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By Root 2035 0

the ruffians he brings to his house.” And as Brichot, who often went to the Baron’s, began to protest, Mme Verdurin, growing more and more animated, exclaimed: “But I assure you! You can take my word for it,” an expression with which she habitually sought to give weight to an assertion flung out more or less at random. “He’ll be found murdered in his bed one of these days, as those people always are. It may not quite come to that, perhaps, because he’s in the clutches of that Jupien whom he had the impudence to send to me and who’s an ex-convict—yes, really, I know it for a positive fact. He has a hold on him because of some letters which are perfectly dreadful, it seems. I got it from somebody who has seen them and who told me: ‘You’d be sick on the spot if you saw them.’ That’s how Jupien gets him to toe the line and makes him cough up all the money he wants. I’d sooner die than live in the state of terror Charlus lives in. In any case, if Morel’s family decides to bring an action against him, I’ve no desire to be dragged in as an accessory. If he goes on, it will be at his own risk, but I shall have done my duty. What is one to do? It’s no joke, I can tell you.”

And, already agreeably excited at the thought of her husband’s impending conversation with the violinist, Mme Verdurin said to me: “Ask Brichot whether I’m not a courageous friend, and whether I’m not capable of sacrificing myself to save my comrades.” (She was alluding to the circumstances in which she had forced him in the nick of time to break first of all with his laundress and then with Mme de Cambremer, as a result of which Brichot had gone almost completely blind and, people said, had taken to morphine.)

“An incomparable friend, farsighted and valiant,” replied the Professor with ingenuous fervour.

“Mme Verdurin prevented me from doing something extremely foolish,” Brichot told me when she had left us. “She doesn’t hesitate to strike at the roots. She’s an interventionist, as our friend Cottard would say. I admit, however, that the thought that the poor Baron is still unconscious of the blow that is about to fall upon him distresses me deeply. He’s completely mad about that boy. If Mme Verdurin succeeds, there’s a man who is going to be very miserable. However, I’m not at all sure she won’t fail. I fear that she may only succeed in sowing discord between them, which in the end, without separating them, will only make them break with her.”

It was often thus with Mme Verdurin and her faithful. But it was evident that the need she felt to preserve their friendship was more and more dominated by the requirement that this friendship should never be thwarted by the friendship they might feel for one another. She had no objection to homosexuality so long as it did not tamper with the orthodoxy of the little clan, but, like the Church, she preferred any sacrifice rather than a concession on orthodoxy. I was beginning to be afraid that her irritation with myself might be due to her having heard that I had prevented Albertine from going to her that day, and that she might presently set to work, if she had not already begun, upon the same task of separating her from me which her husband, in the case of Charlus, was now going to attempt with the violinist.

“Come along, get hold of Charlus, find some excuse, there’s no time to lose,” said Mme Verdurin, “and whatever you do, don’t let him come back here until I send for you. Ah! what an evening,” she added, revealing the true cause of her rage. “Performing a masterpiece in front of those nitwits. I don’t include the Queen of Naples, she’s intelligent, she’s a nice woman” (which meant: “She was nice to me”). “But the others. Ah! it’s enough to drive you mad. After all, I’m no longer a schoolgirl. When I was young, people used to tell me that one had to put up with a bit of boredom, so I made an effort; but now, ah! no, I just can’t help it, I’m old enough to do as I please, life’s too short. Allow myself to be bored stiff, listen to idiots, smile, pretend to think them intelligent—no, I simply can’t do it. Go along,