f the saints!" she cried. "Silence, or I will
throw a dish at you! We are all sons of God, and if things were as
they should be, all the poor ought to live in the Cathedral. Instead
of saying such things it would be much better if you gave those
unhappy people part of what you have stolen from the Virgin."

The sacristan shrugged his shoulders with contempt. If they had not
enough to eat they should not have children. There he was himself with
only one daughter--he did not think he had any right to more--and so
thanks to Our Lady he was able to save a scrap for his old age.

Tomasa spoke of the shoemaker's child to the good gentlemen of the
Chapter when they came into the garden for a few minutes after choir.
They listened absently, putting their hands in their cassocks.

"It is all God's will! What poverty!"

And some gave her ten centimes, others a real, one or two even a
peseta. The old woman went one day to the Archbishop's palace. Don
Sebastian was engaged and unable to see her, but he sent her two
pesetas by one of the servants.

"They don't mean badly," said the gardener's widow, giving her
collection to the poor mother, "but each one lives for himself, and
his neighbour may manage as he can. No one divides his cloak with
another--take this, and see how you can get out of your trouble."

They fed a little better in the shoemaker's house; the miserable
scrofulous children collected in the cloister profited most by the
baby's illness; it was growing daily weaker, lying motionless for
hours, with almost imperceptible breathing, on its mother's lap.

When the unhappy child died, all the people of the Claverias rushed
to the home. Inside could be heard the mother's wailings, strident,
interminable, like the bellowing of a wounded beast; outside the
father wept silently, surrounded by his friends.

"It died just like a bird," he said with long pauses, his words broken
by sobs. "His mother held him on her knees--I was working--'Antonio,
Antonio!' she called, 'see, what is the matter with the child, it is
moving its mouth and making grimaces?' I ran up quickly, its face
was quite dusky--as if it had a veil over it. It opened its mouth, a
couple of twitches with its eyes staring, and its neck fell over--just
the same as a bird, just the same."

He wept, repeating constantly the resemblance between his son and
those birds who die in winter from the cold.

The bell-ringer looked gloomily at Gabriel.

"You who k