first."

They tried to do it that way, but it did not satisfy the poor people, or
calm the shopkeepers.

Caesar, who had lost his lust for a fight, put the scheme aside; and
although it would cost him more, decided to have the construction of the
school begun.

The Municipality ceded the lot and granted a subsidy of five thousand
pesetas to start the work; Caesar gave ten thousand, and at the
Workmen's Club a subscription was opened, and performances were given in
the theatre to collect funds.

The school promised to be a spacious edifice with a beautiful garden.
The corner-stone was laid in the presence of the Governor of the
Province, and despite the fact that the founders' intention was to found
a lay school, the Clerical element took part in the celebration.

When the work began, the majority of the members of the Club were
shocked to find that the masons, instead of working on the same
conditions as for other jobs, asked more pay, as if the school where
their sons might study were an institution more harmful than beneficial
for them.

Caesar, on learning this, smiled bitterly and said:

"They are not obliged to be less of brutes than the bourgeoisie."

From Madrid Caesar continued sending maps for the school, engravings,
bas-reliefs, a moving-picture machine.

Dr. Ortigosa and his friends went every day to look over the work.

A year from the beginning of work, the boys and girls' school was
opened. Dr. Ortigosa succeeded in arranging that two of the three male
teachers they procured were Free-Thinkers. One of them, a poor man who
had lived a dog's life in some town in Andalusia, was reputed to be an
anarchist. They appointed three female teachers too, two old, and one
young, a very attractive and clever girl, who came from a town near
Bilboa.

Caesar took part in the opening, and spoke, and received enthusiastic
applause. Despite which, Caesar felt ill at ease among his old friends;
in his heart he knew that he was deserting them. He now thought it
unlikely, almost impossible, that that town should succeed in emerging
from obscurity and meaning something in modern life. Moreover, he
doubted about himself, began to think that he was not a hero, began to
believe that he had assigned himself a role beyond his powers; and this
precisely at the moment when the town had the most faith in him.

XV. "DRIVELLER" JUAN AND "THE CUB-SLUT"

_A MURDER_

"Driveller" Juan, the town dandy protected by Fat