The Modern Library In Search of Lost Time, Complete and Unabridged : 6-Book Bundle (19 page)

“What is this I have been hearing, Father, about a painter setting up his easel in your church, and copying one of the windows? Old as I am, I can safely say that I have never heard of such a thing in all my life! What is the world coming to! And the ugliest thing in the whole church, too.”

“I will not go so far as to say that it’s quite the ugliest, for although there are certain things in Saint-Hilaire which are well worth a visit, there are others that are very old now in my poor basilica, the only one in all the diocese that has never even been restored. God knows our porch is dirty and antiquated, but still it has a certain majesty. I’ll even grant you the Esther tapestries, which personally I wouldn’t give a brass farthing for, but which the experts place immediately after the ones at Sens. I can quite see, too, that apart from certain details which are—well, a trifle realistic—they show features which testify to a genuine power of observation. But don’t talk to me about the windows. Is it common sense, I ask you, to leave up windows which shut out all the daylight and even confuse the eyes by throwing patches of colour, to which I should be hard put to it to give a name, on to a floor in which there are not two slabs on the same level and which they refuse to renew for me because, if you please, those are the tombstones of the Abbots of Combray and the Lords of Guermantes, the old Counts, you know, of Brabant, direct ancestors of the present Duc de Guermantes and of the Duchess too since she was a Mademoiselle de Guermantes who married her cousin?”
(My grandmother, whose steadfast refusal to take any interest in “persons” had ended in her confusing all their names and titles, whenever anyone mentioned the Duchesse de Guermantes used to make out that she must be related to Mme de Villeparisis. The whole family would then burst out laughing; and she would attempt to justify herself by harking back to some invitation to a christening or funeral: “I feel sure that there was a Guermantes in it somewhere.” And for once I would side with the others against her, refusing to believe that there could be any connexion between her school-friend and the descendant of Geneviève de Brabant.)

“Look at Roussainville,” the Curé went on. “It’s nothing more nowadays than a parish of tenant farmers, though in olden times the place must have had a considerable importance from its trade in felt hats and clocks. (I’m not certain, by the way, of the etymology of Roussainville. I’m rather inclined to think that the name was originally Rouville, from
Radulfi villa
, analogous, don’t you see, to Châteauroux,
Castrum Radulfi
, but we’ll talk about that some other time.) Anyway, the church there has superb windows, almost all modern, including that most imposing ‘Entry of Louis-Philippe into Combray’ which would be more in keeping, surely, at Combray itself and which is every bit as good, I understand, as the famous windows at Chartres. Only yesterday I met Dr Percepied’s brother, who goes in for these things, and he told me that he regarded it as a very fine piece of work. But, as I said to this artist, who, by the way, seems to be a most civil fellow, and is a regular virtuoso, it appears, with the brush, what on earth do you find so extraordinary
in this window, which is if anything a little dingier than the rest?”

“I am sure that if you were to ask the Bishop,” said my aunt in a resigned tone, for she had begun to feel that she was going to be “tired,” “he would never refuse you a new window.”

“You may depend upon it, Mme Octave,” replied the Curé. “Why, it was his Lordship himself who started the outcry about the window, by proving that it represented Gilbert the Bad, a Lord of Guermantes and a direct descendant of Geneviève de Brabant who was a daughter of the House of Guermantes, receiving absolution from Saint Hilaire.”

“But I don’t see where Saint Hilaire comes in.”

“Why yes, have you never noticed, in the corner of the window, a lady in a yellow robe? Well, that’s Saint Hilaire, who is also known, you will remember, in certain parts of the country as Saint Illiers, Saint Hélier, and even, in the Jura, Saint Ylie. But these various corruptions of
Sanctus Hilarius
are by no means the most curious that have occurred in the names of the blessed. Take, for example, my good Eulalie, the case of your own patron,
Sancta Eulalia;
do you know what she has become in Burgundy? Saint Eloi, nothing more nor less! The lady has become a gentleman. Do you hear that, Eulalie—after you’re dead they’ll make a man of you!”

“His Reverence will always have his little joke.”

“Gilbert’s brother, Charles the Stammerer, was a pious prince, but, having early in life lost his father, Pepin the Mad, who died as a result of his mental infirmity, he wielded the supreme power with all the arrogance of a
man who has not been subjected to discipline in his youth, so much so that, whenever he saw a man in a town whose face he didn’t like, he would massacre the entire population. Gilbert, wishing to be avenged on Charles, caused the church at Combray to be burned down, the original church, that was, which Théodebert, when he and his court left the country residence he had near here, at Thiberzy (which is, of course,
Theodeberciacus
), to go and fight the Burgundians, had promised to build over the tomb of Saint Hilaire if the saint brought him victory. Nothing remains of it now but the crypt, into which Théodore has probably taken you, for Gilbert burned all the rest. Finally, he defeated the unlucky Charles with the aid of William the Conqueror,” (the Curé pronounced it “Will’am”), “which is why so many English still come to visit the place. But he does not appear to have managed to win the affection of the people of Combray, for they fell upon him as he was coming out from mass, and cut off his head. Théodore has a little book he lends people that tells the whole story.

“But what is unquestionably the most remarkable thing about our church is the view from the belfry, which is full of grandeur. Certainly in your case, since you are not very strong, I should never recommend you to climb our ninety-seven steps, just half the number they have in the famous cathedral at Milan. It’s quite tiring enough for the most active person, especially as you have to bend double if you don’t wish to crack your skull, and you collect all the cobwebs off the staircase on your clothes. In any case you should be well wrapped up,” he went on, without noticing my aunt’s indignation at the mere suggestion that she could ever be capable of climbing into his
belfry, “for there’s a strong breeze there once you get to the top. Some people even assure me that they have felt the chill of death up there. However, on Sundays there are always clubs and societies who come, often from a long way off, to admire our beautiful panorama, and they always go home charmed. For instance, next Sunday, if the weather holds, you’ll be sure to find a lot of people there, for Rogation-tide. No doubt about it, the view from up there is entrancing, with what you might call vistas over the plain, which have quite a special charm of their own. On a clear day you can see as far as Verneuil. And then another thing; you can see at the same time places which you normally see one without the other, as, for instance, the course of the Vivonne and the irrigation ditches at Saint-Assise-lès-Combray, which are separated by a screen of tall trees, or again, the various canals at Jouy-le-Vicomte, which is
Gaudiacus vice comitis
, as of course you know. Each time I’ve been to Jouy I’ve seen a bit of canal in one place, and then I’ve turned a corner and seen another, but when I saw the second I could no longer see the first. I tried to put them together in my mind’s eye; it was no good. But from the top of Saint-Hilaire it’s quite another matter—a regular network in which the place is enclosed. Only you can’t see any water; it’s as though there were great clefts slicing up the town so neatly that it looks like a loaf of bread which still holds together after it has been cut up. To get it all quite perfect you would have to be in both places at once; up at the top of the steeple of Saint-Hilaire and down there at Jouy-le-Vicomte.”

The Curé had so exhausted my aunt that no sooner had he gone than she was obliged to send Eulalie away.

“Here, my poor Eulalie,” she said in a feeble voice, drawing a coin from a small purse which lay ready to her hand. “This is just something so that you won’t forget me in your prayers.”

“Oh, but, Mme Octave, I don’t think I ought to; you know very well that I don’t come here for that!” So Eulalie would answer, with the same hesitation and the same embarrassment, every Sunday as though it were the first, and with a look of vexation which delighted my aunt and never offended her, for if it happened that Eulalie, when she took the money, looked a little less peevish than usual, my aunt would remark afterwards, “I cannot think what has come over Eulalie; I gave her the same as I always give, and she did not look at all pleased.”

“I don’t think she has very much to complain of, all the same,” Françoise would sigh grimly, for she had a tendency to regard as petty cash all that my aunt might give her for herself or her children, and as treasure riotously squandered on an ungrateful wretch the little coins slipped Sunday after Sunday into Eulalie’s hand, but so discreetly that Françoise never managed to see them. It was not that she wanted for herself the money my aunt bestowed on Eulalie. She already enjoyed a sufficiency of all that my aunt possessed, in the knowledge that the wealth of the mistress automatically elevates and enhances the maid in the eyes of the world, and that she herself was renowned and glorified throughout Combray, Jouy-le-Vicomte, and other places, on account of my aunt’s many farms, her frequent and prolonged visits from the Curé, and the astonishing number of bottles of Vichy water which she consumed. Françoise was avaricious only for my aunt; had she had control over my
aunt’s fortune (which would have more than satisfied her highest ambition) she would have guarded it from the assaults of strangers with a maternal ferocity. She would, however, have seen no great harm in what my aunt, whom she knew to be incurably generous, allowed herself to give away, had she given only to those who were already rich. Perhaps she felt that such persons, not being actually in need of my aunt’s presents, could not be suspected of simulating affection for her on that account. Besides, presents offered to persons of great wealth and position, such as Mme Sazerat, M. Swann, M. Legrandin and Mme Goupil, to persons of the “same rank” as my aunt, and who would naturally “mix with her,” seemed to Françoise to be included among the ornamental customs of that strange and brilliant life led by rich people, who hunt and shoot and give balls and pay each other visits, a life which she would contemplate with an admiring smile. But it was by no means the same thing if the beneficiaries of my aunt’s generosity were of the class whom Françoise would label “folk like me” or “folk no better than me” and who were those she most despised, unless they called her “Madame Françoise” and considered themselves her inferiors. And when she saw that, despite all her warnings, my aunt continued to do exactly as she pleased, and to fling money away with both hands (or so at least Françoise believed) on undeserving creatures, she began to find that the presents she herself received from my aunt were very small compared to the imaginary riches squandered upon Eulalie. There was not, in the neighbourhood of Combray, a farm of such prosperity and importance that Françoise doubted Eulalie’s ability to buy it, without thinking twice, out of the capital which her
visits to my aunt “brought in.” (It must be said that Eulalie had formed an exactly similar estimate of the vast and secret hoards of Françoise.) Every Sunday, after Eulalie had left, Françoise would utter malevolent prophecies about her. She hated Eulalie, but was at the same time afraid of her, and so felt bound, when she was there, to show her a friendly face. She would make up for it, however, after the other’s departure; never, it is true, alluding to her by name, but hinting at her in Sibylline oracles or in maxims of a comprehensive character, like those of Ecclesiastes, so worded that their special application could not escape my aunt. After peering round the edge of the curtain to see whether Eulalie had shut the front-door behind her, “Flatterers know how to make themselves agreeable and to feather their nests, but patience, one fine day the good Lord will be avenged upon them!” she would declaim, with the sidelong, insinuating glance of Joas thinking exclusively of Athalia when he says:

But when the Curé had come as well, and by his interminable visit had drained my aunt’s strength, Françoise would follow Eulalie from the room, saying: “Mme Octave, I will leave you to rest; you look really tired out.”

And my aunt would answer her not a word, breathing a sigh so faint that it seemed it must prove her last, and lying there with closed eyes, as though already dead. But hardly had Françoise arrived downstairs when four peals of a bell pulled with the utmost violence reverberated through the house, and my aunt, sitting bolt upright
in her bed, would call out: “Has Eulalie gone yet? Would you believe it; I forgot to ask her whether Mme Goupil arrived in church before the Elevation. Run after her, quick!”

But Françoise would return alone, having failed to overtake Eulalie.

“It is most provoking,” my aunt would say, shaking her head. “The one important thing that I had to ask her.”

In this way life went by for my aunt Léonie, always the same, in the gentle uniformity of what she called, with a pretence of deprecation but with a deep tenderness, her “little jog-trot.” Respected by all and sundry, not merely in her own house, where every one of us, having learned the futility of recommending a healthier mode of life, had become gradually resigned to its observance, but in the village as well, where, three streets away, a tradesman who had to hammer nails into a packing-case would send first to Françoise to make sure that my aunt was not “resting.” This “jog-trot” was none the less brutally disturbed on one occasion that year. Like a fruit hidden among its leaves, which has grown and ripened unobserved and falls of its own accord, there came upon us one night the kitchen-maid’s confinement. Her pains were unbearable, and, as there was no midwife in Combray, Françoise had to set off before dawn to fetch one from Thiberzy. My aunt was unable to rest owing to the cries of the girl, and as Françoise, though the distance was not great, was very late in returning, her services were greatly missed. And so, in the course of the morning, my mother said to me: “Run upstairs and see if your aunt wants anything.”