"That's just a name they call it by. It's really the Isle of Sarek."
They still stood looking at each other, with a look in which a certain doubt was mingled with a great need of speech and understanding. And at the same time they both felt that they were not enemies.
Véronique was the first to continue:
"Excuse me, but, you see, there are things which are so puzzling . . ."
The Breton woman nodded her head in approval and Véronique continued:
"So puzzling and so disconcerting! . . . For instance, do you know why I'm here? I must tell you. Perhaps you alone can explain . . . It's like this: an accident—quite a small accident, but really it all began with that—brought me to Brittany for the first time and showed me, on the door of an old, deserted, road-side cabin, the initials which I used to sign when I was a girl, a signature which I have not used for fourteen or fifteen years. As I went on, I discovered the same inscription many times repeated, with each time a different consecutive number. That was how I came here, to the beach at Beg-Meil and to this part of the beach, which appeared to be the end of a journey foreseen and arranged by . . . I don't know whom."
"Is your signature here?" asked Honorine, eagerly. "Where?"
"On that stone, above us, at the entrance to the shelter."
"I can't see from here. What are the letters?"
"V. d'H."