Page 442 - swanns-way

‘Yes, Mme. Verdurin,’ said Odette meekly.
‘What! I thought I was to take you home,’ cried Swann,
flinging discretion to the winds, for the carriage-door hung
open, time was precious, and he could not, in his present
state, go home without her.
‘But Mme. Verdurin has asked me...’
‘That’s all right, you can quite well go home alone; we’ve
left you like this dozens of times,’ said Mme. Verdurin.
‘But I had something important to tell Mme. de Crécy.’
‘Very well, you can write it to her instead.’
‘Good-bye,’ said Odette, holding out her hand.
He tried hard to smile, but could only succeed in looking
utterly dejected.
‘What do you think of the airs that Swann is pleased to
put on with us?’ Mme. Verdurin asked her husband when
they had reached home. ‘I was afraid he was going to eat me,
simply because we offered to take Odette back. It really is
too bad, that sort of thing. Why doesn’t he say, straight out,
that we keep a disorderly house? I can’t conceive how Odette
can stand such manners. He positively seems to be saying,
all the time, ‘You belong to me!’ I shall tell Odette exactly
what I think about it all, and I hope she will have the sense
to understand me.’ A moment later she added, inarticulate
with rage: ‘No, but, don’t you see, the filthy creature ...’ us-
ing unconsciously, and perhaps in satisfaction of the same
obscure need to justify herself—like Françoise at Combray
when the chicken refused to die—the very words which the
last convulsions of an inoffensive animal in its death agony
wring from the peasant who is engaged in taking its life.

442 Swann’s Way