“What, you don’t know these splendours?” said the Duchess, referring to the rooms through which we were moving. But, having given its due meed of praise to her cousin’s “palace,” she hastened to add that she infinitely preferred her own “humble den.” “This is an admirable house to visit. But I should die of misery if I had to stay and sleep in rooms that have witnessed so many historic events. It would give me the feeling of having been left behind after closing-time, forgotten, in the Château of Blois, or Fontainebleau, or even the Louvre, with no antidote to my depression except to tell myself that I was in the room in which Monaldeschi was murdered. As a sedative, that is not good enough. Why, here comes Mme de Saint-Euverte. We’ve just been dining with her. As she is giving her great annual beanfeast tomorrow, I supposed she would be going straight to bed. But she can never miss a party. If this one had been in the country, she would have jumped on a delivery-van rather than not go to it.”
As a matter of fact, Mme de Saint-Euverte had come this evening less for the pleasure of not missing another person’s party than in order to ensure the success of her own, recruit the latest additions to her list, and, so to speak, hold an eleventh-hour review of the troops who were on the morrow to perform such brilliant manoeuvres at her garden-party. For in the course of the years the guests at the Saint-Euverte parties had almost entirely changed. The female celebrities of the Guermantes world, formerly so sparsely scattered, had—loaded with attentions by their hostess—begun gradually to bring their friends. At the same time, by a similarly gradual process, but in the opposite direction, Mme de Saint-Euverte had year by year reduced the number of persons unknown to the world of fashion. One after another had ceased to be seen. For some time the “batch” system was in operation, which enabled her, thanks to parties over which a veil of silence was drawn, to summon the unelected separately to entertain one another, which dispensed her from having to invite them with the best people. What cause had they for complaint? Were they not given (panem et circenses) light refreshments and a select musical programme? And so, in a kind of symmetry with the two exiled duchesses whom formerly, when the Saint-Euverte salon was only starting, one used to see holding up its shaky pediment like a pair of caryatids, in these later years one could distinguish, mingling with the fashionable throng, only two heterogeneous persons: old Mme de Cambremer and the architect’s wife with a fine voice who often had to be asked to sing. But, no longer knowing anybody at Mme de Saint-Euverte’s, bewailing their lost comrades, feeling out of place, they looked as though they might at any moment die of cold, like two swallows that have not migrated in time. And so, the following year, they were not invited. Mme de Franquetot made an appeal on behalf of her cousin, who was so fond of music. But as she could obtain for her no more explicit reply than the words: “Why, people can always come in and listen to music, if they like; there’s nothing criminal about that!” Mme de Cambremer did not find the invitation sufficiently pressing, and abstained.
Such a transformation having been effected by Mme de Saint-Euverte, from a leper colony to a gathering of great ladies (the latest form, apparently ultra-smart, that it had assumed), it might seem odd that the person who on the following day was to give the most brilliant party of the season should need to appear overnight to address a final appeal to her troops. But the fact was that the preeminence of Mme de Saint-Euverte’s salon existed only for those whose social life consists exclusively in reading the accounts of afternoon and evening parties in the Gaulois or the Figaro, without ever having been present at any of them. To these worldlings who see the world only through the newspapers, the enumeration of the British, Austrian, etc., ambassadresses, of the Duchesses d’Uzès, de La Trémoïlle, etc., etc., was sufficient to make them automatically imagine the Saint-Euverte salon to be the first in Paris, whereas it was among the last. Not that the reports were mendacious. The majority of the persons mentioned had indeed been present. But each of them had come in response to entreaties, civilities, favours, and with the sense of doing infinite honour to Mme de Saint-Euverte. Such salons, shunned rather than sought after, which are attended as a sort of official duty, deceive no one but the fair readers of the “Society” columns. They pass over a really fashionable party, the sort at which the hostess, who could have had all the duchesses in existence, every one of them athirst to be “numbered among the elect,” has invited only two or three. And so these hostesses, who do not send a list of their guests to the papers, ignorant or contemptuous of the power that publicity has acquired today, are considered fashionable by the Queen of Spain but are overlooked by the crowd, because the former knows and the latter does not know who they are.
Mme de Saint-Euverte was not one of these women, and, like the busy bee she was, had come to gather up for the morrow everyone who had been invited. M. de Charlus was not among these, having always refused to go to her house. But he had quarrelled with so many people that Mme de Saint-Euverte might put this down to his peculiar nature.
Of course, if it had been only Oriane, Mme de Saint-Euverte need not have put herself to the trouble, for the invitation had been given by word of mouth, and moreover accepted with that charming and deceptive grace which is practised to perfection by those Academicians from whose doors the candidate emerges with a warm glow, never doubting that he can count upon their support. But there were others as well. The Prince d’Agrigente—would he come? And Mme de Durfort? And so, keeping a weather eye open, Mme de Saint-Euverte had thought it expedient to appear on the scene in person; insinuating with some, imperative with others, to all alike she hinted in veiled words at unimaginable attractions which could never be seen anywhere again, and promised each of them that they would find at her house the person they most desired or the personage they most needed to meet. And this sort of function with which she was invested on one day in the year—like certain public offices in the ancient world—as the person who is to give on the morrow the biggest garden-party of the season, conferred upon her a momentary authority. Her lists were made up and closed, so that while she wandered slowly through the Princess’s rooms dropping into one ear after another: “You won’t forget tomorrow,” she had the ephemeral glory of averting her eyes, while continuing to smile, if she caught sight of some ugly duckling who was to be avoided or some country squire for whom the bond of a schoolboy friendship had secured admission to “Gilbert’s,” and whose presence at her garden-party would be no gain. She preferred not to speak to him so as to be able to say later on: “I issued my invitations verbally, and unfortunately I didn’t meet you anywhere.” And so she, a mere Saint-Euverte, set to work with her gimlet eyes to pick and choose among the guests at the Princess’s party. And she imagined herself, in so doing, to be every inch a Duchesse de Guermantes.
It must be said that the latter too did not enjoy to the extent that one might suppose the unrestricted use of her greetings and smiles. Sometimes, no doubt, when she withheld them, it was deliberately: “But the woman bores me to tears,” she would say. “Am I expected to talk to her about the party for the next hour?” (A duchess of swarthy complexion went past, whose ugliness and stupidity, and certain irregularities of conduct, had exiled her not from society but from certain elegant circles. “Ah!” murmured Mme de Guermantes, with the sharp, unerring glance of the connoisseur who is shown a false jewel, “so they invite that here!” From the mere sight of this semi-tarnished lady, whose face was overburdened with moles from which black hairs sprouted, Mme de Guermantes gauged the mediocrity of this party. They had been brought up together, but she had severed all relations with the lady; and responded to her greeting only with the curtest little nod. “I cannot understand,” she said to me as if to excuse herself, “how Marie-Gilbert can invite us with all these dregs. It looks as though there are people from every parish. Mélanie Pourtalès arranged things far better. She could have the Orthodox Synod and the Oratoire Protestants in her house if she liked, but at least she didn’t invite us on those days.”) But in many cases, it was fro
m timidity, fear of a scene with her husband, who did not like her to entertain artists and such-like (Marie-Gilbert took a kindly interest in dozens of them: you had to take care not to be accosted by some illustrious German diva), from some misgivings, too, with regard to nationalist feeling, which, inasmuch as she was endowed like M. de Charlus with the wit of the Guermantes, she despised from the social point of view (people were now, for the greater glory of the General Staff, sending a plebeian general in to dinner before certain dukes), but to which nevertheless, as she knew that she was considered unsound in her views, she made large concessions, even dreading the prospect of having to shake hands with Swann in these anti-semitic surroundings. With regard to this, her mind was soon set at rest, for she learned that the Prince had refused to have Swann in the house and had had “a sort of an altercation” with him. There was no risk of her having to converse in public with “poor Charles,” whom she preferred to cherish in private.
“And who in the world is that?” Mme de Guermantes exclaimed, on seeing a little lady with a slightly lost air, in a black dress so simple that you would have taken her for a pauper, make her a deep bow, as did also her husband. She did not recognise the lady and, in her insolent way, drew herself up as though offended and stared at her without responding: “Who is that person, Basin?” she asked with an air of astonishment, while M. de Guermantes, to atone for Oriane’s impoliteness, bowed to the lady and shook hands with her husband. “Why, it’s Mme de Chaussepierre, you were most impolite.” “I’ve never heard of Chaussepierre.” “Old mother Chanlivault’s nephew.” “I haven’t the faintest idea what you’re talking about. Who is the woman, and why does she bow to me?” “But you know perfectly well; she’s Mme de Charleval’s daughter, Henriette Montmorency.” “Oh, but I knew her mother quite well. She was charming, extremely intelligent. What made her go and marry all these people I’ve never heard of? You say she calls herself Mme de Chaussepierre?” she asked, spelling out the name with a questioning look, as though she were afraid of getting it wrong. The Duke looked at her sternly. “It’s not so ridiculous as you appear to think, to be called Chaussepierre! Old Chaussepierre was the brother of the aforesaid Chanlivault, of Mme de Sennecour and of the Vicomtesse du Merlerault. They’re excellent people.” “Oh, do stop,” cried the Duchess, who, like a lion-tamer, never cared to give the impression of being intimidated by the devouring glare of the animal. “Basin, you are the joy of my life. I can’t imagine where you unearthed those names, but I congratulate you on them. If I did not know Chaussepierre, I have at least read Balzac—you’re not the only one—and I’ve even read Labiche. I can appreciate Chanlivault, I do not object to Charleval, but I must confess that du Merlerault is a masterpiece. However, I must admit that Chaussepierre is not bad either. You must have gone about collecting them, it’s not possible. You mean to write a book,” she added, turning to me, “you ought to make a note of Charleval and du Merlerault. You won’t find anything better.” “He’ll find himself in the dock, and will go to prison; you’re giving him very bad advice, Oriane.” “I hope, for his own sake, that he has younger people than me at his disposal if he wishes to ask for bad advice, especially if he means to follow it. But if he means to do nothing worse than write a book!”
At some distance from us, a wonderful, proud young woman stood out delicately from the throng in a white dress, all diamonds and tulle. Mme de Guermantes watched her talking to a whole group of people fascinated by her grace.
“Your sister is the belle of the ball, as usual; she is charming tonight,” she said, as she took a chair, to the Prince de Chimay who was passing.
Colonel de Froberville (the General of that name was his uncle) came and sat down beside us, as did M. de Bréauté, while M. de Vaugoubert, after hovering about us (by an excess of politeness which he maintained even when playing tennis, thus, by dint of asking leave of the eminent personages present before hitting the ball, invariably losing the game for his partner), returned to M. de Charlus (until that moment almost concealed by the huge skirt of the Comtesse Molé, whom he professed to admire above all other women), just as several members of the latest diplomatic mission to Paris chanced to be greeting the Baron. At the sight of a young secretary with a particularly intelligent look, M. de Vaugoubert fastened on M. de Charlus a smile in which a single question visibly shone. M. de Charlus would perhaps readily have compromised someone else, but he was exasperated to feel himself compromised by a smile on another person’s lips which could have but one meaning. “I know absolutely nothing about the matter. I beg you to keep your curiosity to yourself. It leaves me more than cold. Besides, in this instance, you are making a mistake of the first order. I believe this young man to be absolutely the opposite.” Here M. de Charlus, irritated at being thus given away by a fool, was not speaking the truth. Had the Baron been correct, the secretary would have been the exception to the rule in that embassy. It was in fact composed of widely different personalities, many of them extremely second-rate, so that, if one sought to discover what could have been the motive of the selection that had brought them together, the only one possible seemed to be inversion. By setting at the head of this little diplomatic Sodom an ambassador on the contrary enamoured of women with the comic exaggeration of a revue compère, who drilled his battalion of transvestites like clockwork, the authorities seemed to have been obeying the law of contrasts. In spite of what he had beneath his nose, he did not believe in inversion. He gave an immediate proof of this by marrying his sister to a chargé d’affaires whom he believed, quite mistakenly, to be a womaniser. After this he became rather a nuisance and was soon replaced by a new Excellency, who ensured the homogeneity of the party. Other embassies sought to rival this one, but could never dispute the prize (as in the concours général, where a certain lycée always heads the list), and more than ten years had to pass before, heterogeneous attaches having been introduced into this too perfect unit, another could at last wrest the disreputable palm from it and march out in front.
Reassured as regards her fear of having to talk to Swann, Mme de Guermantes now felt merely curious as to the subject of the conversation he had had with their host. “Do you know what it was about?” the Duke asked M. de Bréauté. “I did hear,” the other replied, “that it was about a little play which the writer Bergotte produced at their house. It was a delightful show, I gather. But it seems the actor made himself up to look like Gilbert, whom, as it happens, Master Bergotte had intended to depict.” “Oh, I should have loved to see Gilbert taken off,” said the Duchess with a dreamy smile. “It was about this little performance,” M. de Bréauté went on, thrusting forward his rodent’s jaw, “that Gilbert demanded an explanation from Swann, who merely replied what everyone thought very witty: ‘Why, not at all, it wasn’t the least bit like you, you are far funnier!’ It appears, though,” M. de Bréauté continued, “that the little play was quite delightful. Mme Molé was there, and she was immensely amused.” “What, does Mme Molé go there?” said the Duchess in astonishment. “Ah! that must be Mémé’s doing. That’s what always happens in the end to that sort of house. One fine day everybody begins to flock to it, and I, who have deliberately remained aloof on principle, find myself left to mope alone in my corner.” Already, since M. de Bréauté’s speech, the Duchesse de Guermantes (with regard, if not to Swann’s house, at least to the hypothesis of encountering him at any moment) had, as we see, adopted a fresh point of view. “The explanation that you have given us,” said Colonel de Froberville to M. de Bréauté, “is entirely unfounded. I have good reason to know. The Prince purely and simply gave Swann a dressing-down and begged to instruct him, as our fathers used to say, that he was not to show his face in the house again, in view of the opinions he flaunts. And, to my mind, my uncle Gilbert was right a thousand times over, not only in giving Swann a piece of his mind—he ought to have broken off relations with a professed Dreyfusard six months ago.”
Poor M. de Vaugoubert, from being a too dawdling tennis-player h
aving now become a mere inert tennis-ball which is driven to and fro without compunction, found himself projected towards the Duchesse de Guermantes, to whom he made obeisance. He was none too well received, Oriane living in the belief that all the diplomats—or politicians—of her world were nincompoops.
M. de Froberville had inevitably benefited from the preferential position that had of late been accorded to military men in the social world. Unfortunately, if the wife of his bosom was a quite authentic relative of the Guermantes, she was also an extremely poor one, and, as he himself had lost his fortune, they went scarcely anywhere, and were the sort of people who were apt to be overlooked except on big occasions, when they had the good fortune to bury or marry a relation. Then, they did really enter into communion with high society, like those nominal Catholics who approach the altar rails only once a year. Their material situation would indeed have been deplorable had not Mme de Saint-Euverte, faithful to her affection for the late General de Froberville, done everything to help the household, providing frocks and entertainments for the two girls. But the Colonel, though generally considered a good fellow, was lacking in the spirit of gratitude. He was envious of the splendours of a benefactress who celebrated them herself without pause or restraint. The annual garden-party was for him, his wife and children a marvellous pleasure which they would not have missed for all the gold in the world, but a pleasure poisoned by the thought of the joy of self-satisfied pride that Mme de Saint-Euverte derived from it. The accounts of this garden-party in the newspapers, which, after giving a detailed report, would add with Machiavellian guile: “We shall come back to this brilliant gathering,” the complementary details about the women’s clothes, appearing for several days in succession—all this was so painful to the Frobervilles that although they were cut off from most pleasures and knew that they could count upon the pleasure of this one afternoon, they were moved every year to hope that bad weather would spoil the success of the party, to consult the barometer and to anticipate with delight the threatenings of a storm that might ruin everything.
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