Page 404 - swanns-way

‘Finish your sweet, so that they can take your plate away!’
said Mme. Verdurin sourly to Saniette, who was lost in
thought and had stopped eating. And then, perhaps a little
ashamed of her rudeness, ‘It doesn’t matter; take your time
about it; there’s no hurry; I only reminded you because of
the others, you know; it keeps the servants back.’
‘There is,’ began Brichot, with a resonant smack upon ev-
ery syllable, ‘a rather curious definition of intelligence by
that pleasing old anarchist Fénelon...’
‘Just listen to this!’ Mme. Verdurin rallied Forcheville
and the Doctor. ‘He’s going to give us Fénelon’s definition
of intelligence. That’s interesting. It’s not often you get a
chance of hearing that!’
But Brichot was keeping Fénelon’s definition until Swann
should have given his own. Swann remained silent, and, by
this fresh act of recreancy, spoiled the brilliant tournament
of dialectic which Mme. Verdurin was rejoicing at being
able to offer to Forcheville.
‘You see, it’s just the same as with me!’ Odette was pee-
vish. ‘I’m not at all sorry to see that I’m not the only one he
doesn’t find quite up to his level.’
‘These de La Trémouailles whom Mme. Verdurin has
exhibited to us as so little to be desired,’ inquired Brichot,
articulating vigorously, ‘are they, by any chance, descended
from the couple whom that worthy old snob, Sévigné, said
she was delighted to know, because it was so good for her
peasants? True, the Marquise had another reason, which in
her case probably came first, for she was a thorough jour-
nalist at heart, and always on the look-out for ‘copy.’ And, in

404 Swann’s Way