I was working night and day to go to you. Now I shall certainly work as much, for it is not possible for me to take the slightest resolution till my mother is physically happy. I have still a year to suffer.
Let us say no more of me. So you have been cruelly agitated? A sentiment which gives such remorse was feeble, and it is my heart that was blamed!—I, to whom adoremus in æternum meant something!
Fate is about to take from me a true affection, and to-day I lose all my beliefs in happiness, without anything being able to disengage me from myself. Ah! you have not known me! All those who have suffered forgive, you know. I shall stay as I am; I cannot change. You said yourself: "The Jules women love faithfully, in spite of desertion." Am I therefore not a man? Is this another test? It costs me more than life; it costs me my courage.
I cannot oppose to this blow either disdain, contempt, or any of the egotistical sentiments that console. I remain in my stupor, without understanding. Ah! I knew not that I was writing for myself: To wounded hearts, silence and, shade.
Mon Dieu! my book is finished; I am not rich enough to destroy it, but I lay it at your knees, begging you not to read it: Eve should not open a book in which is the "Duchesse de Langeais." You might, though certain of the entire devotion of him who writes to you, be wounded, as one is pricked by bushes. I shall always weep at being unable to suppress it.
I cannot bid you adieu; I shall never quit you more, and, from this day, I shall not allow myself even the sight of a woman. But you have not told me all! I have been odiously calumniated. You have given ear to impostors. There is room for many blows in a heart like mine; you cannot kill it easily. It is eternally yours, without division.
I tell you nothing of what is in my soul; I have neither strength nor ideas. I suffer through you. So long as it is from your hand, why should I complain? Ah! you shall see that I know how to love. Our hearts will always understand each other.
Paris, March 9, 1834.
My angel returns to me; ah! I will hide my anguish from you, my griefs, my terrible resolutions of a week in which all things have come together to rend my heart. You, Monday; Tuesday. I quarrelled, perhaps to fight, with Émile de Girardin,—that was happiness. There's a society I shall never see again and never want to see. My enemies are setting about a rumour of my liaison with a Russian princess; they name Madame P... I have seen since my return only Madame Appony, Madame de C..., Madame de G..., and, for one hour, Madame de la B... That rumour can come only from Geneva, and not from me, who have never opened my mouth about my journey. Here I am, on bad terms with Madame de C[astries] on account of the "Duchesse de Langeais"—so much the better. But all this happens at once. So, no solitude shall ever be more complete than mine.
I have but an hour in which to answer you. Oh! my love, I swear to you I wrote to Madame P... only to prevent the road to Russia being closed to me. It would be poor cleverness to have it said here, in Paris, that I am starting for Russia. That is the way to have passports refused to me when I ask for them. I have not seen Zaluzki. Is it he who talks? Mon Dieu! I, in my hole, to be subjected to such griefs. Read the "Duchesse de Langeais." You will read it with delight. As true as that I love and adore you, I never said more than two sentences to Madame Bossi, and I never looked at her.