Full resolution (JPEG) - On this page / på denna sida - Part IV - II
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THE CONFESSION OF A FOOL 255
unaccompanied by her ; to take my family with me was out
of the question on account of my limited means. Secretly
she was afraid that I might escape from her strict
guardianship and, worse still, that my appearance in court,
before the public, would give the lie to the rumours con-
cerning my mental condition which she had so sedulously
disseminated.
She pleaded illness, without, however, being able to
make a definite statement as to the nature of her illness,
and kept her bed. Nevertheless I decided to appear
personally in court, and left for Sweden.
The letters which I wrote to her during the following
six weeks, while I was threatened with two years’ penal
servitude, were full of love, love rekindled by our separa-
tion. My overwrought brain cast a glamour over her
fragile form, wove a resplendent halo round her sweet
face ; restraint and longing clothed her with the white
garments of the guardian angel. Everything that was
base, ugly, evil, disappeared ; the madonna of my first
love-dream reappeared. I went so far as to admit to an
old friend, a journalist, "that the influence of a good
woman had made me more humble and pure-minded."
Probably this confession made the round of the papers
of the United Kingdoms.
Did the unfaithful wife laugh when she read it?
The public got its money’s worth, at any rate.
Marie’s replies to my love-letters bore witness to the
keen interest which she took in the financial side of the
question. But her opinion underwent a change in the
same proportion in which the ovations I received in the
theatre, in the street and in court increased, and she called
the judges stupid, and regretted that she was not a
member of the jury.
She met my ardent declarations of love with clever
reserve ; she refused to be drawn into an argument, and
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