Saturday, December 9:
This morning was very bad indeed; the fact that Feustel lost the contract and then made no copy of it when it was recovered upsets R. so much that I become extremely worried. R. sends a telegram to the lawyer. But around midday he suggests an outing and is in good spirits; he interprets the Stiefel song as being about a young recruit who suddenly feels a longing for his mother and deserts; for that he is hanged — and quite legally; he says one is ashamed of having anything to do with these robbers who organize the world.
We stroll in Saint Mark’s Square, which always puts him in very good spirits; but the rain vexes him, and above all the fact that our friends the Grosses see hardly anything of the town in all its beauty. Lunch is somewhat disordered by the new seating arrangements. And in the afternoon the lawyer’s reply is received; Batz refuses to produce the contract, which deprives us of any chance of making headway in court! R. is quite beside himself; he also says that on account of all this he finds it impossible to work. (In St. M.’s Square he told me he had inquiries made of Herr Wolkoff whether he would fulfill the wish I had expressed for a portrait of R. beneath the portal of St. M.’s, but Wolkoff has refused.)
However, to my surprise, he disciplines himself in the evening to be friendly, spending part of the time playing whist with my father and part talking to Jouk., Marie Gr., and me, mainly about Tolstoy’s novel, in which he particularly praises old Kutusov.