Page 191 - swanns-way

had seen with him, on the previous occasion, was just going
to introduce to the wife of another large landed proprietor of
the district. Legrandin’s face shewed an extraordinary zeal
and animation; he made a profound bow, with a subsidiary
backward movement which brought his spine sharply up
into a position behind its starting-point, a gesture in which
he must have been trained by the husband of his sister, Mme.
de Cambremer. This rapid recovery caused a sort of tense
muscular wave to ripple over Legrandin’s hips, which I had
not supposed to be so fleshy; I cannot say why, but this un-
dulation of pure matter, this wholly carnal fluency, with not
the least hint in it of spiritual significance, this wave lashed
to a fury by the wind of an assiduity, an obsequiousness of
the basest sort, awoke my mind suddenly to the possibility
of a Legrandin altogether different from the one whom we
knew. The lady gave him some message for her coachman,
and while he was stepping down to her carriage the impres-
sion of joy, timid and devout, which the introduction had
stamped there, still lingered on his face. Carried away in a
sort of dream, he smiled, then he began to hurry back to-
wards the lady; he was walking faster than usual, and his
shoulders swayed backwards and forwards, right and left,
in the most absurd fashion; altogether he looked, so utterly
had he abandoned himself to it, ignoring all other consid-
erations, as though he were the lifeless and wire-pulled
puppet of his own happiness. Meanwhile we were coming
out through the porch; we were passing close beside him;
he was too well bred to turn his head away; but he fixed his
eyes, which had suddenly changed to those of a seer, lost

191