Under the old apple-tree in full bloom sat my mother, darning small
socks; with her flaxen side-curls (as it was her fashion to wear them)
half-concealing her face. My emotion and astonishment were immense. My
heart beat fast. I felt its pulse in my temples, and my breath
was short.
At a little green table that I remembered well sat a small boy, rather
quaintly dressed in a by-gone fashion, with a frill round his wide
shirt-collar, and his golden hair cut quite close at the top, and rather
long at the sides and back. It was Gogo Pasquier. He seemed a very nice
little boy. He had pen and ink and copy-book before him, and a
gilt-edged volume bound in red morocco. I knew it at a glance; it was
_Elegant Extracts_. The dog Medor lay asleep in the shade. The bees
were droning among the nasturtiums and convolvulus.
A little girl ran up the avenue from the porter's lodge and pushed the
garden gate, which rang the bell as it opened, and she went into the
garden, and I followed her; but she took no notice of me, nor did the
others. It was Mimsey Seraskier.
I went out and sat at my mother's feet, and looked long in her face.
I must not speak to her, nor touch her--not even touch her busy hand
with my lips, or I should "blur the dream.
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