,' he mumbled between his teeth. 'It was virtually
certain that they had hidden him here.'

Then he took a few steps, and cried out: 'I see you. It is an
abomination. Are you a brute beast to go coursing through the woods with
that female? She has led you far astray, has she not? She has besmeared
you with filth, and now you are hairy like a goat.... Pluck a branch
from the trees wherewith to smite her on the back.'

Again Albine whispered in an ardent, prayerful voice: 'Do you love me?
Do you love me?'

But Serge, with bowed head, kept silence, though he did not yet drive
her from him.

'Fortunately, I have found you,' continued Brother Archangias. 'I
discovered this hole.... You have disobeyed God, and have slain your own
peace. Henceforward, for ever, temptation will gnaw you with its fiery
tooth, and you will no longer have ignorance of evil to help you to
fight it. It was that creature who tempted you to your fall, was it not?
Do you not see the serpent's tail writhing amongst her hair? The mere
sight of her shoulders is sufficient to make one vomit with disgust....
Leave her. Touch her not, for she is the beginning of hell. In the name
of God, come forth from that garden.'

'Do you love me? Oh! do you love me?' reiterated Albine.

But Serge hastily drew away from her as though her bare arms and
shoulders really scorched him.

'In the name of God! In the name of God!' cried the Brother, in a voice
of thunder.

Serge unresistingly stepped towards the breach. As soon as Brother
Archangias, with rough violence, had dragged him out of the Paradou,
Albine, who had fallen half fainting to the ground, with hands wildly
stretched towards the love which was deserting her, rose up again,
choking with sobs. And she fled, vanished into the midst of the trees,
whose trunks she lashed with her streaming hair.

BOOK III

I

When Abbe Mouret had said the _Pater_, he bowed to the altar, and went
to the Epistle side. Then he came down, and made the sign of the cross
over big Fortune and Rosalie, who were kneeling, side by side, before
the altar-rails.

'_Ego conjungo vos in matrimonium, in nomine Patris, et Filii, et
Spiritus Sancti_.'

'_Amen_,' responded Vincent, who was serving the mass, and glancing
curiously at his big brother out of the corner of his eye.

Fortune and Rosalie bent their heads, affected by some slight emotion,
although they had nudged each other with their elbows when they knelt