Page 91 - swanns-way

fantastic shower, distilled and dropping from the groin of
the dark and rocky vault down the moist walls, as though
it were along the bed of some rainbow grotto of sinuous
stalactites that I was following my parents, who marched
before me, their prayer-books clasped in their hands; a mo-
ment later the little lozenge windows had put on the deep
transparence, the unbreakable hardness of sapphires clus-
tered on some enormous breastplate; but beyond which
could be distinguished, dearer than all such treasures, a
fleeting smile from the sun, which could be seen and felt as
well here, in the blue and gentle flood in which it washed the
masonry, as on the pavement of the Square or the straw of
the market-place; and even on our first Sundays, when we
came down before Easter, it would console me for the black-
ness and bareness of the earth outside by making burst into
blossom, as in some springtime in old history among the
heirs of Saint Louis, this dazzling and gilded carpet of for-
get-me-nots in glass.
Two tapestries of high warp represented the coronation
of Esther (in which tradition would have it that the weaver
had given to Ahasuerus the features of one of the kings of
France and to Esther those of a lady of Guermantes whose
lover he had been); their colours had melted into one an-
other, so as to add expression, relief, light to the pictures.
A touch of red over the lips of Esther had strayed beyond
their outline; the yellow on her dress was spread with such
unctuous plumpness as to have acquired a kind of solidity,
and stood boldly out from the receding atmosphere; while
the green of the trees, which was still bright in Silk and wool

91