In Search of Lost Time, Volume III_ The Guermantes Way - Marcel Proust [338]
“What sort of person is the Princess?” I asked.
“Why, you know quite well, since you’ve seen her here, that she’s as beautiful as the day, and also a bit of a fool, but very nice, in spite of all her Germanic high-and-mightiness, full of good nature and gaffes.”
Swann was too shrewd not to perceive that the Duchess was trying to show off the “Guermantes wit,” and at no great cost to herself, for she was only serving up in a less perfect form a few of her old quips. Nevertheless, to prove to the Duchess that he appreciated her intention to be funny, and as though she had really succeeded in being funny, he gave a somewhat forced smile, causing me by this particular form of insincerity the same embarrassment as I used to feel long ago when I heard my parents discussing with M. Vinteuil the corruption of certain sections of society (when they knew very well that a corruption far greater reigned at Montjouvain), or simply on hearing Legrandin embellishing his utterances for the benefit of fools, choosing delicate epithets which he knew perfectly well would not be understood by a rich or smart but illiterate audience.
“Come now, Oriane, what on earth are you saying?” broke in M. de Guermantes. “Marie a fool? Why, she’s read everything, and she’s as musical as a fiddle.”
“But, my poor little Basin, you’re as innocent as a new-born babe. As if one couldn’t be all that, and rather an idiot as well. Idiot is too strong a word; no, she’s in the clouds, she’s Hesse-Darmstadt, Holy Roman Empire, and wa-wa-wa. Even her pronunciation gets on my nerves. But I quite admit that she’s a charming loony. In the first place, the very idea of stepping down from her German throne to go and marry, in the most bourgeois way, a private individual. It’s true that she chose him! Ah, but of course,” she went on, turning to me, “you don’t know Gilbert. Let me give you an idea of him: he took to his bed once because I had left a card on Mme Carnot . . . But, my dear Charles” (the Duchess changed the subject when she saw that the story of the card left on the Carnots appeared to irritate M. de Guermantes), “you know, you’ve never sent me that photograph of our Knights of Rhodes, whom I’ve learned to love through you and with whom I’m so anxious to become acquainted.” The Duke meanwhile had not taken his eyes from his wife’s face: “Oriane, you might at least tell the story properly and not cut out half. I ought to explain,” he corrected, addressing Swann, “that the British Ambassadress at that time, who was a very worthy woman but lived rather in the moon and was in the habit of making up these odd combinations, conceived the distinctly quaint idea of inviting us with the President and his wife. Even Oriane was rather surprised, especially as the Ambassadress knew quite enough of the same sort of people as us not to invite us to such an ill-assorted gathering. There was a minister there who’s a swindler . . . however I’ll draw a veil over all that—the fact was that we hadn’t been warned, we were trapped, and to be honest I’m bound to admit that all these people behaved most civilly. Still, that was quite enough of a good thing. But Mme de Guermantes, who does not often do me the honour of consulting me, felt it incumbent upon her to leave a card in the course of the following week at the Elysée. Gilbert may perhaps have gone rather far in regarding it as a stain upon our name. But it must not be forgotten that, politics apart, M. Carnot, who incidentally filled his post quite respectably, was the grandson of a member of the revolutionary tribunal which slaughtered eleven of our people in a single day.”
“In that case, Basin, why used you to go every week to dine at Chantilly? The Duc d’Aumale was just as much the grandson of a member of the revolutionary tribunal, with this difference,