The next morning, even before daybreak, when the doors of the Asilo were opened, every one who had spent the night there left the place and had in a moment disappeared into the outskirts.
Manuel and Jesús chose the Calle de Mendez Alvaro. On the platforms of the Estación del Mediodía the electric arcs shone like globes of light in the gloomy atmosphere of the night.
From the chimneys of the roundhouse rose dense pillars of white smoke; the red and green pupils of the signal lamps winked confidentially from their lofty poles; the straining boilers of the locomotives sent forth most horrible roars.
On both sides along the perspective of the thoroughfare quivered the pale lights of the distant street lamps. Yonder in the country, through the air that was as murky and yellowish as ground glass, could be made out upon the colourless fields, low cottages, black picket fences, high gnarled telegraph poles, distant, obscure embankments that formed the railroad bed. A few ramshackle taverns, lighted by a languidly burning oil lamp, were open.... With the opaque glow of dawn appeared, to the right, the wide, leaden roof of the Estación del Mediodía, glistening with dew; opposite, the pile of the General Hospital, jaundice-hued; to the left, the barren fields, the indistinct brown vegetable patches that rose until they blended, with the undulating hills of the horizon under the grey, humid sky, into the vast desolation of the Madrilenian suburbs....
CHAPTER VII
The Black House—Conflagration—Flight
Near the station stretched a line of carriages; the cabmen had lighted a fire. Here Jesús and Manuel warmed themselves for a moment.
“We’ll have to go to that town,” muttered Jesús.