-as though they were stock
quotations? Did you think you were a numbered "case," that I was
keeping notes about you in that neat filing-cabinet down in the office?
Well, it hasn't been exactly that way.

Do you remember that day you were here? How it rained--how dark it
was? Why, I've never seen you, really. I'm always trying to imagine
your face.

I've got to talk to you--some things can't be written. You won't stop
me. Do you suppose you can? You've got to give me a chance to
talk--that's only square. No, I don't mean all that. I don't quite
know what I'm saying. I mean, you will let me come, won't you? I'll
go away again after; you needn't be afraid. That's fair, isn't it?

You see, it's been strange from the start, and so quick. You, in the
middle of the storm that day--the things you said--the fearful tangle
you were in. And then the letters--the wonderful letters! And we
thought we were keeping it all impersonal. You, with your blazing
individuality--you, impersonal! I can't imagine your face, but you've
stripped the masks and conventions off your soul for me--I've looked at
that. I couldn't help it, could I? I couldn't stop. I can't now. I
can't look at anything else. There isn't anything else--it fills my
world--it's blotted out what used to be reality.

You're hundreds of miles away--what are you doing? Sitting, with your
white dress a rosy blur in the lamplight, reading, thinking,
afraid--frightened at the doctors--shrinking at the thought of that
damned, pawing beast? We'll drop that last--this isn't the time for
that--not yet. Miles away you are--and yet you're here--the real you
that you've sent me in the letters. Always you are here. I listen to
your voice--I've got that--your voice, singing through my days--here in
the silence and the firelight, outside in the night under the stars,
always, everywhere, I hear you--calling me.

You see, my head's gone. Don't think though, that I don't know the
risk this is. But there isn't any other way. Those four weeks you
didn't write, when I thought you had gone under--that was when I began
to see how it was with me. Since then I've gone on, living on your
letters, until now I can't imagine living without them--and more. And
yet I know this may be the end. That's the risk. But I can't go on
like that any more. It's everything now, or nothing. I want to know
what you are going to do about it. What are you thinking--what must
yo