For the gringos he felt a cold hostility—a sense of antagonism and difference—but it was his senile and fatuous uncle, the type of his own defeated race, whom he despised.
CHAPTER IV
When the music stopped Ramon left the hall for the hotel lobby, where he soothed his sensibilities with a small brown cigarette of his own making. In one of the swinging benches covered with Navajo blankets two other dress-suited youths were seated, smoking and talking. One of them was a short, plump Jew with a round and gravely good-natured face; the other a tall, slender young fellow with a great mop of curly brown hair, large soft eyes and a sensitive mouth.
“She’s good looking, all right,” the little fellow assented, as Ramon came up.
“Good looking!” exclaimed the other with enthusiasm. “She’s a little queen! Nothing like her ever hit this town before.”
“Who’s all the excitement about?” Ramon demanded, thrusting himself into the conversation with the easy familiarity which was his right as one of “the bunch.”
Sidney Felberg turned to him in mock amazement.
“Good night, Ramon! Where have you been? Asleep? We’re talking about Julia Roth, same as everybody else.…”