Harkening to their boasts and
strong prophecies his breast heaved and his heart beat faster. He
was a large, full-blooded fellow, fashioned for exploits; the flame
in his darkness burned higher even to hear of them.
It is scarcely conceivable how Boaz Negro could have come through
this much of his life still possessed of that unquenchable and
priceless exuberance; how he would sing in the dawn; how, simply
listening to the recital of deeds in gale or brawl, he could easily
forget himself a blind man, tied to a shop and a last; easily make
of himself a lusty young fellow breasting the sunlit and adventurous
tide of life.
He had had a wife, whom he had loved. Fate, which had scourged him
with the initial scourge of blindness, had seen fit to take his
Angelina away. He had had four sons. Three, one after another, had
been removed, leaving only Manuel, the youngest. Recovering slowly,
with agony, from each of these recurrent blows, his unquenchable
exuberance had lived. And there was another thing quite as
extraordinary. He had never done anything but work, and that sort of
thing may kill the flame where an abrupt catastrophe fails. Work in
the dark. Work, work, work! And accompanied by privation; an almost
miserly scale of personal economy.
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