Besides discussing business with the Polish gentleman, Balzac apologized often for not answering his letters, offering lack of time as his excuse, but he planned to visit Wierzchownia, where he and M. de Hanski would enjoy hearty laughs while Madame Hanska could work at his comedies. In spite of this friendly correspondence, the /Marechal/ probably hinted to his wife that her admiration for the author was too warm, for Balzac asked her to reassure her husband that he was not only invulnerable, but immune from attack. Balzac spoke of dedicating one of his books in the /Comedie humaine/ to M. de Hanski, but no dedication to him is found in this work. His death, which occurred some months after this suggestion, doubtless prevented the realization of it. Balzac evidently received a negative reply to his letter to Madame Hanska asking to be permitted to visit her immediately after her husband's death. It would have been a breach of the /convenances/ had he gone to visit her so early in her widowhood. Soon after learning of M. de Hanski's death, he saw an announcement of the death of a Countess Kicka of Volhynia, and since his "Polar Star" had spoken of being ill, he was seized with fear lest this be a misprint for Hanska, and was confined to his bed for two days with a nervous fever. What must have been Balzac's disappointment, when almost ready to leave at any moment, to receive a letter which, as he expressed it, killed the youth in him, and rent his heart! She felt that she owed everything to her daughter, who had consoled her, and nothing to him; yet she knew that she was everything to him. He thought that she loved Anna too much, protested his fidelity to her when she accused him, and reverted to his favorite theme of comparing her to the devoted Madame de Berny. He complained of her coldness, wanted to visit her in August at St. Petersburg, and desired her to promise that they would be married within two years. Princess Radziwill wrote: "When Madame Hanska's husband died, it was supposed that her union with Balzac would occur at once, but obstacles were interposed by others. Her own family looked down upon the great French author as a mere story-teller; and by her late husband's people sordid motives were imputed to him, to account for his devotion to the heiress. The latter objection was removed, a few years later, by the widow's giving up to her daughter the fortune left to her by Monsieur Hanski." It is at this period that Balzac furnishes us with the key to one of his works, /Albert Savarus/, in writing to Madame Hanska: