Abbe Mouret's Transgression: Chapter 7

Chapter 7

Albine and Serge entered the flower garden. She was watching him with
tender anxiety, fearing lest he should overtire himself; but he
reassured her with a light laugh. He felt strong enough indeed to carry
her whithersoever she listed. When he found himself once more in the
full sunlight, he drew a sigh of content. At last he lived; he was no
longer a plant subject to the terrible sufferings of winter. And how he
was moved with loving gratitude! Had it been within his power, he would
have spared Albine's tiny feet even the roughness of the paths; he
dreamed of carrying her, clinging round his neck, like a child lulled to
sleep by her mother. He already watched over her with a guardian's
watchful care, thrusting aside the stones and brambles, jealous lest the
breeze should waft a fleeting kiss upon those darling locks which were
his alone. She on her side nestled against his shoulder and serenely
yielded to his guidance.

Thus Albine and Serge strolled on together in the sunlight for the first
time. A balmy fragrance floated in their wake, the very path on which
the sun had unrolled a golden carpet thrilled with delight under their
feet. Between the tall flowering shrubs they passed like a vision of
such wondrous charm that the distant paths seemed to entreat their
presence and hail them with a murmur of admiration, even as crowds hail
long-expected sovereigns. They formed one sole, supremely lovely being.
Albine's snowy skin was but the whiteness of Serge's browner skin. And
slowly they passed along clothed with sunlight--nay, they were
themselves the sun--worshipped by the low bending flowers.

A tide of emotion now stirred the Paradou to its depths. The old flower
garden escorted them--that vast field bearing a century's untrammelled
growth, that nook of Paradise sown by the breeze with the choicest
flowers. The blissful peace of the Paradou, slumbering in the broad
sunlight, prevented the degeneration of species. It could boast of a
temperature ever equable, and a soil which every plant had long enriched
to thrive therein in the silence of its vigour. Its vegetation was
mighty, magnificent, luxuriantly untended, full of erratic growths
decked with monstrous blossoming, unknown to the spade and watering-pot
of gardeners. Nature left to herself, free to grow as she listed, in the
depths of that solitude protected by natural shelters, threw restraint
aside more heartily at each return of spring, indulged in mighty
gambols, delighted in offering herself at all seasons strange nosegays
not meant for any hand to pluck. A rabid fury seemed to impel her to
overthrow whatever the effort of man had created; she rebelliously cast
a straggling multitude of flowers over the paths, attacked the rockeries
with an ever-rising tide of moss, and knotted round the necks of marble
statues the flexible cords of creepers with which she threw them down;
she shattered the stonework of the fountains, steps, and terraces with
shrubs which burst through them; she slowly, creepingly, spread over the
smallest cultivated plots, moulding them to her fancy, and planting on
them, as ensign of rebellion, some wayside spore, some lowly weed which
she transformed into a gigantic growth of verdure. In days gone by the
parterre, tended by a master passionately fond of flowers, had displayed
in its trim beds and borders a wondrous wealth of choice blossoms. And
the same plants could still be found; but perpetuated, grown into such
numberless families, and scampering in such mad fashion throughout the
whole garden, that the place was now all helter-skelter riot to its very
walls, a very den of debauchery, where intoxicated nature had hiccups of
verbena and pinks.

Though to outward seeming Albine had yielded her weaker self to the
guidance of Serge, to whose shoulder she clung, it was she who really
led him. She took him first to the grotto. Deep within a clump of
poplars and willows gaped a cavern, formed by rugged bits of rocks which
had fallen over a basin where tiny rills of water trickled between the
stones. The grotto was completely lost to sight beneath the onslaught of
vegetation. Below, row upon row of hollyhocks seemed to bar all entrance
with a trellis-work of red, yellow, mauve, and white-hued flowers, whose
stems were hidden among colossal bronze-green nettles, which calmly
exuded blistering poison. Above them was a mighty swarm of creepers
which leaped aloft in a few bounds; jasmines starred with balmy flowers;
wistarias with delicate lacelike leaves; dense ivy, dentated and
resembling varnished metal; lithe honeysuckle, laden with pale coral
sprays; amorous clematideae, reaching out arms all tufted with white
aigrettes. And among them twined yet slenderer plants, binding them more
and more closely together, weaving them into a fragrant woof.
Nasturtium, bare and green of skin, showed open mouths of ruddy gold;
scarlet runners, tough as whipcord, kindled here and there a fire of
gleaming sparks; convolvuli opened their heart-shaped leaves, and with
thousands of little bells rang a silent peal of exquisite colours;
sweetpeas, like swarms of settling butterflies, folded tawny or rosy
wings, ready to be borne yet farther away by the first breeze. It was
all a wealth of leafy locks, sprinkled with a shower of flowers,
straying away in wild dishevelment, and suggesting the head of some
giantess thrown back in a spasm of passion, with a streaming of
magnificent hair, which spread into a pool of perfume.

'I have never dared to venture into all that darkness,' Albine whispered
to Serge.

He urged her on, carried her over the nettles; and as a great boulder
barred the way into the grotto, he held her up for a moment in his arms
so that she might be able to peer through the opening that yawned at a
few feet from the ground.

'A marble woman,' she whispered, 'has fallen full length into the
stream. The water has eaten her face away.'

Then he, too, in his turn wanted to look, and pulled himself up. A cold
breeze played upon his cheeks. In the pale light that glided through the
hole, he saw the marble woman lying amidst the reeds and the duckweed.
She was naked to the waist. She must have been drowning there for the
last hundred years. Some grief had probably flung her into that spring
where she was slowly committing suicide. The clear water which flowed
over her had worn her face into a smooth expanse of marble, a mere white
surface without a feature; but her breasts, raised out of the water by
what appeared an effort of her neck, were still perfect and lifelike,
throbbing even yet with the joys of some old delight.

'She isn't dead yet,' said Serge, getting down again. 'One day we will
come and get her out of there.'

But Albine shuddered and led him away. They passed out again into the
sunlight and the rank luxuriance of beds and borders. They wandered
through a field of flowers capriciously, at random. Their feet trod a
carpet of lovely dwarf plants, which had once neatly fringed the walks,
and now spread about in wild profusion. In succession they passed
ankle-deep through the spotted silk of soft rose catchflies, through the
tufted satin of feathered pinks, and the blue velvet of forget-me-nots,
studded with melancholy little eyes. Further on they forced their way
through giant mignonette, which rose to their knees like a bath of
perfume; then they turned through a patch of lilies of the valley in
order that they might spare an expanse of violets, so delicate-looking
that they feared to hurt them. But soon they found themselves surrounded
on all sides by violets, and so with wary, gentle steps they passed over
their fresh fragrance inhaling the very breath of springtide. Beyond the
violets, a mass of lobelias spread out like green wool gemmed with pale
mauve. The softly shaded stars of globularia, the blue cups of
nemophila, the yellow crosses of saponaria, the white and purple ones of
sweet rocket, wove patches of rich tapestry, stretching onward and
onward, a fabric of royal luxury, so that the young couple might enjoy
the delights of that first walk together without fatigue. But the
violets ever reappeared; real seas of violets that rolled all round
them, shedding the sweetest perfumes beneath their feet and wafting in
their wake the breath of their leaf-hidden flowerets.

Albine and Serge quite lost themselves. Thousands of loftier plants
towered up in hedges around them, enclosing narrow paths which they
found it delightful to thread. These paths twisted and turned, wandered
maze-like through dense thickets. There were ageratums with sky-blue
tufts of bloom; woodruffs with soft musky perfume; brazen-throated
mimuluses, blotched with bright vermilion; lofty phloxes, crimson and
violet, throwing up distaffs of flowers for the breezes to spin; red
flax with sprays as fine as hair; chrysanthemums like full golden moons,
casting short faint rays, white and violet and rose, around them. The
young couple surmounted all the obstacles that lay in their path and
continued their way betwixt the walls of verdure. To the right of them
sprang up the slim fraxinella, the centranthus draped with snowy
blossoms, and the greyish hounds-tongue, in each of whose tiny
flowercups gleamed a dewdrop. To their left was a long row of columbines
of every variety; white ones, pale rose ones, and some of deep violet
hues, almost black, that seemed to be in mourning, the blossoms that
drooped from their lofty, branching stems being plaited and goffered
like crape. Then, as they advanced further on, the character of the
hedges changed. Giant larkspurs thrust up their flower-rods, between the
dentated foliage of which gaped the mouths of tawny snapdragons, while
the schizanthus reared its scanty leaves and fluttering blooms, that
looked like butterflies' wings of sulphur hue splashed with soft lake.
The blue bells of campanulae swayed aloft, some of them even over the
tall asphodels, whose golden stems served as their steeples. In one
corner was a giant fennel that reminded one of a lace-dressed lady
spreading out a sunshade of sea-green satin. Then the pair suddenly
found their way blocked. It was impossible to advance any further; a
mass of flowers, a huge sheaf of plants stopped all progress. Down
below, a mass of brank-ursine formed as it were a pedestal, from the
midst of which sprang scarlet geum, rhodanthe with stiff petals, and
clarkia with great white carved crosses, that looked like the insignia
of some barbarous order. Higher up still, bloomed the rosy viscaria, the
yellow leptosiphon, the white colinsia, and the lagurus, whose dusty
green bloom contrasted with the glowing colours around it. Towering over
all these growths scarlet foxgloves and blue lupins, rising in slender
columns, formed a sort of oriental rotunda gleaming vividly with crimson
and azure; while at the very summit, like a surmounting dome of dusky
copper, were the ruddy leaves of a colossal castor-bean.

As Serge reached out his hands to try to force a passage, Albine stopped
him and begged him not to injure the flowers. 'You will break the stems
and crush the leaves,' she said. 'Ever since I have been here, I have
always taken care to hurt none of them. Come, and I will show you the
pansies.'

She made him turn and led him from the narrow paths to the centre of the
parterre, where, once upon a time, great basins had been hollowed out.
But these had now fallen into ruin, and were nothing but gigantic
_jardinieres_, fringed with stained and cracked marble. In one of the
largest of them, the wind had sown a wonderful basketful of pansies. The
velvety blooms seemed almost like living faces, with bands of violet
hair, yellow eyes, paler tinted mouths, and chins of a delicate flesh
colour.

When I was younger they used to make me quite afraid,' murmured Albine.
'Look at them. Wouldn't you think that they were thousands of little
faces looking up at you from the ground? And they turn, too, all in the
same direction. They might be a lot of buried dolls thrusting their
heads out of the ground.'

She led him still further on. They went the round of all the other
basins. In the next one a number of amaranthuses had sprung up, raising
monstrous crests which Albine had always shrunk from touching, such was
their resemblance to big bleeding caterpillars. Balsams of all colours,
now straw-coloured, now the hue of peach-blossom, now blush-white, now
grey like flax, filled another basin where their seed pods split with
little snaps. Then in the midst of a ruined fountain, there flourished a
colony of splendid carnations. White ones hung over the moss-covered
rims, and flaked ones thrust a bright medley of blossom between the
chinks of the marble; while from the mouth of the lion, whence formerly
the water-jets had spurted, a huge crimson clove now shot out so
vigorously that the decrepit beast seemed to be spouting blood. Near by,
the principal piece of ornamental water, a lake, on whose surface swans
had glided, had now become a thicket of lilacs, beneath whose shade
stocks and verbenas and day-lilies screened their delicate tints, and
dozed away, all redolent of perfume.

'But we haven't seen half the flowers yet,' said Albine, proudly. 'Over
yonder there are such huge ones that I can quite bury myself amongst
them like a partridge in a corn-field.'

They went thither. They tripped down some broad steps, from whose fallen
urns still flickered the violet fires of the iris. All down the steps
streamed gilliflowers, like liquid gold. The sides were flanked with
thistles, that shot up like candelabra, of green bronze, twisted and
curved into the semblance of birds' heads, with all the fantastic
elegance of Chinese incense-burners. Between the broken balustrades
drooped tresses of stonecrop, light greenish locks, spotted as with
mouldiness. Then at the foot of the steps another parterre spread out,
dotted over with box-trees that were vigorous as oaks; box-trees which
had once been carefully pruned and clipped into balls and pyramids and
octagonal columns, but which were now revelling in unrestrained freedom
of untidiness, breaking out into ragged masses of greenery, through
which blue patches of sky were visible.

And Albine led Serge straight on to a spot that seemed to be the
graveyard of the flower-garden. There the scabious mourned, and
processions of poppies stretched out in line, with deathly odour,
unfolding heavy blooms of feverish brilliance. Sad anemones clustered in
weary throngs, pallid as if infected by some epidemic. Thick-set daturas
spread out purplish horns, from which insects, weary of life, sucked
fatal poison. Marigolds buried with choking foliage their writhing
starry flowers, that already reeked of putrefaction. And there were
other melancholy flowers also: fleshy ranunculi with rusty tints,
hyacinths and tuberoses that exhaled asphyxia and died from their own
perfume. But the cinerarias were most conspicuous, crowding thickly in
half-mourning robes of violet and white. In the middle of this gloomy
spot a mutilated marble Cupid still remained standing, smiling beneath
the lichens which overspread his youthful nakedness, while the arm with
which he had once held his bow lay low amongst the nettles.

Then Albine and Serge passed on through a rank growth of peonies,
reaching to their waists. The white flowers fell to pieces as they
passed, with a rain of snowy petals which was as refreshing to their
hands as the heavy drops of a thunder shower. And the red ones grinned
with apoplectical faces which perturbed them. Next they passed through a
field of fuchsias, forming dense, vigorous shrubs that delighted them
with their countless bells. Then they went on through fields of purple
veronicas and others of geraniums, blazing with all the fiery tints of a
brasier, which the wind seemed to be ever fanning into fresh heat. And
they forced their way through a jungle of gladioli, tall as reeds, which
threw up spikes of flowers that gleamed in the full daylight with all
the brilliance of burning torches. They lost themselves too in a forest
of sunflowers, with stalks as thick as Albine's wrist, a forest darkened
by rough leaves large enough to form an infant's bed, and peopled with
giant starry faces that shone like so many suns. And thence they passed
into another forest, a forest of rhododendrons so teeming with blossom
that the branches and leaves were completely hidden, and nothing but
huge nosegays, masses of soft calyces, could be seen as far as the eye
could reach.

'Come along; we have not got to the end yet,' cried Albine. 'Let us push
on.'

But Serge stopped. They were now in the midst of an old ruined
colonnade. Some of the columns offered inviting seats as they lay
prostrate amongst primroses and periwinkles. Further away, among the
columns that still remained upright, other flowers were growing in
profusion. There were expanses of tulips showing brilliant streaks like
painted china; expanses of calceolarias dotted with crimson and gold;
expanses of zinnias like great daisies; expanses of petunias with petals
like soft cambric through which rosy flesh tints gleamed; and other
fields, with flowers they could not recognise spreading in carpets
beneath the sun, in a motley brilliance that was softened by the green
of their leaves.

'We shall never be able to see it all,' said Serge, smiling and waving
his hand. 'It would be very nice to sit down here, amongst all this
perfume.'

Near them there was a large patch of heliotropes, whose vanilla-like
breath permeated the air with velvety softness. They sat down upon one
of the fallen columns, in the midst of a cluster of magnificent lilies
which had shot up there. They had been walking for more than an hour.
They had wandered on through the flowers from the roses to the lilies.
These offered them a calm, quiet haven after their lovers' ramble amid
the perfumed solicitations of luscious honeysuckle, musky violets,
verbenas that breathed out the warm scent of kisses, and tuberoses that
panted with voluptuous passion. The lilies, with their tall slim stems,
shot up round them like a white pavilion and sheltered them with snowy
cups, gleaming only with the gold of their slender pistils. And there
they rested, like betrothed children in a tower of purity; an
impregnable ivory tower, where all their love was yet perfect innocence.

Albine and Serge lingered amongst the lilies till evening. They felt so
happy there, and seemed to break out into a new life. Serge felt the
last trace of fever leave his hands, while Albine grew quite white, with
a milky whiteness untinted by any rosy hue. They were unconscious that
their arms and necks and shoulders were bare, and their straying
unconfined hair in nowise troubled them. They laughed merrily one at the
other, with frank open laughter. The expression of their eyes retained
the limpid calmness of clear spring water. When they quitted the lilies,
their feelings were but those of children ten years old; it seemed to
them that they had just met each other in that garden so that they might
be friends for ever and amuse themselves with perpetual play. And as
they returned through the parterre, the very flowers bore themselves
discreetly, as though they were glad to see their childishness, and
would do nothing that might corrupt them. The forests of peonies, the
masses of carnations, the carpets of forget-me-nots, the curtains of
clematis now steeped in the atmosphere of evening, slumbering in
childlike purity akin to their own, no longer spread suggestions of
voluptuousness around them. The pansies looked up at them with their
little candid faces, like playfellows; and the languid mignonette, as
Albine's white skirt brushed by it, seemed full of compassion, and held
its breath lest it should fan their love prematurely into life.

Back to chapter list of: Abbe Mouret's Transgression