Monday, 13 March 1882

Yes, it is horrible — poor Dina cannot console herself for having refused to see him after he struck her on the head with his cane; and my aunt and Maman weep for not having taken him in. After he would come and shout under our windows that they were two infamous women and two thieves — and I am devoured by remorse for having written to the prefect of police to prevent him from shouting and gathering crowds in front of our apartment when he had finished smashing the kitchen door.
Ah, we are all very guilty — so this poor martyr did not wish to give us such remorse, and to lighten our consciences: he is not dead at all.
Yes, this so-persecuted creature, this innocent so unhappy, is in the very best of health and out carousing this very moment with the hundred francs Étienne sent by telegram while writhing in despair at having destroyed his family's happiness by his idiotic — yes, idiotic — marriage.
Mme Hamsley, very pale, was also of the opinion that his marriage was idiotic. And Papa, who sent telegrams asking Alexandre to send the funeral money — for it is Alexandre who holds Georges's inheritance. And dear Alexandre has no doubt arranged everything to better exclude Dina and the other sister. Étienne mourns his hundred francs and calls the deceased scoundrel and pig. Even in my despair I was saying to myself last evening that this death was the complement to the concluded lawsuit. Ah, quite.