Red Pens

    The little Hispanic girl at the stationer's

    on Park Avenue South just now

    asked me my name， and repeated Tonio

    when I replied Tony. ？Estranjero？

    Is he a foreigner？

    she asked her embarrassed mother，

    the proprietor， as I was leaving with

    the red pens I had bought

    for editing English but now

    used to delete the No，

    fué nacido aquí

    I had been about to say，

    to show that I too was a native.