She felt “spoon” to be too hard a word to apply to the piece of silver which measured out her syrups, and said, in consequence, “spune”; she would have been afraid of hurting the feelings of the sweet singer of Télémaque by calling him bluntly Fénelon⁠—as I myself said with a clear conscience, having had as a friend the dearest and cleverest of men, good and gallant, never to be forgotten by any that knew him, Bertrand de Fénelon⁠—and never said anything but “Fénélon,” feeling that the acute accent added a certain softness. The far from soft son-in-law of this Madame Poussin, whose name I have forgotten, having been a lawyer at Combray, ran off with the contents of the safe, and relieved my uncle among others of a considerable sum of money. But most of the people of Combray were on such friendly terms with the rest of the family that no coolness ensued and her neighbours said merely that they were sorry for Madame Poussin. She never entertained, but whenever people passed by her railings they would stop to admire the delicious shade of her trees, which was the only thing that could be made out. She gave us no trouble at Balbec, where I encountered her only once, at a moment when she was saying to a daughter who was biting her nails: “When they begin to fester, that will be a pretty kettle of fish.”