But her uncle persisted in his refusal. He was irritated to find that he

could not unfasten the knot in which he had tied his reins. And then she

began to skip round him, clapping her hands and repeating in a sing-song

voice: ‘Yes! yes! you’ll stay, and we will eat it up, we’ll eat it up!’

Her uncle could no longer resist her blandishments; he raised his head

and smiled at her. She seemed so full of life and health and sincerity;

her gaiety was as frank and natural as the sheet of sunlight which was

gilding her bare arms.

‘You big silly!’ he said; and clasping her by the wrists as she

continued skipping gleefully about him, he went on: ‘No, dear; not

to-day. I have to go to see a poor girl who is ill. But I will come some

other morning. I promise you faithfully.’

‘When? when?’ she persisted. ‘On Thursday? The cow is in calf, you know,

and she hasn’t seemed at all well these last two days. You are a doctor,

and you ought to be able to give her something to do her good.’

Abbé Mouret, who had calmly remained there, could not restrain a slight

laugh.

The doctor gaily got into his gig and exclaimed: ‘All right, my dear,

I will attend to your cow. Come and let me kiss you. Ah! how nice

and healthy you are! And you are worth more than all the others put

together. Ah! if every one was like my big silly, this earth would be

too beautiful!’

He set his horse off with a cluck of his tongue, and continued talking

to himself as the gig rattled down the hill.

‘Yes, yes! there should be nothing but animals. Ah! if they were mere

animals, how happy and gay and strong they would all be! It has gone

well with the girl, who is as happy as her cow; but it has gone badly

with the lad, who is in torture beneath his cassock. A drop too much

blood, a little too much nerve, and one’s whole life is wrecked! ...

They are true Rougons and true Macquarts those children there! The

tail-end of the stock--its final degeneracy.’

Then, urging on his horse, he drove at a trot up the hill that led to

the Paradou.

VII

Sunday was a busy day for Abbé Mouret. He had to think of vespers, which

he generally said to empty seats, for even mother Brichet did not carry

her piety so far as to go back to church in the afternoon. Then, at four

o’clock, Brother Archangias brought the little rogues from his school

to repeat their catechism to his reverence. This lesson sometimes lasted

until late. When the children showed themselves quite intractable, La

Teuse was summoned to frighten them with her broom.

On that particular Sunday, about four o’clock, Desirée found herself

quite alone in the parsonage. As she felt a little bored, she went to

gather some food for her rabbits in the churchyard, where there were

some magnificent poppies, of which rabbits are extremely fond. Dragging

herself about on her knees between the grave-stones, she gathered

apronfuls of juicy verdure on which her pets fell greedily.

‘Oh! what lovely plantains!’ she muttered, stooping before Abbé Caffin’s

tombstone, and delighted with the discovery she had made.

There were, indeed, some magnificent plantains spreading out their broad

leaves beside the stone. Desirée had just finished filling her apron

with them when she fancied she heard a strange noise behind her. A

rustling of branches and a rolling of small pebbles came from the ravine

which skirted one side of the graveyard, and at the bottom of which

flowed the Mascle, a stream which descended from the high lands of

the Paradou. But the ascent here was so rough, so impracticable, that

Desirée imagined that the noise could only have been made by some lost

dog or straying goat. She stepped quickly to the edge, and, as she

looked over, she was amazed to see amidst the brambles a girl who was

climbing up the rocks with extraordinary agility.

‘I will give you a hand,’ she said. ‘You might easily break your neck

there.’

The girl, directly she saw she was discovered, started back, as though

she would rather go down again, but after a moment’s hesitation she

ventured to take the hand that was held out to her.

‘Oh! I know who you are,’ said Desirée, with a beaming smile, and

letting her apron fall that she might grasp the girl by the waist. ‘You

once gave me some blackbirds, but they all died, poor little dears. I

was so sorry about it.--Wait a bit, I know your name, I have heard it

before. La Teuse often mentions it when Serge isn’t there; but she

told me that I was not to repeat it. Wait a moment, I shall remember it

directly!’

She tried to recall the name, and grew quite grave in the attempt. Then,

having succeeded in remembering it, she became gay again, and seemingly

found great pleasure in dwelling upon its musical sound.

‘Albine! Albine!---- What a sweet name it is! At first I used to think

you must be a tomtit, because I once had a tomtit with a name very like

yours, though I don’t remember exactly what it was.’

Albine did not smile. Her face was very pale, and there was a feverish

gleam in her eyes. A few drops of blood trickled from her hands. When

she had recovered her breath, she hastily exclaimed:

No! no! leave it alone. You will only stain your handkerchief. It is

nothing but a scratch. I didn’t want to come by the road, as I should

have been seen--so I preferred coming along the bed of the torrent----

Is Serge there?’

Desirée did not feel at all shocked at hearing the girl pronounce

her brother’s name thus familiarly and with an expression of subdued

passion. She simply replied that he was in the church hearing the

children say their catechism.

‘You must not speak at all loudly,’ she added, raising her finger to

her lips. ‘Serge forbade me to talk loudly when he is catechising the

children, and we shall get into trouble if we don’t keep quiet. Let us

go into the stable--shall we? We can talk better there.’

‘I want to see Serge,’ said Albine, simply.

Desirée cast a hasty glance at the church, and then whispered, ‘Yes,

yes; Serge will be finely caught. Come with me. We will hide ourselves,

and keep quite quiet. We shall have some fine fun!’

She had picked up the herbage which had fallen from her apron, and

quitting the graveyard she stole back to the parsonage, telling Albine

to hide herself behind her and make herself as little as possible. As

they stealthily glided through the farmyard, they caught sight of La

Teuse, who was crossing over to the vestry, but she did not appear to

notice them.

‘There! There!’ said Desirée, quite delighted, as they stowed themselves

away in the stable; ‘keep quiet, and no one will know that we are here.

There is some straw there for you to lie down upon.’

Albine seated herself on a truss of straw.

‘And Serge?’ she asked, persisting in her one fixed idea.

‘Listen! You can hear his voice. When he claps his hands, it will be all

over, and the children will go away--Listen! he is telling them a tale.’

They could indeed just hear Abbé Mouret’s voice, which was wafted to

them through the vestry doorway which La Teuse had doubtless left open.

It came to them like a solemn murmur, in which they could distinguish

the name of Jesus thrice repeated. Albine trembled. She sprang up as

though to hasten to that beloved voice whose caressing accents she knew

so well, but all sound of it suddenly died away, shut off by the

closing of the door. Then she sat down again, to wait, her hands tightly

clasped, and her clear eyes gleaming with the intensity of her thoughts.

Desirée, who was lying at her feet, gazed up at her with innocent

admiration.

‘How beautiful you are!’ she whispered. ‘You are like an image that

Serge used to have in his bedroom. It was quite white like you are, with

great curls floating about the neck; and the heart was quite bare and

uncovered, just in the place where I can feel yours beating---- But

you are not listening to me. You are looking quite sad. Let us play at

something? Will you?’

Then she stopped short, holding her breath and saying between her teeth:

‘Ah! the wretches! they will get us caught!’ She still had her apron

full of herbage with her, and her pets were taking it by assault. A

troop of fowls had surrounded her, clucking and calling each other, and

pecking at the hanging green stuff. The goat pushed its head slyly under

her arm, and began to eat the longer leaves. Even the cow, which was

tethered to the wall, strained at its cord and poked out its nose,

kissing her with its warm breath.

‘Oh! you thieves!’ cried Desirée. ‘But this is for the rabbits, not for

you! Leave me alone, won’t you! You, there, will get your ears boxed, if

you don’t go away! And you too will have your tail pulled if I catch you

at it again. The wretches! they will be eating my hands soon!’

She drove the goat off, dispersed the fowls with her feet, and tapped

the cow’s nose with her fists. But the creatures just shook themselves,

and then came back more greedily than ever, surrounding her, jumping

on her, and tearing open her apron. At this she whispered to Albine, as

though she were afraid the animals might hear her.

‘Aren’t they amusing, the dears? Watch them eat.’

Albine looked on with a grave expression.

‘Now, now, be good,’ resumed Desirée; ‘you shall all have some, but you

must wait your turns. Now, big Lisa, you first. Eh! how fond you are of

plantain, aren’t you?’

Big Lisa was the cow. She slowly munched a handful of the juicy leaves

which had grown beside Abbé Caffin’s tomb. A thread of saliva hung down

from her mouth, and her great brown eyes shone with quiet enjoyment.

‘There! now it’s your turn,’ continued Desirée, turning towards the

goat. ‘You are fond of poppies, I know; and you like the flowers best,

don’t you? The buds that shine in your teeth like red-hot butterflies!

See, here are some splendid ones; they came from the left-hand corner,

where there was a burial last year.’

As she spoke, she gave the goat a bunch of scarlet flowers, which the

animal ate from her hand. When there was nothing left in her grasp

but the stalks, she pushed these between its teeth. Behind her, in the

meanwhile, the fowls were desperately pecking away at her petticoats.

She threw them some wild chicory and dandelions which she had gathered

amongst the old slabs that were ranged alongside the church walls.

It was particularly over the dandelions that the fowls quarrelled, so

voraciously indeed, with such scratchings and flapping of wings,

that the other fowls in the yard heard them. And then came a general

invasion. The big yellow cock, Alexander, was the first to appear;

having seized a dandelion and torn it in halves, without attempting to

eat it, he called to the hens who were still outside to come and peck.

Then a white hen strutted in, then a black one, and then a whole crowd

of hens, who hustled one another, and trod on one another’s tails, and

ended by forming a wild flood of feathers. Behind the fowls came the

pigeons, and the ducks, and the geese, and, last of all, the turkeys.

Desirée laughed at seeing herself thus surrounded by this noisy,

squabbling mob.

‘This is what always happens,’ said she, ‘every time that I bring any

green stuff from the graveyard. They nearly kill each other to get at

it; they must find it very nice.’

Then she made a fight to keep a few handfuls of the leaves from the

greedy beaks which rose all round her, saying that something must really

be saved for the rabbits. She would surely get angry with them if

they went on like that, and give them nothing but dry bread in future.

However, she was obliged to give way. The geese tugged at her apron

so violently that she was almost pulled down upon her knees; the ducks

gobbled away at her ankles; two of the pigeons flew upon her head, and

some of the fowls fluttered about her shoulders. It was the ferocity of

creatures who smell flesh: the fat plantains, the crimson poppies,

the milky dandelions, in which remained some of the life of the dead.

Desirée laughed loudly, and felt that she was on the point of slipping

down, and letting go of her last two handfuls, when the fowls were

panic-stricken by a terrible grunting.

‘Ah! it’s you, my fatty,’ she exclaimed, quite delighted; ‘eat them up,

and set me at liberty.’

The pig waddled in; he was no longer the little pig of former days--pink

as a newly painted toy, with a tiny little tail, like a bit of string;

but a fat wobbling creature, fit to be killed, with a belly as round

as a monk’s, and a back all bristling with rough hairs, that reeked of

fatness. His stomach had grown quite yellow from his habit of sleeping

on the manure heap. Waddling along on his shaky feet, he charged with

lowered snout at the scared fowls, and so left Desirée at liberty to

escape, and take the rabbits the few scraps of green stuff which she had

so strenuously defended. When she came back, all was peace again. The

stupid, ecstatic-looking geese were lazily swaying their long necks

about, the ducks and turkeys were waddling in ungainly fashion alongside

the wall; the fowls were quietly clucking and peaking at invisible

grains on the hard ground of the stable; while the pig, the goat, and

the big cow, were drowsily blinking their eyes, as though they were

falling asleep. Outside it had just begun to rain.

‘Ah! well, there’s a shower coming on!’ cried Desirée, throwing herself

down on the straw. ‘You had better stay where you are, my dears, if you

don’t want to get soaked.’

Then she turned to Albine and added: ‘How stupid they all look, don’t

they? They only wake up just to eat!’

Albine still remained silent. The merry laughter of that buxom girl

as she struggled amidst those greedy necks and gluttonous beaks, which

tickled and kissed her, and seemed bent on devouring her very flesh, had

rendered the unhappy daughter of the Paradou yet paler than she had been

before. So much gaiety, so much vitality, so much boisterous health made

her despair. She strained her feverish arms to her desolate bosom, which

desertion had parched.

‘And Serge?’ she asked again, in the same clear, stubborn voice.

‘Hush!’ said Desirée. ‘I heard him just now. He hasn’t finished yet----

We have been making a pretty disturbance; La Teuse must surely have

grown deaf this afternoon---- Let us keep quiet now. I like to hear the

rain fall.’

The shower beat in at the open doorway, casting big drops upon the

threshold. The restless fowls, after venturing out for a moment, had

quickly retreated to the far end of the stable; where, indeed, with the

exception of three ducks who remained quietly walking in the rain, all

the pets had now taken refuge, clustering round the girl’s skirts. It

was growing very warm amongst the straw. Desirée pulled two big trusses

together, made a bed of them, and lay down at full length. She felt

extremely comfortable there.

‘It is so nice,’ she murmured. ‘Come and lie down like me. It is so

springy and soft, all this straw; and it tickles one so funnily in the

neck. Do you roll about in the straw at home? There is nothing I am

fonder of---- Sometimes I tickle the soles of my feet with it. That is

very funny, too----’

But at that moment, the big yellow cock, who had been gravely stalking

towards her, jumped upon her breast.

‘Get away with you, Alexander! get away!’ she cried. ‘What a tiresome

creature he is! The idea of his perching himself on me---- You are too

rough, sir, and you scratch me with your claws. Do you hear me? I don’t

want you to go away, but you must be good, and mustn’t peck at my hair.’

Then she troubled herself no further about him. The cock still

maintained his position, every now and then glancing inquisitively at

the girl’s chin with his gleaming eye. The other birds all began to

cluster round her. After rolling amongst the straw, she was now lying

lazily on her back with her arms stretched out.

‘Ah! how pleasant it is,’ she said; ‘but then it makes me feel so

sleepy. Straw always makes one drowsy, doesn’t it? Serge doesn’t like

it. Perhaps you don’t either. What do you like? Tell me, so that I may

know.’

She was gradually dozing off. For a moment she opened her eyes widely,

as though she were looking for something, and then her eyelids fell with

a tranquil smile of content. She seemed to be asleep, but after a few

minutes she opened her eyes again, and said:

‘The cow is going to have a calf---- That will be so nice, and will

please me more than anything.’

Then she sank into deep slumber. The fowls had ended by perching on

her body; she was buried beneath a wave of living plumage. Hens were

brooding over her feet; geese stretched their soft downy necks over her

legs. The pig lay against her left side, while on the right, the goat

poked its bearded head under her arm. The pigeons were roosting and

nestling all over her, on her hands, her waist, and her shoulders. And

there she lay asleep, in all her rosy freshness, caressed by the cow’s

warm breath, while the big cock still squatted just below her bosom with

gleaming comb and quivering wings.

Outside, the rain was falling less heavily. A sunbeam, escaping from

beneath a cloud, gilded the fine drops of water. Albine, who had

remained perfectly still, watched the slumber of Desirée, that big,

plump girl who found her great delight in rolling about in the straw.

She wished that she, too, could slumber away so peacefully, and feel

such pleasure, because a few straws had tickled her neck. And she felt

jealous of those strong arms, that firm bosom, all that vitality, all

that purely animal development which made the other like a tranquil

easy-minded sister of the big red and white cow.

However, the rain had now quite ceased. The three cats of the parsonage

filed out into the yard one after the other, keeping close to the wall,

and taking the greatest precautions to avoid wetting their paws. They

peeped into the stable, and then stalked up to the sleeping girl, and

lay down, purring, close by her. Moumou, the big black cat, curled

itself up close to her cheek, and gently licked her chin.

‘And Serge?’ murmured Albine, quite mechanically.

What was it that kept them apart? Who was it that prevented them from

being happy together? Why might she not love him, and why might she

not be loved, freely and in the broad sunlight, as the trees lived and

loved? She knew not, but she felt that she had been forsaken, and had

received a mortal wound. Yet she was possessed by a stubborn, determined

longing, a very necessity, indeed, of once more clasping her love in

her arms, of concealing him somewhere, that he might be hers in all

felicity. She rose to her feet. The vestry door had just been opened

again. A clapping of hands sounded, followed by the uproar of a swarm

of children clattering in wooden shoes over the stone flags. The

catechising was over. Then Albine gently glided out of the stable, where

she had been waiting for an hour amidst the reeking warmth that emanated

from Desirée’s pets.

As she quietly slipped through the passage that led to the vestry,

she caught sight of La Teuse, who was going to her kitchen, and who

fortunately did not turn her head. Certain, now, of not being seen and

stopped, Albine softly pushed the door which was before her, keeping

hold of it in order that it might make no noise as it closed again.

And she found herself in the church.

VIII

At first she could see nobody. Outside, the rain had again begun to fall

in fine close drops. The church looked very grey and gloomy. She passed

behind the high altar, and walked on towards the pulpit. In the middle

of the nave, there were only a number of empty benches, left there in

disorder by the urchins of the catechism class. Amidst all this void

came a low tic-tac from the swaying pendulum. She went down the church

to knock at the confessional-box, which she saw standing at the other

end. But, just as she passed the Chapel of the Dead, she caught sight

of Abbé Mouret prostrated before the great bleeding Christ. He did not

stir; he must have thought that it was only La Teuse putting the seats

in order behind him.

But Albine laid her hand upon his shoulder.

‘Serge,’ she said, ‘I have come for you.’

The priest raised his head with a start. His face was very pale. He

remained on his knees and crossed himself, while his lips still quivered

with the words of his prayer.

‘I have been waiting for you,’ she continued. ‘Every morning and every

evening I looked to see if you were not coming. I have counted the days

till I could keep the reckoning no longer. Ah! for weeks and weeks----

Then, when I grew sure that you were not coming, I set out myself, and

came here. I said to myself: “I will fetch him away with me.” Give me

your hand and let us go.’

She stretched out her hands, as though to help him to rise. But he only

crossed himself, afresh. He still continued his prayers as he looked at

her. He had succeeded in calming the first quiver of his flesh. From

the Divine grace which had been streaming around him since the early

morning, like a celestial bath, he derived a superhuman strength.

‘It is not right for you to be here,’ he said, gravely. ‘Go away. You

are aggravating your sufferings.’

‘I suffer no longer,’ she said, with a smile. ‘I am well again; I am

cured, now that I see you once more---- Listen! I made myself out

worse than I really was, to induce them to go and fetch you. I am quite

willing to confess it now. And that promise of going away, of leaving

the neighbourhood, you didn’t suppose I should have kept it, did you?

No, indeed, unless I had carried you away with me on my shoulders. The

others don’t know it, but you must know that I cannot now live anywhere

but at your side.’

She grew quite cheerful again, and drew close to the priest with the

caressing ways of a child of nature, never noticing his cold and rigid

demeanour. And she became impatient, clapped her hands, and exclaimed:

‘Come, Serge; make up your mind and come. We are only losing time. There

is no necessity to think so much about it. It is quite simple; I am

going to take you with me. If you don’t want any one to see you, we will

go along by the Mascle. It is not very easy walking, but I managed it

all by myself; and, when we are together, we can help each other. You

know the way, don’t you? We cross the churchyard, we descend to the

torrent, and then we shall only have to follow its course right up to

the garden. And one is quite at home down there. Nobody can see us,

there is nothing but brambles and big round stones. The bed of the

stream is nearly dry. As I came along, I thought: “By-and-by, when he is

with me, we will walk along gently together and kiss one another.” Come,

Serge, be quick; I am waiting for you.’

The priest no longer appeared to hear her. He had betaken himself to

his prayers again, and was asking Heaven to grant him the courage of the

saints. Before entering upon the supreme struggle, he was arming himself

with the flaming sword of faith. For a moment he had feared he was

wavering. He had required all a martyr’s courage and endurance to remain

firmly kneeling there on the flagstones, while Albine was calling

him: his heart had leapt out towards her, all his blood had surged

passionately through his veins, filling him with an intense yearning to

clasp her in his arms and kiss her hair. Her mere breath had awakened

all the memory of their love; the vast garden, their saunters beneath

the trees, and all the joy of their companionship.

But Divine grace was poured down upon him more abundantly, and the

torturing strife, during which all his blood seemed to quit his veins,

lasted but a moment. Nothing human then remained within him. He had

become wholly God’s.

Albine, however, again touched him on the shoulder. She was growing

uneasy and angry.

‘Why do you not speak to me?’ she asked. ‘You can’t refuse; you will

come with me? Remember that I shall die if you refuse. But no! you

can’t; it is impossible. We lived together once; it was vowed that we

should never separate. Twenty times, at least, did you give yourself to

me. You bade me take you wholly, your limbs, your breath, your very life

itself. I did not dream it all. There is nothing of you that you have

not given to me; not a hair in your head which is not mine. Your hands

are mine. For days and days have I held them clasped in mine. Your face,

your lips, your eyes, your brow, all, all are mine, and I have lavished

my love upon them. Do you hear me, Serge?’

She stood erect before him, full of proud assertion, with outstretched

arms. And, in a louder voice, she repeated:

‘Do you hear me, Serge? You belong to me.’

Then Abbé Mouret slowly rose to his feet. He leant against the altar,

and replied:

‘No. You are mistaken. I belong to God.’

He was full of serenity. His shorn face seemed like that of some stone

saint, whom no impulse of the flesh can disturb. His cassock fell around

him in straight folds like a black winding-sheet, concealing all the

outlines of his body. Albine dropped back at the sight of that sombre

phantom of her former love. She missed his freely flowing beard, his

freely flowing curls. And in the midst of his shorn locks she saw the

pallid circle of his tonsure, which disquieted her as if it had been

some mysterious evil, some malignant sore which had grown there, and

would eat away all memory of the happy days they had spent together. She

could recognise neither his hands, once so warm with caresses, nor his

lissom neck, once so sonorous with laughter; nor his agile feet, which

had carried her into the recesses of the woodlands. Could this, indeed,

be the strong youth with whom she had lived one whole season--the youth

with soft down gleaming on his bare breast, with skin browned by the

sun’s rays, with every limb full of vibrating life? At this present

hour he seemed fleshless; his hair had fallen away from him, and all his

virility had withered within that womanish gown, which left him sexless.

‘Oh! you frighten me,’ she murmured. ‘Did you think then that I was

dead, that you put on mourning? Take off that black thing; put on a

blouse. You can tuck up the sleeves, and we will catch crayfishes again.

Your arms used to be as white as mine.’

She laid her hand on his cassock, as though to tear it off him; but he

repulsed her with a gesture, without touching her. He looked at her now

and strengthened himself against temptation by never allowing his eyes

to leave her. She seemed to him to have grown taller. She was no longer

the playful damsel adorned with bunches of wild-flowers, and casting to

the winds gay, gipsy laughter, nor was she the amorosa in white skirts,

gracefully bending her slender form as she sauntered lingeringly beside

the hedges. Now, there was a velvety bloom upon her lips; her hips were

gracefully rounded; her bosom was in full bloom. She had become a woman,

with a long oval face that seemed expressive of fruitfulness. Life

slumbered within her. And her cheeks glowed with luscious maturity.

The priest, bathed in the voluptuous atmosphere that seemed to emanate

from all that feminine ripeness, took a bitter pleasure in defying the

caresses of her coral lips, the tempting smile of her eyes, the witching

charm of her bosom, and all the intoxication which seemed to pour from

her at every movement. He even carried his temerity so far as to search

with his gaze for the spots that he had once so hotly kissed, the

corners of her eyes and lips, her narrow temples, soft as satin, and the

ambery nape of her neck, which was like velvet. And never, even in

her embrace, had he tasted such felicity as he now felt in martyring

himself, by boldly looking in the face the love that he refused. At

last, fearing lest he might there yield to some new allurement of the

flesh, he dropped his eyes, and said, very gently:

‘I cannot hear you here. Let us go out, if you, indeed, persist in

adding to the pain of both of us. Our presence in this place is a

scandal. We are in God’s house.’

‘God!’ cried Albine, excitedly, suddenly becoming a child of nature

once more. ‘God! Who is He? I know nothing of your God! I want to know

nothing of Him if He has stolen you away from me, who have never harmed

Him. My uncle Jeanbernat was right then when he said that your God was

only an invention to frighten people, and make them weep! You are lying;

you love me no longer, and that God of yours does not exist.’

‘You are in His house now,’ said Abbé Mouret, sternly. ‘You blaspheme.

With a breath He might turn you into dust.’

She laughed with proud disdain, and raised her hands as if to defy

Heaven.

‘Ah! then,’ said she, ‘you prefer your God to me. You think He is

stronger than I am, and you imagine that He will love you better than

I did. Oh! but you are a child, a foolish child. Come, leave all this

folly. We will return to the garden together, and love each other, and

be happy and free. That, that is life!’

This time she succeeded in throwing an arm round his waist, and she

tried to drag him away. But he, quivering all over, freed himself from

her embrace, and again took his stand against the altar.

‘Go away!’ he faltered. ‘If you still love me, go away.... O Lord,

pardon her, and pardon me too, for thus defiling this Thy house. Should

I go with her beyond the door, I might, perhaps, follow her. Here, in

Thy presence, I am strong. Suffer that I may remain here, to protect

Thee from insult.’

Albine remained silent for a moment. Then, in a calm voice, she said:

‘Well, let us stay here, then. I wish to speak to you. You cannot,

surely, be cruel. You will understand me. You will not let me go away

alone. Oh! do not begin to excuse yourself. I will not lay my hands upon

you again, since it distresses you. I am quite calm now as you can see.

We will talk quietly, as we used to do in the old days when we lost our

way, and did not hurry to find it again, that we might have the more

time to talk together.’

She smiled at that memory, and continued:

‘I don’t know about these things myself. My uncle Jeanbernat used to

forbid me to go to church. “Silly girl,” he’d say to me, “why do you

want to go to a stuffy building when you have got a garden to run about

in?” I grew up quite happy and contented. I used to look in the birds’

nests without even taking the eggs. I did not even pluck the flowers,

for fear of hurting the plants; and you know that I could never torture

an insect. Why, then, should God be angry with me?’

‘You should learn to know Him, pray to Him, and render Him the constant

worship which is His due,’ answered the priest.

‘Ah! it would please you if I did, would it not?’ she said. ‘You would

forgive me, and love me again? Well, I will do all that you wish me.

Tell me about God, and I will believe in Him, and worship Him. All that

you tell me shall be a truth to which I will listen on my knees. Have I

ever had a thought that was not your own? We will begin our long walks

again; and you shall teach me, and make of me whatever you will. Say

“yes,” I beg of you.’

Abbé Mouret pointed to his cassock.

‘I cannot,’ he simply said. ‘I am a priest.’

‘A priest!’ she repeated after him, the smile dying out of her eyes. ‘My

uncle says that priests have neither wife, nor sister, nor mother. So

that is true, then. But why did you ever come? It was you who took me

for your sister, for your wife. Were you then lying?’

The priest raised his pale face, moist with the sweat of agony. ‘I have

sinned,’ he murmured.

‘When I saw you so free,’ the girl went on, ‘I thought that you were

no longer a priest. I believed that all that was over, that you would

always remain there with me, and for my sake.---- And now, what would

you have me do, if you rob me of my whole life?’

‘What I do,’ he answered; ‘kneel down, suffer on your knees, and never

rise until God pardons you.’

‘Are you a coward, then?’ she exclaimed, her anger roused once more, her

lips curving scornfully.

He staggered, and kept silence. Agony held him by the throat; but he

proved stronger than pain. He held his head erect, and a smile almost

played about his trembling lips. Albine for a moment defied him with

her fixed glance; then, carried away by a fresh burst of passion, she

exclaimed:

‘Well, answer me. Accuse me! Say it was I who came to tempt you! That

will be the climax! Speak, and say what you can for yourself. Strike me

if you like. I should prefer your blows to that corpse-like stiffness

you put on. Is there no blood left in your veins? Have you no spirit?

Don’t you hear me calling you a coward? Yes, indeed, you are a coward.

You should never have loved me, since you may not be a man. Is it that

black robe of yours which holds you back? Tear it off! When you are

naked, perhaps you will remember yourself again.’

The priest slowly repeated his former words:

‘I have sinned. I had no excuse for my sin. I do penitence for my sin

without hope of pardon. If I tore off my cassock, I should tear away my

very flesh, for I have given myself wholly to God, soul and body. I am a

priest.’

‘And I! what is to become of me?’ cried Albine.

He looked unflinchingly at her.

‘May your sufferings be reckoned against me as so many crimes! May I be

eternally punished for the desertion in which I am forced to leave you!

That will be only just. All unworthy though I be, I pray for you each

night.’

She shrugged her shoulders with an air of great discouragement. Her

anger was subsiding. She almost felt inclined to pity him.

‘You are mad,’ she murmured. ‘Keep your prayers. It is you yourself that

I want. But you will never understand me. There were so many things

I wanted to tell you! Yet you stand there and irritate me with your

chatter of another world. Come, let us try to talk sensibly. Let us wait

for a moment till we are calmer. You cannot dismiss me in this way,

I cannot leave you here. It is because you are here that you are so

corpse-like, so cold that I dare not touch you. We won’t talk any more

just now. We will wait a little.’

She ceased speaking, and took a few steps, examining the little church.

The rain was still gently pattering against the windows; and the cold

damp light seemed to moisten the walls. Not a sound came from outside

save the monotonous plashing of the rain. The sparrows were doubtless

crouching for shelter under the tiles, and the rowan-tree’s deserted

branches showed but indistinctly in the veiling, drenching downpour.

Five o’clock struck, grated out, stroke by stroke, from the wheezy chest

of the old clock; and then the silence fell again, seeming to grow yet

deeper, dimmer, and more despairing. The priest’s painting work, as yet

scarcely dry, gave to the high altar and the wainscoting an appearance

of gloomy cleanliness, like that of some convent chapel where the sun

never shines. Grievous anguish seemed to fill the nave, splashed with

the blood that flowed from the limbs of the huge Christ; while, along

the walls, the fourteen scenes of the Passion displayed their awful

story in red and yellow daubs, reeking with horror. It was life that was

suffering the last agonies there, amidst that deathlike quiver of the

atmosphere, upon those altars which resembled tombs, in that bare vault

which looked like a sepulchre. The surroundings all spoke of slaughter

and gloom, terror and anguish and nothingness. A faint scent of incense

still lingered there, like the last expiring breath of some dead girl,

who had been hurriedly stifled beneath the flagstones.

‘Ah,’ said Albine at last, ‘how sweet it used to be in the sunshine!

Don’t you remember? One morning we walked past a hedge of tall rose

bushes, to the left of the flower-garden. I recollect the very colour of

the grass; it was almost blue, shot with green. When we reached the end

of the hedge we turned and walked back again, so sweet was the perfume

of the sunny air. And we did nothing else, that morning; we took just

twenty paces forward and then twenty paces back. It was so sweet a spot

you would not leave it. The bees buzzed all around; and there was a

tomtit that never left us, but skipped along by our side from branch to

branch. You whispered to me, “How delightful is life!” Ah! life! it was

the green grass, the trees, the running waters, the sky, and the sun,

amongst which we seemed all fair and golden.’

She mused for another moment and then continued: ‘Life ‘twas the

Paradou. How vast it used to seem to us! Never were we able to find the

end of it. The sea of foliage rolled freely with rustling waves as far

as the eye could reach. And all that glorious blue overhead! we were

free to grow, and soar, and roam, like the clouds without meeting more

obstacles than they. The very air was ours!’

She stopped and pointed to the low walls of the church.

‘But, here, you are in a grave. You cannot stretch out your hand without

hurting it against the stones. The roof hides the sky from you and blots

out the sun. It is all so small and confined that your limbs grow stiff

and cramped as though you were buried alive.’

‘No,’ answered the priest. ‘The church is wide as the world.’

But she waved her hands towards the crosses, and the dying Christ, and

the pictures of the Passion.

‘And you live in the very midst of death. The grass, the trees, the

springs, the sun, the sky, all are in the death throes around you.’

‘No, no; all revives, all grows purified and reascends to the source of

light.’

He had now drawn himself quite erect, with flashing eyes. And feeling

that he was now invincible, so permeated with faith as to disdain

temptation, he quitted the altar, took Albine’s hand, and led her, as

though she had been his sister, to the ghastly pictures of the Stations

of the Cross.

‘See,’ he said, ‘this is what God suffered! Jesus is cruelly scourged.

Look! His shoulders are naked; His flesh is torn; His blood flows down

His back.... And Jesus is crowned with thorns. Tears of blood trickle

down His gashed brow. On His temple is a jagged wound.... Again Jesus is

insulted by the soldiers. His murderers have scoffingly thrown a purple

robe around His shoulders, and they spit upon His face and strike Him,

and press the thorny crown deep into His flesh.’

Albine turned away her head, that she might not see the crudely painted

pictures, in which the ochreous flesh of Christ had been plentifully

bedaubed with carmine wounds. The purple robe round His shoulders seemed

like a shred of His skin torn away.

‘Why suffer? why die?’ she said. ‘O Serge, if you would only

remember!... You told me, that morning, that you were tired. But I knew

that you were only pretending, for the air was quite cool and we had

only been walking for a quarter of an hour. But you wanted to sit down

that you might hold me in your arms. Right down in the orchard, by

the edge of a stream, there was a cherry tree--you remember it, don’t

you?--which you never could pass without wishing to kiss my hands. And

your kisses ran all up my arms and shoulders to my lips. Cherry time was

over, and so you devoured my lips.... It used to make us feel so sad to

see the flowers fading, and one day, when you found a dead bird in the

grass, you turned quite pale, and caught me to your breast, as if to

forbid the earth to take me.’

But the priest drew her towards the other Stations of the Cross.

‘Hush! hush!’ he cried, ‘look here, and here! Bow down in grief and

pity---- Jesus falls beneath the weight of His cross. The ascent of

Calvary is very tiring. He has dropped down on His knees. But He does

not stay to wipe even the sweat from His brow, He rises up again and

continues His journey.... And again Jesus falls beneath the weight of

His cross. At each step He staggers. This time He has fallen on His

side, so heavily that for a moment He lies there quite breathless. His

lacerated hands have relaxed their hold upon the cross. His bruised and

aching feet leave blood-stained prints behind them. Agonising weariness

overwhelms Him, for He carries upon His shoulders the sins of the whole

world.’

Albine gazed at the pictured Jesus, lying in a blue shirt prostrate

beneath the cross, the blackness of which bedimmed the gold of His

aureole. Then, with her glance wandering far away, she said:

‘Oh! those meadow-paths! Have you no memory left, Serge? Have you

forgotten those soft grassy walks through the meadows, amidst very seas

of greenery? On the afternoon I am telling you of, we had only meant

to stay out of doors an hour; but we went wandering on and were still

wandering when the stars came out above us. Ah! how velvety it was, that

endless carpet, soft as finest silk! It was just like a green sea whose

gentle waters lapped us round. And well we knew whither those beguiling

paths that led nowhere, were taking us! They were taking us to our love,

to the joy of living together, to the certainty of happiness.’

With his hands trembling with anguish, Abbé Mouret pointed to the

remaining pictures.

‘Jesus,’ he stammered, ‘Jesus is nailed to the cross. The nails are

hammered through His outspread hands. A single nail suffices for his

feet, whose bones split asunder. He, Himself, while His flesh quivers

with pain, fixes His eyes upon heaven and smiles.... Jesus is crucified

between two thieves. The weight of His body terribly aggravates His

wounds. From His brow, from His limbs, does a bloody sweat stream down.

The two thieves insult Him, the passers-by mock at Him, the soldiers

cast lots for His raiment. And the shadowy darkness grows deeper and the

sun hides himself.... Jesus dies upon the cross. He utters a piercing

cry and gives up the ghost. Oh! most terrible of deaths! The veil of the

temple is rent in twain from top to bottom. The earth quakes, the stones

are broken, and the very graves open.’

The priest had fallen on his knees, his voice choked by sobs, his eyes

fixed upon the three crosses of Calvary, where writhed the gaunt pallid

bodies of the crucified. Albine placed herself in front of the paintings

in order that he might no longer see them.

‘One evening,’ she said, ‘I lay through the long gloaming with my head

upon your lap. It was in the forest, at the end of that great avenue of

chestnut-trees, through which the setting sun shot a parting ray. Ah!

what a caressing farewell He bade us! He lingered awhile by our feet

with a kindly smile, as if saying “Till to-morrow.” The sky slowly grew

paler. I told you merrily that it was taking off its blue gown, and

donning its gold-flowered robe of black to go out for the evening.

And it was not night that fell, but a soft dimness, a veil of love and

mystery, reminding us of those dusky paths, where the foliage arches

overhead, one of those paths in which one hides for a moment with the

certainty of finding the joyousness of daylight at the other end.

‘That evening the calm clearness of the twilight gave promise of a

splendid morrow. When I saw that it did not grow dark as quickly as you

wished, I pretended to fall asleep. I may confess it to you now, but

I was not really sleeping while you kissed me on the eyes. I felt your

kisses and tried to keep from laughing. And then, when the darkness

really came, it was like one long caress. The trees slept no more than

I did. At night, don’t you remember, the flowers always breathed a

stronger perfume.’

Then, as he still remained on his knees, while tears streamed down his

face, she caught him by the wrists, and pulled him to his feet, resuming

passionately:

‘Oh! if you knew you would bid me carry you off; you would fasten your

arms about my neck, lest I should go away without you.... Yesterday I

had a longing to see the garden once more. It seems larger, deeper,

more unfathomable than ever. I discovered there new scents, so sweetly

aromatic that they brought tears into my eyes. In the avenues I found a

rain of sunbeams that thrilled me with desire. The roses spoke to me

of you. The bullfinches were amazed at seeing me alone. All the garden

broke out into sighs. Oh! come! Never has the grass spread itself out

more softly. I have marked with a flower the hidden nook whither I

long to take you. It is a nest of greenery in the midst of a tangle of

brushwood. And there one can hear all the teeming life of the garden, of

the trees and the streams and the sky. The earth’s very breathing

will softly lull us to rest there. Oh! come! come! and let us love one

another amidst that universal loving!’

But he pushed her from him. He had returned to the Chapel of the

Dead and stood in front of the painted papier-mache Christ, big as a

ten-year-old boy, that writhed in such horridly realistic agony. There

were real iron nails driven into the figure’s limbs, and the wounds

gaped in the torn and bleeding flesh.

‘O Jesus, Who hast died for us!’ cried the priest, ‘convince her of our

nothingness! Tell her that we are but dust, rottenness, and damnation!

Ah! suffer that I may hide my head in a hair-cloth and rest it against

Thy feet and stay there, motionless, until I rot away in death. The

earth will no longer exist for me. The sun will no longer shine. I

shall see nothing more, feel nothing, hear nothing. Nought of all this

wretched world will come to turn my soul from its adoration of Thee.’

He was gradually becoming more and more excited, and he stepped towards

Albine with upraised hands.

‘You said rightly. It is Death that is present here; Death that is

before my eyes; Death that delivers and saves one from all rottenness.

Hear me! I renounce, I deny life, I wholly refuse it, I spit upon it.

Those flowers of yours stink; your sun dazzles and blinds; your

grass makes lepers of those that lie upon it; your garden is but

a charnel-place where all rots and putrefies. The earth reeks with

abomination. You lie when you talk of love and light and gladsome life

in the depths of your palace of greenery. There is nought but darkness

there. Those trees of yours exhale a poison which transforms men into

beasts; your thickets are charged with the venom of vipers; your streams

carry pestilence in their blue waters. If I could snatch away from that

world of nature, which you extol, its kirtle of sunshine and its girdle

of greenery, you would see it hideous like a very fury, a skeleton,

rotting away with disease and vice.

‘And even if you spoke the truth, even if your hands were really filled

with pleasures, even if you should carry me to a couch of roses and

offer me the dreams of Paradise, I would defend myself yet the more

desperately from your embraces. There is war between us; war eternal and

implacable. See! the church is very small; it is poverty-stricken; it is

ugly; its confessional-box and pulpit are made of common deal, its font

is merely of plaster, its altars are formed of four boards which I have

painted myself. But what of that? It is yet vaster than your garden,

greater than the valley, greater, even, than the whole earth. It is an

impregnable fortress which nothing can ever break down. The winds, the

sun, the forests, the ocean, all that is, may combine to assault it; yet

it will stand erect and unshaken for ever!

‘Yes, let all the jungles tower aloft and assail the walls with their

thorny arms, let all the legions of insects swarm out of their holes

in the ground and gnaw at the walls; the church, ruinous though it may

seem, will never fall before the invasion of life. It is Death, Death

the inexpugnable!... And do you know what will one day happen? The

tiny church will grow and spread to such a colossal size, and will cast

around such a mighty shadow, that all that nature, you speak of, will

give up the ghost. Ah! Death, the Death of everything, with the skies

gaping to receive our souls, above the curse-stricken ruins of the

world!’

As he shouted those last words, he pushed Albine forcibly towards the

door. She, extremely pale, retreated step by step. When he had finished

in a gasping voice she very gravely answered:

‘It is all over, then? You drive me away? Yet, I am your wife. It is you

who made me so. And God, since He permitted it, cannot punish us to such

a point as this.’

She was now on the threshold, and she added:

‘Listen! Every day, at sunset, I go to the end of the garden, to the

spot where the wall has fallen in. I shall wait for you there.’

And then she disappeared. The vestry door fell back with a sound like a

deep sigh.

IX

The church was perfectly silent, except for the murmuring sound of the

rain, which was falling heavily once more. In that sudden change to

quietude the priest’s anger subsided, and he even felt moved. It was

with his face streaming with tears, his frame shaken by sobs, that he

went back to throw himself on his knees before the great crucifix. A

torrent of ardent thanksgiving burst from his lips.

‘Thanks be to Thee, O God, for the help which Thou hast graciously

bestowed upon me. Without Thy grace I should have hearkened unto the

promptings of my flesh, and should have miserably returned to my sin. It

was Thy grace that girded my loins as with armour for battle; Thy grace

was indeed my armour, my courage, the support of my soul, that kept me

erect, beyond weakness. Oh! my God, Thou wert in me; it was Thy voice

that spoke in me, for I no longer felt the cowardice of the flesh, I

could have cut asunder my very heart-strings. And now, O God, I offer

Thee my bleeding heart. It no longer belongs to any creature of this

world; it is Thine alone. To give it to Thee I have wrenched it from all

worldly affection. But think not, O God, that I take any pride to myself

for this victory. I know that without Thee I am nothing; and I humbly

cast myself at Thy feet.’

He sank down upon the altar steps, unable to utter another word, while

his breath panted incense-like from his parted lips. The divine grace

bathed him in ineffable ecstasy. He sought Jesus in the recesses of his

being, in that sanctuary of love which he was ever preparing for His

worthy reception. And Jesus was now present there. The Abbé knew it by

the sweet influences which permeated him. And thereupon he joined with

Jesus in that spiritual converse which at times bore him away from earth

to companionship with God. He sighed out the verse from the ‘Song of

Solomon,’ ‘My beloved is mine, and I am his; He feedeth his flock

among the lilies, until the day be cool, and the shadows flee away.’ He

pondered over the words of the ‘Imitation:’ ‘It is a great art to know

how to talk with Jesus, and it requires much prudence to keep Him near

one.’ And then, with adorable condescension, Jesus came down to him,

and spoke with him for hours of his needs, his happiness, and his hopes.

Their confidences were not less affectionate and touching than those

of two friends, who meet after long separation and quietly retire to

converse on the bank of some lonely stream; for during those hours of

divine condescension Jesus deigned to be his friend, his best, most

faithful friend, one who never forsook him, and who in return for a

little love gave him all the treasures of eternal life. That day the

priest was eager to prolong the sweet converse, and indeed, when six

o’clock sounded through the quiet church, he was still listening to the

words which echoed through his soul.

On his side there was unreserved confession, unimpeded by the restraints

of language, natural effusion of the heart which spoke even more quickly

than the mind. Abbé Mouret told everything to Jesus, as to a God who

had come down in all the intimacy of the most loving tenderness, and who

would listen to everything. He confessed that he still loved Albine; and

he was surprised that he had been able to speak sternly to her and drive

her away, without his whole being breaking out into revolt. He marvelled

at it, and smiled as though it were some wonderful miracle performed by

another. And Jesus told him that he must not be astonished, and that the

greatest saints were often but unconscious instruments in the hands of

God. Then the Abbé gave expression to a doubt. Had he not lost merit in

seeking refuge in the Cross and even in the Passion of his Saviour? Had

he not shown that he possessed as yet but little courage, since he had

not dared to fight unaided? But Jesus evinced kindly tolerance, and

answered that man’s weakness was God’s continual care, and that He

especially loved those suffering souls, to whose assistance He went,

like a friend to the bedside of a sick companion.

But was it a sin to love Albine, a sin for which he, Serge, would

be damned? No; if his love was clean of all fleshly taint, and added

another hope to his desire for eternal life. But, then, how was he to

love her? In silence; without speaking a word to her, without taking a

step towards her; simply allowing his pure affection to breathe forth,

like a sweet perfume, pleasing unto heaven. And Jesus smiled with

increasing kindliness, drawing nearer as if to encourage confession, in

such wise that the priest grew bolder and began to recapitulate Albine’s

charms. She had hair that was fair and golden as an angel’s; she was

very white, with big soft eyes, like those of the aureoled saints. Jesus

seemed to listen to this in silence, though a smile still played upon

His face. And the priest continued: She had grown much taller. She was

now like a queen, with rounded form and splendid shoulders. Oh! to clasp

her waist, were it only for a second, and to feel her shoulders drawn

close by his embrace! But the smile on the divine countenance then

paled and died away, as a star sinks and falls beneath the horizon.

Abbé Mouret now spoke all alone. Ah! had he not shown himself too

hard-hearted? Why had he driven her away without one single word of

affection, since Heaven allowed him to love her?

‘I do love her! I do love her!’ he cried aloud, in a distracted voice,

that rang through the church.

He thought he saw her still standing there. She was stretching out her

arms to him; she was beautiful enough to make him break all his vows. He

threw himself upon her bosom without thought of the reverence due to

his surroundings, he clasped her and rained kisses upon her face. It was

before her that he now knelt, imploring her mercy, and beseeching her to

forgive him his unkindness. He told her that, at times a voice which was

not his own spoke through his lips. Could he himself ever have treated

her harshly? It was the strange voice that had repulsed her. It could

not, surely, be he himself, for he would have been unable to touch a

hair of her head without loving emotion. And yet he had driven her away.

The church was really empty! Whither should he hasten to find her again,

to bring her back, and wipe her tears away with kisses? The rain was

streaming down more violently than ever. The roads must be rivers

of mud. He pictured her to himself lashed by the downpour, tottering

alongside the ditches, her clothes soaked and clinging to her skin. No!

no! it could not have been himself; it was that other voice, the jealous

voice that had so cruelly sought to slay his love.

‘O Jesus!’ he cried in desperation, ‘be merciful and give her back to

me!’

But his Lord was no longer there. Then Abbé Mouret, awaking with a

start, turned horribly pale. He understood it all. He had not known

how to keep Jesus with him. He had lost his friend, and had been left

defenceless against the powers of evil. Instead of that inward light,

which had shone so brightly within him as he received his God, he now

found utter darkness, a foul vapour that irritated his senses. Jesus had

withdrawn His grace on leaving him; and he, who since early morning

had been so strong with heaven-sent help, now felt utterly miserable,

forsaken, weak and helpless as an infant. How frightful was his fall!

How galling its bitterness! To have straggled so heroically, to have

remained unshaken, invincible, implacable, while the temptress actually

stood before him, with all her warm life, her swelling bosom and

superb shoulders, her perfume of love and passion; and then to fall

so shamefully, to throb with desire, when she had disappeared, leaving

behind her but the echo of her skirts, and the fragrance diffused from

her white neck! Now, these mere recollections sufficed to make her all

powerful, her influence permeated the church.

‘Jesus! Jesus!’ cried the priest, once more, ‘return, come back to me;

speak to me once again!’

But Jesus remained deaf to his cry. For a moment Abbé Mouret raised his

arms to heaven in desperate entreaty. His shoulders cracked and strained

beneath the wild violence of his supplications. But soon his hands fell

down again in discouragement. Heaven preserved that hopeless silence

which suppliants at times encounter. Then he once more sat down on the

altar steps, heart-crushed and with ashen face, pressing his elbows to

his sides, as though he were trying to reduce his flesh to the smallest

proportions possible.

‘My God! Thou deserted me!’ he murmured. ‘Nevertheless, Thy will be

done!’

He spoke not another word, but sat there, panting breathlessly, like a

hunted beast that cowers motionless in fear of the hounds. Ever since

his sin, he had thus seemed to be the sport of the divine grace. It

denied itself to his most ardent prayers; it poured down upon him,

unexpectedly and refreshingly, when he had lost all hope of winning it

for long years to come.

At first he had been inclined to rebel against this dispensation of

Heaven, complaining like a betrayed lover, and demanding the immediate

return of that consoling grace, whose kiss made him so strong. But

afterwards, after unavailing outbursts of anger, he had learned to

understand that humility profited him most and could alone enable him to

endure the withdrawal of the divine assistance. Then, for hours and for

days, he would humble himself and wait for comfort which came not. In

vain he cast himself unreservedly into the hands of God, annihilated

himself before the Divinity, wearied himself with the incessant

repetition of prayers. He could not perceive God’s presence with him;

and his flesh, breaking free from all restraint, rose up in rebellious

desire. It was a slow agony of temptation, in which the weapons of faith

fell, one by one, from his faltering hands, in which he lay inert in

the clutch of passion, in which he beheld with horror his own ignominy,

without having the courage to raise his little finger to free himself

from the thraldom of sin.

Such was now his life. He had felt sin’s attacks in every form. Not

a day passed that he was not tried. Sin assumed a thousand guises,

assailed him through his eyes and ears, flew boldly at his throat,

leaped treacherously upon his shoulders, or stole torturingly into

his bones. His transgression was ever present, he almost always beheld

Albine dazzling as the sunshine, lighting up the greenery of the

Paradou. He only ceased to see her in those rare moments when the divine

grace deigned to close his eyes with its cool caresses. And he strove to

hide his sufferings as one hides those of some disgraceful disease. He

wrapped himself in the endless silence, which no one knew how to make

him break, filling the parsonage with his martyrdom and resignation, and

exasperating La Teuse, who, at times, when his back was turned, would

shake her fist at heaven.

This time he was alone now, and need take no care to hide his torment.

Sin had just struck him such an overwhelming blow, that he had not

strength left to move from the altar steps, where he had fallen. He

remained there, sighing, and groaning, parched with agony, incapable of

a single tear. And he thought of the calm unruffled life that had once

been his. Ah! the perfect peace, the full confidence of his first days

at Les Artaud! The path of salvation had seemed so straight and easy

then! He had smiled at the very mention of temptation. He had lived in

the midst of wickedness, without knowledge of it, without fear of it,

certain of being able to withstand it. He had been a model priest, so

pure and chaste, so inexperienced and innocent in God’s sight, that God

had led him by the hand like a little child.

But now, all that childlike innocence was dead, God visited him in the

morning, and forthwith tried him. A state of temptation became his life

on earth. Now that full manhood and sin had come upon him, he entered

into the everlasting struggle. Could it be that God really loved him

more now than before? The great saints have all left fragments of their

torn flesh upon the thorns of the way of sorrow. He tried to gather some

consolation from this circumstance. At each laceration of his flesh,

each racking of his bones, he tried to assure himself of some exceeding

great reward. And then, no infliction that Heaven might now cast upon

him could be too heavy. He even looked back with scorn on his former

serenity, his easy fervour, which had set him on his knees with mere

girlish enthusiasm, and left him unconscious even of the bruising of the

hard stones. He strove also to discover pleasure in pain, in plunging

into it, annihilating himself in it. But, even while he poured out

thanks to God, his teeth chattered with growing terror, and the voice of

his rebellious blood cried out to him that this was all falsehood, and

that the only happiness worth desiring was in Albine’s arms, amongst the

flowers of the Paradou.

Yet he had put aside Mary for Jesus, sacrificing his heart that he might

subdue his flesh, and hoping to implant some virility in his faith.

Mary disquieted him too much, with her smoothly braided hair, her

outstretched hands, and her womanly smile. He could never kneel before

her without dropping his eyes, for fear of catching sight of the hem of

her dress. Then, too, he accused her of having treated him too tenderly

in former times. She had kept him sheltered so long within the folds of

her robe, that he had let himself slip from her arms to those of a human

creature without being conscious even of the change of his affection.

He thought of all the roughness of Brother Archangias, of his refusal

to worship Mary, of the distrustful glances with which he had seemed

to watch her. He himself despaired of ever rising to such a height of

roughness, and so he simply left her, hiding her images and deserting

her altar. Yet she remained in his heart, like some love which, though

unavowed, is ever present. Sin, with sacrilege whose very horror made

him shudder, made use of her to tempt him.

Whenever he still invoked her, as he did at times of irrepressible

emotion, it was Albine who showed herself beneath the white veil, with

the blue scarf knotted round her waist and the golden roses blooming on

her bare feet. All the representations of the Virgin, the Virgin with

the royal mantle of cloth-of-gold, the Virgin crowned with stars, the

Virgin visited by the Angel of the Annunciation, the peaceful Virgin

poised between a lily and a distaff, all brought him some memory of

Albine, her smiling eyes or her delicately curved mouth or her softly

rounded cheeks.

Thereupon, by a supreme effort, he drove the female element from his

worship, and sought refuge in Jesus, though even His gentle mildness

sometimes proved a source of disquietude to him. What he needed was a

jealous God, an implacable God, the Jehovah of the Old Testament, girded

with thunder and manifesting Himself only to chastise the terrified

world. He had done with the saints and the angels and the Divine Mother;

he bowed down before God Himself alone, the omnipotent Master, who

demanded from him his every breath. And he felt the hand of this God

laid heavily upon him, holding him helpless at His mercy through space

and time, like a guilty atom. Ah! to be nothing, to be damned, to dream

of hell, to wrestle vainly against hideous temptations, all that was

surely good.

From Jesus he took but the cross. He was seized with that passion for

the cross which has made so many lips press themselves again and again

to the crucifix till they were worn away with kissing. He took up the

cross and followed Jesus. He sought to make it heavier, the mightiest of

burdens; it was great joy to him to fall beneath its weight, to drag it

on his knees, his back half broken. In it he beheld the only source

of strength for the soul, of joy for the mind, of the consummation of

virtue and the perfection of holiness. In it lay all that was good; all

ended in death upon it. To suffer and to die, those words ever sounded

in his ears, as the end and goal of mortal wisdom. And, when he had

fastened himself to the cross, he enjoyed the boundless consolation of

God’s love. It was no longer, now, upon Mary that he lavished filial

tenderness or lover’s passion. He loved for love’s mere sake, with an

absolute abstract love. He loved God with a love that lifted him out of

himself, out of all else, and wrapped him round with a dazzling radiance

of glory. He was like a torch that burns away with blazing light. And

death seemed to him to be only a great impulse of love.

But what had he omitted to do that he was thus so sorely tried? With

his hand he wiped away the perspiration that streamed down his brow,

and reflected that, that very morning, he had made his usual

self-examination without finding any great guilt within him. Was he not

leading a life of great austerity and mortification of the flesh? Did he

not love God solely and blindly? Ah! how he would have blessed His Holy

Name had He only restored him his peace, deeming him now sufficiently

punished for his transgression! But, perhaps, that sin of his could

never be expiated. And then, in spite of himself, his mind reverted to

Albine and the Paradou, and all their memories.

At first he tried to make excuses for himself. He had fallen, one

evening, senseless upon the tiled floor of his bedroom, stricken with

brain fever. For three weeks he had remained unconscious. His blood

surged furiously through his veins and raged within him like a torrent

that had burst its banks. His whole body, from the crown of his head to

the soles of his feet, was so scoured and renewed and wrought afresh

by the mighty labouring of his ailment, that in his delirium he had

sometimes thought he could hear the very hammer blows of workmen that

nailed his bones together again. Then, one morning, he had awakened,

feeling like a new being. He was born a second time, freed of all that

his five-and-twenty years of life had successively implanted in him. His

childish piety, his education at the seminary, the faith of his early

priesthood, had all vanished, had been carried off, and their place was

bare and empty. In truth, it could be hell alone that had thus prepared

him for the reception of evil, disarming him of all his former weapons,

and reducing his body to languor and softness, through which sin might

readily enter.

He, perfectly unconscious of it all, unknowingly surrendered himself

to the gradual approach of evil. When he had reopened his eyes in the

Paradou, he had felt himself an infant once more, with no memory of the

past, no knowledge of his priesthood. He experienced a gentle pleasure,

a glad feeling of surprise at thus beginning life afresh, as though it

were all new and strange to him and would be delightful to learn. Oh!

the sweet apprenticeship, the charming observations, the delicious

discoveries! That Paradou was a vast abode of felicity; and hell, in

placing him there, had known full well that he would be defenceless.

Never, in his first youth, had he known such enjoyment in growing. That

first youth of his, when he now thought of it, seemed quite black and

gloomy, graceless, wan and inactive, as if it had been spent far away

from the sunlight.

But at the Paradou, how joyfully had he hailed the sun! How admiringly

had he gazed at the first tree, at the first flower, at the tiniest

insect he had seen, at the most insignificant pebble he had picked up!

The very stones charmed him. The horizon was a source of never-ending

amazement. One clear morning, the memory of which still filled his eyes,

bringing back a perfume of jasmine, a lark’s clear song, he had been so

affected by emotion that he felt all power desert his limbs. He had long

found pleasure in learning the sensations of life. And, ah! the morning

when Albine had been born beside him amidst the roses! As he thought of

it, an ecstatic smile broke out upon his face. She rose up like a

star that was necessary to the very sun’s existence. She illumined

everything, she made everything clear. She made his life complete.

Then in fancy he once again walked with her through the Paradou. He

remembered the little curls that waved behind her neck as she ran on

before him. She exhaled delicious scent, and the touch of her warm

swaying skirts seemed like a caress. And when she clasped him with her

supple curving arms, he half expected to see her, so slight and slender

she was, twine herself around him. It was she who went foremost. She led

him through winding paths, where they loitered, that their walk might

last the longer. It was she who instilled into him love for nature; and

it was by watching the loves of the plants that he had learned to love

her, with a love that was long, indeed, in bursting into life, but whose

sweetness had been theirs at last. Beneath the shade of the giant tree

they had reached their journey’s goal. Oh! to clasp her once again--yet

once again!

A low groan suddenly came from the priest. He hastily sprang up and then

flung himself down again. Temptation had just assailed him afresh. Into

what paths were his recollections leading him? Did he not know, only

too well, that Satan avails himself of every wile to insinuate

his serpent-head into the soul, even when it is absorbed in

self-examination? No! no! he had no excuse. His illness had in no wise

authorised him to sin. He should have set strict guard upon himself,

and have sought God anew upon recovering from his fever. And what a

frightful proof he now had of his vileness: he was not even able to

make calm confession of his sin. Would he never be able to silence his

nature? He wildly thought of scooping his brains out of his skull that

he might be able to think no more, and of opening his veins that his

blood might no longer torment him. For a moment he buried his face

within his hands, shuddering as though the beasts that he felt prowling

around him might infect him with the hot breath of temptation.

But his thoughts strayed on in spite of himself, and his blood throbbed

wildly in his very heart. Though he held his clenched fists to his eyes,

he still saw Albine, dazzling like a sun. Every effort that he made to

press the vision from his sight only made her shine out before him with

increased brilliancy. Was God, then, utterly forsaking him, that he

could find no refuge from temptation? And, in spite of all his efforts

to control his thoughts, he espied every tiny blade of grass that thrust

itself up by Albine’s skirts; he saw a little thistle-flower fastened in

her hair, against which he remembered that he had pricked his lips.

Even the perfumed atmosphere of the Paradou floated round him, and

well-remembered sounds came back, the repeated call of a bird, then an

interval of hushed silence, then a sigh floating through the trees.

Why did not Heaven at once strike him dead with its lightning? That

would have been less cruel. It was with a voluptuous pang, like the

pangs which assail the damned, that he recalled his transgression. He

shuddered when he again heard in his heart the abominable words that he

had spoken at Albine’s feet. Their echoes were now accusing him before

the throne of God. He had acknowledged Woman as his sovereign. He had

yielded to her as a slave, kissing her feet, longing to be the water she

drank and the bread she ate. He began to understand now why he could

no longer recover self-control. God had given him over to Woman. But he

would chastise her, scourge her, break her very limbs to force her to

let him go! It was she who was the slave; she, the creature of impurity,

to whom the Church should have denied a soul. Then he braced himself,

and shook his fists at the vision of Albine; but his fists opened and

his hands glided along her shoulders in a loving caress, while his lips,

just now breathing out anger and insult, pressed themselves to her hair,

stammering forth words of adoration.

Abbé Mouret opened his eyes again. The burning apparition of Albine

vanished. It was sudden and unexpected solace. He was able to weep.

Tears flowed slowly and refreshingly down his cheeks, and he drew a long

breath, still fearing to move, lest the Evil One should again grip

him by the neck, for he yet thought that he heard the snarl of a beast

behind him. And then he found such pleasure in the cessation of his

sufferings that his one thought was to prolong the enjoyment of it.

Outside the rain had ceased falling. The sun was setting in a vast

crimson glow, which spread across the windows like curtains of

rose-coloured satin. The church was quite warm and bright in the parting

breath of the sinking luminary. The priest thanked God for the respite

He had been pleased to vouchsafe to him. A broad ray of light, like a

beam of gold-dust, streamed through the nave and illumined the far end

of the building, the clock, the pulpit, and the high altar. Perhaps the

Divine grace was returning to him from heaven along that radiant path.

He watched with interest the atoms that came and went with prodigious

speed through the ray, like a swarm of busy messengers ever hastening

with news from the sun to the earth. A thousand lighted candles

would not have filled the church with such splendour. Curtains of

cloth-of-gold seemed to hang behind the high altar; treasures of the

goldsmith’s art covered all the ledges; candle-holders arose in dazzling

sheaves; censers glowed full of burning gems; sacred vases gleamed

like fiery comets; and around all there seemed to be a rain of luminous

flowers amidst waving lacework--beds, bouquets, and garlands of roses,

from whose expanding petals dropped showers of stars.

Never had Abbé Mouret desired such magnificence for his poor church. He

smiled, and dreamt of how he might retain all that splendour there, and

then arrange it most effectively. He would have preferred to see the

curtains of cloth-of-gold hung rather higher; the vases, too, needed

more careful arrangement; and he thought that the bouquets of flowers

might be tied up more neatly, and the garlands be more regularly shaped.

Yet how wondrously magnificent it all was! He was the pontiff of a

church of gold. Bishops, princes, princesses, arrayed in royal mantles,

multitudes of believers, bending to the ground, were coming to visit it,

encamping in the valley, waiting for weeks at the door until they should

be able to enter. They kissed his feet, for even his feet had turned

to gold, and worked miracles. The bath of gold mounted to his knees.

A golden heart was beating within his golden breast, with so clear a

musical pulsation that the waiting crowds could hear it from outside.

Then a feeling of overweening pride seized upon him. He was an idol.

The golden beam mounted still higher, the high altar was all ablaze

with glory, and the priest grew certain that the Divine grace must be

returning to him, such was his inward satisfaction. The fierce snarl

behind him had now grown gentle and coaxing, and he only felt on his

shoulder a soft velvety pressure, as though some giant cat were lightly

caressing him.

He still pursued his reverie. Never before had he seen things under such

a favourable light. Everything seemed quite easy to him now that he once

more felt full of strength. Since Albine was waiting for him, he would

go and join her. It was only natural. On the previous morning he had

married Fortune and Rosalie. The Church did not forbid marriages. He saw

that young couple again as they knelt before him, smiling and nudging

each other while his hands were held over them in benediction. Then, in

the evening, they had shown him their room. Each word that he had spoken

to them echoed loudly in his ear. He had told Fortune that God had sent

him a companion, because He did not wish man to live alone; and he had

told Rosalie that she must cleave to her husband, never leaving him,

but always acting as his obedient helpmate. But he had said these things

also for Albine and himself. Was she not his companion, his obedient

helpmate, whom God had sent to him that his manhood might not wither up

in solitude? Besides, they had been joined the one to the other. He felt

surprised that he had not understood and recognised it at once; that he

had not gone away with her, as his duty plainly required that he should

have done. But he had quite made up his mind now; he would certainly

join her in the morning. He could be with her in half an hour. He would

go through the village, and take the road up the hill; it was much the

shortest way. He could do what he pleased; he was the master, and no one

would presume to say anything to him. If any one looked at him, a wave

of his hand would force them to bend their heads. He would live with

Albine. He would call her his wife. They would be very happy together.

The golden stream mounted still higher, and played amongst his fingers.

Again did he seem to be immersed in a bath of gold. He would take

the altar-vases away to ornament his house, he would keep up a fine

establishment, he would pay his servants with fragments of chalices

which he could easily break with his fingers. He would hang his

bridal-bed with the cloth-of-gold that draped the altar; and he would

give his wife for jewels the golden hearts and chaplets and crosses that

hung from the necks of the Virgin and the saints. The church itself, if

another storey were added to it, would supply them with a palace. God

would have no objection to make since He had allowed them to love each

other. And, besides, was it not he who was now God, with the people

kissing his golden miracle-working feet?

Abbé Mouret rose. He made that sweeping gesture of Jeanbernat’s, that

wide gesture of negation, that took in everything as far as the horizon.

‘There is nothing, nothing, nothing!’ he said. ‘God does not exist.’

A mighty shudder seemed to sweep through the church. The terrified

priest turned deadly pale and listened. Who had spoken? Who was it that

had blasphemed? Suddenly the velvety caress, whose gentle pressure

he had felt upon his shoulder, turned fierce and savage: sharp talons

seemed to be rending his flesh, and once more he felt his blood

streaming forth. Yet he remained on his feet, struggling against the

sudden attack. He cursed and reviled the triumphant sin that sniggered

and grinned round his temples, whilst all the hammers of the Evil One

battered at them. Why had he not been on his guard against Satan’s

wiles? Did he not know full well that it was his habit to glide up

softly with gentle paws that he might drive them like blades into the

very vitals of his victim?

His anger increased as he thought how he had been entrapped, like a mere

child. Was he destined, then, to be ever hurled to the ground, with sin

crouching victoriously on his breast? This time he had actually denied

his God. It was all one fatal descent. His transgression had destroyed

his faith, and then dogma had tottered. One single doubt of the

flesh, pleading abomination, sufficed to sweep heaven away. The divine

ordinances irritated one; the divine mysteries made one smile. Then came

other temptations and allurements; gold, power, unrestrained liberty,

an irresistible longing for enjoyment, culminating in luxuriousness,

sprawling on a bed of wealth and pride. And then God was robbed. His

vessels were broken to adorn woman’s impurity. Ah! well, then, he was

damned. Nothing could make any difference to him now. Sin might speak

aloud. It was useless to struggle further. The monsters who had hovered

about his neck were battening on his vitals now. He yielded to them with

hideous satisfaction. He shook his fists at the church. No; he believed

no longer in the divinity of Christ; he believed no longer in the Holy

Trinity; he believed in naught but himself, and his muscles and the

appetites of his body. He wanted to live. He felt the necessity of being

a man. Oh! to speed along through the open air, to be lusty and strong,

to owe obedience to no jealous master, to fell one’s enemies with

stones, to carry off the fair maidens that passed upon one’s shoulders.

He would break out from that living tomb where cruel hands had thrust

him. He would awaken his manhood, which had only been slumbering. And

might he die of shame if he should find that it were really dead! And

might the Divinity be accursed if, by the touch of His finger, He had

made him different from the rest of mankind.

The priest stood erect, his mind all dazed and scared. He fancied that,

at this fresh outburst of blasphemy, the church was falling down upon

him. The sunlight, which had poured over the high altar, had gradually

spread and mounted the walls like ruddy fire. Flames soared and licked

the rafters, then died away in a sanguineous, ember-like glow. And all

at once the church became quite black. It was as though the fires of the

setting sun had burst the roof asunder, pierced the walls, thrown open

wide breaches on every side to some exterior foe. The gloomy framework

seemed to shake beneath some violent assault. Night was coming on

quickly.

Then, in the far distance, the priest heard a gentle murmur rising from

the valley of Les Artaud. The time had been when he had not understood

the impassioned language of those burning lands, where writhed but

knotted vine-stocks, withered almond-trees, and decrepit olives

sprawling with crippled limbs. Protected by his ignorance, he had passed

undisturbed through all that world of passion. But, to-day, his ear

detected the slightest sigh of the leaves that lay panting in the heat.

Afar off, on the edge of the horizon, the hills, still hot with the

sinking luminary’s farewell, seemed to set themselves in motion with the

tramp of an army on the march. Nearer at hand, the scattered rocks,

the stones along the road, all the pebbles in the valley, throbbed and

rolled as if possessed by a craving for motion. Then the tracts of ruddy

soil, the few fields that had been reduced to cultivation, seemed to

heave and growl like rivers that had burst their banks, bearing along in

a blood-like flood the engenderings of seeds, the births of roots, the

embraces of plants. Soon everything was in motion. The vine-branches

appeared to crawl along like huge insects; the parched corn and the dry

grass formed into dense, lance-waving battalions; the trees stretched

out their boughs like wrestlers making ready for a contest; the fallen

leaves skipped forward; the very dust on the road rolled on. It was a

moving multitude reinforced by fresh recruits at every step; a legion,

the sound of whose coming went on in front of it; an outburst of

passionate life, sweeping everything along in a mighty whirlwind of

fruitfulness. And all at once the assault began. From the limits of

the horizon, the whole countryside, the hills and stones and fields and

trees, rushed upon the church. At the first shock, the building quivered

and cracked. The walls were pierced and the tiles on the roof were

thrown down. But the great Christ, although shaken, did not fall.

A short respite followed. Outside, the voices sounded more angrily, and

the priest could now distinguish human ones amongst them. The Artauds,

those bastards who sprang up out of the rocky soil with the persistence

of brambles, were now in their turn blowing a blast that reeked of

teeming life. They had planted everywhere forests of humanity that

swallowed up all around them. They came up to the church, they shattered

the door with a push, and threatened to block up the very nave with the

invading scions of their race. Behind them came the beasts; the oxen

that tried to batter down the walls with their horns, the flocks of

asses, goats, and sheep, that dashed against the ruined church like

living waves, while swarms of wood-lice and crickets attacked the

foundations and reduced them to dust with their sawlike teeth. Yet

again, on the other side, there was Desirée’s poultry-yard, where the

dunghill reeked with suffocating fumes. Here the big cock, Alexander,

sounded the assault, and the hens loosened the stones with their beaks,

and the rabbits burrowed under the very altars; whilst the pig, too

fat to stir, grunted and waited till all the sacred ornaments should be

reduced to warm ashes in which he might wallow at his ease.

A great roar ascended, and a second assault was delivered. The

villagers, the animals, all that overflowing sea of life assailed the

church with such impetuosity that the rafters bent and curved. This

time a part of the walls tottered and fell down, the ceiling shook,

the woodwork of the windows was carried away, and the grey mist of the

evening streamed in through the frightful gaping breaches. The great

Christ now only clung to His cross by the nail that pierced His left

hand.

A mighty shout hailed the downfall of the block of wall. Yet the church

still stood there firmly, in spite of the injuries it had received. It

offered a stern, silent, unflinching resistance, clutching desperately

to the tiniest stones of its foundations. It seemed as though, to keep

itself from falling, it required only the support of its slenderest

pillar, which, by some miracle of equilibration, held up the gaping

roof. Then Abbé Mouret beheld the rude plants of the plateau, the

dreadful-looking growths that had become hard as iron amidst the

arid rocks, that were knotted like snakes and bossy with muscles, set

themselves to work. The rust-hued lichens gnawed away at the rough

plasterwork like fiery leprosy. Then the thyme-plants thrust their roots

between the bricks like so many iron wedges. The lavenders insinuated

hooked fingers into the loosened stonework, and by slow persistent

efforts tore the blocks asunder. The junipers, the rosemaries, the

prickly holly bushes, climbed higher and battered the walls with

irresistible blows; and even the grass, the grass whose dry blades

slipped beneath the great door, stiffened itself into steel-like spears

and made its way down the nave, where it forced up the flagstones with

powerful levers. It was a victorious revolt, it was revolutionary nature

constructing barricades out of the overturned altars, and wrecking the

church which had for centuries cast too deep a shadow over it. The

other combatants had fallen back, and let the plants, the thyme and the

lavender and the lichens, complete the overthrow of the building with

their ceaseless little blows, their constant gnawing, which proved more

destructive than the heavier onslaught of the stronger assailants.

Then, suddenly, the end came. The rowan-tree, whose topmost branches had

already forced their way through the broken windows under the vaulted

roof, rushed in violently with its formidable stream of greenery. It

planted itself in the centre of the nave and grew there monstrously.

Its trunk expanded till its girth became so colossal that it seemed as

though it would burst the church asunder like a girdle spanning it too

closely. Its branches shot out in knotted arms, each one of which broke

down a piece of the wall or thrust off a strip of the roof, and they

went on multiplying without cessation, each branch ramifying, till a

fresh tree sprang out of each single knot, with such impetuosity of

growth that the ruins of the church, pierced through and through like a

sieve, flew into fragments, scattering a fine dust to the four quarters

of the heavens.

Now the giant tree seemed to reach the stars; its forest of branches was

a forest of legs, arms, and breasts full of sap; the long locks of women

streamed down from it; men’s heads burst out from the bark; and up aloft

pairs of lovers, lying languid by the edges of their nests, filled the

air with the music of their delights.

A final blast of the storm which had broken over the church swept away

the dust of its remains: the pulpit and the confessional-box, which

had been ground into powder, the lacerated holy pictures, the shattered

sacred vessels, all the litter at which the legion of sparrows that had

once dwelt amongst the tiles was eagerly pecking. The great Christ,

torn from the cross, hung for a moment from one of the streaming women’s

curls, and then was whirled away into the black darkness, in the depths

of which it sank with a loud crash. The Tree of Life had pierced the

heavens; it overtopped the stars.

Abbé Mouret was filled with the mad joy of an accursed spirit at the

sight before him. The church was vanquished; God no longer had a house.

And thenceforward God could no longer trouble him. He was free to rejoin

Albine, since it was she who triumphed. He laughed at himself for having

declared, an hour previously, that the church would swallow up the

whole earth with its shadow. The earth, indeed, had avenged itself

by consuming the church. The mad laughter into which he broke had

the effect of suddenly awakening him from his hallucination. He

gazed stupidly round the nave, which the evening shadows were slowly

darkening. Through the windows he could see patches of star-spangled

sky; and he was about to stretch out his arms to feel the walls, when he

heard Desirée calling to him from the vestry-passage:

‘Serge! Serge! Are you there? Why don’t you answer? I have been looking

for you for this last half-hour.’

She came in; she was holding a lighted lamp; and the priest then saw

that the church was still standing. He could no longer understand

anything, but remained in a horrible state of doubt betwixt the

unconquerable church, springing up again from its ashes, and Albine, the

all-powerful, who could shake the very throne of God by a single breath.

X

Desirée came up to him, full of merry chatter.

‘Are you there? Are you there?’ she cried. ‘Why are you playing at

hide-and-seek? I called out to you at the top of my voice at least a

dozen times. I thought you must have gone out.’