id come in, he saw the _diligence_ for Madrid
go out. He knew, and accepted the salutes of every _arriero_ who
worked in and out of the city, and passed the time of day with Micael
the lame water-seller, who never failed to salute him.

At noon he ate an onion and a piece of cheese, and then he dozed till
three. As the clock of the University struck that hour he put on his
_capa_--summer and winter he wore it, with melancholy and good reason;
by ten minutes past he was entering the shop of Sebastian the
goldsmith, in the Plaza San Benito, in the which he sat till dusk,
motionless and absorbed in thought, talking little, seeming to observe
little, and yet judging everything in the light of strong common sense.

Summer or winter, at dusk he arose, flecked a mote or two of dust from
his _capa_, seated his beaver upon his grey head, grasped his malacca,
and departed with a "Be with God, my friend." To this Sebastian the
goldsmith invariably replied, "At the feet of your grace, Don Luis."

He supped sparingly, and the last act of his day was his one act of
luxury; his cup of chocolate or glass of _agraz_, according to season,
at the Cafe de la Luna in the Plaza Mayor. This was his title to table
and chair, and the respect of all Valladolid from dusk until nine--on
the last stroke of which, saluting the company, who rose almost to a
man, he retired to his garret and thin bed.

Pepe, the head waiter at the Luna, who had been there for thirty years,
Gomez the barber, who was sixty-three and looked forty, Sebastian the
goldsmith, well over middle age, and the old priest of Las Angustias,
who had confessed him every Friday and said mass at the same altar
every morning since his ordination (God knows how long ago), would have
testified to the fact that Don Luis had never once varied his daily
habits within time of memory.

They would have been wrong, of course, like all clean sweepers; for in
addition to his inheritance of ruin, misfortunes had graved him deeply.
Valladolid knew it well. His wife had left him, his son had gone to
the devil. He bore the first blow like a stoic, not moving a muscle
nor varying a habit: the second sent him on a journey. The barber, the
water-seller, Pepe the waiter, Sebastian the deft were troubled about
him for a week or more. He came back, and hid his wound, speaking to
no one of it; and no one dared to pity him. And although he resumed
his routine and was outwardly the same man, we ma