"And don't you ever see Vidal?" asked Manuel.
"No. See here, Have you got any money?" blurted El Bizco.
"Twenty or thirty centimos at most."
"Fine."
Manuel bought a loaf of bread, which he gave to El Bizco, and the two
drank a glass of brandy in a tavern. Then they went wandering about
the streets and, at about eleven, returned to the Puerta del Sol.
Around the asphalt caldrons had gathered knots of men and tattered
gamins; some were sleeping with their heads bent against the furnace
as if they were about to attack it in bull fashion. The ragamuffins
were talking and shouting, and they laughed at the passers-by who came
over out of curiosity for a closer look.
"We sleep just as if we were in the open country," said one of the
idlers.
"It wouldn't be at all bad," added another, "to take a walk now over
to the Plaza Mayor and see whether they wouldn't give us a pound of
ham."
"It has trichinae in it, anyway."
"Take care of that spring-matress," bellowed a flat-nosed gamin who
was going about striking the sleepers with a stick in the shins. "Hey,
there, you're rumpling the sheets!"
At Manuel's side, a rachetic urchin with thick lips and streaked eyes
and one of his feet bandaged in dirty rags, was crying and groaning;
Manuel, engrossed in his own thoughts, had not noticed him before.
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