The coast of Brittany dimples as it smiles, and in its most charming dimple is tucked away our little village. The sea has all the glitter of crushed gems. It sparkles in amethyst and emerald; it glooms to garnet and sardonyx. There is a bow of golden sand, and the hill-side is ablaze with yellow brown.
“Dreamhaven” I call our house, and it stands between the poppies and the pines. A house of Breton granite, built to suffice a score of generations, it glimmers like some silvery grand-dame, and its roof is velvety with orange-coloured moss.
We have been here three weeks and Anastasia has responded wonderfully to the change. Nothing can exceed her delight. She sings all day, rivalling the merle that wakes us every morning with his flute-like run of melody.
She loves to sit in a corner of the old garden where a fig tree climbs the silvery wall. There she will knit tranquilly and watch the little lizards flicker over the sun-warmed stone, then pause with panting sides and bead-like eyes to peer around. But for me, I prefer the scented gloom of the pine coppice beyond the garden. Dearly do I love the sudden solitude of pines.
I have corrected the proofs of Tom, Dick and Harry there. I am relieved to find the story goes with vim. It is as light as a biscuit, and as easy of mental digestion. I have sent off the last batch of proofs; my part is done; the rest is Fate.
Now I turn to my jolly Bretons, so dirty and devout, so toilworn and so tranquil. My old women have the bright, clear eyes of children. Never have they worn hat or shoes, never left their native heaths. Yet they are happy—because it has never struck them that they are not happy.
My young women all want to marry sailors so that they may be left at home in tranquillity. They do not desire to see over-much of their lords and masters, who I fear, are fond of mixing eau-de-vie with their cider. If they go to live in cities they generally die of consumption. Their costume is hauntingly Elizabethan, and they are three hundred years behind the times.
About a week ago I had a curious conversation with Anastasia.
“Little Thing,” I began, “do you know that if I like I can go away and marry some other French girl?”