The ragdealer's daughter, Justa by
name, was a modiste in a shop.
During the first few weeks neither of the children came to their
parents' home. Juan lived in the laundry and Justa with a relative
of hers who owned a workshop.
Manuel, who spent many hours in conversation with Senor Custodio,
noted very soon that the rag-dealer, though fully aware of his very
humble condition, was a man of extraordinary pride and that as
regarded honour and virtue he had the ideas of a mediaeval nobleman.
One Sunday, after he had been living there a month Manuel had
finished his meal and was standing at the door when he saw a girl
with her skirts gathered come running down the slope of the
dumping-ground. As she approached and he got a close look at her,
Manuel went red and then blanched. It was the lass that had come two
or three times to the lodging-house to fit the Baroness's dresses;
but she had since then grown to womanhood.
She drew near, raising her skirt and her starched petticoats,
careful not to soil her patent-leather slippers.
"What can she be coming here for?" Manuel asked himself.
"Is father in?" she inquired.
Senor Custodio came out and embraced her. She was the ragdealer's
daughter of whom Manuel was forever hearing and whom, without
knowing just why, he had imagined as a very thin, emaciated,
disagreeable creature.
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