sun has the better of you. But as long as life does last the
effort will be made to get back to the Boulevard Felix-Martin at
Saint-Raphael. For there, better than anywhere else on the Riviera,
one can look at the sea.

CHAPTER XV

THEOULE

From Cannes to Menton the Riviera is cursed with electric tram lines.
We were led beyond Cannes to the Corniche de l'Esterel by the absence
of a tram line. We could not get away from the railway, however,
without abandoning the coast. Is there any place desirable for living
purposes in which the railway does not obtrude? When choosing a
country residence, men with families, unless they have several motors
and several chauffeurs, must stick close to the railway. Monsieur
l'Adjoint was showing us the salon of his villa when a whistle
announced the Vintimille express. He hastened to anticipate the train
by reassuring us that there was a deep cut back of the villa and that
the road-bed veered away from us just at the corner of the garden. It
was in the neighboring villa that trains were really heard. We were to
believe him--at that moment chandeliers and windows and two vases of
dried grasses on the mantelpiece danced a passing greeting to the
train. Monsieur l'Adjoint thought that he had failed to carry the day.
But we live on a Paris boulevard, and know that noises are comparative.
Vintimille expresses were not going to pass all the time.

We were glad that the railway had not deterred us. It was good to be
right above the water. Some people do not like the glare of sun
reflected from the sea. But they are late risers. Parents of small
children are accustomed to waking with the sun. On the first morning
in the Villa Etoile the baby chuckled early. Sun spots were dancing on
the ceiling, and she was watching them. The breakfast on the terrace
was no hurried swallowing of a cup of coffee with eyes fixed upon a
newspaper propped against a sugar bowl. The agreement of the day
before had been tripartite. The proprietor was easily satisfied with
bank notes. But the wife had not consented to leave the freedom of the
hotel until it had been solemnly agreed that newspapers were to be
refused entrance into the Villa Etoile, and that watches were not to be
drawn out (even furtively) from waistcoat pockets.

Unless agreements are fortified by favorable circumstances and
constantly recurring interest, they are seldom lived up to. When
promises are difficult to keep,