XXVI.
EDGAR DE MEILHAN
to the
PRINCE DE MONBERT,
Poste Restante (Rouen).
Richeport, July 23d 18—.
I am mad with rage, wild with grief! That Louise! I do not know what keeps me from setting fire to the house that conceals her! I must go away; I shall commit some insane act, some crime, if I remain! I have written her letter after letter; I have tried in every way to see her; all my efforts unavailing! It is like beating your head against a wall! Coquette and prude!—appalling combination, too common a monstrosity, alas!
She will not see me! all is over! nothing can overcome her stupid, obstinacy which she takes for virtue. If I could only have spoken to her once, I should have said—I don't know what, but I should have found words to make her return to me. But she entrenches herself behind her obstinacy; she knows that I would vanquish her; she has no good arguments with which to answer me; for I love her madly, desperately, frantically! Passion is eloquent. She flies from me! O perfidy and cowardice! she dare not face the misery she has caused, and veils her eyes when she strikes!
I am going to America. I will dull my mental grief by physical exhaustion; I will subdue the soul through the body; I will ascend the giant rivers whose bosoms bloom with thousands of islands; penetrate into the virgin forests where no trapper has yet set his foot; I will hunt the buffalo with the savage, and swim upon that ocean of shaggy heads and sharp horns; I will gallop at full speed over the prairie, pursued by the smoke of the burning grass. If the memory of Louise refuses to leave me, I will stop my horse and await the flames! I will carry my love so far away that it must perforce leave me.
I feel it, my life is wrecked for ever!—I cannot live in a world where Louise is not mine! Perhaps the young universe may contain a panacea for my anguish! Solitude shall pour its balm in my wound; once away from this civilization which stifles me, nature will cradle me in her motherly arms; the elements will resume their empire over me; ocean, sky, flowers, foliage will draw off the feverish electricity that excites my nerves; I will become absorbed in the grand whole, I will no longer live; I will vegetate and succeed in attaining the content of the plant that opens its leaves to the sun. I feel that I must stop my brain, suspend the beating of my heart, or I shall go raving mad.
I shall sail from Havre. A year from now write to me at the English fort in the Rocky Mountains, and I will join you in whatever corner of the globe you have gone to bury your despair over the loss of Irene de Chateaudun!
EDGAR DE MEILHAN