She felt that he wanted to hear her say: "Don't have him again
when you come to me," just as he might have wanted her to kiss him. So,
being in a good temper, she said it; and he was deeply moved. That
evening, when talking to M. de Charlus, with whom he had the satisfaction
of being able to speak of her openly (for the most trivial remarks that he
uttered now, even to people who had never heard of her, had always some
sort of reference to Odette), he said to him:
"I believe, all the same, that she loves me; she is so nice to me now, and
she certainly takes an interest in what I do."
And if, when he was starting off for her house, getting into his carriage
with a friend whom he was to drop somewhere on the way, his friend said:
"Hullo! that isn't Loredan on the box?" with what melancholy joy would
Swann answer him:
"Oh! Good heavens, no! I can tell you, I daren't take Loredan when I go to
the Rue La Perouse; Odette doesn't like me to have Loredan, she thinks he
doesn't suit me. What on earth is one to do? Women, you know, women. My
dear fellow, she would be furious. Oh, lord, yes; I've only to take Remi
there; I should never hear the last of it!"
These new manners, indifferent, listless, irritable, which Odette now
adopted with Swann, undoubtedly made him suffer; but he did not realise
how much he suffered; since it had been with a regular progression, day
after day, that Odette had chilled towards him, it was only by directly
contrasting what she was to-day with what she had been at first that he
could have measured the extent of the change that had taken place.
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