Page 580 - swanns-way

bus, topics selected from those which she had picked up and
would repeat in each of the score of houses up the stairs of
which she clambered in the course of an afternoon.
‘I needn’t ask you, M. Swann, whether a man so much in
the movement as yourself has been to the Mirlitons, to see
the portrait by Machard that the whole of Paris is running
after. Well, and what do you think of it? Whose camp are
you in, those who bless or those who curse? It’s the same in
every house in Paris now, no one will speak of anything else
but Machard’s portrait; you aren’t smart, you aren’t really
cultured, you aren’t up-to-date unless you give an opinion
on Machard’s portrait.’
Swann having replied that he had not seen this portrait,
Mme. Cottard was afraid that she might have hurt his feel-
ings by obliging him to confess the omission.
‘Oh, that’s quite all right! At least you have the courage
to be quite frank about it. You don’t consider yourself dis-
graced because you haven’t seen Machard’s portrait. I do
think that so nice of you. Well now, I have seen it; opinion is
divided, you know, there are some people who find it rather
laboured, like whipped cream, they say; but I think it’s just
ideal. Of course, she’s not a bit like the blue and yellow la-
dies that our friend Biche paints. That’s quite clear. But I
must tell you, perfectly frankly (you’ll think me dreadful-
ly old-fashioned, but I always say just what I think), that I
don’t understand his work. I can quite see the good points
there are in his portrait of my husband; oh, dear me, yes;
and it’s certainly less odd than most of what he does, but
even then he had to give the poor man a blue moustache!

580 Swann’s Way