"Paco! Paco!"
The landlady got up and asked who was making all that racket; one of the men who had just entered the house explained in a whisky-soaked voice that they were students who boarded on the third floor, and had just come from the ball in search of Paco, one of the salesmen. The landlady told them that some one had died in the house and one of the drunkards, who was a student of medicine, said he would like to view the corpse. He was persuaded to change his mind and everybody went back to his place. The next day Manuel's sisters were notified and Petra was buried….
On the day after the interment Manuel left the boarding-house and said farewell to Doña Casiana.
"What are you going to do?" she asked.
"I don't know. I'll see."
"I can't keep you here, but I don't want you to starve. Come here from time to time."
After walking about town all the morning, Manuel found himself at noon on the Ronda de Toledo, leaning against the wall of Las Americas, at a loss to know what to do with himself. To one side, likewise seated upon the turf, was a loathsome, terribly ugly, flat-nosed gamin, with a clouded eye, bare feet, and a tattered jacket through whose rents could be glimpsed his dark skin, which had been tanned by the sun and wind. Hanging from his neck was a canister into which he threw the cigarette ends that he gathered.
"Where do you live?" Manuel asked him.
"I haven't any father or mother," answered the urchin, evasively.
"What's your name?"