Swann's Way

to him with the vain presence of this woman, whom he might approach, yet
never dared embrace.

She was not at Prevost's; he must search for her, then, in every
restaurant upon the boulevards. To save time, while he went in one
direction, he sent in the other his coachman Rémi (Rizzo's Doge Loredan)
for whom he presently--after a fruitless search--found himself waiting
at the spot where the carriage was to meet him. It did not appear, and
Swann tantalised himself with alternate pictures of the approaching
moment, as one in which Rémi would say to him: "Sir, the lady is there,"
or as one in which Rémi would say to him: "Sir, the lady was not in
any of the cafés." And so he saw himself faced by the close of his
evening--a thing uniform, and yet bifurcated by the intervening accident
which would either put an end to his agony by discovering Odette, or
would oblige him to abandon any hope of finding her that night, to
accept the necessity of returning home without having seen her.

The coachman returned; but, as he drew up opposite him, Swann asked,
not "Did you find the lady?" but "Remind me, to-morrow, to order in
some more firewood. I am sure we must be running short." Perhaps he had