After a time I stepped down from the stone, and said to you, casually and without mentioning the diamond, that it would be a great joke to throw a big stone over the top of the wall. This stone was very heavy. You were eager to help me, and without asking any questions (which is not natural to you), by dint of pushing we succeeded in placing the stone on the top of the wall, and we were making ready to push it over, when the wall itself gave way and crumbled, and we both fell with the stone and the débris of the wall. I do not know what happened then, for I awoke. That you may understand the scene better, I enclose a drawing of it. I was unable to see the gardener’s face, which is most exasperating. You are very kind. I have said this to you frequently of late. It was very kind of you to have answered the question that I asked you recently. I need not tell you that your reply pleased me. You have even said, unconsciously, perhaps, several things that have given me pleasure, and especially that the husband of a woman who resembled you would have your sincere sympathy. I can readily believe you, and will add that no one could be more unfortunate unless it were a man who loved you. You must be cold and sarcastic in your perverse moods, with an insuperable pride which forbids you to acknowledge when you are in the wrong. Add to this your energetic temperament, which compels you to disdain tears and complaints. When in the course of time and of events we become friends, it shall be seen which of us knows better how to torment the other. Only to think of it makes my hair stand on end. Have I interpreted correctly your _but_? Rest assured that, notwithstanding your resolutions, the threads of our lives are too closely intermingled for us to fail to find each other some day or other. I am dying to see and talk with you. It seems to me that I should be perfectly happy if I knew that I should see you this evening. By the way, you are wrong to suspect Mr. V. of undue curiosity. Even if it were equal to yours, which is not possible, Mr. V. is a Cato, and under no consideration would he break a seal. Therefore send him the _schizzo_ under cover, and have no fear of any indiscretion on his part. I should like to see you as you were writing, _Amigo de mi alma_. When you are having your photograph taken for me, say those words to yourself, instead of “prunes and prisms,” as ladies say when they wish to give their mouth a pleasant expression.