Thursday, 3 December 1874

I dreamed of a great many things and remember nothing.
I dismissed Michelazzi, the Latin and Italian teacher, because he was taking several lesson tokens for a single lesson. I could not very well tell him he was stealing; and when I said he had already received his token, he assured me he had not — with such brazen assurance that I would hand him another. I preferred to dismiss the thief rather than be outraged at each theft.
Words today refuse to form sentences; I am completely listless and stupefied; my mouth will not open to speak and I have difficulty pronouncing the few words that must be said. Taking advantage of the brief moments when Georges was less drunk, I reproached him with every fury one might expect from a grief like mine for his misdeeds. This monster has caused our ruin. As if the world did not see that my mother spoke with that woman in Monaco, went about with her — and finally that Georges had the unheard-of audacity to bring this Anna to our house. [Crossed out: it is true that] We were away, but my aunt was there; yet even an empty house should never have seen that woman. And my grandfather took her riding in our carriage — with him and my aunt!
Horror! Indignity! Baseness! Cowardice! By this they have murdered me!
And my aunt — to be complicit in such indignities! It is worse than stealing! It is worse than killing — for in killing one does not make one suffer, whereas in doing what they did they torture me!
Wretches, cowards! It seems as if all these horrors did not exist before, and that only today do I understand them. Only today do I remember the slightest things that have gradually brought us to the state we are in. The more I say, the less I shall express all my tribulations and sufferings! But what I long to know is whether it is true. Oh! Let someone tell me, my God! I suffer so in this immense uncertainty!
Georges has been drinking himself drunk since Saturday and we are forced to endure his horrors! There is no money to take him away from here!
My God! My God! Do not punish this monster as much as I desire. I wish him no harm — it is myself I wish to purify. In Nice we are lost. It will be a miracle if we ever live there tolerably. My God, have mercy on me!
I said dreadful things to my mother — furious as I was — and she did not even grow angry; she sees what a state I am in!
[Crossed out: I have never felt] I have never been as I am now — for I have never even imagined a misfortune like this.
Rejected, slandered, abandoned by all! I do not know why today I felt all this — even the day before yesterday I was not so miserable. Even the day before yesterday I looked at everyone naturally, as a year ago, as always. Only yesterday did I see the full horror of my position. Only yesterday did I understand all my despair!
It is this business with Markevitch that has given a definitive and concrete form to all my former despairs! For if it is true — I must, I must — ah, I do not know what I must do! I believe I shall go mad!

Notes

In English in the original.