The Quest Part 38

El Bizco and Manuel went along in the dark from one side to the other, exploring the hollows of the mountain, until a ray of light issuing from a crevice in the earth betrayed one of the caves.

They approached the hole; from within came the interrupted hum of hoa.r.s.e voices.

By the flickering light of a candle which was held in position on the ground by two rocks, more than a dozen outcasts, some seated and some on their knees, formed a knot of card-players. In the corners might be discerned the hazy outlines of men stretched out on the sand.

A fetid vapour was exhaled by the cave.

The flame flickered, illuminating now a corner of the den, now the pale face of one of the players, and as the light blinked, the shadows of the men grew long or short on the sandy walls. From time to time was heard a curse or a blasphemy.

Manuel thought that he had beheld something like this before in one of his feverish nightmares.

"I'm not going in," he said to El Bizco.

"Why?" asked his companion.

"I'd rather freeze."

"As you please, then. I know one of these fellows. He's El Interprete."

"And who is this Interprete?"

"The captain of all the mountain vagabonds."

Despite these a.s.surances Manuel hesitated.

"Who's there?" came a voice from inside.

"I," answered El Bizco.

Manuel dashed off at full speed. Near the cave stood a group of two or three huts, with a yard in the middle, surrounded by a rough stone wall.

This, according to the ironic name given to it by the ragam.u.f.fins, was the Crystal Palace, the nest of some low-flying turtledoves who frequented the Montana barracks and who, at night, were joined by friendly hawks and gerfalcons.

The entrance to the yard was closed by a double-panelled door.

Manuel examined it to see if it yielded, but it was strong, and was armoured with tins that were stretched out and nailed down upon mats.

He thought that n.o.body could be there and tried to climb the wall; he scaled the low rubble inclosure and as he advanced, got caught in a wire; a stone fell noisily from the wall, a dog began to bark furiously, and a curse echoed from inside.

Manuel, convinced that the nest was not empty, took to flight. He sought shelter in a doorway that was somewhat protected from the rain and huddled down to sleep.

It was still night when he awoke shivering with the cold, trembling from head to foot. He started to run so as to warm himself; he reached the Paseo de Rosales and strode up and down several times.

It seemed that the night would never end.

The rain ceased; the sun came out in the morning; Manuel took refuge in a hollow on the slope of the embankment. The sun began to warm him most deliciously. Manuel dreamed of a very white, exceedingly beautiful woman with golden tresses. Frozen almost to death, he drew near the lady, and she wrapped him in her golden strands and he nestled tenderly, ever so tenderly in her lap....

CHAPTER VI

Senor Custodio and His Establishment--The Free Life.

... And he was in the midst of the most ravishing dreams when a harsh voice recalled him to the bitter, impure realities of existence.

"What are you doing there, loafer?" some one was asking him.

"I!" mumbled Manuel, opening his eyes and staring at his questioner.

"I'm not doing anything."

"Yes, I can see that. I can see that."

Manuel got up; before him he beheld an old man with greyish hair and gloomy mien, with a sack across his shoulder and a hook in his hand.

The fellow wore a fur cap, a sort of yellowish overcoat and a reddish m.u.f.fler rolled around his neck.

"Have you a home?" asked the man.

"No, sir."

"And you sleep in the open?"

"Well, as I haven't any home...."

The ragpicker began to rake over the ground, fished up some objects and various papers, shoved them into the sack and turning his gaze again upon Manuel, added:

"You'd be better off if you went to work."

"If I had work, I'd work; but I haven't, so ..."--and Manuel, wearied of these useless words, huddled into his corner to continue his slumbers.

"See here," said the ragdealer, "you come along with me. I need a boy ... I'll feed you."

Manuel looked at the man without replying.

"Well, do you want to or not? Hurry up and decide."

Manuel lazily arose. The rag man, sack slung across his shoulder, climbed the slope of the embankment until he reached Rosales Street, where he had a cart drawn by two donkeys. The man told them to move on and they ambled down toward the Paseo de la Florida, thence through Virgen del Puerto Avenue to the Ronda de Segovia. The cart, with its license plate and number, was a tumbledown affair, held together by strips of bra.s.s, and was laden with two or three sacks, buckets and baskets.

The ragman, Senor Custodio,--that was what he gave as his name,--looked like a good-natured soul.

From time to time he would bend over, pick up something from the street and throw it into the cart.

Underneath the cart, attached to it by a chain, jogged along in leisurely fashion a dog with yellowish locks, long and l.u.s.trous,--an amiable creature who appeared to Manuel as good a canine as his master was a human being.

Between the Segovia and Toledo bridges, not far from the head of Imperial Avenue, there opens a dark depression with a cl.u.s.ter of two or three squalid, wretched huts. It is a quadrangular ditch, blackened by smoke and coal dust, hemmed in by crumbling walls and heaps of rubbish.