a strong and
sudden friendship. But, on the other hand, men who, like Swann, had
these tastes but did not speak of them, left her cold. She was obliged,
of course, to admit that Swann was most generous with his money, but she
would add, pouting: "It's not the same thing, you see, with him,"
and, as a matter of fact, what appealed to her imagination was not the
practice of disinterestedness, but its vocabulary.

Feeling that, often, he could not give her in reality the pleasures of
which she dreamed, he tried at least to ensure that she should be happy
in his company, tried not to contradict those vulgar ideas, that bad
taste which she displayed on every possible occasion, which all the same
he loved, as he could not help loving everything that came from her,
which even fascinated him, for were they not so many more of those
characteristic features, by virtue of which the essential qualities
of the woman emerged, and were made visible? And so, when she was in a
happy mood because she was going to see the _Reine Topaze_, or when her
eyes grew serious, troubled, petulant, if she was afraid of missing the
flower-show, or merely of not being in time for tea, with muffins and
toast, at the Rue Royale tea-rooms, where she believed that regular
attendance was indispensable, and set the seal upon a woman's
certificate of 'smartness,' Swann, enraptured, as all of us are, at
times, by the natural behaviour of a child, or by the likeness of a
portrait, which appears to be on the point of speaking, would feel so
distinctly the soul of his mistress rising to fill the outlines of her
face that he could not refrain from going across and welcoming it
with his lips. "Oh, then, so little Odette wants us to take her to the
flower-show, does she? she wants to be admired, does she? very well, we
will take her there, we can but obey her wishes." As Swann's sight was
beginning to fail, he had to resign himself to a pair of spectacles,
which he wore at home, when working, while to face the world he adopted
a single eyeglass, as being less disfiguring. The first time that she
saw it in his eye, she could not contain herself for joy: "I really do
think--for a man, that is to say--it is tremendously smart! How nice you
look with it! Every inch a gentleman. All you want now is a title!" she
concluded, with a tinge of regret in her voice. He liked Odette to say
these things, just as, if he had been in love with a Breton girl, he
would have enjoyed s