Manuel would sit down upon a trunk and the old lady, a cigarette in her mouth and blowing smoke through her nostrils, would recount adventures from the days of her glory.
That room of Doña Violante and her daughters was a haunt of infection; from the hooks nailed to the wall hung dirty rags, and between the lack of air and the medley of odours a stench arose strong enough to fell an ox.
Manuel listened to Doña Violante's stories with genuine delight. The old lady was at her best in her commentaries.
"I tell you, my boy," she would say, "you can take my word for it. A woman with a good pair of breasts and who happens to be a pretty warm article"—and here the old lady pulled at her cigarette and with an expressive gesture indicated what she meant by her no less expressive word—"will always have a trail of men after her."
Doña Violante used to sing songs from Spanish zarzuelas and from French operettas, which produced in Manuel a terrible sadness. He could not say why, but they gave him the impression of a world of pleasures that was hopelessly beyond his reach. When he heard Doña Violante sing the song from El Juramento
Disdain is a sword with a double edge, One slays with love, the other with forgetfulness….
he had a vision of salons, ladies, amorous intrigues; but even more than by this he was overwhelmed with sadness by the waltzes from La Dina and La Grande Duchesse.
Doña Violante's reflexions opened Manuel's eyes; the scenes that occurred daily in the house, however, worked quite as much as these toward such a result.
Another good instructor was found in the person of Doña Casiana's niece, a trifle older than Manuel,—a thin, weakly chit of such a malicious nature that she was always hatching plots against somebody.
If any one struck her she didn't shed a tear; she would go down to the concierge's lodge when the concierge's little boy was left alone, would grab him and pinch him and kick him, in this manner wreaking vengeance for the blows she had received.