She's just
going. We've been waiting for you, to make up a prisoner's base."
While I had been going up the Avenue des Champs-Elysees, Gilberte had
arrived by the Rue Boissy-d'Anglas, Mademoiselle having taken advantage of
the fine weather to go on some errand of her own; and M. Swann was coming
to fetch his daughter. And so it was my fault; I ought not to have strayed
from the lawn; for one never knew for certain from what direction Gilberte
would appear, whether she would be early or late, and this perpetual
tension succeeded in making more impressive not only the Champs-Elysees in
their entirety, and the whole span of the afternoon, like a vast expanse
of space and time, on every point and at every moment of which it was
possible that the form of Gilberte might appear, but also that form
itself, since behind its appearance I felt that there lay concealed the
reason for which it had shot its arrow into my heart at four o'clock
instead of at half-past two; crowned with a smart hat, for paying calls,
instead of the plain cap, for games; in front of the Ambassadeurs and not
between the two puppet-shows; I divined one of those occupations in which
I might not follow Gilberte, occupations that forced her to go out or to
stay at home, I was in contact with the mystery of her unknown life.
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