During our wanderings I had met several padrones who used to beat the children who worked for them. They were very cruel, and they swore, and usually they were drunk. Would I belong to one of those terrible men?
And then, even if fate gave me a kind master, it was another change. First, my foster mother, then Vitalis, then another.... Was it to be always so? Should I never find anyone that I could love and stay with always? Little by little I had grown attached to Vitalis. He seemed almost what I thought a father would be. Should I never have a father, have a family? Always alone in this great world! Nobody's boy!
Vitalis had asked me to be brave. I did not wish to add to his sorrows, but it was hard, so hard, to leave him.
As we walked down a dirty street, with heaps of snow on either side covered with cinders and rotten vegetables, I asked: "Where are we?"
"In Paris, my boy."
Where were my marble houses? And the trees of gold, and the finely dressed people. Was this Paris! Was I to spend the winter in a place like this, parted from Vitalis and Capi?