The spell of the ink-stained table had survived the night. Moving about, preparing for today, she turned continually towards the window-space, as to an actual presence, and was answered by the rising within her of a tide of serenity, driving her forward in a stupor of confidence, impervious to strain and pain. It was as if she had entered a companionship that now spread like a shield between her and the life she had so far dealt with unaided. …
The week of working days, standing between her and next Sunday’s opportunity, was a small space that would pass in a dream; the scattered variously-developing interests of life outside Wimpole Street changed, under her eyes, from separate bewildering competitively attractive scraps of life, to pleasantly related resources, permitted distractions from an engrossment so secure that she could, without fear of loss, move away and forget it.
She felt eager to jest. Ranged with her friends she saw their view of her own perpetually halting scrupulousness and marvelled at their patient loyalty. She shared the exasperated intolerance of people who disliked her. … It could be disarmed … by fresh, surprising handling. … Because, she asked herself scornfully as she opened the door to go downstairs, she had corrected Mr. Lahitte’s unspeakable lecture? No. Sitting over there, forgetting, she had let go … and found something … and waking again had seen distant things in their right proportions. But leaving go, not going through life clenched, would mean losing oneself, passing through, not driving in, ceasing to affect and be affected. But the forgetfulness was itself a more real life, if it made life disappear and then show only as a manageable space and at last only as an indifferent distance … a game to be played, or even not played. … It meant putting