To which the aunt had answered that, “coute que coute, she need not cry about it;” nor did she.  Though the General’s compliment had foiled her thrust, she answered gayly to the effect that enough was enough; “but, ah!  General,” dropping her voice to an undertone, “if you had heard what some of those rosebuds said of you!”

The old General pricked up like a country beau.  Madame laughed to herself, “Monsieur Peacock, I have thee;” but aloud she said gravely: 

“Come into the drawing-room, if you please, and seat yourself.  You must be greatly fatigued.”

The friends who waited below overheard the invitation.

“Au revoir, General,” said they.

“Au revoir, Messieurs,” he answered, and followed the lady.

“General,” said she, as if her heart were overflowing, “you have been spoken against.  Please sit down.”

“Is that true, Madame?”

“Yes, General.”

She sank into a luxurious chair.

“A lady said to-day—­but you will be angry with me, General.”

“With you, Madame?  That is not possible.”

“I do not love to make revelations, General; but when a noble friend is evil spoken of”—­she leaned her brow upon her thumb and forefinger, and looked pensively at her slipper’s toe peeping out at the edge of her skirt on the rich carpet—­“one’s heart gets very big.”

“Madame, you are an angel!  But what said she, Madame?”

“Well, General, I have to tell you the whole truth, if you will not be angry.  We were all speaking at once of handsome men.  She said to me:  ’Well, Madame Delicieuse, you may say what you will of General Villivicencio, and I suppose it is true; but everybody knows’—­pardon me, General, but just so she said—­’all the world knows he treats his son very badly.’”

“It is not true,” said the General.

“If I wasn’t angry!” said Madame, making a pretty fist.  ’How can that be?’ I said.  ‘Well,’ she said, ’mamma says he has been angry with his son for fifteen years.’  ‘But what did his son do?’ I said.  ‘Nothing,’ said she. ‘Ma foi,’ I said, ’me, I too would be angry if my son had done nothing for fifteen years’—­ho, ho, ho!”

“It is not true,” said the General.

The old General cleared his throat, and smiled as by compulsion.

“You know, General,” said Madame, looking distressed, “it was nothing to joke about, but I had to say so, because I did not know what your son had done, nor did I wish to hear any thing against one who has the honor to call you his father.”

She paused a moment to let the flattery take effect, and then proceeded: 

“But then another lady said to me; she said, ’For shame, Clarisse, to laugh at good Dr. Mossy; nobody—­neither General Villivicencio, neither any other, has a right to be angry against that noble, gentle, kind, brave’”—­