She put on widow's weeds, and wore them still when 'Tite Poulette "had seventeen," as the frantic lads would say.
How they did chatter over her.

Quiet Kristian Koppig had never seen the like.

He wrote to his mother, and told her so.

A pretty fellow at the corner would suddenly double himself up with beckoning to a knot of chums; these would hasten up; recruits would come in from two or three other directions; as they reached the corner their countenances would quickly assume a genteel severity, and presently, with her mother, 'Tite Poulette would pass--tall, straight, lithe, her great black eyes made tender by their sweeping lashes, the faintest tint of color in her Southern cheek, her form all grace, her carriage a wonder of simple dignity.
The instant she was gone every tongue was let slip on the marvel of her beauty; but, though theirs were only the loose New Orleans morals of over fifty years ago, their unleashed tongues never had attempted any greater liberty than to take up the pet name, 'Tite Poulette.

And yet the mother was soon to be, as we shall discover, a paid dancer at the _Salle de Conde_.
To Zalli, of course, as to all "quadroon ladies," the festivities of the Conde-street ball-room were familiar of old.