“I have two boys, Don Quentin,” answered El Pullí slyly.
“Well, then, here’s something for the other one.”
That clinking of silver produced an extraordinary effect in the tavern. Every one looked at Quentin, who, pretending not to notice the fact, began to eat and to carry on an animated conversation with his friend.
At this point two men approached the table: one was tall, smiling, some thirty years old, toothless, with a black beard and reddish, blood-shot eyes; the other was short, blond, timid-and insignificant-looking.
Quentin greeted them with a slight nod, and indicated that they should be seated.
“Here,” said Quentin to Springer, indicating the man with the beard, “you have a thoroughgoing poet; the only bad thing about him is his name: he is called Cornejo. He is Corneille translated into Cordovese. But sit down, gentlemen, and order what you like; then we shall talk.”
The two men seated themselves.
The poet looked something like a carp, with his dull, protruding eyes. He wore very short trousers, checked yellow and black, and carried a cane so worn by use that he had to stretch out his arm to touch the ground with it. From what Quentin said, Cornejo was a fantastic individual. He had on a blue, threadbare coat which he called his “black suit,” and a ragged overcoat which he called his “surtout.” He always had patches in his trousers; sometimes these were made of cloth, and sometimes of rawhide; he lived in the perpetual combination of a zealous appetite and an empty stomach; he fed only upon alcohol and vanity; hence his poetical compositions were so ethereal that they were windy, rather than wingèd verse.
Once when he was walking with a comrade who was also a poet and a ragamuffin, he said, pointing to some grand ladies in a carriage:
“My lad, they are looking at us with a contempt that is ... inexplicable.”