V O L U M E 8 , D O C U M E N T 4 7 1 a 8 7
you, after all, also want to take away from me the only secure thing that we really
have left, namely the pension, by divorcing, and to leave me at the utter mercy of
your 2nd
wife[12]
about whether she will pay out the pension sum to me, so that I
have to fight with these people as well for the rest of my
life?[13]
Please consider all
of this; it’s impossible not to admit that anything is more appropriate than closing
your suggestions with a
threat.[14]
I wish also that your health may improve soon and beg you to do everything to-
ward this as well; that is surely the most important thing for the time being.
Miza.
Vol. 8, 471a. To Heinrich Zangger
[Berlin, 27 February 1918]
Dear friend Zangger,
Endless is the chain of illnesses afflicting our
families.[1]
How could your little
girl possibly have contracted such a serious sickness in the
Engadin?[2]
But I con-
fidently hope that things will improve, now that you are back in Zurich.
The affair with my wife’s sister is a new
misfortune,[3]
which however makes
some things more explicable to me. A few weeks ago I received a letter from her
that stumped me. My wife had withheld from me the existence of this sister
throughout the 20 years of our relations, so I was beside myself with surprise at be-
ing addressed as “brother-in-law” by a woman I had never heard
of.[4]
The frightful
mistrust with which my wife has been plaguing me and all others is also of a
pathological nature. I was of the impression that the other sister of my wife, known
to me as Zora, was in Zurich.–
Now it is absolutely imperative that we emerge from the provisional measures
for my family. I have now decided upon the following solution.
1) Albert goes immediately to my sister’s in Lucerne,
permanently.[5]
2) My wife is put permanently in good care either in Zurich or in Lucerne. The
latter would have the advantage that she could then see Albert daily.
3) Tete stays up there at Pedolin’s until
June.[6]
Then I’ll collect him myself and
take him with me to Berlin. I won’t permit that the boy should grow up so unat-
tached to his own family. I’ll then take him along whenever I go to Switzerland.
4) The household is dissolved in the summer. I shall come with Elsa to Switzer-
land and we’ll take care of everything
ourselves.[7]
5) What will become of my poor sister-in-law, i.e., when can she be given back
to her family, only God knows.
__________