Get a long
way off it: God lets us turn all things into toys by his great gift
of distance. Once let me see my old brick house standing up quite
little against the horizon, and I shall want to go back to it again.
I shall see the funny little toy lamp-post painted green against the gate,
and all the dear little people like dolls looking out of the window.
For the windows really open in my doll's house.'
"`But why?' I asked, `should you wish to return to that particular
doll's house? Having taken, like Nora, the bold step against convention,
having made yourself in the conventional sense disreputable, having dared
to be free, why should you not take advantage of your freedom?
As the greatest modern writers have pointed out, what you called your
marriage was only your mood. You have a right to leave it all behind,
like the clippings of your hair or the parings of your nails.
Having once escaped, you have the world before you. Though the words
may seem strange to you, you are free in Russia.'
"He sat with his dreamy eyes on the dark circles of the plains,
where the only moving thing was the long and labouring trail of smoke
out of the railway engine, violet in tint, volcanic in outline,
the one hot and heavy cloud of that cold clear evening of pale green.
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