As letters will be very long in reaching me, send me a dispatch when you
have good news to announce to me. My life hangs upon this expectation.
Think of all that I am suffering.
* * * * *
_28 March, 1895._
I was hoping to receive news of you at about this time; as yet I have
heard nothing. I have already written you two letters.
I know nothing as yet beyond the four walls of my chamber. As for my
health, it could not be very brilliant. Aside from my physical miseries,
of which I speak only to cite them, the cause of this condition of my
health lies chiefly in the disorder of my nervous system, produced by an
uninterrupted succession of moral shocks.
You know that no matter how severe they might be at times, physical
sufferings never wrung a groan from me, and that I could look death
coolly in the face if only my mental sufferings did not darken my
thoughts.
My mind cannot extricate itself for an instant from the horrible drama
of which I am the victim, a tragedy which has struck a blow not only at
my life--that is the least of evils, and truly it would have been better
had the wretch who committed the crime killed me instead of wounding me
as he has--but at my honor, the honor of my children, the honor of you
all.
This piercing thought of my honor torn from me leaves me no rest either
by day or by night. My nights, alas! you can imagine what they are!
Formerly it was only sleeplessness, now the greater part of the night is
passed in such a state of hallucination and of fever that I ask myself
each morning how my brain still resists. This is one of the most cruel
of all my sufferings. Add to this the long hours of the day passed in
solitary communion with my thoughts, in the most absolute isolation.
Is it possible to rise above such preoccupation of the mind? Is it
possible to force the mind to turn aside to other subjects of thought? I
do not believe it; at least I cannot. When one is in this, the most
agitating, the most tragic, plight that can possibly be conceived for a
man whose honor has never failed him, nothing can turn the mind from the
idea which dominates it.
Then when I think of you, of our dear children, my grief is unutterable;
for the weight of the crime which some wretch has committed weighs
heavily upon you also. You must, therefore, for our children’s sake,
pursue without truce, without rest, the work you have undertaken, and
you must make my innocence burst forth in such a way that no doubt can
be left in the mind of any human being. Whoever may be the persons who
are convinced of my innocence, tell yourself that they will change
nothing in our position; we often pay ourselves in words and nourish
ourselves on illusions; nothing but my rehabilitation can save us.
You see, then, what I cannot cease reiterating to you, that it is a
matter of life or of death, not only for me, but for our children. For
myself I never will accept life without my honor. To say that an
innocent man ought to live, that he always can live, is a commonplace
whose triteness drives me to despair.
I used to say it and I used to believe it. Now that I have suffered all
this myself, I declare that if a man has any spirit he cannot live under
such circumstances. Life is admissible only when he can lift his head
and look the world in the face; otherwise, there is nothing left for him
but to die. To live for the sake of living is simply low and cowardly.
I am sure that in this you think as I do; any other opinion would be
unworthy of us.
The situation, already so tragic, becomes each day more tense. You have
not to weep, not to groan, but to face it with all your energy and with
all your soul. To make clear this situation, we must not wait for a
happy chance, but we must display all-absorbing activity. Knock at all
doors. We must employ all means to make the light burst forth. All forms
of investigation must be tried; the object we have in view is my life,
the life of every one of us.
Here is a very clear bulletin of my state, moral and physical. I will
sum it up:
A pitiable nervous and cervical condition, but extreme moral energy,
outstretched toward the one object, which, no matter what the price, no
matter by what means, we must attain--vindication. I will leave you to
judge from this what struggles I am each day forced to make to keep
myself from choosing death rather than this slow agony in every fibre of
my being, rather than this torture of every instinct, in which physical
suffering is added to agony of soul. You see that I am holding to my
promise that I made you to struggle to live until the day of my
rehabilitation. It remains for you to do the rest if you would have me
reach that day.
Then away with weakness. Tell yourself that I am suffering martyrdom,
that each day my brain is growing weaker; tell yourself that it is a
question of my honor--that is to say, of my life, of the honor of your
children. Let these thoughts inspire you, and then act accordingly.
Embrace every one, the children, for me.
A thousand kisses from your husband, who loves you.