I embrace you as I love you.
Alfred.
Sunday, 3 February, 1895.
My Darling:
I have passed an atrocious week. I have been without a word from you since last Sunday—that is to say, for eight days. I thought that you must be sick, then that one of the children was sick, then, in my reeling brain, I conjured up all kinds of suppositions—I imagined everything.
You can realize, my darling, all that I have suffered, all that I still suffer. In my horrible solitude, in the tragic situation in which events as unnatural as they are incomprehensible have placed me, I had at least one consolation; it was to feel that you were near me, your heart beating in unison with mine and sharing all my tortures.
The night between Thursday and Friday, above all, was appalling. I will not tell you about it; it would rend your heart. All that I can tell you is that my mind kept going over and over the accusation they had brought against me. I told myself that the thing was impossible.... Then I aroused myself, and I realized the sad truth of it all.
Oh, why cannot they open my heart and read there as one reads in an open book; there, at least, they would see the sentiments which I have always professed and which I still hold. No, no, it seems to me impossible that all this is to endure eternally. Some day the truth must come to light. By an unheard-of effort of the will I regained my self-control; I told myself that I could neither go down into my grave nor go mad with a dishonored name. I must live then, whatever may be the torture of soul to which I am a prey.
Oh, this opprobrium, this infamy covering my name! When will they be taken away?