…
Ah! here comes your letter. I read it.
My divine love, how stupid you are! Madame de S … !—I have quarrelled with her, have I, so that I never say a word to her; I will not even bow to her daughter? Alas! I have met her, Madame de S … , at Madame d'Abrantès' this winter. She came up to me and said: "She is not here" (meaning Madame de Castries); "have you been so severe as you were at Aix?" I said, pointing to her lover, former lover of Mme. d'A., a Portuguese count, "But he is here." The duchess burst out laughing.
Oh! my celestial angel, Madame de S … —if you could see her you would know how atrocious the calumny is. … Your Polish women saw too much of Madame de C … to pay attention to Madame de S … who was paying court to her. But I was at Aix with Madame de C … and we were dining together. As for the marquise, faith, the portrait you draw of her makes me die of laughing. There is something in it, but changed now. Fresh, yes; without heart, yes, at least I think so. She will always be sacred to me; but in the chatter of your Polish women there was just enough truth to make the slander pass.
My idolized love, no more doubts; never, do you understand? I love but you and can love none but you. Eva is your symbolic name. Better than that; I have never loved in the past as I feel that I love you. To you, all my life of love may belong.
Adieu, my breath. I would I could communicate to these pages the virtue of talismans, that you might feel my soul enveloping you. Adieu, my beloved. I kiss this page; I add a leaf of my last rose, a petal of my last jasmine. You are in my thought as the very base of intellect, the substance of all things.
"Eugénie Grandet" is enchanting. You shall soon have it in Geneva.
Well, adieu, you whom I would fain see, feel, press, adieu. Can I not find a way to press you? What impotent wishes imagination has! My dear light, I kiss you with an ardour, an embrace of life, an effusion of the soul, without example in my life.
My angel, I don't answer about the cry I gave apropos of Madame de C … and the son M … dying for his mother-in-law. To-morrow for all that. You must have laughed at my pretended savagery.
Do not put poste restante any longer.
Paris, Sunday, October 20, 1833.
What! my love; fears, torments? You have received, I hope, the first two letters that I wrote you after my return. What shall I do not to give you the slightest trouble, to make you clear skies? What! could you not have reckoned on a day's delay, an hour of weariness. Mon Dieu! Mon Dieu! what shall I do?
I write to you every day; if you want to receive a letter every third day instead of every eighth day, say so, speak, order. I will do all not to let a single evil thought come into your heart.
If you knew the harm your letter has done me. You do not know me yet. All that is bad. But I pardon the little grief your letter has caused me, because it is one way of telling me you love me.
I have good news to tell you. I think that the "Études de Mœurs" will be a settled business by Tuesday next, and that I shall have as debtor one of the most solid firms of publishers in the market. That is something.
Forgive me, my Eva of love, if I talk to you of my mercantile affairs; but it is my tranquillity; it will no doubt enable me to go to Geneva. Alas! I may not go till December, because I cannot leave till I have finished the first part of these "Études."
Adieu; I must return to "Eugénie Grandet," who is going on well. I have still all Monday and a part of Tuesday.
Adieu, my angel of light; adieu, dear treasure; do not ill-treat me. I have a heart as sensitive as that of a woman can be, and I love you better or worse, for I rest without fear on your dear heart, and kiss your two eyes—all!
Adieu; à demain.
Paris, Wednesday, October 23, 1833.
To you, my love, to you a thousand tendernesses. Yesterday I was running about all day and was so tired that I permitted myself to sleep the night through, so that I made my idol only a mental prayer. I went to sleep in thy dear thought just as, if married, I should have fallen asleep in the arms of my beloved.
Mon Dieu! I am frightened to see how my life belongs to you; with what rapidity it turns to your heart. Your arteries beat as much for me as for yourself. Adored darling, what good your letters do me! I believe in you, don't you see, as I believe in my respiration. I am like a child in this happiness, like a savant, like a fool who takes care of tulips. I weep with rage at not being near you. I assemble all my ideas to develop this love, and I am here, watching ceaselessly that it shall grow without harm. Does not that partake of the child, the savant, and the botanist? Thus, my angel, commit no follies. No, don't quit your tether, poor little goat. Your lover will come when you cry. But you make me shudder. Don't deceive yourself, my dear Eve; they do not return to Mademoiselle Henriette Borel a letter so carefully folded and sealed without looking at it. There are clever dissimulations. Now, I entreat you, take a carriage that you may never get wet in going to the post. Besides, it is always cold in the rue du Rhône. Go every Wednesday, because the letters posted here on Sunday arrive on Wednesday. I will never, whatever may be the urgency, post letters for you on any day but Sunday. Burn the envelopes. Let Henriette scold the post-office man who delivered her letter, which was poste restante; but scold him laughing, for officials are rancorous. They would be capable of saying some Wednesday there were no letters, and then delivering them in a way to cause trouble. O my angel, misfortunes only come through letters. I beg you, on my knees, find a place, a lair, a mine to hide the treasures of our love. Do it, so that you can have no uneasiness.
Now, the Countess Potoçka, is she not that beautiful Greek, beloved by P … , married to a doctor, married to General de W … , and then to Count L … P … ? If she is, don't confide to her a single thing about your love, my poor lamb without mistrust. If she has proofs, then own to her; but such an avowal must not be made until you cannot do otherwise, and then, make a merit of a forced confession. You must judge of the opportunity; but when I am in Geneva, you understand that people who run two ideas and who suppose evil when it does not exist, will know well how to divine when true.
Now, when I read your letters I am in Geneva, I see all. Mon Dieu, what grace and prettiness in your letters! Eh! my angel of love, I shall be in Geneva precisely when you choose. But calculate that it takes your letter four days to reach me, and four days for me to arrive; that makes eight days.
My cherished angel, do not share my troubles more than you must in knowing them; heaven has given me all the courage necessary to support them. I would not have a single one of my thoughts hidden from you, and I tell you all. But do not give yourself a fever about them. Yes, the sending of the newspapers was an indignity. Tell me who was capable of such a joke. There will be a duel between him and me. Whoever wounds you is my head enemy; but an enemy Arab fashion, with an oath of vengeance.
My dear happiness, there is not a voice here in my favour; all are hostile. I must resign myself. They treat me, it is true, like a man of genius; and that gives pride. I must redouble cares and courage to mount this last step. I am preparing fine subjects of hatred for them. I work with unexampled obstinacy.
I can only write the ostensible letter to you next week, for I wish the package to be full. So much the better if I am blamed; the recollection will be all the more precious.
My darling, you can very well say that you saw me at Neufchâtel, for that can no more be concealed than the nose upon one's face. It will be known; it should therefore be told, soul of my soul.[1]
