Manuel thought that if in time he should become the owner of a little house like Señor Custodio's, and of a cart and donkeys, and hens and a dog, and find in addition a woman to love him, he would be one of the almost happy men in this world.
CHAPTER VII
Señor Custodio's Ideas—La Justa, El Carnicerín, and El Conejo.
Señor Custodio was an intelligent fellow of natural gifts, very observant and quick to take advantage of a situation. He could neither read nor write, yet made notes and kept accounts; with crosses and scratches of his own invention he devised a substitute for writing, at least for the purposes of his own business.
Señor Custodio was exceedingly eager for knowledge, and if it weren't that the notion struck him as ridiculous, he would have set about learning how to read and write. In the afternoon, work done, he would ask Manuel to read the newspapers and the illustrated reviews that he picked up on the streets, and the ragdealer and his wife listened with the utmost attention.
Señor Custodio had, too, several volumes of novels in serial form that had been left behind by his daughter, and Manuel began to read them aloud.
The comment of the ragdealer, who took this fiction for historic truth, was always perspicacious and just, revelatory of an instinct for reasoning and common sense. The man's realistic criticism was not always to Manuel's taste, and at times the boy would make bold to defend a romantic, immoral thesis. Señor Custodio, however, would at once cut him short, refusing to let him continue.
For professional reasons the ragdealer was much preoccupied with thought of the manure that went to waste in Madrid. He would say to Manuel:
"Can you imagine how much money all the refuse that comes from
Madrid is worth?"
"No."