? Oh; but that don’t count (here a new self came in)。 Lying in bed of a morning listening to the pigeons on fine linen; silver dishes; wine; maids; footmen。 Spoilt? Perhaps。 Too many things for nothing。 Hence my books (here she mentioned fifty classical titles; which represented; so we think; the early romantic works that she tore up)。 Facile; glib; romantic。 But (here another self came in) a duffer; a fumbler。 More clumsy I couldn’t be。 And—and—(here she hesitated for a word and if we suggest ‘Love’ we may be wrong; but certainly she laughed and blushed and then cried out—) A toad set in emeralds! Harry the Archduke! Blue–bottles on the ceiling! (here another self came in)。 But Nell; Kit; Sasha? (she was sunk in gloom: tears actually shaped themselves and she had long given over crying)。 Trees; she said。 (Here another self came in。) I love trees (she was passing a clump) growing there a thousand years。 And barns (she passed a tumbledown barn at the edge of the road)。 And sheep dogs (here one came trotting across the road。 She carefully avoided it)。 And the night。 But people (here another self came in)。 People? (She repeated it as a question。) I don’t know。 Chattering; spiteful; always telling lies。 (Here she turned into the High Street of her native town; which was crowded; for it was market day; with farmers; and shepherds; and old women with hens in baskets。) I like peasants。 I understand crops。 But (here another self came skipping over the top of her mind like the beam from a lighthouse)。 Fame! (She laughed。) Fame! Seven editions。 A prize。 Photographs in the evening papers (here she alluded to the ‘Oak Tree’ and ‘The Burdett Coutts’ Memorial Prize which she had won; and we must snatch space to remark how disposing it is for her biographer that this culmination to which the whole book moved; this peroration with which the book was to end; should be dashed from us on a laugh casually like this; but the truth is that when we write of a woman; everything is out of place—culminations and perorations; the accent never falls where it does with a man)。 Fame! she repeated。 A poet—a charlatan; both every morning as regularly as the post es in。 To dine; to meet; to meet; to dine; fame—fame! (She had here to slow down to pass through the crowd of market people。 But no one noticed her。 A porpoise in a fishmonger’s shop attracted far more attention than a lady who had won a prize and might; had she chosen; have worn three coros one on top of another on her brow。) Driving very slowly she now hummed as if it were part of an old song; ‘With my guineas I’ll buy flowering trees; flowering trees; flowering trees and walk among my flowering trees and tell my sons what fame is’。 So she hummed; and now all her words began to sag here and there like a barbaric necklace of heavy beads。 ‘And walk among my flowering trees;’ she sang; accenting the words strongly; ‘and see the moon rise slow; the waggons go。。。’ Here she stopped short and looked ahead of her intently at the bon of the car in profound meditation。
‘He sat at Twitchett’s table;’ she mused; ‘with a dirty ruff on。。。Was it old Mr Baker e to measure the timber? Or was it Sh–p—re? (for when we speak names we deeply reverence to ourselves we never speak them whole。) She gazed for ten minutes ahead of her; letting the car e almost to a standstill。
‘Haunted!’ she cried; suddenly pressing the accelerator。 ‘Haunted! ever since I was a child。 There flies the wild goose。 It flies past the window out to sea。 Up I jumped (she gripped the steering–wheel tighter) and stretched after it。 But the goose flies too fast。 I’ve seen it; here—there—there—England; Persia; Italy。 Always it flies fast out to sea and always I fling after it words like s (here she flung her hand out) which shrivel as I’ve seen s shrivel drawn on deck with only sea–weed in them; and sometimes there’s an inch of silver—six words—in the bottom of the 。 But never the great fish who lives in the coral groves。’ Here she bent her head; pondering deeply。
And it was at this moment; when she had ceased to call ‘Orlando’ and was deep in thoughts of something else; that the Orlando whom she had called came of its own accord; as was proved by the change that now came over her (she had passed through the lodge gates and was entering the park)。
The whole of her darkened and settled; as when some foil whose addition makes the round and solidity of a surface is added to it; and the shallow bees deep and the near distant; and all is contained as water is contained by the sides of a well。 So she was now darkened; stilled; and bee; with the addition of this Orlando; what is called; rightly or wrongly; a single self; a real self。 And she fell silent。 For it is probable that when people talk aloud; the selves (of which there may be more than two thousand) are conscious of disseverment; and are trying to municate; but when munication is established they fall silent。
Masterfully; swiftly; she drove up the curving drive between the elms and oaks through the falling turf of the park whose fall was so gentle that had it been water it would have spread the beach with a smooth green tide。 Planted here and in solemn groups were beech trees and oak trees。 The deer stepped among them; one white as snow; another with its head on one side; for some wire ting had caught in its horns。 All this; the trees; deer; and turf; she observed with the greatest satisfaction as if her mind had bee a fluid that flowed round things and enclosed them pletely。 Next minute she drew up in the courtyard where; for so many hundred years she had e; on horseback or in coach and six; with men riding before or ing after; where plumes had tossed; torches flashed; and the same flowering trees that let their leaves drop now had shaken their blossoms。 Now she was alone。 The autumn leaves were falling。 The porter opened the great gates。 ‘Morning; James;’ she said; ‘there’re some things in the car。 Will you bring ‘em in?’ words of no beauty; interest; or significance themselves; it will be conceded; but now so plumped out with meaning that they fell like ripe nuts from a tree; and proved that when the shrivelled skin of the ordinary is stuffed out with meaning it satisfies the senses amazingly。 This was true indeed of every movement and action now; usual though they were; so that to see Orlando change her skirt for a pair of whipcord breeches and leather jacket; which she did in less than three minutes; was to be ravished with the beauty of movement as if Madame Lopokova were using her highest art。 Then she strode into the dining–room where her old friends Dryden; Pope; Swift; Addison regarded her demurely at first as who should say Here’s the prize winner! but when they reflected that two hundred guineas was in question; they nodded their heads approvingly。 Two hundred guineas; they seemed to say; two hundred guineas are not to be sniffed at。 She cut herself a slice of bread and ham; clapped the two together and began to eat; striding up and down the room; thus shedding her pany habits in a second; without thinking。 After five or six such turns; she tossed off a glass of red Spanish wine; and; filling another which she carried in her hand; strode down the long corridor and through a dozen drawing–rooms and so began a perambulation of the house; attended by such elk–hounds and spaniels as chose to follow her。
This; too; was all in the day’s routine。 As soon would she e home and leave her own grandmother without a kiss as e back and leave the house unvisited。 She fancied that the rooms brightened as she came in; stirred; opened their eyes as if they had been dozing in her absence。 She fancied; too; that; hundreds and thousands of times as she had seen them; they never looked the same twice; as if so long a life as theirs had stored in them a myriad moods which changed with winter and summer; bright weather and dark; and her own fortunes and the people’s characters who visited them。 Polite; they always were to strangers; but a little weary: with her; they were entirely open and at their ease。 Why not indeed? They had known each other for close on four centuries now。 They had nothing to conceal。 She knew their sorrows and joys。 She knew what age each part of them was and its little secrets—a hidden drawer; a concealed cupboard; or some deficiency perhaps; such as a part made up; or added later。 They; too; knew her in all her moods and changes。 She had hidden nothing from them; had e to them as boy and woman; crying and dancing; brooding and gay。 In this window–seat; she had written her first verses; in that chapel; she had been married。 And she would be buried here; she reflected; kneeling on the window–sill in the long gallery and sipping her Spanish wine。 Though she could hardly fancy it; the body of the heraldic leopard would be making yellow pools on the floor the day they lowered her to lie among her ancestors。 She; who believed in no immortality; could not help feeling that her soul would e and go forever with the reds on the panels and the greens on the sofa。 For the room—she had strolled into the Ambassador’s bedroom—shone like a shell that has lain at the bottom of the sea for centuries and has been crusted over and paint