Page 500 - swanns-way

sound advice. If you could arrange something for to-mor-
row which would please her, something that we could all
three do together. Try to put out a feeler, too, for the sum-
mer; see if there’s anything she wants to do, a cruise that
we might all three take; anything you can think of. I don’t
count upon seeing her to-night, myself; still if she would
like me to come, or if you find a loophole, you’ve only to
send me a line at Mme. de Saint-Euverte’s up till midnight;
after that I shall be here. Ever so many thanks for all you are
doing for me—you know what I feel about you!’
His friend promised to go and do as Swann wished as
soon as he had deposited him at the door of the Saint-Eu-
verte house, where he arrived soothed by the thought that
M. de Charlus would be spending the evening in the Rue La
Pérouse, but in a state of melancholy indifference to every-
thing that did not involve Odette, and in particular to the
details of fashionable life, a state which invested them with
the charm that is to be found in anything which, being no
longer an object of our desire, appears to us in its own guise.
On alighting from his carriage, in the foreground of that fic-
titious summary of their domestic existence which hostesses
are pleased to offer to their guests on ceremonial occasions,
and in which they shew a great regard for accuracy of cos-
tume and setting, Swann was amused to discover the heirs
and successors of Balzac’s ‘tigers’—now ‘grooms’—. who
normally followed their mistress when she walked abroad,
but now, hatted and booted, were posted out of doors, in
front of the house on the gravelled drive, or outside the
stables, as gardeners might be drawn up for inspection at

500 Swann’s Way