“He must have reached it,” said Lily Briscoe aloud, feeling suddenlycompletely tired out. —
For the Lighthouse had become almost invisible,had melted away into a blue haze, and the effort of looking at it and theeffort of thinking of him landing there, which both seemed to be one andthe same effort, had stretched her body and mind to the utmost. —
Ah, butshe was relieved. Whatever she had wanted to give him, when he left herthat morning, she had given him at last.
“He has landed,” she said aloud. “It is finished.” —
Then, surging up,puffing slightly, old Mr Carmichael stood beside her, looking like an oldpagan god, shaggy, with weeds in his hair and the trident (it was only aFrench novel) in his hand. —
He stood by her on the edge of the lawn,swaying a little in his bulk and said, shading his eyes with his hand:
“They will have landed,” and she felt that she had been right. They hadnot needed to speak. —
They had been thinking the same things and he hadanswered her without her asking him anything. —
He stood there as if hewere spreading his hands over all the weakness and suffering of mankind; —
she thought he was surveying, tolerantly and compassionately,their final destiny. —
Now he has crowned the occasion, she thought, whenhis hand slowly fell, as if she had seen him let fall from his great height awreath of violets and asphodels which, fluttering slowly, lay at lengthupon the earth.
Quickly, as if she were recalled by something over there, she turned toher canvas. —
There it was—her picture. Yes, with all its greens and blues,its lines running up and across, its attempt at something. —
It would behung in the attics, she thought; it would be destroyed. But what did thatmatter? —
she asked herself, taking up her brush again. She looked at thesteps; they were empty; —
she looked at her canvas; it was blurred. —
With asudden intensity, as if she saw it clear for a second, she drew a line there,in the centre. —
It was done; it was finished. Yes, she thought, laying downher brush in extreme fatigue, I have had my vision.
The End