C'erano intorno a
Combray due parti per le passeggiate, e così opposte che infatti non si usciva
da casa nostra per la stessa porta, se si voleva andare da una parte o
dall'altra: la parte di Méséglise-la-Vineuse, che chiamavamo anche dalla parte
di Swann, perchè si passava davanti alla tenuta di Swann andando per di là e la
parte di Guermantes.
Now there
was no connection whatsoever between the ‘little nucleus’ and the society which
Swann frequented, and a purely worldly man would have thought it hardly worth
his while, when occupying so exceptional a position in the world, to seek an
introduction to the Verdurins. But Swann was so ardent a lover that, once he
had got to know almost all the women of the aristocracy, once they had taught
him all that there was to learn, he had ceased to regard those naturalisation
papers, almost a patent of nobility, which the Faubourg Saint-Germain had
bestowed upon him, save as a sort of negotiable bond, a letter of credit with
no intrinsic value, which allowed him to improvise a status for himself in some
little hole in the country, or in some obscure quarter of Paris, where the
good-looking daughter of a local squire or solicitor had taken his fancy.
Il faut ajouter qu'une vive antipathie qu'avait depuis peu pour Gilberte la versatile duchesse pouvait [vol II.186] lui faire prendre un certain plaisir à recevoir Rachel, ce qui lui permettait en plus de proclamer une des maximes des Guermantes à savoir qu'ils étaient trop nombreux pour épouser les querelles (presque pour prendre le deuil) les uns des autres, indépendance de "je n'ai pas à" qu'avait renforcée la politique qu'on avait dû adopter à l'égard de M. de Charlus lequel, si on l'avait suivi, vous eût brouillé avec tout le monde.
