How can
people be so common as to go running after them?"
But he might, at least, have replied, like Forcheville: "Gad, she's a
duchess; there are still plenty of people who are impressed by that sort
of thing," which would at least have permitted Mme. Verdurin the final
retort, "And a lot of good may it do them!" Instead of which, Swann merely
smiled, in a manner which shewed, quite clearly, that he could not, of
course, take such an absurd suggestion seriously. M. Verdurin, who was
still casting furtive and intermittent glances at his wife, could see with
regret, and could understand only too well that she was now inflamed with
the passion of a Grand Inquisitor who cannot succeed in stamping out a
heresy; and so, in the hope of bringing Swann round to a retractation (for
the courage of one's opinions is always a form of calculating cowardice in
the eyes of the 'other side'), he broke in:
"Tell us frankly, now, what you think of them yourself. We shan't repeat
it to them, you may be sure."
To which Swann answered: "Why, I'm not in the least afraid of the Duchess
(if it is of the La Tremoilles that you're speaking).
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