{"product_id":"2940014054379","title":"The Villa Lucienne","description":"Madame Koetlegon told the story, and told it so well that her audience\u003cbr\u003eseemed to know the sombre alley, the neglected garden, the shuttered\u003cbr\u003ehouse, as intimately as though they had visited it themselves, seemed\u003cbr\u003eto feel a faint reverberation of the incommunicable thrill which she\u003cbr\u003ehad felt--which the surly guardian, the torn rag of lace, the closed\u003cbr\u003epavilion had made her feel. And yet, as you will see, there is in\u003cbr\u003ereality no story at all; it is merely an account of how, when in the\u003cbr\u003eRiviera two winters ago, she went with some friends to look over a\u003cbr\u003efurnished villa, which one of them thought of taking.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIt was afternoon when we started on our expedition, Madame de M--,\u003cbr\u003eCécile her widowed daughter-in-law, and I. Cécile's little girl Renée,\u003cbr\u003ethe nurse, and Médor, the boarhound of which poor Guy had been so\u003cbr\u003einordinately fond, dawdled after us up the steep and sunny road.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe December day was deliciously blue and warm. Cécile took off her\u003cbr\u003efurs and carried them over her arm. We only put down our sunshades\u003cbr\u003ewhen a screen of olive-trees on the left interposed their grey-green\u003cbr\u003efoliage between us and the sunshine.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eUp in these trees barefooted men armed with bamboos were beating the\u003cbr\u003ebranches to knock down the fruit; and three generations of women,\u003cbr\u003egrandmothers, wives, and children, knelt in the grass, gathering up\u003cbr\u003ethe little purplish olives into baskets. All these paused to follow us\u003cbr\u003ewith black persistent eyes, as we passed by; but the men went on\u003cbr\u003eworking, unmoved. The tap-tapping, swish-swishing, of their light\u003cbr\u003esticks against the boughs played a characteristically southern\u003cbr\u003eaccompaniment to our desultory talk.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWe were reasonably happy, pleasantly exhilarated by the beauty of the\u003cbr\u003eweather and the scene.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eRenée and Médor, with shrill laughter and deep-mouthed joy-notes,\u003cbr\u003eplayed together the whole way. And when the garden wall, which now\u003cbr\u003ereplaced the olive-trees upon our right, gave place to a couple of\u003cbr\u003eiron gates standing open upon a broad straight drive, and we, looking\u003cbr\u003eup between the overarching palm-trees and cocoanuts, saw a white,\u003cbr\u003eelegant, sun-bathed house at the end, Cécile jumped to the conclusion\u003cbr\u003ethat here was the Villa Lucienne, and that nowhere else could she find\u003cbr\u003ea house which on the face of it would suit her better.","brand":"WDS Publishing","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47158199091440,"sku":"2940014054379","price":1.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"url":"https:\/\/shop-qa.barnesandnoble.com\/products\/2940014054379","provider":"Barnes \u0026 Noble (DEV)","version":"1.0","type":"link"}