In telling the Verdurins that Swann was extremely “smart,” Odette had alarmed them with the prospect of another “bore.” When he arrived, however, he made an excellent impression, an indirect cause of which, though they did not know it, was his familiarity with the best society. He had, indeed, one of the advantages which men who have lived and moved in society enjoy over those, however intelligent, who have not, namely that they no longer see it transfigured by the longing or repulsion which it inspires, but regard it as of no importance. Their good nature, freed from all taint of snobbishness and from the fear of seeming too friendly, grown independent, in fact, has the ease, the grace of movement of a trained gymnast each of whose supple limbs will carry out precisely what is required without any clumsy participation by the rest of his body. The simple and elementary gestures of a man of the world as he courteously holds out his hand to the unknown youth who is introduced to him, or bows discreetly to the ambassador to whom he is introduced, had gradually pervaded the whole of Swann’s social deportment without his being conscious of it, so that in the company of people from a lower social sphere, such as the Verdurins and their friends, he displayed an instinctive alacrity, made amiable overtures, from which in their view a “bore” would have refrained. He showed a momentary coldness only on meeting Dr Cottard; for, seeing him wink at him with an ambiguous smile, before they had yet spoken to one another (a grimace which Cottard styled “wait and see”), Swann supposed that the doctor recognised him from having met him already, probably in some haunt of pleasure, though these he himself very rarely visited, never having lived a life of debauchery. Regarding such an allusion as in bad taste, especially in front of Odette, whose opinion of himself it might easily alter for the worse, Swann assumed his most icy manner. But when he learned that a lady standing near him was Mme Cottard, he decided that so young a husband would not deliberately have hinted at amusements of that order in his wife’s presence, and so ceased to interpret the doctor’s expression in the sense which he had at first suspected. The painter at once invited Swann to visit his studio with Odette; Swann thought him very civil. “Perhaps you will be more highly favoured than I have been,” said Mme Verdurin in a tone of mock resentment, “perhaps you’ll be allowed to see Cottard’s portrait” (which she had commissioned from the painter). “Take care, Master Biche,” she reminded the painter, whom it was a time-honoured pleasantry to address as “Master,” “to catch that nice look in his eyes, that witty little twinkle. You know what I want to have most of all is his smile; that’s what I’ve asked you to paint—the portrait of his smile.” And since the phrase struck her as noteworthy, she repeated it very loud, so as to make sure that as many as possible of her guests should hear it, and even made use of some vague pretext to draw the circle closer before she uttered it again. Swann begged to be introduced to everyone, even to an old friend of the Verdurins called Saniette, whose shyness, simplicity and good-nature had lost him most of the consideration he had earned for his skill in palaeography, his large fortune, and the distinguished family to which he belonged. When he spoke, his words came out in a burble which was delightful to hear because one felt that it indicated not so much a defect of speech as a quality of the soul, as it were a survival from the age of innocence which he had never wholly outgrown. All the consonants which he was unable to pronounce seemed like harsh utterances of which his gentle lips were incapable. In asking to be introduced to M. Saniette, Swann gave Mme Verdurin the impression of reversing roles (so much so that she replied, with emphasis on the distinction: “M. Swann, pray allow me to introduce our friend Saniette to you”) but aroused in Saniette himself a warmth of devotion, which, however, the Verdurins never disclosed to Swann, since Saniette rather irritated them, and they did not feel inclined to provide him with friends. On the other hand the Verdurins were extremely touched by Swann’s next request, for he felt that he must ask to meet the pianist’s aunt. She wore a black dress, as was her invariable custom, for she believed that a woman always looked well in black and that nothing could be more distinguished; but her face was exceedingly red, as it always was for some time after a meal. She bowed to Swann with deference, but drew herself up again with great dignity. As she was entirely uneducated, and was afraid of making mistakes in grammar and pronunciation, she used purposely to speak in an indistinct and garbling manner, thinking that if she should make a slip it would be so buried in the surrounding confusion that no one could be certain whether she had actually made it or not; with the result that her talk was a sort of continuous, blurred expectoration, out of which would emerge, at rare intervals, the few sounds and syllables of which she felt sure. Swann supposed himself entitled to poke a little mild fun at her in conversation with M. Verdurin, who, however, was rather put out.
“She’s such an excellent woman!” he rejoined. “I grant you that she’s not exactly brilliant; but I assure you that she can be most agreeable when you chat with her alone.”
“I’m sure she can,” Swann hastened to concede. “All I meant was that she hardly struck me as ‘distinguished,’ ” he went on, isolating the epithet in the inverted commas of his tone, “and that, on the whole, is something of a compliment.”
“For instance,” said M. Verdurin, “now this will surprise you: she writes quite delightfully. You’ve never heard her nephew play? It’s admirable, eh, Doctor? Would you like me to ask him to play something, M. Swann?”
“Why, it would be a joy …” Swann was beginning to reply, when the doctor broke in derisively. Having once heard it said, and never having forgotten, that in general conversation over-emphasis and the use of formal expressions were out of date, whenever he heard a solemn word used seriously, as the word “joy” had just been used by Swann, he felt that the speaker had been guilty of pomposity. And if, moreover, the word in question happened to occur also in what he called an old “tag,” however common it might still be in current usage, the doctor jumped to the conclusion that the remark which was about to be made was ridiculous, and completed it ironically with the cliché he assumed the speaker was about to perpetrate, although in reality it had never entered his mind.
“A joy for ever!” he exclaimed mischievously, throwing up his arms in a grandiloquent gesture.
M. Verdurin could not help laughing.
“What are all those good people laughing at over there? There’s no sign of brooding melancholy down in your corner,” shouted Mme Verdurin. “You don’t suppose I find it very amusing to be stuck up here by myself on the stool of repentance,” she went on with mock peevishness, in a babyish tone of voice.
Mme Verdurin was seated on a high Swedish chair of waxed pinewood, which a violinist from that country had given her, and which she kept in her drawing-room although in appearance it suggested a work-stand and clashed with the really good antique furniture which she had besides; but she made a point of keeping on view the presents which her “faithful” were in the habit of making her from time to time, so that the donors might have the pleasure of seeing them there when they came to the house. She tried to persuade them to confine their tributes to flowers and sweets, which had at least the merit of mortality; but she never succeeded, and the house was gradually filled with a collection of foot-warmers, cushions, clocks, screens, barometers and vases, a constant repetition and a boundless incongruity of useless but indestructible objects.
From this lofty perch she would take a spirited part in the conversation of the “faithful,” and would revel in all their “drollery”; but, since the accident to her jaw, she had abandoned the effort involved in wholehearted laughter, and had substituted a kind of symbolical dumb-show which signified, without endangering or fatiguing her in any way, that she was “splitting her sides.” At the least witticism aimed by a member of the circle against a bore or against a former member who was now relegated to the limbo of bores—and to the utter despair of M. Verdurin, who had always made out that he was just as affable as his wife, but who, since his laughter was the “real thing,”
was out of breath in a moment and so was overtaken and vanquished by her device of a feigned but continuous hilarity—she would utter a shrill cry, shut tight her little bird-like eyes, which were beginning to be clouded over by a cataract, and quickly, as though she had only just time to avoid some indecent sight or to parry a mortal blow, burying her face in her hands, which completely engulfed it and hid it from view, would appear to be struggling to suppress, to annihilate, a laugh which, had she succumbed to it, must inevitably have left her inanimate. So, stupefied with the gaiety of the “faithful,” drunk with good-fellowship, scandal and asseveration, Mme Verdurin, perched on her high seat like a cage-bird whose biscuit has been steeped in mulled wine, would sit aloft and sob with affability.
Meanwhile M. Verdurin, after first asking Swann’s permission to light his pipe (“No ceremony here, you understand; we’re all pals!”), went and asked the young musician to sit down at the piano.
“Leave him alone; don’t bother him; he hasn’t come here to be tormented,” cried Mme Verdurin. “I won’t have him tormented.”
“But why on earth should it bother him?” rejoined M. Verdurin. “I’m sure M. Swann has never heard the sonata in F sharp which we discovered. He’s going to play us the pianoforte arrangement.”
“No, no, no, not my sonata!” she screamed, “I don’t want to be made to cry until I get a cold in the head, and neuralgia all down my face, like last time. Thanks very much, I don’t intend to repeat that performance. You’re all so very kind and considerate, it’s easy to see that none of you will have to stay in bed for a week.”
This little scene, which was re-enacted as often as the young pianist sat down to play, never failed to delight her friends as much as if they were witnessing it for the first time, as a proof of the seductive originality of the “Mistress” and of the acute sensitiveness of her musical ear. Those nearest to her would attract the attention of the rest, who were smoking or playing cards at the other end of the room, by their cries of “Hear, hear!” which, as in Parliamentary debates, showed that something worth listening to was being said. And next day they would commiserate with those who had been prevented from coming that evening, assuring them that the scene had been even more amusing than usual.
“Well, all right, then,” said M. Verdurin, “he can play just the andante.”
“Just the andante! That really is a bit rich!” cried his wife. “As if it weren’t precisely the andante that breaks every bone in my body. The Master is really too priceless! Just as though, in the Ninth, he said ‘we’ll just hear the finale,’ or ‘just the overture’ of the Mastersingers.”
The doctor, however, urged Mme Verdurin to let the pianist play, not because he supposed her to be feigning when she spoke of the distressing effects that music always had upon her—for he recognised certain neurasthenic symptoms therein—but from the habit, common to many doctors, of at once relaxing the strict letter of a prescription as soon as it jeopardises something they regard as more important, such as the success of a social gathering at which they are present, and of which the patient whom they urge for once to forget his dyspepsia or his flu is one of the essential ingredients.
“You won’t be ill this time, you’ll find,” he told her, seeking at the same time to influence her with a hypnotic stare. “And if you are ill, we’ll look after you.”
“Will you really?” Mme Verdurin spoke as though, with so great a favour in store for her, there was nothing for it but to capitulate. Perhaps, too, by dint of saying that she was going to be ill, she had worked herself into a state in which she occasionally forgot that it was all a fabrication and adopted the attitude of a genuine invalid. And it may often be remarked that invalids, weary of having to make the infrequency of their attacks depend on their own prudence, like to persuade themselves that they can do everything that they enjoy, and that does them harm, with impunity, provided that they place themselves in the hands of a higher authority who, without putting them to the least inconvenience, can and will, by uttering a word or by administering a pill, set them once again on their feet.
Odette had gone to sit on a tapestry-covered settee near the piano, saying to Mme Verdurin, “I have my own little corner, haven’t I?”
And Mme Verdurin, seeing Swann by himself on a chair, made him get up: “You’re not at all comfortable there. Go along and sit by Odette. You can make room for M. Swann there, can’t you, Odette?”
“What charming Beauvais!” said Swann politely, stopping to admire the settee before he sat down on it.
“Ah! I’m glad you appreciate my settee,” replied Mme Verdurin, “and I warn you that if you expect ever to see another like it you may as well abandon the idea at once. They’ve never made anything else like it. And these little chairs, too, are perfect marvels. You can look at them in a moment. The emblems in each of the bronze mouldings correspond to the subject of the tapestry on the chair; you know, you’ll have a great deal to enjoy if you want to look at them—I can promise you a delightful time, I assure you. Just look at the little friezes round the edges; here, look, the little vine on a red background in this one, the Bear and the Grapes. Isn’t it well drawn? What do you say? I think they knew a thing or two about drawing! Doesn’t it make your mouth water, that vine? My husband makes out that I’m not fond of fruit, because I eat less of them than he does. But not a bit of it, I’m greedier than any of you, but I have no need to fill my mouth with them when I can feed on them with my eyes. What are you all laughing at now, pray? Ask the doctor; he’ll tell you that those grapes act on me like a regular purge. Some people go to Fontainebleau for cures; I take my own little Beauvais cure here. But, M. Swann, you mustn’t run away without feeling the little bronze mouldings on the backs. Isn’t it an exquisite patina? No, no, you must feel them properly, with your whole hand!”
“If Mme Verdurin is going to start fingering her bronzes,” said the painter, “we shan’t get any music tonight.”
“Be quiet, you wretch! And yet we poor women,” she went on, turning towards Swann, “are forbidden pleasures far less voluptuous than this. There is no flesh in the world to compare with it. None. When M. Verdurin did me the honour of being madly jealous … Come, you might at least be polite—don’t say that you’ve never been jealous!”
“But, my dear, I’ve said absolutely nothing. Look here, Doctor, I call you as a witness. Did I utter a word?”
Swann had begun, out of politeness, to finger the bronzes, and did not like to stop.
“Come along; you can caress them later. Now it’s you who are going to be caressed, caressed aurally. You’ll like that, I think. Here’s the young gentleman who will take charge of that.”
After the pianist had played, Swann was even more affable towards him than towards any of the other guests, for the following reason:
The year before, at an evening party, he had heard a piece of music played on the piano and violin. At first he had appreciated only the material quality of the sounds which those instruments secreted. And it had been a source of keen pleasure when, below the delicate line of the violin-part, slender but robust, compact and commanding, he had suddenly become aware of the mass of the piano-part beginning to emerge in a sort of liquid rippling of sound, multiform but indivisible, smooth yet restless, like the deep blue tumult of the sea, silvered and charmed into a minor key by the moonlight. But then at a certain moment, without being able to distinguish any clear outline, or to give a name to what was pleasing him, suddenly enraptured, he had tried to grasp the phrase or harmony—he did not know which—that had just been played and that had opened and expanded his soul, as the fragrance of certain roses, wafted upon the moist air of evening, has the power of dilating one’s nostrils. Perhaps it was owing to his ignorance of music that he had received so confused an impression, one of those that are none the less the only purely musical impressions, limited in their extent, entirely original, and irreducible to any other kind. An impression of this order, vanishing in an instant, is, so to speak, si
ne materia. Doubtless the notes which we hear at such moments tend, according to their pitch and volume, to spread out before our eyes over surfaces of varying dimensions, to trace arabesques, to give us the sensation of breadth or tenuity, stability or caprice. But the notes themselves have vanished before these sensations have developed sufficiently to escape submersion under those which the succeeding or even simultaneous notes have already begun to awaken in us. And this impression would continue to envelop in its liquidity, its ceaseless overlapping, the motifs which from time to time emerge, barely discernible, to plunge again and disappear and drown, recognised only by the particular kind of pleasure which they instil, impossible to describe, to recollect, to name, ineffable—did not our memory, like a labourer who toils at the laying down of firm foundations beneath the tumult of the waves, by fashioning for us facsimiles of those fugitive phrases, enable us to compare and to contrast them with those that follow. And so, scarcely had the exquisite sensation which Swann had experienced died away, before his memory had furnished him with an immediate transcript, sketchy, it is true, and provisional, which he had been able to glance at while the piece continued, so that, when the same impression suddenly returned, it was no longer impossible to grasp. He could picture to himself its extent, its symmetrical arrangement, its notation, its expressive value; he had before him something that was no longer pure music, but rather design, architecture, thought, and which allowed the actual music to be recalled. This time he had distinguished quite clearly a phrase which emerged for a few moments above the waves of sound. It had at once suggested to him a world of inexpressible delights, of whose existence, before hearing it, he had never dreamed, into which he felt that nothing else could initiate him; and he had been filled with love for it, as with a new and strange desire.
In Search of Lost Time, Volume I Page 28
