In Search of Lost Time by Marcel Proust Page A

offering one’s hospitality, a respect that would perhaps have touched me in a book but that always irritated me on her lips, because of the solemn and tender tones she adopted in speaking of it, and especially so this evening, when the sacred character she conferred on the dinner might have the effect of making her refuse to disturb its ceremonial. But to give myself a better chance, I did not hesitate to lie and tell her that it was not in the least I who had wanted to write to Mama, but that it was Mama who, as she said goodnight to me, had exhorted me not to forget to send her an answer concerning an object she had asked me to look for; and she would certainly be very annoyed if this note was not delivered to her. I think Françoise did not believe me, for, like those primitive men whose senses were so much more powerful than ours, she could immediately discern, from signs imperceptible to us, any truth that wewanted to hide from her; she looked at the envelope for five minutes as if the examination of the paper and the appearance of the writing would inform her about the nature of the contents or tell her which article of her code she ought to apply. Then she went out with an air of resignation that seemed to signify: ‘If it isn’t a misfortune for parents to have a child like that!’ She came back after a moment to tell me that they were still only at the ice cream stage, that it was impossible for the butler to deliver the letter right away in front of everyone, but that, when the mouth-rinsing bowls were put round, they would find a way to hand it to Mama. Instantly my anxiety subsided; it was now no longer, as it had been a moment ago, until tomorrow that I had left my mother, since my little note, though it would no doubt annoy her (and doubly so because this stratagem would make me ridiculous in Swann’s eyes), would allow me, invisible and enraptured, at least to enter the same room, would whisper about me in her ear; since that forbidden, hostile dining-room, where, just a moment before, even the ice cream – the ‘
granité
’ 22 – and the rinsing bowls seemed to me to contain pleasures that were noxious and mortally sad because Mama was enjoying them so far away from me, was opening itself to me and, like a fruit that has turned sweet and bursts its skin, was about to propel, to project, all the way to my intoxicated heart, Mama’s attention while she read my lines. Now I was no longer separated from her; the barriers were down, an exquisite thread joined us. And that was not all: Mama would probably come!
    I thought that Swann would surely have laughed at the anguish I had just suffered if he had read my letter and guessed its purpose; yet, on the contrary, as I learned later, a similar anguish was the torment of long years of his life and no one, perhaps, could have understood me as well as he; in his case, the anguish that comes from the feeling that the person you love is in a place of enjoyment where you are not, where you cannot follow, came to him through love, to which it is in some sense predestined, by which it will be hoarded, appropriated; but when, as in my case, this anguish comes into us before love has made its appearance in our life, it drifts as it waits for it, indeterminate and free, without a particular assignment, at the service of one feeling one day, of another the next, sometimes of filial tenderness or affection fora friend. And the joy with which I served my first apprenticeship when Françoise came back to tell me my letter would be delivered Swann too had known well, that deceptive joy which some friend, some relative of the woman we love can give us when, arriving at the house or theatre where she is, for some dance, gala evening or première at which he is going to meet her, this friend sees us wandering outside, desperately waiting for some opportunity to communicate with her. He recognizes us, speaks to us familiarly, asks us what