They dined by the latticed window; two candles lighted them; old Anne served them—old Anne of Fäouette in her wide white coiffe and collarette, her velvet bodice and her chaussons broidered with the rose.
Always she talked as she moved about with dish and salver—garrulous, deaf, and aged, and perhaps flushed with the gentle afterglow of that second infancy which comes before the night.
"Ouidame! It is I, Anne Le Bihan, who tell you this, my pretty gentleman. I have lived through eighty years and I have seen life begin and end in the Woods of Aulnes—alas!—in the Woods and the House of Aulnes——"
"The red wine, Anne," said her mistress, gently.
"Madame the Countess is served.... These grapes grew when I was young, Monsieur—and the world was young, too, mon Capitaine—hélas!—but the Woods of Aulnes were old, old as the headland yonder. Only the sea is older, beau jeune homme—only the sea is older—the sea which always was and will be."
"Madame," he said, turning toward the young girl beside him, "—to France!—I have the honour—" She touched her glass to his and they saluted France with the ancient wine of France—a sip, a faint smile, and silence through which their eyes still lingered for a moment.
"This year is yielding a bitter vintage," he said. "Light is lacking. But—but there will be sun enough another year."
"Yes."
"B'en oui! The sun must shine again," muttered old Anne, "but not in the Woods of Aulnes. Non pas. There is no sunlight in the Woods of Aulnes where all is dim and still; where the Blessed walk at dawn with[pg 123] Our Lady of Aulnes in shining vestments all——"
"She has seen thin mists rising there," whispered the Countess in his ear.