SHORT STORIES AND POEMS........Judy Boss




KERFOL
as first published in
Scribner's Magazine, March 1916


I


"You ought to buy it," said my host; "it's just the place for a
solitary-minded devil like you. And it would be rather worth
while to own the most romantic house in Brittany. The present
people are dead broke, and it's going for a song--you ought to
buy it."

It was not with the least idea of living up to the character my
friend Lanrivain ascribed to me (as a matter of fact, under my
unsociable exterior I have always had secret yearnings for
domesticity) that I took his hint one autumn afternoon and went
to Kerfol. My friend was motoring over to Quimper on business:
he dropped me on the way, at a cross-road on a heath, and said:
"First turn to the right and second to the left. Then straight
ahead till you see an avenue. If you meet any peasants, don't
ask your way. They don't understand French, and they would
pretend they did and mix you up. I'll be back for you here by
sunset--and don't forget the tombs in the chapel."