with him in the train, generally found that the Grand Hotel was rather too far away, but, as there was nothing before Balbec except small beach-resorts with uncomfortable villas, had yielded to a preference for luxury and well-being and resigned himself to the long journey when, as the train came to a standstill at Maineville, he suddenly saw looming up in front of him the Palace, which he could never have suspected of being a house of ill fame. “Well, don’t let us go any further,” he would invariably say to Mme Cottard, a woman well-known for her practical judgment and sound advice. “There’s the very thing I want. What’s the point of going on to Balbec, where I certainly shan’t find anything better. I can tell at a glance that it has every modern comfort, and I can perfectly well invite Mme Verdurin there, for I intend, in return for her hospitality, to give a few little parties in her honour. She won’t have so far to come as if I stay at Balbec. It seems to me the very place for her, and for your wife, my dear Professor. There are bound to be reception rooms, and we shall bring the ladies there. Between you and me, I can’t imagine why Mme Verdurin didn’t come and settle here instead of taking La Raspelière. It’s far healthier than an old house like La Raspelière, which is bound to be damp, and isn’t clean either; they have no hot water laid on, one can never get a wash. Maineville strikes me as being far more agreeable. Mme Verdurin could have played her role as hostess here to perfection. However, tastes differ; anyhow I intend to remain here. Mme Cottard, won’t you come along with me? We shall have to be quick, of course, for the train will be starting again in a minute. You can pilot me through this establishment, which you doubtless know inside out, since you must often have visited it. It’s an ideal setting for you.” The others would have the greatest difficulty in making the unfortunate new arrival hold his tongue, and still more in preventing him from leaving the train, while he, with the obstinacy which often arises from a gaffe, would insist, would gather his luggage together and refuse to listen to a word until they had assured him that neither Mme Verdurin nor Mme Cottard would ever come to call upon him there. “Anyhow, I’m going to take up residence there. Mme Verdurin can write to me if she wishes to see me.”
The incident that concerns Morel was of a more highly specialised order. There were others, but I confine myself at present, as the little train halts and the porter calls out “Doncières,” “Grattevast,” “Maineville” etc., to noting down the particular memory that the watering-place or garrison town recalls to me. I have already mentioned Maineville (media villa) and the importance that it had acquired from that luxurious house of prostitution which had recently been built there, not without arousing futile protests from the local mothers. But before I proceed to say why Maineville is associated in my memory with Morel and M. de Charlus, I must mention the disproportion (which I shall have occasion to examine more thoroughly later on) between the importance that Morel attached to keeping certain hours free, and the triviality of the occupations to which he pretended to devote them, this same disproportion recurring amid the explanations of another sort which he gave to M. de Charlus. He who played the disinterested artist for the Baron’s benefit (and might do so with impunity in view of the generosity of his patron), when he wished to have the evening to himself in order to give a lesson, etc., never failed to add to his excuse the following words, uttered with a smile of cupidity: “Besides, there may be forty francs to be got out of it. That’s not to be sneezed at. You must let me go, because as you see it’s in my interest. Damn it all, I haven’t got a regular income like you, I have my way to make in the world, it’s a chance of earning a little money.” In professing his anxiety to give his lesson, Morel was not altogether insincere. For one thing, it is false to say that money has no colour. A new way