Read "Abbé Mouret's Transgression" by Émile Zola online for free on Textopian. Full text with search, annotations, highlights, and AI-powered reading aids.
They went down and out into the garden without the smile fading from Serge's face. All that he saw of the greenery around him was such as was reflected in the clear depths of Albine's eyes. As they approached, the garden smiled and smiled again, a murmur of content sped from leaf to leaf and from bough to bough to the furthest depths of the avenues. For days and days the garden must have been hoping and expecting to see them thus, clinging to one another, making their peace again with the trees and searching for their lost love on the grassy banks. A solemn warning breath sighed through the branches; the afternoon sky was drowsy with heat; the plants raised their bowing heads to watch them pass.
‘Listen,' whispered Albine. ‘They drop into silence as we come near them; but over yonder they are expecting us, they are telling each other the way they must lead us. I told you we should have no trouble about the paths, the trees themselves will direct us with their spreading arms.'