I am so vexed with you that you will think, it may be, that the I which you admire is too much in evidence. In fact, I am thinking seriously of putting into execution the threat I made you one day.
How did you enjoy the fireworks? I was at the house of an “Excellency” who has a lovely garden, from where we had a good view of them. The crowning piece was fine. They are really far more wonderful than a volcano, for art is always more beautiful than nature. Good-bye. Try to think of me occasionally.
Our walks have now become a part of my life, and I can hardly realise how I lived without them. It seems to me you take them very philosophically. But how will it be when we see each other no longer? Six months ago we resumed our conversation at the very same point where it had been interrupted. Shall we do the same again? I have an indefinable fear that I shall find you changed. Every time we meet you are enveloped in an armour of ice, which melts only after a quarter of an hour. By the time I return you will have amassed a veritable iceberg. Well, it is better not to cross the bridge until you come to it. Let us continue our dreams.
Should you suppose a Roman capable of saying pretty things, and of showing affection? I will show you Monday some Latin verses, which you shall translate for yourself, and which fit our habitual disputes like a glove. You shall see that the ancients are a great deal better than your Wilhelm Meister.
LXVI
Wednesday, June, 1843.
Your letter was so kind and affectionate that it has blown away the last remaining cloud of the recent storm. But I feel that we shall not be sure of having forgotten it until we have buried our quarrel beneath other memories.
Why should we not take a walk Friday? If it will not inconvenience you, it will give me the greatest pleasure. I hope we shall have fine weather. You promised, moreover, to tell me something which must be too important to be deferred. I shall bring along a Spanish book, and, if you like, we will read.
You have not yet told me whether you would pay me for my lessons. The time which we spend otherwise than in what you are pleased to call talking nonsense, seems to me so ill-employed that I ought at least to earn something for my pains. Why should I not give you Spanish lessons at your house? I could call myself Don Furlano, or something else, and bring you a letter of introduction from Madame de P. describing me as victim of Espartero’s tyranny.
I am beginning to find our dependence on sunshine and rain somewhat irksome. I want, also, to paint your portrait. You have promised often to invent some plan of meeting. You pretend to govern, but, as a fact, you discharge your duties very badly, and I can judge very unfairly, therefore, of your possibilities and your impossibilities. If you were to reflect upon the delicate problem of how to see each other as often as possible, would you not be doing a worthy action? There are many other things I wish to say to you, but it would be necessary to refer to our quarrel, and I desire to blot it altogether from my memory. I want to remember only our reconciliation, which you seem to regret. That would be unkind in you. I am sorry, indeed, that I must owe so much happiness to such an unfortunate cause.