vate view was not in itself any more
ridiculous than the pleasure which he himself had at one time felt in
going to luncheon with the Prince of Wales, so he did not think that the
admiration which she professed for Monte-Carlo or for the Righi was any
more unreasonable than his own liking for Holland (which she imagined
as ugly) and for Versailles (which bored her to tears). And so he denied
himself the pleasure of visiting those places, consoling himself with
the reflection that it was for her sake that he wished to feel, to like
nothing that was not equally felt and liked by her.

Like everything else that formed part of Odette's environment, and was
no more, in a sense, than the means whereby he might see and talk to her
more often, he enjoyed the society of the Verdurins. With them, since,
at the heart of all their entertainments, dinners, musical evenings,
games, suppers in fancy dress, excursions to the country, theatre
parties, even the infrequent 'big evenings' when they entertained
'bores,' there were the presence of Odette, the sight of Odette,
conversation with Odette, an inestimable boon which the Verdurins, by
inviting him to their house, bestowed on Swann, he was happier in the
little 'nucleus' than anywhere else, and tried to find some genuine
merit in each of its members, imagining that his tastes would lead him
to frequent their society for the rest of his life. Never daring to
whisper to himself, lest he should doubt the truth of the suggestion,
that he would always be in love with Odette, at least when he tried to
suppose that he would always go to the Verdurins' (a proposition
which, a priori, raised fewer fundamental objections on the part of his
intelligence), he saw himself for the future continuing to meet Odette
every evening; that did not, perhaps, come quite to the same thing as
his being permanently in love with her, but for the moment while he was
in love with her, to feel that he would not, one day, cease to see her
was all that he could ask. "What a charming atmosphere!" he said to
himself. "How entirely genuine life is to these people! They are far
more intelligent, far more artistic, surely, than the people one knows.
Mme. Verdurin, in spite of a few trifling exaggerations which are rather
absurd, has a sincere love of painting and music! What a passion for
works of art, what anxiety to give pleasure to artists! Her ideas about
some of the people one knows are not quite right, but then th