obstinate as a mule. As long as she could do as she pleased the rest
mattered little.

While the machinist was alive, the family's economic situation had
been relatively comfortable. Alcazar and Petra paid sixteen duros per
month for their rooms on Relojo street, and took in boarders: a mail
clerk and other railroad employes.

Their domestic existence might have been peaceful and pleasureful were
it not for the daily altercations between husband and wife. They had
both come to feel such a need for quarrelling that the most
insignificant cause would lead to scandalous scenes. It was enough
that he said white for her to cry black; this opposition infuriated
the machinist, who would throw the dishes about, belabour his wife,
and smash all the household furniture. Then Petra, satisfied that she
had sufficient cause for affliction, shut herself in her room to weep
and pray.

What with his alcohol, his fits of temper, and his hard work, the
machinist went about half dazed; on one terribly hot day in August he
fell from the train on to the roadbed and was found dead without a
wound.

Petra, disregarding the advice of her boarders, insisted upon changing
residence, as she disliked that section of the city. This she did,
taking in new lodgers--unreliable, indigent folk who ran up large
bills or never paid at all--and in a short time she found herself
compelled to sell her furniture and abandon her new house.

Then she hired out her daughters as servants, sent her two boys off to