Just as Mrs. Ramsay found it impossible to pierce beneath Elizabeth’s outward veil, so did Elizabeth, in her turn, find it impossible to become intimate with Nana. She thought perhaps Nana was jealous, and disapproving; no trace of those feelings was apparent in her bearing. Her manners were unimpeachable; if she disagreed with Elizabeth she put forward her own suggestion with deference, and showed no desire to domineer. She baffled Elizabeth with her calmness, and her tight smile. Elizabeth hated her.

Stephen was afraid that Elizabeth might be dull at first, buried as she was in the depths of the country. She assured him that there was no fear of it. While the country was there to explore, while the fowls required attention, and while rabbits scuttled in the woods boredom, for her, would be impossible. There were Stephen’s dogs too to be exercised and groomed, three of them, all different. Of Hector, the Irish wolfhound, she was at first nervous. She had never seen so large a dog before, but she was careful to hide her alarm of him in case Stephen should laugh, or not understand. The silky cocker, Flo, was her favourite, because Flo was gentle, and had liquid, mournful eyes. But Flo would never willingly leave Stephen.

She was older than the others and preferred to be under Stephen’s desk when Elizabeth went with Hector, and Jerry, the Airedale, for a tramp through the woods.

“Keeping house,” the duty to which Elizabeth had so eagerly looked forward, proved to be less pleasant than she had expected, and not a duty at all, but a hobby. For years Nana had held the reins of this office; Elizabeth acknowledged that it would be unfair to wrest them from her. Nana assumed that Elizabeth would find the task onerous; Stephen would not hear of her attempting it. Sadly she thought, how little they understood her! She assumed joint responsibility with Nana; Stephen laughed, thinking it a child’s hobby.

Almost at once after their return he plunged into the work that awaited him. Elizabeth looked with awe upon the sheets of scrawled manuscript, marvelled that he could write so fast and in so great a muddle. His study, he said, was inviolate. She asked, Against me? He told her not to say silly things. It was inviolate against all spring-cleaning or tidying invasion. She pointed to the dust upon his desk.

“I like it,” he said simply.

“But how extraordinary!” she exclaimed.

“Have you ever looked at dust with the sun on it?” he asked.

She never had; she considered the question absurd.

“It’s perfectly beautiful,” he said.

She ventured to arrange a bowl of roses on his desk, the petals fell; he ordered that the bowl should be removed. She was hurt, but she said nothing.