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“Just Heaven! Madame, you shall not speak of my son as of one dead and buried! But, if you have some bad news”–

“Your son took your quarrel on his hands, eh?”

“I believe so–I think”–

“Well; I saw him an hour ago in search of your slanderer!”

“He must find him!” said the General, plucking up.

“But if the search is already over,” slowly responded Madame.

The father looked one instant in her face, then rose with an exclamation:

“Where is my son? What has happened? Do you think I am a child, to be trifled with–a horse to be teased? Tell me of my son!”

Madame was stricken with genuine anguish.

“Take your chair,” she begged; “wait; listen; take your chair.”

“Never!” cried the General; “I am going to find my son–my God! Madame, you have locked this door! What are you, that you should treat me so? Give me, this instant”–

“Oh! Monsieur, I beseech you to take your chair, and I will tell you all. You can do nothing now. Listen! suppose you should rush out and find that your son had played the coward at last! Sit down and”–

“Ah! Madame, this is play!” cried the distracted man.

“But no; it is not play. Sit down; I want to ask you something.”

He sank down and she stood over him, anguish and triumph strangely mingled in her beautiful face.

“General, tell me true; did you not force this quarrel into your son’s hand? I know he would not choose to have it. Did you not do it to test his courage, because all these fifteen years you have made yourself a fool with the fear that he became a student only to escape being a soldier? Did you not?”

Her eyes looked him through and through.

“And if I did?” demanded he with faint defiance.

“Yes! and if he has made dreadful haste and proved his courage?” asked she.

“Well, then,”–the General straightened up triumphantly–“then he is my son!”

He beat the desk.

“And heir to your wealth, for example?”

“Certainly.”

The lady bowed in solemn mockery.

“It will make him a magnificent funeral!”

The father bounded up and stood speechless, trembling from head to foot. Madame looked straight in his eye.

“Your son has met the writer of that article.”

“Where?” the old man’s lips tried to ask.

“Suddenly, unexpectedly, in a passage-way.”

“My God! and the villain”–

“Lives!” cried Madame.

He rushed to the door, forgetting that it was locked.

“Give me that key!” he cried, wrenched at the knob, turned away bewildered, turned again toward it, and again away; and at every step and turn he cried, “Oh! my son, my son! I have killed my son! Oh! Mossy, my son, my little boy! Oh! my son, my son!”

Madame buried her face in her hands and sobbed aloud. Then the father hushed his cries and stood for a moment before her.

“Give me the key, Clarisse, let me go.”

She rose and laid her face on his shoulder.

“What is it, Clarisse?” asked he.

“Your son and I were ten years betrothed.”

“Oh, my child!”

“Because, being disinherited, he would not be me husband.”

“Alas! would to God I had known it! Oh! Mossy, my son.”

“Oh! Monsieur,” cried the lady, clasping her hands, “forgive me–mourn no more–your son is unharmed! I wrote the article–I am your recanting slanderer! Your son is hunting for me now. I told my aunt to misdirect him. I slipped by him unseen in the carriage-way.”

The wild old General, having already staggered back and rushed forward again, would have seized her in his arms, had not the little Doctor himself at that instant violently rattled the door and shook his finger at them playfully as he peered through the glass.

“Behold!” said Madame, attempting a smile: “open to your son; here is the key.”

She sank into a chair.

Father and son leaped into each other’s arms; then turned to Madame:

“Ah! thou lovely mischief-maker”–

She had fainted away.

“Ah! well, keep out of the way, if you please, papa,” said Dr. Mossy, as Madame presently reopened her eyes; “no wonder you fainted; you have finished some hard work–see; here; no; Clarisse, dear, take this.”

Father and son stood side by side, tenderly regarding her as she revived.

“Now, papa, you may kiss her; she is quite herself again, already.”

“My daughter!” said the stately General; “this–is my son’s ransom; and, with this,–I withdraw the Villivicencio ticket.”

“You shall not,” exclaimed the laughing lady, throwing her arms about his neck.

“But, yes!” he insisted; “my faith! you will at least allow me to remove my dead from the field.”

“But, certainly;” said the son; “see, Clarisse, here is Madame, your aunt, asking us all into the house. Let us go.”

The group passed out into the Rue Royale, Dr. Mossy shutting the door behind them. The sky was blue, the air was soft and balmy, and on the sweet south breeze, to which the old General bared his grateful brow, floated a ravishing odor of–

“Ah! what is it?” the veteran asked of the younger pair, seeing the little aunt glance at them with a playful smile.

Madame Delicieuse for almost the first time in her life, and Dr. Mossy for the thousandth–blushed.

It was the odor of orange-blossoms.