It is true that we were married; but, finding, after eight days, that our union was not likely to turn out a happy one, we parted by mutual consent. The story of my responsibility for the Pic du Midi business only exists in the imaginative brain of some journalist who revels in supplying tragic details. Anyhow, Mr. Editor, I count upon your sympathy to exculpate me from any share in the melancholy event.--
Yours, LOLA MONTEZ.
Mauclerc, however, so far from being dead, was still very much alive, and was sunning himself just then at Bayonne. Having read this letter, he answered it in the next issue:
I have just seen in the columns of La Presse a letter from Lola Montez. This gives an account of a deliberate jump from the top of a cliff and of a marriage with myself as the chief actor in each catastrophe. All I have to say about them is that I know nothing of these important occurrences. I assure you, sir, I have never felt any desire to "precipitate" myself, either from the Pic du Midi or from anywhere else; nor have I ever had the distinction of being the husband of the famous Countess of Landsfeld for a matter of even eight days.--MAUCLERC. Artist dramatique.
September 9, 1856.
Lola ignored this démenti. Possibly, however, she did not read it, for she was just then arranging another trip to America.