to live. If I could not feel your warm affection, the love of all of ours, struggling with me for my honor, I should not have the courage to pursue this almost superhuman task. They still give me no letters from any of the family, and I am not permitted to write to them. The Minister is the only one who can modify this state of things.
You cannot imagine, my poor child, how unhappy I am. Night and day I think of the horrible word that is coupled with my name; there are times when my brain refuses to admit such a thing. I ask myself, in my agitated nights, if I am awake or if I sleep. Added to everything else I have no occupation by which to distract my sombre thoughts.
I kiss you a thousand times, and also all the others.
Alfred.
28 January, 1895.
My dear Lucie:
This is one of the happy days of my sad existence, because I can come to pass half an hour with you, talking to you and telling you of my life. You know that I am permitted to write to you but twice a week. I have received your two letters, of Friday and Saturday. Each time that they bring me a letter from you a ray of joy pierces to my wounded heart. What you told me in your letter of Saturday is perfectly true. Like you, I have the absolute conviction that all will be discovered, but when? You know that in the end everything is blunted, even the most heroic courage. And, then, between the courage that makes a man confront danger—no matter what danger it may be—and the
