bookbeneath his arm, in his yellow slippers, that shewas suspected; and that all this desire of hers togive, to help, was vanity. For her own self-satisfaction was it that she wished so instinctivelyto help, to give, that people might say of her,“O Mrs. Ramsay! dear Mrs. Ramsay . . . Mrs.Ramsay, of course!" and need her and send for68
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