CP 02902/en
Marcel Proust to Lucien Daudet [30 or 31 January 1915]
(Click on the link above to see this letter and its notes in the Corr-Proust digital edition, including all relevant hyperlinks.)
My dear little one,
I was very sorry to learn that you are still unwell. Have you had a high fever? Have you stayed in bed[2] ? I was also sorry to not have been able to write to you. The day before I received word from you[3], I was out for the first time in an extremely long time, (close to two and a half months[4]) and I had gone on a whim, around midnight (after having let her know) to Madame Edward’s[5]; an evening about which there is too much to say for the constraints of one letter[6], but which had broken me. In the following days, it was Céleste (now my only housemaid) who was tired, so that I couldn’t send her to visit you. Moreover, since I’ve been more unwell (which doubtless you didn’t know), my hours have once again become later, and at the time when I know that I am able to have guests, I wouldn’t dare send you a message, and I’m sure in any case that you wouldn’t have been able to come without advance warning. My dear little one, these details are frightfully boring, but it's so that you know that I like nothing more than to see you, and if it weren’t impossible I would’ve seen you. I consoled myself by reading the marvellous work of your brother, to whom I have not yet written[7]. But we are less hurried for the things we admire than for polite words. I believe that you received a letter from me in Tours a month ago[8]. Deep down, the polite habit of responding with “I have received your letter on” is very reassuring.
My dear little one, I stay silent due to a plethora of things to say, and moreover we don’t maintain “a correspondence,” so it’s too difficult to start. Tell me when you can come, and let me kiss you tenderly.
Your
Marcel