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She is well now; then I have had to set in order the rest of my poor Bouilhet's papers, on whom I have begun the article. I wrote this week nearly six pages, which was very good for me; this work is very painful in every way. The difficulty is in knowing what not to say. I shall console myself a little in blurting out two or three dogmatic opinions on the art of writing.
Bouilhet's position gives him four thousand francs a year and lodging. He now need not think of earning his living, which is a real luxury. No one talks of the war any more, they don't talk of anything. The Exposition alone is what "everybody is thinking about," and the cabmen exasperate the bourgeois. One would have said that SOCIETY was going to pieces.
Listen to this: in the very beginning, your play was to come after Aisse; then it was agreed that it should come BEFORE. Now Chilly and Duquesnel want it to come after, simply and solely "to profit by the occasion," to profit by my poor Bouilhet's death. They will give you a "sort of compensation." Well, I am the owner and the master of Aisse just as if I were the author, and I do not want that.
Anyway your commission shall be done next week. You must forgive me, for I have not had for the last two weeks ten minutes of freedom. Well, the rehearsals are to begin on Monday next. I read the play to the actors today, and the roles are to be verified tomorrow. I think it will go well. I have had Bouilhet's volume of verse printed, the preface of which I re-wrote.
You must tell me how you mean that and I will read Turgot to please you. Summon me at the time of Bouilhet's play. I shall be here, working hard, but ready to run, and loving you with all my heart. Now that I am no longer a woman, if the good God was just, I should become a man; I should have the physical strength and would say to you: "Come let's go to Carthage or elsewhere."
All my sorrows were at once dispersed like a cloud of butterflies. I told my mother of my joy, and she naturally concluded that as I was asked to attend a reading my engagement was not to be cancelled, and I was not to be asked again to apologise to Madame Nathalie. I went to the theatre, and to my utter surprise I received from M. Davennes the role of Dolores, the chief part in Bouilhet's play.
Throughout the rehearsals they advertised in the papers the revival of Ruy Blas, etc., etc. They made me strangle la Baronne quite as Ruy Blas will strangle Aisse. In short, Bouilhet's heir will get very little money. Honor is saved, that is all. I have had Dernieres Chansons printed. You will receive this volume at the same time as Aisse and a letter of mine to the Conseil municipal de Rouen.
On the first night of Louis Bouilhet's piece, Mademoiselle Aisse, at the Odeon, Flaubert, who was an intimate friend of the author, introduced an attache of the British Embassy to me. "Oh, I have known you for some time, Mademoiselle," he said; "you are the little stick with the sponge on the top." This caricature of me had just appeared, and had been the delight of idle folks.
One needs patience in any event, I have it, and I tell you again if you are really upset at this delay, I am ready to sacrifice myself. With this I embrace you and I love you. G. Sand CXXXI. TO GEORGE SAND 14 October, 1869 Dear master, No! no sacrifices! so much the worse! If I did not look at Bouilhet's affairs as mine absolutely, I should have at once accepted your proposition.
But there, one who has neither sex nor strength, progresses towards childhood, and it is quite otherwhere that one is renewed; WHERE? I shall know that before you do, and, if I can, I shall come back in a dream to tell you. XXII. TO GUSTAVE FLAUBERT Nohant, 19 October Dear friend, they write me from the Odeon that Bouilhet's play is on the 27th. I must be in Paris the 26th.
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