* * * * *

Before dinner we went to walk, it was wonderful moonlight. I said a
thousand foolish things to O----, and if Dina and M---- were as
crazy as we, a great scandal would have happened, for we wanted to
dance a ring around a priest who was passing.

O---- is writing a novel, it appears. After dinner we went in search
of her; I shut myself up with her, and the good girl read it. But at
the second page I stopped her and proposed that we should write one
together. I gave the idea, everything, everything, and the girl
imagines she is composing too. It would be the story of Dumas with
the _Tour de Nesle_, but I shall not assert my rights, I am giving
her a love scene for to-morrow. She makes no pretensions, and asks
for ideas, details, and love scenes with perfect simplicity.

As for me, I set to work and, at one dash, wrote the first chapter,
in which my hero bursts open a door and leaps through the window.

People are doing me the honour to busy themselves very much about
me, to gossip a great deal over me. Haven't I always desired it?

My journal is suffering because I have begun to write a novel, and I
shall succeed. Thank Heaven, I am capable of doing everything I
wish. Two chapters in two days is going on finely. I have read it to
Dina, and my story interests her. But I am able to judge for myself
personally, and I believe it will go.

While we were walking, surrounded by a group of young men, I was
happy, proud, and of what? I am little and vain; I took good care to