A singular excitement was occasioned by the disappearance of the last ball in the pocket. Some faces grew pale; but no one stirred from the spot where he had been standing as a spectator. Alfonse looked steadily round him, and made two or three times the circuit of the room, as though he were in search, but in vain, of some one worth quarrelling with. At last he perceived a sort of sub-lieutenant, originally drum-major and _maître-d'armes_, and who boasted of having killed his thirty pequins, sitting quietly in a corner. Alfonse walked straight up to him, and, saluting him with a politeness that electrified the company, said, in his cool way, "Monsieur, I am exceedingly distressed at the situation in which I find myself placed; but my honour is concerned, and you will allow me to engage yours." Without further preliminaries, he gave him a severe hit in the face. The officer, who little expected so abrupt and unanswerable a mode of provocation, sprang like a madman from his chair; and had not Alfonse, with the activity and nimbleness of a cat, leaped with one bound on the table, the ex-drum-major would probably have strangled him on the spot. He was quickly at the aggressor's heels, when his own comrades stopped him of their own accord, saying, "Come, come! no child's play or boxing! the thing is too serious! _C'est un combat à la mort!_" "Where shall I find you to-morrow?" said one of the officers, addressing Alfonse. "Fix your ground," was the reply. "No to-morrows!" said the officer who had received the blow; "this instant!" "This instant be it, if you please," replied Alfonso with the utmost indifference. "I shall not sleep to-night till that blow is avenged!" said the other, foaming with rage. "I, too, want to unnumb my hand. I have hurt my knuckles against your cheek-bones," said Alfonse. "Where would they fight at such a time of night as this?" observed some of the officers. "In the garden behind the _café_," cried the ancient _maître d'armes_; "a sword in one hand, and a billiard-lamp in the other." "But," said Alfonse, "I am tired. I know your style of fighting men, _Crane_; you want to make me break ground, and drive me step by step round the garden. Don't think it, my lad. Besides, the lamp may go out. But, if you have no objection, the billiard-table will be a good arena. We shall be well lighted, and there will be no means of drawing back a foot. "Be it so," said the other. The doors were closed, and they laid hands on the waiters and the proprietor of the _café_, who were going to the police. The swords were then brought. The two adversaries cast lots for them, and then pulled off their coats and waistcoats, and unbuttoned their shirts, to show that they had nothing under. Both then took their swords.