Le Coin Sauvage

The mercury is rising.

Mu, in a moment of regression, bought a child's paddling pool which she spent hours inflating and filling with water on the terrace.  By the evening the water temperature had reached 30 and the surface was strippled with suntan oil.  

Danielle has taken to sleeping on our sunbed beneath the acacia trees on the bank of the canal.  She lies rolled up in a little ball and surprises us by her presence whenever we come or go.  The canal water is too low to flow and lies lethargically still, covered in a film of poplar blossom and cut grass, so we take to the lake where the water is snow-melt cold.