As she drew his attention, now to the
fiery-tongued dragons painted upon a bowl or stitched upon a fire-screen,
now to a fleshy cluster of orchids, now to a dromedary of inlaid
silver-work with ruby eyes, which kept company, upon her mantelpiece, with
a toad carved in jade, she would pretend now to be shrinking from the
ferocity of the monsters or laughing at their absurdity, now blushing at
the indecency of the flowers, now carried away by an irresistible desire
to run across and kiss the toad and dromedary, calling them 'darlings.'
And these affectations were in sharp contrast to the sincerity of some of
her attitudes, notably her devotion to Our Lady of the Laghetto who had
once, when Odette was living at Nice, cured her of a mortal illness, and
whose medal, in gold, she always carried on her person, attributing to it
unlimited powers. She poured out Swann's tea, inquired "Lemon or cream?"
and, on his answering "Cream, please," went on, smiling, "A cloud!" And as
he pronounced it excellent, "You see, I know just how you like it." This
tea had indeed seemed to Swann, just as it seemed to her, something
precious, and love is so far obliged to find some justification for
itself, some guarantee of its duration in pleasures which, on the
contrary, would have no existence apart from love and must cease with its
passing, that when he left her, at seven o'clock, to go and dress for the
evening, all the way home, sitting bolt upright in his brougham, unable to
repress the happiness with which the afternoon's adventure had filled him,
he kept on repeating to himself: "What fun it would be to have a little
woman like that in a place where one could always be certain of finding,
what one never can be certain of finding, a really good cup of tea.
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