She looked down at the kitchen premises, the wrong side of the hotel life, which was cut off from the right side by a maze of small bushes.

The ground was bare, old tins were scattered about, and the bushes wore towels and aprons upon their heads to dry.

Every now and then a waiter came out in a white apron and threw rubbish on to a heap.

Two large women in cotton dresses were sitting on a bench with blood-smeared tin trays in front of them and yellow bodies across their knees.

They were plucking the birds, and talking as they plucked.
Suddenly a chicken came floundering, half flying, half running into the space, pursued by a third woman whose age could hardly be under eighty.
Although wizened and unsteady on her legs she kept up the chase, egged on by the laughter of the others; her face was expressive of furious rage, and as she ran she swore in Spanish.