Our ignorance of the real existence led by the women who do not advertise it in the newspapers draws thus over certain situations (thereby helping to differentiate one house from another) a veil of mystery. In Odette’s case, at the start, a few men of the highest society, anxious to meet Bergotte, had gone to dine, quite quietly, at her house. She had had the tact, recently acquired, not to advertise their presence, they found when they went there, a memory perhaps of the little nucleus, whose traditions Odette had preserved in spite of the schism, a place laid for them at table, and so forth.
Odette took them with Bergotte (whom these excursions, incidentally, finished off) to interesting first nights. They spoke of her to various women of their own world who were capable of taking an interest in such a novelty. These women were convinced that Odette, an intimate friend of Bergotte, had more or less collaborated in his works, and believed her to be a thousand times more intelligent than the most outstanding women of the Faubourg, for the same reason that made them pin all their political faith to certain Republicans of the right shade such as M. Doumer and M. Deschanel, whereas they saw France doomed to destruction were her destinies entrusted to the Monarchy men who were in the habit of dining with them, men like Charette or Doudeauville.
This change in Odette’s status was carried out, so far as she was concerned, with a discretion that made it more secure and more rapid but allowed no suspicion to filter through to the public that is prone to refer to the social columns of the Gaulois for evidence as to the advance or decline of a house, with the result that one day, at the dress rehearsal of a play by Bergotte, given in one of the most fashionable theatres in aid of a charity, the really dramatic moment was when people saw enter the box opposite, which was that reserved for the author, and sit down by the side of Mme. Swann, Mme. de Marsantes and her who, by the gradual self-effacement of the Duchesse de Guermantes (glutted with fame, and retiring to save the trouble of going on), was on the way to becoming the lion, the queen of the age, Comtesse Mole. “We never even supposed that she had begun to climb,” people said of Odette as they saw Comtesse Molé enter her box, “and look, she has reached the top of the ladder.”
So that Mme. Swann might suppose that it was from snobbishness that I was taking up again with her daughter.
Odette, notwithstanding her brilliant escort, listened with close attention to the play, as though she had come there solely to see it performed, just as in the past she used to walk across the Bois for her health, as a form of exercise. Men who in the past had shewn less interest in her came to the edge of the box, disturbing the whole audience, to reach up to her hand and so approach the imposing circle that surrounded her. She, with a smile that was still more friendly than ironical, replied patiently to their questions, affecting greater calm than might have been expected, a calm which was, perhaps, sincere, this exhibition being only the belated revelation of a habitual and discreetly hidden intimacy.
Behind these three ladies to whom every eye was drawn was Bergotte flanked by the Prince d’Agrigente, Comte Louis de Turenne, and the Marquis de Bréauté. And it is easy to understand that, to men who were received everywhere and could not expect any further advancement save as a reward for original research, this demonstration of their merit which they considered that they were making in letting themselves succumb to a hostess with a reputation for profound intellectuality, in whose house they expected to meet all the dramatists and novelists of the day, was more exciting, more lively than those evenings at the Princesse de Guermantes’s, which, without any change of programme or fresh attraction, had been going on year after year, all more or less like the one we have described in such detail.
In that exalted sphere, the sphere of the Guermantes, in which people were beginning to lose interest, the latest intellectual fashions were not incarnate in entertainments fashioned in their image, as in those sketches that Bergotte used to write for Mme. Swann, or those positive committees of public safety (had society been capable of taking an interest in the Dreyfus case) at which, in Mme. Verdurin’s drawing-room, used to assemble Picquart, Clemenceau, Zola, Reinach and Labori.
Gilberte, too, helped to strengthen her mother’s position, for an uncle of Swann had just left nearly twenty-four million francs to the girl, which meant that the Faubourg Saint-Germain was beginning to take notice of her. The reverse of the medal was that Swann (who, however, was dying) held Dreyfusard opinions, though this as a matter of fact did not injure his wife, but was actually of service to her. It did not injure her because people said: “He is dotty, his mind has quite gone, nobody pays any attention to him, his wife is the only person who counts and she is charming.” But even Swann’s Dreyfusism was useful to Odette.
Left to herself, she would quite possibly have allowed herself to make advances to fashionable women which would have been her undoing. Whereas on the evenings when she dragged her husband out to dine in the Faubourg Saint-Germain, Swann, sitting sullenly in his corner, would not hesitate, if he saw Odette seeking an introduction to some Nationalist lady, to exclaim aloud: “Really, Odette, you are mad. Why can’t you keep yourself to yourself. It is idiotic of you to get yourself introduced to anti-Semites, I forbid you.” People in society whom everyone else runs after are not accustomed either to such pride or to such ill-breeding. For the first time they beheld some one who thought himself ‘superior’ to them. The fame of Swann’s mut-terings was spread abroad, and cards with turned-down corners rained upon Odette. When she came to call upon Mme. d’Arpajon there was a brisk movement of friendly curiosity. “You didn’t mind my introducing her to you,” said Mme. d’Arpajon. “She is so nice.
It was Marie de Mar-santes that told me about her.” “No, not at all, I hear she’s so wonderfully clever, and she is charming. I had been longing to meet her; do tell me where she lives.” Mme. d’Arpajon told Mme. Swann that she had enjoyed herself hugely at the latter’s house the other evening, and had joyfully forsaken Mme. de Saint-Euverte for her. And it was true, for to prefer Mme. Swann was to shew that one was intelligent, like going to concerts instead of to tea-parties. But when Mme. de Saint-Euverte called on Mme. d’Arpajon at the same time as Odette, as Mme. de Saint-Euverte was a great snob and Mme. d’Arpajon, albeit she treated her without ceremony, valued her invitations, she did not introduce Odette, so that Mme. de Saint-Euverte should not know who it was.
The Marquise imagined that it must be some Princess who never went anywhere, since she had never seen her before, prolonged her call, replied indirectly to what Odette was saying, but Mme. d’Arpajon remained adamant. And when Mme. Saint-Euverte owned herself defeated and took her leave: “I did not introduce you,” her hostess told Odette, “because people don’t much care about going to her parties and she is always inviting one; you would never hear the last of her.” “Oh, that is all right,” said Odette with a pang of regret. But she retained the idea that people did not care about going to Mme. de Saint-Euverte’s, which was to a certain extent true, and concluded that she herself held a position in society vastly superior to Mme. de Saint-Euverte’s, albeit that lady held a very high position, and Odette, so far, had none at all.
That made no difference to her, and, albeit all Mme. de Guermantes’s friends were friends also of Mme. d’Arpajon, whenever the latter invited Mme. Swann, Odette would say with an air of compunction: “I am going to Mme. d’Arpajon’s; you will think me dreadfully old-fashioned, I know, but I hate going, for Mme. de Guermantes’s sake” (whom, as it happened, she had never met). The distinguished men thought that the fact that Mme. Swann knew hardly anyone in good society meant that she must be a superior woman, probably a great musician, and that it would be a sort of extra distinction, as for a Duke to be a Doctor of Science, to go to her house.
The completely unintelligent women were attracted by Odette for a diametrically opposite reason; hearing that she attended the Colonne concerts and professed herself a Wagnerian, they concluded from this that she must be ‘rather a lark,’ and were greatly excited by the idea of getting to know her. But, being themselves none too firmly established, they were afraid of compromising themselves in public if they appeared to be on friendly terms with Odette, and if, at a charity concert, they caught sight of Mme. Swann, would
