The Letter by Edith Wharton (1904)
Colonel Jack Alingdon, an elderly English veteran of Italy's liberation struggles, breaks his habitual silence about his past to recount, in old age, what he considers the bravest act he ever witnessed in a woman, one brought about by his own regrettable conduct. In 1847, as a young English officer of twenty-nine working in Milan on behalf of Italian liberal exiles in England, Alingdon fell in love with Donna Candida Falco, a widowed noblewoman of thirty who was a central, discreetly effective figure in the liberal cause. Candida's brother, Emilio Verna, had been hanged as a youth of eighteen in Modena in 1831 after the failed Menotti conspiracy, leaving their mother, Countess Verna, inconsolable because Emilio had sent no farewell letter, unlike other executed conspirators. Candida, unlike her grief-fixed mother, had thrown herself into active patriotic work. Candida did not return Alingdon's love; she was devoted, without hope of requital, to Fernando Briga, a rising liberal leader and son of the Modenese prison physician. After a bitter quarrel in which Alingdon sneered at Briga, the Cinque Giornate uprising freed Milan; Alingdon, lightly wounded, later went to Modena after its provisional government was established, where he was set to work sorting the fallen Duke's confiscated archives. Among papers taken from political prisoners in 1831, Alingdon discovered Emilio Verna's long-lost farewell letter to his mother and sister, docketed as having been "given by Doctor Briga's son" to the prison warder. Alingdon inferred that young Fernando, present in the prison with his father, must have received the letter from Emilio and then betrayed it to the authorities, and had kept silent about it ever since. Still resentful over Candida, Alingdon rushed the letter to her in Milan, deliberately hiding the incriminating docket at first. Candida was overjoyed at recovering her brother's last words, until Alingdon revealed the endorsement implicating Briga. Rather than turning against her beloved, she reasoned her way to Briga's defense: as an unsuspected agent vital to the cause, he could not risk exposing his connection to the Verna family by keeping or revealing the letter, and had likely surrendered it to protect his covert usefulness to Italy. Alingdon, despite himself, found her argument persuasive. Candida then resolved that no one, not even her mother, must ever learn of the letter's discovery or of Briga's part in its loss, fearing the grieving Countess could not forgive him and might endanger him by exposing the matter. Declaring that she would not be surpassed in sacrifice for Italy, Candida burned her brother's letter in the flame of her sealing-taper before Alingdon's eyes. When he asked whether she would at least tell Briga of what she had done for him, she answered that she could never tell him, since that renunciation was her own gift to Italy.
By Edith Wharton · First published 1904 · Genre: Drama, Romance, Historical Fiction · 7,459 words
First lines
For many years he had lived withdrawn from the world in which he had once played so active and even turbulent a part. The study of Tuscan art was his only pursuit, and it was to help him in the classification of his notes and documents that I was first called to his villa. Colonel Alingdon had then the look of a very old man, though his age can hardly have exceeded seventy. He was small and bent, with a finely wrinkled face which still wore the tan of youthful exposure. But for this dusky redness it would have been hard to reconstruct from the shrunken recluse, with his low fastidious voice and carefully tended hands, an image of that young knight of adventure whose sword had been at the service of every uprising which stirred the uneasy soil of Italy in the first half of the nineteenth century.
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The Letter is listed on Textopian as a novella by Edith Wharton, dated 1904 CE.
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- Work type: Novella
- Author: Edith Wharton
- Date: 1904 CE
- Language: English
- Genres: Drama, Romance, Historical Fiction, Psychological Fiction
- Length: 7,459 words
- Structure: 1 section, 111 paragraphs
- Reading fit: Fairly Easy (7th Grade)
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- Canonical title URL and first readable passage URL
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Similar titles
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Genres
- Drama — The narrative is filled with emotional conflicts and struggles, focusing on personal relationships and moral dilemmas.
- Romance — The plot revolves around love and relationships, with a focus on emotional bonds and romantic entanglements.
- Historical Fiction — The setting and context are based on a specific historical period, with the narrative incorporating historical events and figures.
- Psychological Fiction — The narrative delves into the psychological and emotional states of the characters, exploring their thoughts, feelings, and motivations.
Tags
Romance · Drama · Tragedy · Love Triangle · Marriage · Infidelity · Deception · Secrets · Social Class · High Society · Gilded Age · American Literature