We revisit the calculation of height correlations in the two-dimensional
Abelian sandpile model by taking advantage of a technique developed recently by
Kenyon and Wilson. The formalism requires to equip the usual graph Laplacian,
ubiquitous in the context of cycle-rooted spanning forests, with a complex
connection. In the case at hand, the connection is constant and localized along
a semi-infinite defect line (zipper). In the appropriate limit of a trivial
connection, it allows one to count spanning forests whose components contain
prescribed sites, which are of direct relevance for height correlations in the
sandpile model. Using this technique, we first rederive known 1- and 2-site
lattice correlators on the plane and upper half-plane, more efficiently than
what has been done so far. We also compute explicitly the (new) next-to-leading
order in the distances (r−4 for 1-site on the upper half-plane, r−6
for 2-site on the plane). We extend these results by computing new correlators
involving one arbitrary height and a few heights 1 on the plane and upper
half-plane, for the open and closed boundary conditions. We examine our lattice
results from the conformal point of view, and confirm the full consistency with
the specific features currently conjectured to be present in the associated
logarithmic conformal field theory.Comment: 60 pages, 21 figures. v2: reformulation of the grove theorem, minor
correction