_Mon Dieu, mon Dieu_, God in whom I believe, he owes me some soft emotions at the sight of Geneva, for I left it disconsolate, cursing everything, abhorring womankind. With what joy I shall return to it, my celestial love, my Eva! Take me with you to your Ukraine; let us go first to Italy. All that will be possible, when the "Études de Mœurs" are once published.
So, then, at l'Auberge de l'Arc! I shall be there December 7th or 8th without fail. You see I have received your little note.
After writing to you last night I was obliged to go to bed without working. I was ill. It is five days now since I have been out of my apartments; I am not very well just now, but I think it is only a nervous movement caused by overwork.
From our windows we shall see each other!--that is very dangerous.
Well, _à bientôt_. I put in for you a kissed rose-leaf; it carries my soul and the most celestial hope a man can have here below. Oh! my love, you do not know yourself how wholly you are mine. I am very greedy.
Adieu, my beautiful life; there are only a few days more. I imagine we can travel to Italy and stay three or six months together.
Adieu, angel, whom I shall soon see face to face.
PARIS, December 4th, four in the morning.
My adored angel, during these eight days I have made the efforts of a lion; but, in spite of sitting up all night, I do not see that my two volumes can be finished before the 5th, and the two others I must leave to appear during my absence. But on the 10th I get into a carriage, for, finished or not, neither my body nor my head, however powerful my monk's life makes them, can sustain this steam-engine labour.
So, the 13th, I think, I shall be in Geneva. Nothing can now change that date. I shall have the manuscript of "Eugénie Grandet" bound, and send it ostensibly to you.
I have great need of rest, to be near you,--you, the angel; you, the thought of whom never fatigues; you, who are the repose, the happiness, the beautiful secret life of my life! It is now forty-eight hours that I have not been in bed. I have at this moment the keenest anxieties about money. I stripped myself of everything to win tranquillity, of which I have such need, and to be near you for a little while. But, relying on my publisher, yesterday, for my payments at the month's end, he betrays me in the midst of my torrent of work.