I wrote to you some days ago to tell you that I had not yet received your letters of October. At last, after a long and terrible time of waiting, I have just received your letters of October, and at the same time those of November.
How must I sometimes cause you pain by my letters, my poor darling, and you suffer so much without that! But at times it is stronger than I am, so eager am I to see the end of this horrible drama, for I would willingly give my blood, drop by drop, to learn at last that my innocence is recognized, that the guilty ones, doubly criminal as they are, are unmasked.
But when I suffer too much, when I faint before this life of deluding memories, of restraint of all my intellectual and physical forces, I murmur to myself the three names that are my talisman, that make me live on—yours, those of our dear little Pierre, and Jeanne.
Let us hope that we shall soon see the end of this awful drama. I cannot write much to you, for what can I tell you that is not already common to us? I live in the thought of you, and my soul is with you from morning till night, and from night till morning. All my faculties are straining toward the end that must be attained, that you will attain—all my honor as a soldier, all the honor of our children.
Perhaps I give you extravagant advice at times, the issue of the dreams of a lonely exile who is suffering martyrdom, a martyrdom whose tortures are made up not only of his own anguish, but of yours, of the anguish you all suffer ... and nevertheless I know perfectly well that you can judge far better than I can of the means to attain my complete, my absolute, rehabilitation. I am going to pass a good part of the night, of the long, long days in reading and re-reading your dear letters, in living with you, in sustaining you in my thoughts with all my strength, with all my ardor, with all the force of my will.
My health is good; do not be anxious on that score. Moreover, to reassure you, I have asked permission to send you a dispatch. I trust that it will reach you. I hope that your health, that the health of you all, is also good. You must sustain yourself physically to have the force necessary to arrive at the goal.
Let us hope that soon, near to one another and with our dear children at our side, we may forget the events of this horrible tragedy. You must all tell yourselves, too, that if at times I cry out in anguish, it is because I am always as silent as the dead. I have only the paper, and these cries of grief, these cries of suffering—call them what you will—my heart is always valiant, even if it cannot always be silent. So I am waiting just as you asked me to, and I will wait until that day when the light shall at last shine out.
Long and tender kisses to our dear children. I often gaze at their portraits and I try to see them as they are to-day.
Ah, dear Lucie, remember that in my moments of distress I have these three names, that are my support, my safeguard, that raise me when I fall, for our children must enter upon life with heads erect.
I embrace you as I love you, with all my strength.