Page 494 - swanns-way

tleman who was in my friend’s box the other day; the one
I go to the Hippodrome with,’ that explanation would set
Swann’s suspicions at rest; it was, after all, inevitable that
this friend should have other guests than Odette in her box
at the Hippodrome, but he had never sought to form or suc-
ceeded in forming any coherent impression of them. Oh!
how he would have loved to know her, that friend who went
to the Hippodrome, how he would have loved her to invite
him there with Odette. How readily he would have sacri-
fied all his acquaintance for no matter what person who was
in the habit of seeing Odette, were she but a manicurist or
a girl out of a shop. He would have taken more trouble, in-
curred more expense for them than for queens. Would they
not have supplied him, out of what was contained in their
knowledge of the life of Odette, with the one potent ano-
dyne for his pain? With what joy would he have hastened to
spend his days with one or other of those humble folk with
whom Odette kept up friendly relations, either with some
ulterior motive or from genuine simplicity of nature. How
willingly would he have fixed his abode for ever in the at-
tics of some sordid but enviable house, where Odette went
but never took him, and where, if he had lived with the little
retired dressmaker, whose lover he would readily have pre-
tended to be, he would have been visited by. Odette almost
daily. In those regions, that were almost slums, what a mod-
est existence, abject, if you please, but delightful, nourished
by tranquillity and happiness, he would have consented to
lead indefinitely.
It sometimes happened, again, that, when, after meeting

494 Swann’s Way