The conversation became discussion, Frowenfeld, Raoul and Raoul’s little seraph against the whole host, chariots, horse and archery.  Ah! such strokes as the apothecary dealt!  And if Raoul and “Madame Raoul” played parts most closely resembling the blowing of horns and breaking of pitchers, still they bore themselves gallantly.  The engagement was short; we need not say that nobody surrendered; nobody ever gives up the ship in parlor or veranda debate:  and yet—­as is generally the case in such affairs—­truth and justice made some unacknowledged headway.  If anybody on either side came out wounded—­this to the credit of the Creoles as a people—­the sufferer had the heroic good manners not to say so.  But the results were more marked than this; indeed, in more than one or two candid young hearts and impressible minds the wrongs and rights of sovereign true love began there on the spot to be more generously conceded and allowed.  “My-de’-seh,” Honore had once on a time said to Frowenfeld, meaning that to prevail in conversational debate one should never follow up a faltering opponent, “you mus’ crack the egg, not smash it!” And Joseph, on rising to take his leave, could the more amiably overlook the feebleness of the invitation to call again, since he rejoiced, for Honore’s sake, in the conviction that the egg was cracked.

Agricola, the Grandissimes told the apothecary, was ill in his room, and Madame de Grandissime, his sister—­Honore’s mother—­begged to be excused that she might keep him company.  The Fusiliers were a very close order; or one might say they garrisoned the citadel.

But Joseph’s rising to go was not immediately upon the close of the discussion; those courtly people would not let even an unwelcome guest go with the faintest feeling of disrelish for them.  They were casting about in their minds for some momentary diversion with which to add a finishing touch to their guest’s entertainment, when Clemence appeared in the front garden walk and was quickly surrounded by bounding children, alternately begging and demanding a song.  Many of even the younger adults remembered well when she had been “one of the hands on the place,” and a passionate lover of the African dance.  In the same instant half a dozen voices proposed that for Joseph’s amusement Clemence should put her cakes off her head, come up on the veranda and show a few of her best steps.

“But who will sing?”

“Raoul!”

“Very well; and what shall it be?”

“‘Madame Gaba.’”

No, Clemence objected.

“Well, well, stand back—­something better than ‘Madame Gaba.’”

Raoul began to sing and Clemence instantly to pace and turn, posture, bow, respond to the song, start, swing, straighten, stamp, wheel, lift her hand, stoop, twist, walk, whirl, tiptoe with crossed ankles, smite her palms, march, circle, leap,—­an endless improvisation of rhythmic motion to this modulated responsive chant: