CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
His home—or ‘wretched hovel’ as he often referred to it—was situated on the pastured slopes above Montreux. It was a pleasant walk up the lanes and roadways from the village, through a damp and dark tunnel under the autoroute, and through the beautiful green fields of Sonzier, a valley kissed by uncountable numbers of cattle, embraced by hundred-year-old trees, and cradled by verdant slopes that swept high up into the Alps. At all times, though almost imperceptibly, the gentle roar of La Baye de Montreux could be heard squeezing through the Gorges du Chauderon. The wild river flowed among a thin sliver of virgin, forested landscape that licked along the edge of cultivation—and civilization—to reach almost down into the center of Montreux, where it ejected into the lake
