CHAPTER I
Can Better Times Have Come at Last?—Vidal’s Proposals
When Manuel awoke next morning it was already twelve. For so long his first sensations, upon awakening, had been of cold, hunger or anguish, that now, finding himself under a blanket, sheltered, in a narrow room with little light in it, he wondered whether he were dreaming.
Then all at once the suicide at the Virgen del Puerto came to his mind; there followed his encounter with Vidal, the dance at the Romea and the conversation with La Rabanitos in the bun shop.
“Can better times have come at last?” he asked himself. He sat up in bed, and catching sight of his rags strewn across a chair, was at a loss. “If they find me dressed like this, they’ll throw me out,” he thought. And in his hesitancy he slipped back under the sheets.
It must have been almost two when he heard the door to his room being opened. It was Vidal.
“Why, man! Do you know what time it is? Why don’t you get up?”
“If they see me with those things on,” replied Manuel, pointing to his shreds and patches, “they’ll throw me out.”