But all this was supererogatory. What occupied my mind was not something intelligent that she might have said, but a chance remark that had aroused in me a doubt as to her actions; I tried to remember whether she had said this or that, in what tone, at what moment, in response to what words, to reconstruct the whole scene of her dialogue with me, to recall at what moment she had expressed a desire to visit the Verdurins, what word of mine had brought that look of vexation to her face. The most important event might have been at issue without my going to so much trouble to establish the truth of it, to reconstitute its precise atmosphere and colour. No doubt, after these anxieties have intensified to a degree which we find unbearable, we sometimes manage to calm them altogether for an evening. We too are invited to the party which the woman we love was to attend and the true nature of which has been obsessing us for days; she has neither looks nor words for anyone but us; we take her home and then, all our anxieties dispelled, we enjoy a repose as complete and as healing as the deep sleep that comes after a long walk. And no doubt such repose is worth a high price. But would it not have been simpler not to buy ourselves, deliberately, the preceding anxiety, and at an even higher price? Besides, we know all too well that however profound these temporary respites may be, anxiety will still prevail. Often, indeed, it is revived by a remark that was intended to set our mind at rest. The demands of our jealousy and the blindness of our credulity are greater than the woman we love could ever suppose. When, spontaneously, she swears to us that such and such a man is no more to her than a friend, she shatters us by informing us—something we never suspected—that he has been her friend. While she is telling us, in proof of her sincerity, how they had tea together that very afternoon, at each word that she utters the invisible, the unsuspected, takes shape before our eyes. She admits that he has asked her to be his mistress, and we suffer agonies at the thought that she can have listened to his overtures. She refused them, she says. But presently, when we recall her story, we wonder whether that refusal is really genuine, for there is wanting, between the different things that she said to us, that logical and necessary connexion which, more than the facts related, is the sign of truth. Besides, there was that frightening note of scorn in her voice: “I said to him no, categorically,” which is to be found in every class of society when a woman is lying. We must nevertheless thank her for having refused, encourage her by our kindness to repeat these painful confidences in the future. At the most, we may remark: “But if he had already made advances to you, why did you accept his invitation to tea?” “So that he should not hold it against me and say that I hadn’t been nice to him.” And we dare not reply that by refusing she would perhaps have been nicer to us.
Albertine alarmed me further when she said that I was quite right to say, out of regard for her reputation, that I was not her lover, since “for that matter,” she went on, “it’s perfectly true that you aren’t.” I was not perhaps her lover in the full sense of the word, but then, was I to suppose that all the things that we did together she did also with all the other men whose mistress she swore to me that she had never been? The desire to know at all costs what Albertine was thinking, whom she saw, whom she loved—how strange that I should sacrifice everything to this need, since I had felt the same need to know in the case of Gilberte names and facts which now meant nothing to me! I was perfectly well aware that in themselves Albertine’s actions were of no greater interest. It is curious that a first love, if by the fragile state in which it leaves one’s heart it paves the way for subsequent loves, does not at least provide one, in view of the identity of symptoms and sufferings, with the means of curing them. Besides, is there any need to know a fact? Are we not aware beforehand,