As usual, Lily thought. There was always something that had to be doneat that precise moment, something that Mrs Ramsay had decided forreasons of her own to do instantly, it might be with every one standingabout making jokes, as now, not being able to decide whether they weregoing into the smoking-room, into the drawing-room, up to the attics.

　　Then one saw Mrs Ramsay in the midst of this hubbub standing therewith Minta's arm in hers, bethink her, "Yes, it is time for that now," andso make off at once with an air of secrecy to do something alone. Anddirectly she went a sort of disintegration set in; they wavered about,went different ways, Mr Bankes took Charles Tansley by the arm andwent off to finish on the terrace the discussion they had begun at dinnerabout politics, thus giving a turn to the whole poise of the evening, makingthe weight fall in a different direction, as if, Lily thought, seeing themgo, and hearing a word or two about the policy of the Labour Party, theyhad gone up on to the bridge of the ship and were taking their bearings;the change from poetry to politics struck her like that; so Mr Bankes andCharles Mrs Ramsay going upstairs in the lamplight alone. Where, Lilywondered, was she going so quickly?

　　Not that she did in fact run or hurry; she went indeed rather slowly.

　　She felt rather inclined just for a moment to stand still after all that chatter,and pick out one particular thing; the thing that mattered; to detachit; separate it off; clean it of all the emotions and odds and ends of things,and so hold it before her, and bring it to the tribunal where, rangedabout in conclave, sat the judges she had set up to decide these things. Isit good, is it bad, is it right or wrong? Where are we all going to? and soon. So she righted herself after the shock of the event, and quite unconsciouslyand incongruously, used the branches of the elm trees outside tohelp her to stabilise her position. Her world was changing: they werestill. The event had given her a sense of movement. All must be in order.

　　She must get that right and that right, she thought, insensibly approvingof the dignity of the trees' stillness, and now again of the superb upwardrise (like the beak of a ship up a wave) of the elm branches as the windraised them. For it was windy (she stood a moment to look out). It waswindy, so that the leaves now and then brushed open a star, and thestars themselves seemed to be shaking and darting light and trying toflash out between the edges of the leaves. Yes, that was done then, accomplished;and as with all things done, became solemn. Now onethought of it, cleared of chatter and emotion, it seemed always to havebeen, only was shown now and so being shown, struck everything intostability. They would, she thought, going on again, however long theylived, come back to this night; this moon; this wind; this house: and toher too. It flattered her, where she was most susceptible of flattery, tothink how, wound about in their hearts, however long they lived shewould be woven; and this, and this, and this, she thought, going upstairs,laughing, but affectionately, at the sofa on the landing (hermother's); at the rocking-chair (her father's); at the map of the Hebrides.

　　All that would be revived again in the lives of Paul and Minta; "the Rayleys"—she tried the new name over; and she felt, with her hand on thenursery door, that community of feeling with other people which emotiongives as if the walls of partition had become so thin that practically(the feeling was one of relief and happiness) it was all one stream, andchairs, tables, maps, were hers, were theirs, it did not matter whose, andPaul and Minta would carry it on when she was dead.

　　She turned the handle, firmly, lest it should squeak, and went in, pursingher lips slightly, as if to remind herself that she must not speakaloud. But directly she came in she saw, with annoyance, that the precautionwas not needed. The children were not asleep. It was most annoying.

　　Mildred should be more careful. There was James wide awakeand Cam sitting bolt upright, and Mildred out of bed in her bare feet,and it was almost eleven and they were all talking. What was the matter?

　　It was that horrid skull again. She had told Mildred to move it, but Mildred,of course, had forgotten, and now there was Cam wide awake, andJames wide awake quarreling when they ought to have been asleephours ago. What had possessed Edward to send them this horrid skull?

　　She had been so foolish as to let them nail it up there. It was nailed fast,Mildred said, and Cam couldn't go to sleep with it in the room, andJames screamed if she touched it.

　　Then Cam must go to sleep (it had great horns said Cam)—must go tosleep and dream of lovely palaces, said Mrs Ramsay, sitting down on thebed by her side. She could see the horns, Cam said, all over the room. Itwas true. Wherever they put the light (and James could not sleepwithout a light) there was always a shadow somewhere.

　　"But think, Cam, it's only an old pig," said Mrs Ramsay, "a nice blackpig like the pigs at the farm." But Cam thought it was a horrid thing,branching at her all over the room.

　　"Well then,&q............