In Search of Lost Time

Montesquiou.” “But it is not so extraordinary,” said Saniette, breathless with emotion but smiling, albeit he was in no smiling mood. Mme. Verdurin could not contain herself. “Yes, indeed!” she cried with a titter. “You may be quite sure that nobody would ever have guessed that you meant the Chercheuse d’Esprit.” M. Verdurin went on in a gentler tone, addressing both Saniette and Brichot: “It is quite a pretty piece, all the same, the Chercheuse d’Esprit.” Uttered in a serious tone, this simple phrase, in which one could detect no trace of malice, did Saniette as much good and aroused in him as much gratitude as a deliberate compliment. He was unable to utter a single word and preserved a happy silence. Brichot was more loquacious. “It is true,” he replied to M. Verdurin, “and if it could be passed off as the work of some Sarmatian or Scandinavian author, we might put forward the Chercheuse d’Esprit as a candidate for the vacant post of masterpiece. But, be it said without any disrespect to the shade of the gentle Favart, he had not the Ibsenian temperament.” (Immediately he blushed to the roots of his hair, remembering the Norwegian philosopher who appeared troubled because he was seeking in vain to discover what vegetable the buis might be that Brichot had cited a little earlier in connection with the name Bussière.) “However, now that Porel’s satrapy is filled by a functionary who is a Tolstoyst of rigorous observance, it may come to pass that we shall witness Anna Karenina or Resurrection beneath the Odeonian architrave.” “I know the portrait of Favart to which you allude,” said M. de Charlus. “I have seen a very fine print of it at Comtesse Molé’s.” The name of Comtesse Molé made a great impression upon Mme. Verdurin. “Oh! So you go to Mme. de Molé’s!” she exclaimed. She supposed that people said Comtesse Molé, Madame Molé, simply as an abbreviation, as she heard people say “the Rohans” or in contempt, as she herself said: “Madame la Trémoïlle.” She had no doubt that Comtesse Molé, who knew the Queen of Greece and the Principessa di Caprarola, had as much right as anybody to the particle, and for once in a way had decided to bestow it upon so brilliant a personage, and one who had been extremely civil to herself. And so, to make it clear that she had spoken thus on purpose and did not grudge the Comtesse her “de,” she went on: “But I had no idea that you knew Madame de Molé!” as though it had been doubly extraordinary, both that M. de Charlus should know the lady, and that Mme. Verdurin should not know that he knew her. Now society, or at least the people to whom M. de Charlus gave that name, forms a relatively homogeneous and compact whole. And so it is comprehensible that, in the incongruous vastness of the middle classes, a barrister may say to somebody who knows one of his school friends: “But how in the world do you come to know him?” whereas to be surprised at a Frenchman’s knowing the meaning of the word temple or forest would be hardly more extraordinary than to wonder at the hazards that might have brought together M. de Charlus and the Comtesse Molé. What is more, even if such an acquaintance had not been derived quite naturally from the laws that govern society, how could there be anything strange in the fact of Mme. Verdurin’s not knowing of it, since she was meeting M. de Charlus for the first time, and his relations with Mme. Molé were far from being the only thing that she did not know with regard to him, about whom, to tell the truth, she knew nothing. “Who was it that played this Chercheuse d’Esprit, my good Saniette?” asked M. Verdurin. Albeit he felt that the storm had passed, the old antiquarian hesitated before answering. “There you go,” said Mme. Verdurin, “you frighten him, you make fun of everything that he says, and then you expect him to answer. Come along, tell us who played the part, and you shall have some galantine to take home,” said Mme. Verdurin, making a cruel allusion to the penury into which Saniette had plunged himself by trying to rescue the family of a friend. “I can remember only that it was Mme. Samary who played the Zerbine,” said Saniette. “The Zerbine? What in the world is that,” M. Verdurin shouted, as though the house were on fire. “It is one of the parts in the old repertory, like Captain Fracasse, as who should say the Fire-eater, the Pedant.” “Ah, the pedant, that’s yourself. The Zerbine! No, really the man’s mad,” exclaimed M. Verdurin. Mme. Verdurin looked at her guests and laughed as though to apologise for Saniette. “The Zerbine, he imagines that everybody will know at once what it means. You are like M. de Longepierre, the stupidest man I know, who said to us quite calmly the other day ‘the Banat.’ Nobody had any idea what he meant. Finally we were informed that it was a province in Serbia.” To put an end to Saniette’s torture, which hurt me more than it hurt him, I asked Brichot if he knew what the word Balbec meant. “Balbec is probably a corruption of Dalbec,” he told me. “One would have to consult the charters of the Kings of England, Overlords of Normandy, for Balbec was held of the Barony of Dover, for which reason it was often styled Balbec d’Outré-Mer, Balbec-en-Terre. But the Barony of Dover was itself held of the Bishopric of Bayeux, and, notwithstanding the rights that were temporarily enjoyed in the abbey by the Templars, from the time of Louis d’Harcourt, Patriarch of Jerusalem and Bishop of Bayeux; it was the Bishops of that diocese who collated to the benefice of Balbec. So it was explained to me by the incumbent of Douville, a bald person, eloquent, fantastic, and