DOI article:
Dowson, Ernest Christopher: Apple blossom in Brittany
DOI Page / Citation link:https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.27812#0110
106 Apple Blossom in Brittany
IV
Up by the great, stone Calvary, where they had climbed nearly
a year before, Campion stood, his face deliberately averted, while
the young girl uttered her hesitating confidences ; hesitating, yet
candid, with a candour which seemed to separate him from the
child by more than a measurable space of years, to set him with
an appealing trustfulness in the seat of judgment—for him, for her.
They had wandered there insensibly, through apple-orchards white
with the promise of a bountiful harvest, and up the pine-clad hill,
talking of little things—trifles to beguile their way—perhaps, in a
sort of vain procrastination. Once, Marie-Ursule had plucked a
branch of the snowy blossom, and he had playfully chided her
that the cider would be less by a /ifrg that year in Brittany.
" But the blossom is so much prettier," she protested ; "and there
will be apples and apples—always enough apples. But I like the
blossom best—and it is so soon over."
And then, emerging clear of the trees, with Ploumariel lying in
its quietude in the serene sunshine below them, a sudden strenuous-
ness had supervened, and the girl had unburdened herself, speaking
tremulously, quickly, in an undertone almost passionate; and
Campion, perforce, had listened. . . . A fancy? a whim? Yes,
he reflected ; to the normal, entirely healthy mind, any choice of
exceptional conditions, any special self-consecration or withdrawal
from the common lot of men and women must draw down upon
it some such reproach, seeming the mere pedantry of inexperience.
Yet, against his reason, and what he would fain call his better
judgment, something in his heart of hearts stirred sympathetically
with this notion of the girl. And it was no fixed resolution, no
deliberate
IV
Up by the great, stone Calvary, where they had climbed nearly
a year before, Campion stood, his face deliberately averted, while
the young girl uttered her hesitating confidences ; hesitating, yet
candid, with a candour which seemed to separate him from the
child by more than a measurable space of years, to set him with
an appealing trustfulness in the seat of judgment—for him, for her.
They had wandered there insensibly, through apple-orchards white
with the promise of a bountiful harvest, and up the pine-clad hill,
talking of little things—trifles to beguile their way—perhaps, in a
sort of vain procrastination. Once, Marie-Ursule had plucked a
branch of the snowy blossom, and he had playfully chided her
that the cider would be less by a /ifrg that year in Brittany.
" But the blossom is so much prettier," she protested ; "and there
will be apples and apples—always enough apples. But I like the
blossom best—and it is so soon over."
And then, emerging clear of the trees, with Ploumariel lying in
its quietude in the serene sunshine below them, a sudden strenuous-
ness had supervened, and the girl had unburdened herself, speaking
tremulously, quickly, in an undertone almost passionate; and
Campion, perforce, had listened. . . . A fancy? a whim? Yes,
he reflected ; to the normal, entirely healthy mind, any choice of
exceptional conditions, any special self-consecration or withdrawal
from the common lot of men and women must draw down upon
it some such reproach, seeming the mere pedantry of inexperience.
Yet, against his reason, and what he would fain call his better
judgment, something in his heart of hearts stirred sympathetically
with this notion of the girl. And it was no fixed resolution, no
deliberate