It was a letter from the adventuress, friend No. 1. The subject of it was my insanity, mockingly, contemptuously discussed; it concluded with a prayer that God might soon deliver "her dear Marie" from her martyrdom by extinguishing the last glimmer of my reason.
I copied the worst passages, re-sealed the envelope, and laid the letter aside, ready to hand it to my wife with the evening mail. When the time came I gave it to her, and sat down by her side to watch her while she read it.
When she came to the part where the writer prayed for my death—at the top of the second page—she burst into shrill laughter.
So my beloved wife saw no other way out of her difficulties than my death. It was her only hope of escape from the consequences of her indiscretions. When I was gone, she would cash my life insurance and receive the pension due to the widow of a famous writer; then she would marry again, perhaps, or remain a gay widow all her life ... my beloved wife....
Moriturus sum! I resolved to hasten the catastrophe by a liberal recourse to absinthe, sole source of happiness now, and in the meantime play billiards to calm my excited brain.
A fresh complication confronted me, worse, if possible, than any of the previous ones. The authoress who had pretended to be in love with me made a conquest of Marie, and Marie became so devoted to her that her attachment gave rise to a great deal of gossip. This roused the jealousy of the authoress's former "inseparable," a fact which was not calculated to contradict the ugly rumours.
One evening Marie asked me whether I was in love with her friend....
"No, on the contrary! A common tippler! You can't be serious!"
"I am mad on her," she replied. "It is strange, isn't it?... I am afraid of being alone with her!"