An American academic, researching the life of the most famous artist of the century and the mystery of why and how he abandoned the passionate relationship with his muse and lover during the war, finds a cache of letters in the woman's house after her death. The burningly passionate correspondence reveals the nature of their love and, eventually, the reason for their parting, and encompasses a taut Resistance storyline as well as a beautiful evocation of Provence - a harsher place than the tourist brochures or Peter Mayle portray.
