CHAPTER I
The Studio—The Life Led by Roberto Hasting—Alex Monzón
Roberto had got out of bed. Dressed in his street clothes, seated before a table heaped with documents, he was writing.
The room was a low-ceiled garret, with a large window that overlooked a patio. The centre of the room was occupied by two clay statues with an inner framework of wire,—two figures of more than natural size, huge and fantastic, both merely sketched, as if the artist had been unable to complete them; they were two giants exhausted by weariness, with small, clean-shaven heads, sunken chests, bulging stomachs and long, simian arms. They seemed crushed by a profound dejection. Before the wide window extended a sofa covered with flowered percaline; on the chairs and upon the floor lay statues half swathed in damp cloths; in one corner stood a box filled with dry bits of scagliola, and in a corner, a tub of clay.
From time to time Roberto would glance at a pocket watch placed upon the table amidst his papers. Then he would get up and pace for a while up and down the room. Through the window he could see tattered, filthy women moving about in the galleries of the houses across the way; up from the street rose a deafening racket of cries from the huckstresses and the peddlers.
Roberto, however, was not at all disturbed by the continuous din, and after a short while would resume his seat and continue writing.
In the meantime Manuel was climbing and descending every stairway in the neighbourhood, in search of Roberto Hasting.