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The Blood of the Arena

by Vicente Blasco Ibáñez · English · Gutenberg #33799 · 617,772 chars · public domain (US)

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Title: The Blood of the Arena

Author: Vicente Blasco Ibáñez

Illustrator: Margaret West Kinney
        Troy Kinney

Translator: Frances Douglas


        
Release date: November 22, 2010 [eBook #33799]

Language: English

Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/33799

Credits: Produced by Chuck Greif and the Online Distributed
        Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was
        produced from images available at The Internet Archive)


*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE BLOOD OF THE ARENA ***




Produced by Chuck Greif and the Online Distributed
Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was
produced from images available at The Internet Archive)









[Illustration: When the swordsman clasped her hand she looked into his
eyes. "Don't go--come; come!"
[Chapter III]]




THE BLOOD OF
THE ARENA

BY

VICENTE BLASCO IBANEZ

FROM THE SPANISH, BY FRANCES DOUGLAS

ILLUSTRATED IN COLOR BY TROY
AND MARGARET WEST KINNEY

[Illustration: colophon]

CHICAGO

A. C. McCLURG & CO.

1911

Copyright

A. C. McCLURG & CO.

1911

Published November, 1911

Entered at Stationers' Hall, London

W. F. Gall Printing Company

Chicago




CONTENTS


Chapter                                   Page

   I The Hero and the Public                 9

  II The Matador and the Lady               33

 III Born for the Bull-ring                 64

  IV At Carmen's Window-grille              80

   V The Lure of Golden Hair               106

  VI The Voice of the Siren                126

 VII The Spanish Wild Beast                153

VIII Diamonds in the Ring                  178

  IX Breakfast with the Bandit             195

   X A Look into the Face of Death         228

  XI Doctor Ruiz on Tauromachy             256

 XII Airing the Saints                     269

XIII The Mastery of Self-preservation      288

 XIV The Spanish Lilith                    307

  XV Behind the Scenes                     328

 XVI "The Greatest Man in the World"       348

XVII The Atonement of Blood                362




ILLUSTRATIONS


                                                                    Page

When the swordsman clasped her hand she looked
into his eyes. "Don't go--come; come!"                      Frontispiece

Gallardo's wedding was a national event. Far into
the night guitars strummed with melancholy plaint....
Girls, their arms held high, beat the marble
floor with their little feet                                          96

"For me?" asked the bandit in tones of surprise
and wonder. "For me, Senora Marquesa?"                               224

The animal moved in confusion between the red
cloths, drawing him far away from the swordsman                      294




THE BLOOD OF THE ARENA





CHAPTER I

THE HERO AND THE PUBLIC


JUAN GALLARDO breakfasted early, as he did whenever there was to be a
bull-fight. A slice of roast meat was his only dish. Wine he did not
even touch; the bottle remained unopened before him. He must keep
himself calm. He drank two cups of thick, black coffee, and lighted an
enormous cigar, sitting with his elbows on the table and his chin in his
hands, looking with dreamy eyes at the guests who one by one filled the
dining-room.

It was a number of years ago, not long after he had been given "the
alternative" in the bull-ring of Madrid, that he came to lodge at a
certain hotel on Alcala Street where his hosts treated him as if he were
one of the family, and the dining-room servants, porters, scullions, and
old waiters adored him as the glory of the establishment. There, too, he
had spent many days wrapped in bandages, in a dense atmosphere heavy
with the smell of iodoform, in consequence of two gorings, but the
unhappy recollection did not weigh upon him.

In his Southern superstitious mind, exposed to continual danger, he
regarded this hotel as a charmed shelter, and thought that nothing ill
would happen to him while living in it; accidents common to the
profession, rents in his clothing, scratches in his flesh perhaps, but
no last and final fall after the manner of other comrades, the
recollection of whom haunted even his happier hours.

On the days of the great bull-fights, after the early breakfast, he
enjoyed sitting in the dining-room contemplating the movement of
travellers. They were foreigners, or people from distant provinces, who
passed near with indifferent countenances, and without looking at him;
and then became curious on learning from the servants that the fine
youth with shaven face and black eyes, dressed like a young gentleman,
was Juan Gallardo, by all familiarly called Gallardo, the famous
bull-fighter. Thus were whiled away the long and painful hours before
going to the plaza.

These moments of uncertainty, in which vague fears emerged from the
depths of his soul, making him doubt himself, were the bitterest in his
professional experience. He would not go out on the street thinking of
the strain of the contest, and of the need of keeping himself rested and
agile; and he could not entertain himself at the table on account of the
necessity of eating a light meal, in order to reach the ring without
disturbance of his digestion.

He remained at the head of the table, his face between his hands and a
cloud of perfumed smoke before his eyes, turning his gaze from time to
time with a certain fatuousness to look at some ladies who were
contemplating the famous bull-fighter with interest.

His pride as the idol of the masses made him feel that he could divine
eulogy and flattery in these looks. They thought him smart and elegant.
And, with the instinct of all men accustomed to pose before the public,
forgetting his preoccupation, he sat erect, knocked off with his finger
nails the cigar ashes fallen on his sleeves, and arranged his ring,
which covered the whole joint of one of his fingers with an enormous
diamond surrounded by a nimbus of colors as if its clear liquid depths
burned with magic fire.

His eyes roved with satisfaction over his person, admiring the suit of
elegant cut, the cap which he wore around the hotel lying on a nearby
chair, the fine gold chain that crossed the upper part of his vest from
pocket to pocket, the pearl in his cravat that seemed to illuminate the
brown tone of his countenance with milky light, and the shoes of Russia
leather showing between their tops and the edge of the rolled-up
trousers socks of open-work silk embroidered like the stockings of a
cocotte.

An atmosphere of English perfumes, mild and vague, but used with
profusion, arose from his clothing and from his black and brilliant
hair. This he brushed carefully down over his temples, adopting a style
certain to attract feminine curiosity. For a bull-fighter the ensemble
was not bad; he felt satisfied with his appearance. Where was there
another more distinguished, or one who had a better way with women?

But suddenly his preoccupation returned, the brilliancy of his eyes
clouded, and he rested his chin in his hands again, puffing at his cigar
tenaciously, his gaze lost in the cloud of smoke. He thought wistfully
of the hour of nightfall, wishing it already here; of the return from
the bull-ring, sweaty and tired, but with the joy of danger conquered,
the appetites awakened, a mad desire for sport, and the certainty of a
few days of safety and rest.

If God would protect him as heretofore he was going to feast with the
appetite of his days of poverty and starvation, get a little drunk, and
go in search of a certain girl who sang in a music-hall, whom he had
seen on his last trip without having a chance to cultivate her
acquaintance. Leading this life of continual change from one end of the
Peninsula to the other he did not have time for much in the way of
pleasure.

Enthusiastic friends who wished to see the swordsman before going to
breakfast at their homes began entering the dining-room. They were old
admirers anxious to figure in a _banderia_ and to have an idol; they had
made the young Gallardo the _matador_ of their choice, and they gave him
sage counsel, frequently recalling their old-time adoration for
Lagartijo or Frascuelo.

In addressing Gallardo they called him _thou_, with gracious
familiarity, while he put _don_ before their names with the traditional
class distinction that still exists between the bull-fighter risen from
the social subsoil and his admirers. These men linked their enthusiasm
with memories of the past to make the young _matador_ feel their
superiority of years and experience. They talked of the old plaza of
Madrid where only bulls that _were_ bulls and bull-fighters that _were_
bull-fighters were recognized. Coming down to the present, they trembled
with emotion on mentioning the Negro, Frascuelo.

"If thou hadst seen him! But thou and those of thy time were at the
breast then, or were not even born."

Other enthusiasts began entering the dining-room, poorly clad and
hungry-looking; obscure newspaper reporters; and men of problematical
profession who appeared as soon as the news of Gallardo's arrival was
circulated, besieging him with praises and petitions for tickets. Common
enthusiasm jostled them against great merchants or public functionaries,
who discussed bull-fighting affairs with them warmly, regardless of
their beggarly aspect.

All, on seeing the swordsman, embraced him or shook his hand with an
accompaniment of questions and exclamations.

"Juanillo--how goes it with Carmen?"

"Well, thanks."

"And how is your mother, Senora Angustias?"

"Fine, thanks. She's at La Rincona'."

"And your sister and your little nephews?"

"As usual, thanks."

"And that good-for-nothing brother-in-law of yours, how is he?"

"He's all right--as much of a gabbler as ever."

"Are there any additions to the family? Any expectations?"

"No--not even that."

He made a fingernail crackle between his teeth with a strong negative
expression and then began returning the questions to the new arrivals,
of whose life he knew nothing beyond their inclination for the art of
bull-fighting.

"And how is your family--all right? Well, glad to hear it. Sit down and
have something."

Then he inquired about the condition of the bulls that were to be fought
within a few hours, for all these friends had come from the plaza and
from seeing the separation and penning in of the animals; and, with
professional curiosity, he asked news of the Cafe Ingles, a favorite
gathering place of bull-fight fans.

It was the first bull-fight of the spring season, and Gallardo's
enthusiasts showed great hopes, remembering the glowing accounts in the
newspapers of his recent triumphs in other towns of Spain. He was the
bull-fighter who had the most contracts. Since the Easter _corrida_ in
Seville (the first important one of the taurine year) Gallardo had gone
from plaza to plaza killing bulls.

When August and September came, he would have to spend his nights on the
train and his afternoons in the rings, without time to rest. His agent
at Seville was almost crazy, so besieged was he by letters and
telegrams, not knowing how to harmonize so many petitions for contracts
with the exigencies of time. The afternoon before he had fought at
Ciudad Real and, still dressed in his spangled costume, he had boarded
the train to reach Madrid by morning. He had spent a wakeful night, only
napping occasionally, crouched in the portion of a seat left him by the
other passengers who crowded close together to give some chance for rest
to this man who was to expose his life on the morrow, and was to afford
them the joy of a tragic emotion without danger to themselves.

The enthusiasts admired his physical endurance, and the rash daring with
which he threw himself upon the bulls at the moment of killing.

"We will see what thou art going to do this afternoon," they said with
the fervor of true believers. "The devotees expect a great deal of thee.
Thou wilt win many favors, surely. We shall see if thou dost as well as
at Seville."

His admirers now began to disperse to go home to breakfast so as to be
able to reach the bull-fight at an early hour. Gallardo, finding himself
alone, was preparing to retire to his room, impelled by the nervous
restlessness that dominated him. A man, leading two children by the
hand, passed through the doorway of the dining-room, paying no attention
to the questions of the servants. He smiled seraphically on seeing the
bull-fighter, and advanced, dragging the little boys, his eyes glued
upon him, taking no thought as to his feet. Gallardo recognized him.

"How are you, Godfather?"

And then followed the customary questions regarding the health of the
family. The man turned to his sons, saying gravely:

"There he is! Are ye not continually asking me about him? Just like he
is in the pictures."

The two little fellows reverently contemplated the hero whom they had so
often seen in the prints that adorned the rooms of their poor home; he
seemed to them a supernatural being whose heroic deeds and riches were
their greatest marvel as they began to take notice of the things of this
world.

"Juanillo, kiss thy godfather's hand."

The smaller of the two boys dashed his red face, freshly scrubbed by his
mother in preparation for this visit, against the swordsman's right
hand. Gallardo patted his head absent-mindedly. It was one of the many
god-children he had throughout Spain. His enthusiastic friends obliged
him to be godfather in baptism to their children, believing thus to
assure them a future.

To exhibit himself at baptism after baptism was one of the consequences
of his glory. This godchild recalled to his memory the hard times when
he was at the beginning of his career, and he felt a certain gratitude
to the father for the faith he had shown in him in spite of the lack of
it in every one else.

"And how is business, _compadre_?" asked Gallardo. "Are things going
better?"

The _aficionado_ made a wry face. He was living, thanks to his
commissions in the barley market, barely living, no more. Gallardo
looked compassionately at his mean dress--a poor man's Sunday best.

"You want to see the bull-fight, don't you, _compadre_? Go up to my room
and let Garabato give you a ticket. Good-bye, my good fellow. Here, take
this to buy yourselves something."

As his godson kissed his right hand again, the bull-fighter handed the
boys a couple of _duros_ with his left. The father dragged away his
offspring with expressions of gratitude, not making it clear in his
confusion whether his enthusiasm were for the gift to the children or
for the ticket for the _corrida_ which the swordsman's servant was about
to give him.

Gallardo allowed a few moments to elapse, so that he would not meet the
enthusiast and his children again in his room. Then he looked at his
watch. One o'clock! How long it was yet before the hour for the
bull-fight!

As Gallardo walked out of the dining-room and started toward the
stairway a crowd of curiosity-seekers and starvelings hanging around the
street door, attracted by the presence of the bull-fighter, rushed in.
Pushing the servants aside, an irruption of beggars, vagabonds, and
newsboys filed into the vestibule.

The imps with their bundles of papers under one arm took off their caps,
cheering with lusty familiarity.

"Gallardo! Hurrah for Gallardo!"

The most audacious among them grasped his hand and pressed it firmly and
shook it in all directions, anxious to prolong as much as possible this
contact with the great man of the people whose picture they had seen in
the newspapers. Then they rudely invited their companions to participate
in this glory.

"Shake hands with him! He won't get mad. Why, he's all right."

They almost knelt before the bull-fighter, so great was their respect
for him. Other curious ones, with unkempt beards, dressed in old clothes
that had once been elegant, moved about the idol in their worn shoes and
held their grimy hats out to him, talking to him in low tones, calling
him _Don_ Juan to differentiate themselves from the enthusiastic and
irreverent mob. As they told him of their misery they solicited alms, or
more audacious, they begged him, in the name of their devotion to the
game, for a ticket for the bull-fight,--with the intention of selling it
immediately.

Gallardo defended himself, laughing at this avalanche that pushed and
shoved him, the hotel clerks being quite unable to defend him, so awed
were they by the respect that popularity inspires. He searched in all
his pockets till they were empty, distributing silver-pieces blindly
among the greedy, outstretched hands.

"There's none left now. The coal's all burnt up! Let me alone,
pesterers."

Pretending to be annoyed by this popularity which really flattered him,
he opened a passage for himself by a push with his strong arms and
escaped by the stairway, running up the steps with the agility of an
athlete, while the servants, no longer restrained by his presence, swept
and pushed the crowd toward the street.

Gallardo passed the room occupied by Garabato and saw his servant
through the half-opened door bending over valises and boxes getting his
costume ready for the bull-fight.

Finding himself alone in his room the pleasant excitement caused by the
avalanche of his admirers instantly vanished. The unhappy moments of
these bull-fighting days had come, the trepidation of the last hours
before going to the plaza. Miura bulls and the public of Madrid! The
danger which, when he faced it, seemed to intoxicate him and increase
his boldness, caused him bitter anguish now in his solitude, and seemed
to him something supernatural, awful, on account of its uncertainty.

He felt crushed, as if suddenly the fatigue of the hideous night before
had fallen upon him. He had a desire to lie down and rest on the bed at
the other end of the room, when again anxiety over what awaited him,
doubtful and mysterious, drove away his drowsiness.

He strode restlessly up and down the room and lighted another Havana by
the end of the one he had just consumed.

How would this season which he was about to open in Madrid end for him?
What would his enemies say? How would his professional rivals succeed?
He had killed many Miuras--well, they were bulls like all the others;
but he thought of his comrades who had fallen in the ring, almost all of
them victims of the animals of that stock. Accursed Miuras! It was for a
good reason that he and other swordsmen made out their contracts for a
thousand _pesetas_ more when they had to fight animals of this herd.

He continued wandering about the room with nervous step. He stopped to
contemplate stupidly well-known objects that were a part of his
equipment; then he let himself fall into an easy chair as if attacked by
sudden weakness. He looked at his watch repeatedly. It was not yet two
o'clock. How the time crept!

He wished that, as a stimulant for his nerves, the hour for dressing and
going to the ring would come. The people, the noise, the popular
curiosity, the desire to show himself calm and happy in the presence of
the enthusiastic populace, and above all the very nearness of danger,
actual and personal, instantly effaced this anguish of isolation in
which the swordsman, without the aid of external excitement, felt
something akin to fear.

The need of diverting himself caused him to search in the inside pocket
of his waistcoat. He drew out with his pocket-book a little envelope
which emitted a mild, sweet perfume. Standing by a window through which
the obscure light of an inner courtyard entered, he contemplated the
envelope which had been handed him when he arrived at the hotel,
admiring the fine and genteel elegance of the characters in which the
address was written.

He drew out the sheet of paper, breathing in its indefinable perfume
with delight. Ah! people of high birth who have travelled widely,--how
they reveal their inimitable superiority, even in the smallest details!

Gallardo, as though he felt that his person preserved the keen stench of
the misery of his earlier years, perfumed himself with offensive
profusion. His enemies joked about the athletic youth who, by his
excessive use of perfumes, gave the lie to his sex. His admirers smiled
at this weakness, but very often had to turn away their faces, nauseated
by the heavy odors he carried with him.

A whole perfumery shop accompanied him on his travels, and the most
effeminate essences anointed his body when he descended into the arena
among the dead horses, and foul _debris_ characteristic of the place.
Certain enthusiastic _cocottes_, whom he had met on a trip to the towns
in the south of France, had given him the secret of mixtures and
combinations of strange perfumes; but the fragrance of the
letter--_that_ was like the person of her who had written it--a
mysterious odor, delicate and indefinable, that could not be imitated,
that seemed to emanate from her aristocratic body; it was what he called
"the odor of a lady"!

He read and re-read the letter with a beaming smile of delight and
pride. It was not a great matter; half a dozen lines--a greeting from
Seville, wishing him good luck in Madrid; anticipated congratulations
for his triumphs. That letter could have gone astray without in the
least compromising the woman who wrote it. "Friend Gallardo" at the
beginning, in elegant lettering that seemed to tickle the bull-fighter's
eyes, and at the end, "Your friend, Sol"; all in a coldly friendly
style, addressing him as _you_, with an amiable tone of superiority as
though the words were not from equal to equal but had descended
mercifully from on high.

The bull-fighter, gazing at the letter with the adoration which a man of
the people has for caste, though little versed in reading, could not
escape a certain feeling of annoyance, as if he beheld himself
patronized.

"That baggage," he murmured. "That woman! No one living can break her
pride. Look how she talks to me--_you! you!_--and to me!"

But happy memories brought a satisfied smile to his lips. This frigid
style was for letters; these were the customs of a great lady; the
precautions of a woman who had travelled over the world. His annoyance
changed to admiration.

"What that woman doesn't know! And such a cautious creature!"

And in his smile appeared a professional satisfaction, the pride of the
tamer who, appreciating the strength of the conquered wild beast, extols
his own deed.

While Gallardo was admiring this letter his servant Garabato came and
went, bringing clothing and boxes which he left on the bed.

He was a fellow of quiet movements and agile hands, and seemed to take
no notice of the presence of the bull-fighter. For some years he had
accompanied the _diestro_ on all his travels as sword-bearer. He had
commenced in Seville at the same time as Gallardo, serving first as
_capeador_, but the hard blows were reserved for him, while advancement
and glory were for his companion. He was little, dark, and of weak
muscles, and a tortuous and poorly united gash scarred with a whitish
pot-hook his wrinkled, flaccid oldish face. It was from a thrust of a
bull's horn which had left him almost dead in the plaza of a certain
town, and to this atrocious wound others were added that disfigured the
hidden parts of his body.

By a miracle he escaped with his life from his apprenticeship as a
bull-fighter, and the cruellest part of it all was that the people
laughed at his misfortunes, taking pleasure in seeing him stamped on and
routed by the bulls. Finally his total eclipse took place, and he agreed
to be the attendant, the confidential servant, of his old comrade. He
was Gallardo's most fervent admirer, although he abused the confidence
of intimacy by allowing himself to give advice and to criticise. Had
_he_ been in his master's skin, _he_ would have done better at certain
moments. Gallardo's friends found cause for laughter in the frustrated
ambitions of the sword-bearer, but he paid no attention to their jokes.
Renounce the bulls? Never! And so that the memory of his past should not
be wholly obliterated he combed his coarse hair in shining locks over
his ears and wore on the back of his head the long and sacred great lock
of hair, the _coleta_ of his youthful days, the professional emblem that
distinguished him from common mortals.

When Gallardo was angry with him his fierce passion always threatened
this capillary adornment.

"And thou dost wear a _coleta_, shameless one? I'm going to cut that
rat's tail off for thee--brazen-face! _Maleta!_"

Garabato received these threats with resignation, but he took his
revenge by shutting himself up in the silence of a superior man,
answering the joy of the master with shrugs of his shoulders when the
latter, on returning from the plaza of an afternoon in a happy mood,
asked him with infantile satisfaction:

"What didst thou think of it? Did I do well, sure?"

On account of their juvenile comradeship he retained the privilege of
saying _thou_ to his master. He could not talk to the _maestro_ in any
other way, but the _thou_ was accompanied by a grave gesture and an
expression of ingenuous respect. His familiarity was like that of the
ancient shield-bearers to the knights of adventure.

From his collar up, including the tail on the back of his head, he was a
bull-fighter; the rest of his person resembled a tailor and a valet at
the same time. He dressed in a suit of English cloth, a present from the
_Senor_, wearing the lapels stuck full of pins, and with several
threaded needles on one sleeve. His dry, dark hands possessed a feminine
delicacy for handling and arranging things.

When he had placed in order all that was necessary for the master's
dressing, he looked over the numerous objects to assure himself that
nothing was lacking. Then he planted himself in the middle of the room
and without looking at Gallardo, as if he were speaking to himself, he
said in a hoarse voice and with a stubborn accent:

"Two o'clock!"

Gallardo lifted his head nervously, as if he had not noticed the
presence of his servant until then. He put the letter in his pocket and
went to the lower end of the room with a certain hesitancy, as if he
wished to delay the moment of dressing.

"Is everything ready?"

But suddenly his pale face colored with violent emotion. His eyes
opened immeasurably wide as if they had just suffered the shock of a
frightful surprise.

"What clothes hast thou laid out?"

Garabato pointed to the bed, but before he could speak the anger of the
_maestro_ fell upon him, loud and terrible.

"Curses on thee! Dost thou know nothing of the affairs of the
profession? Thou has just come from hay-making, maybe? Bull-fight in
Madrid, with Miura bulls, and thou dost get me out a green costume, the
same that poor Manuel el Espartero wore! My bitterest enemy couldn't do
worse, thou more than shameless one! It seems as if thou wishes to see
me killed, _malaje!_"

His anger increased as he considered the enormity of this carelessness,
which was like a challenge to ill fortune. To fight in Madrid in a green
costume after what had happened! His eyes flashed with hostile fire as
if he had just received a traitorous attack; the whites of his eyes grew
red, and he seemed about to fall upon poor Garabato with his rough
bull-fighter hands.

A discreet knock on the door of the room ended this scene.

"Come in!"

A young man entered, dressed in light clothes, with a red cravat, and
carrying a Cordovan _sombrero_ in a hand beringed with great brilliants.
Gallardo recognized him instantly, with that gift for remembering faces
possessed by all who live before the public.

He changed suddenly from anger to smiling amiability as if the visit
were a sweet surprise. It was a friend from Bilbao, an enthusiastic
admirer, a champion of his glory. That was all he could remember. But
his name? He met so many! What could his name be? The only thing he
knew for certain was that he must address him by _thou_, for an old
friendship existed between the two.

"Sit down! What a surprise! When didst thou come? The family well?"

And the admirer sat down with the satisfaction of a devotee who enters
the sanctuary of the idol determined not to move until the last instant,
gratifying himself by the attention of the bull-fighter's _thou_, and
calling him _Juan_ at every two words so that furniture, walls, and
whoever might pass along the corridor should know of his intimacy with
the great man. He had arrived from Bilbao this morning and would return
on the following day. He took the trip for no other purpose than to see
Gallardo. He had read of his great exploits; the season was beginning
well; this afternoon would be fine! He had been at the sorting of the
bulls where he had especially noticed a dark beast that would
undoubtedly yield great sport in Gallardo's hands.

"What costume shall I get out?" interrupted Garabato, with a voice that
seemed even more hoarse with the desire to show himself submissive.

"The red one, the tobacco-colored, the blue--any one thou wishest."

Another knock sounded on the door and a new visitor appeared. It was
Doctor Ruiz, the popular physician who for thirty years had been signing
the medical certificates of all the injured and treating every
bull-fighter that fell wounded in the plaza of Madrid.

Gallardo admired him and regarded him as the highest representative of
universal science, although he indulged in good-natured jokes about his
kindly disposition and his lack of care in his dress. His admiration was
like that of the populace which only recognizes wisdom in a man of ill
appearance and oddity of character that makes him different from
ordinary mortals.

"He is a saint," Gallardo used to say, "a wise fellow, with wheels in
his head, but as good as good bread, and he never has a _peseta_. He
gives away all he has and he accepts whatever they choose to give him."

Two grand passions animated the doctor's life, revolution and bulls. A
vague and tremendous revolution was to come that would leave in Europe
nothing now existing; an anarchistic republic which he did not take the
trouble to explain, and as to which he was only clear in his
exterminating negations. The bull-fighters talked to him as to a father.
He spoke as a familiar to all of them, and no more was needed than to
get a telegram from a distant part of the Peninsula, for the good doctor
to take the train on the instant to go to treat the horn-wound received
by one of his _boys_ with no other hope of recompense than whatever they
might freely wish to give him.

On seeing Gallardo after a long absence he embraced him, pressing his
flabby abdomen against the other's body which seemed made of bronze.
Bravo! He thought the _espada_ looking better than ever.

"And how is the Republic getting on, doctor? When is it going to
happen?" asked Gallardo with an Andalusian drawl. "Nacional says it's
going to come off soon; that it will be here one of these days."

"And what does that matter to thee, rogue? Let poor Nacional alone. The
best thing for him to do is to stick in his _banderillas_ better. As for
thee, the only thing that should interest thee is to keep on killing
bulls, like the very God himself. A fine afternoon this is going to be.
They tell me that the bulls--"

But here the young man who had seen the sorting of the animals and
wished to talk about it, interrupted the doctor to tell of a dark bull
that had caught his eye, and from which he expected the greatest
prowess. The two men, who had remained silent after bowing to one
another, were face to face, and Gallardo thought an introduction
necessary. But what was the name of that friend whom he addressed as
_thou_? He scratched his head, knitting his eyebrows with an effort at
recollection, but his indecision was short.

"Listen! What is thy name? Pardon, thou seest--with meeting so many
people--"

The young man concealed beneath a smile of approbation his
disenchantment at seeing himself forgotten by the master, and gave his
name. Gallardo on hearing it felt the past come back suddenly to his
memory, and made reparation for his forgetfulness by adding after the
name, "wealthy miner from Bilbao." Then he presented the "famous Doctor
Ruiz" and both men, as if they had known one another all their lives,
united by the enthusiasm of a common devotion, began to gossip about the
bulls of the afternoon.

"Sit down." Gallardo motioned to a sofa at the end of the room. "You'll
not be in the way there. Talk and don't notice me. I am going to dress.
I think that, as we're all men--"

And he took off his clothes, remaining in his under-garments.

Seated on a chair in the centre of the archway that divided the little
reception room from the sleeping alcove, he gave himself up to the
hands of Garabato, who had opened a bag of Russia-leather and was taking
out of it an almost feminine _necessaire_ for the swordsman's toilet.

In spite of the fact that the latter was carefully shaved he lathered
his face again and passed the razor over his cheeks with the skill of
one daily accustomed to the task. After washing himself Gallardo
returned to his seat. The servant deluged his hair with brilliantine and
other perfumes, combing it in curls over his forehead and temples; then
he undertook the arrangement of the professional emblem, the sacred
_coleta_.

With a certain respect he combed the long lock that crowned the occiput
of the _maestro_, braided it and, postponing the completion of the
operation, fixed it on the top of his head with two hairpins, leaving
its final arrangement until later. Now he must occupy himself with the
feet, and he stripped the athlete of his socks, leaving him dressed only
in an undershirt and drawers of silk mesh.

Gallardo's strong muscles were outlined beneath this clothing in
vigorous protuberances. A hollow in one thigh showed a deep scar where
the flesh had disappeared on account of a horn-stab. Signs of old wounds
were marked by white spots on the brown skin of his arms. His breast,
dark and free from hair, was crossed by two irregular purplish lines,
with a round depression, as if it had served as a mould for a coin. But
his gladiatorial person exhaled an odor of clean brave flesh, mingled
with strong but effeminate perfumes.

Garabato, with an armful of cotton and white bandages, knelt at the
swordsman's feet.

"Like the ancient gladiators," said Dr. Ruiz, interrupting his
conversation with the man from Bilbao; "thou hast become a Roman, Juan."

"Age, doctor," answered Gallardo with a certain melancholy. "We all have
to grow old. When I used to fight bulls and hunger too, I didn't need
this--and I had feet of iron in doing the cape-work."

Garabato introduced little tufts of cotton between his master's toes;
then he covered the soles and upper part with a layer of this soft
material and, putting on the bandages, began to bind them in tight
spirals, as the ancient mummies are enwrapped. To fasten this
arrangement he took the threaded needles he wore on one sleeve and
carefully sewed the ends of the bandages.

Gallardo stamped on the floor with his compressed feet, which seemed
firmer inside their soft swathing. Thus encased they felt strong and
agile. The servant then drew on long stockings which reached half way up
his leg; they were thick and flexible like leggings--the only defence of
the legs under the silk of the fighting dress.

"Be careful about wrinkles. Look out, Garabato, I don't like to wear
pockets!"

And he stood up to look at himself in the two panels of the mirror,
stooping to pass his hands over his legs and smooth out the wrinkles.
Over the white stockings Garabato drew on others of rose-colored silk.
Then Gallardo thrust his feet into his low shoes, choosing them from
among several pairs that Garabato had put on a trunk, all with white
soles and perfectly new.

Now the real task of dressing began. The servant handed him his fighting
trousers held by the legs,--tobacco-colored silk with heavy embroideries
of gold on their seams. Gallardo put them on and the thick cords with
gold tassels that closed the knees, congesting the leg with artificial
fulness, hung to his feet.

Gallardo told his servant to tighten them as much as he could, at the
same time swelling up the muscles of his legs. This operation was one of
the most important. A bull-fighter must wear the _machos_ well
tightened. And Garabato, with deft speed, converted the dangling cords
into little bows.

The master put on the fine batiste shirt which the servant offered him,
with gatherings on the bosom, soft and transparent as a feminine
garment. Garabato after buttoning it tied the knot of the long cravat
that fell in a red line, dividing the bosom until it was lost in the
waistband of the trousers.

The most complicated part of the dressing still remained, the _faja_, a
band of silk nearly five yards long, that seemed to fill the whole
apartment, Garabato managing it with the skill of long practice.

The swordsman walked to the other extreme of the room where his friends
were and put one of the ends around his waist.

"Come, be very careful!" he said to his servant. "Make the most of thy
little skill."

Slowly turning on his heels he drew near his servant who held one end of
the belt, thus winding it around his body in regular curves, giving
greater elegance to his waist. Garabato, with rapid movements of his
hands, changed the folds of the band of silk. With some turns the belt
rolled double, with others wide open, and it all adjusted itself to the
bull-fighter's form, smooth as if it were a single piece, without
wrinkles or puffs. Gallardo, scrupulous and fastidious in the
arrangement of his person, stopped his progress in the course of the
rotatory journey to go back two or three times and improve upon the
work.

"It isn't good," he said with ill-humor. "Damn it all! Be careful
Garabato."

After many halts Gallardo reached the end with the entire piece of silk
wound around his waist. The skilful servant had sewed and put pins and
safety pins all over his master's body, converting his clothes into one
single piece. To get out of them the bull-fighter would have to resort
to scissors and to others' hands. He could not divest himself of a
single garment until his return to the hotel, unless the bull should
accomplish it for him in the open plaza and they should finish
undressing him in the hospital.

Gallardo seated himself again and Garabato went about the business of
arranging the queue, taking out the hairpins and adding the _mona_, the
black rosette with streamers which recalled the ancient head-dress of
early bull-fighting times.

The master, as if he wished to put off the moment of final encasement in
the costume, stretched himself, asked Garabato for the cigar that he had
left on the little night-table, and demanded the time, thinking that all
the clocks were fast.

"It's early yet. The boys haven't come. I don't like to go to the plaza
early. It makes a fellow tired to be there waiting!"

A servant of the hotel announced that the carriage with the _cuadrilla_
had arrived.

It was time to go. There was no excuse for delaying the moment of
setting forth. He put over his belt the gold-embroidered vest and
outside of this the jacket, a shining garment with enormous embossments,
heavy as armor and resplendent with light as a glowing coal. The silk,
color of tobacco, was only visible on the under side of the arms and in
two triangles on the back. Almost the entire garment disappeared under
the heavy layer of trimmings and gold-embroidered designs forming
flowers with colored stones in their corollas. The shoulder pieces were
heavy masses of gold embroidery from which fell a fringe of the same
metal. The garment was edged with a close fringe that moved at every
step. From the golden opening of the pockets the points of two
handkerchiefs peeped forth, red like the cravat and the tie.

The cap!

Garabato took out of an oval box with great care the fighting cap, black
and shining, with two pendent tassels, like ears of passementerie.
Gallardo put it on, taking care that the _coleta_ should remain
unhidden, hanging symmetrically down his back.

The cape!

Garabato caught up the cape from off a chair, the _capa de gala_, a
princely mantle of silk of the same shade as the dress and equally
burdened with gold embroidery. Gallardo hung it over one shoulder and
looked at himself in the glass, satisfied with his preparations. It was
not bad.

"To the plaza!"

His two friends took their farewells hastily and called a cab to follow
him. Garabato put under one arm a great bundle of red cloths, from the
ends of which peeped the hilts and guards of many swords.




CHAPTER II

THE MATADOR AND THE LADY


As Gallardo descended to the vestibule of the hotel he saw the street
filled with a dense and noisy crowd as though some great event had taken
place. The buzzing of the multitude outside the door reached his ears.
The proprietor and all his family appeared with extended hands as if
they would bid him farewell for a long journey.

"Good luck! May all go well with you!"

The servants, forgetting distance at the impulse of enthusiasm and
emotion, also held their right hands out to him.

"Good luck, Don Juan!"

And he turned in all directions smiling, regardless of the frightened
faces of the ladies of the hotel.

"Thanks, many thanks! See you later."

He was a different man. From the moment he had hung the glittering cape
over one shoulder a persistent smile illuminated his countenance. He was
pale, with a sweaty pallor like that of the sick; but he smiled,
satisfied to live and to show himself in public, adopting his new pose
with the instinctive freedom of one who but needs an incentive to parade
before the people.

He swaggered with arrogance, puffing occasionally at the cigar he
carried in his left hand. He moved his hips haughtily under his handsome
cape and strode with a firm step and with the flippancy of a gay youth.

"Come, gentlemen, make way! Many thanks; many thanks."

And he tried to preserve his dress from unclean contact as way was made
among an ill-clad, enthusiastic crowd which surged against the doors of
the hotel. They had no money with which to go to the bull-fight but they
took advantage of the opportunity of pressing the hand of the famous
Gallardo, or of at least touching his garments.

A coach drawn by four richly caparisoned mules with tassels and bells
stood waiting at the door. Garabato had already seated himself on the
box with his bundle of _muletas_ and swords. Three bull-fighters were
inside with their capes over their knees, dressed in gayly colored
clothes embroidered with as great profusion as the master's, but in
silver.

Pressed onward by the popular ovation, and having to defend himself with
his elbows from greedy hands, Gallardo reached the carriage-step.

"Good-afternoon, gentlemen," he said shortly to the men of his
_cuadrilla_.

He seated himself at the back so that all could see him, and smiled with
responsive nods to the shouts of some ragged women and to the short
applause begun by some newsboys.

The carriage started with all the impetus of the spirited mules, filling
the street with gay ringing. The mob parted to give passage but many
rushed at the carriage as though they would fall under its wheels. Hats
and canes were waved; an explosion of enthusiasm burst from the crowd,
one of those contagions that agitate and madden the masses at certain
times--making every one shout without knowing why.

"Hurrah for the brave! _Viva Espana!_"

Gallardo, ever pale and smiling, saluted, repeating "many thanks," moved
by the contagion of popular enthusiasm and proud of his standing which
united his name to that of his native land.

A troop of dishevelled youngsters ran after the coach at full speed, as
though convinced that, at the end of the mad race, something
extraordinary surely awaited them.

For at least an hour Alcala Street had been like a river of carriages
that flowed toward the outskirts of the city between two banks of
close-packed foot passengers. All kinds of vehicles, ancient and modern,
figured in this tumultuous and noisy emigration, from the ancient
diligence, brought to light like an anachronism, to the automobile.
Crowded tramways passed with groups of people overflowing on their
steps. Omnibuses carried people to the corner of Seville Street, while
the conductor shouted "To the plaza! To the plaza!" Tasselled mules with
jingling bells trotted ahead of open carriages in which rode women in
white _mantillas_ with bright flowers in their hair; every instant
exclamations of alarm were heard at the escape, by apelike agility, of
some boy beneath the wheels of a carriage as he crossed by leaps from
one sidewalk to the other defying the current of vehicles. Automobile
horns tooted; coachmen yelled; newsboys shouted the page with the
picture and history of the bulls that were to be fought, or the likeness
and biography of the famous _matadores_, and from time to time an
explosion of curiosity swelled the deafening roar of the crowd.

Among the dark steeds of the mounted police rode gayly dressed
_caballeros_ with their legs rigidly encased in yellow leggings,
wearing gilded jackets and beaver hats with heavy tassels in lieu of a
cockade, mounted on thin and miserable hacks. They were the _picadores_.
Aft on the crupper, behind the high Moorish saddle, rode an impish
figure dressed in red, the _mono sabio_, or servant who had brought the
troop of horses to their hostelry.

The _cuadrillas_ passed in open coaches, and the embroidery of the
bull-fighters, reflecting the afternoon light, seemed to dazzle the
crowd and excite its enthusiasm. "That is Fuentes!" "That is Bomba!" And
the people, pleased with the identification, followed the retreating
carriages with greedy stare as if something startling were going to
happen and they feared to be too late.

From the top of the hill on Alcala Street the broad straight road shone
white in the sun, with its rows of trees turning green at the breath of
spring, the balconies black with people, and the highway only visible at
intervals beneath the ant-like movement of the crowd and the rolling of
the coaches descending to the Fountain of Cibeles. Here the hill rose
again amid groves and tall buildings and the Puerta de Alcala closed the
perspective like a triumphal arch, rearing its perforated white mass
against the blue space in which flecks of clouds floated like solitary
swans.

Gallardo rode in silence, responding to the multitude with a fixed
smile. Since his greeting to the _banderilleros_ he had not spoken a
word. They were also silent and pale with anxiety over the unknown.
Being all bull-fighters together, they put aside as useless the
gallantries necessary before the public.

A mysterious influence seemed to tell the crowd of the passing of the
last _cuadrilla_ that wound its way to the plaza. The vagabonds that ran
behind the coach shouting after Gallardo had been outstripped and the
group scattered among the carriages, but in spite of this the people
turned their heads as if they divined the proximity of the celebrated
bull-fighter behind them and they stopped, lining up against the edge of
the sidewalk to see him better.

The women in the coaches in advance turned their heads, attracted by the
jingling bells of the trotting mules. An indescribable roar rose from
certain groups that barred the passage along the sidewalks. There were
enthusiastic exclamations. Some waved their hats; others lifted canes
and swung them in salutation.

Gallardo responded to all with grinning smile but in his preoccupation
he seemed to take small account of these greetings. At his side rode
Nacional, his confidential servant, a _banderillero_, older than himself
by ten years, a rugged, strong man with brows grown together and a grave
visage. He was famous among the men of the profession for his good
nature, his manliness, and his political enthusiasms.

"Juan--don't complain of Madri'," said Nacional; "thou art made with the
public."

But Gallardo, as if he did not hear him and as if he wished to get away
from the thoughts that occupied him, answered:

"I feel it in my heart that something's going to happen this afternoon."

When they arrived at Cibeles the coach stopped. A great funeral was
coming along the Prado from the Castellana, cutting through the
avalanche of carriages from Alcala Street.

Gallardo turned paler, contemplating with angry eyes the passing of the
cross and the defile of the priests who broke into a grave chant as they
gazed, some with aversion, others with envy, at that God-forgotten
multitude running after amusement.

Gallardo made haste to take off his cap, in which he was imitated by all
his _banderilleros_ except Nacional.

"But damn it!" yelled Gallardo, "uncover, _condenao_!"

He looked furious, as though he would strike him, convinced by some
confused intuition that this rebellion would cause the most terrible
misfortune to befall him.

"Well, I take it off," said Nacional with the ill grace of a thwarted
child, as he saw the cross pass on, "I take it off, but it is to the
dead."

They were detained some time to let the long _cortege_ pass.

"Bad sign!" muttered Gallardo in a voice trembling with anger. "Whoever
would have thought of bringing a funeral along the road to the plaza?
Damn it! I say something's going to happen to-day!"

Nacional smiled, shrugging his shoulders.

"Superstitions and fanaticisms! Neither God nor Nature bothers over
these things."

These words, which irritated Gallardo still more, caused the grave
preoccupation of the other bull-fighters to vanish, and they began to
joke about their companion as they did on all occasions when he dragged
in his favorite expression of "God or Nature."

When the road was clear the carriage began to move at the full speed of
the mules, crowding along with the other vehicles that flowed to the
plaza. Arrived there it turned to the left toward the gate of the
stables that led to the enclosures and stalls, obliged to move now at
slower pace among the dense crowd. Another ovation to Gallardo when he
descended from the coach followed by his _banderilleros_; blows and
pushes to keep his dress from unclean contact; smiles of greeting;
concealment of the right hand which all wished to press.

"Make way, gentlemen! many thanks!"

The large enclosure between the body of the plaza and the walls of the
outbuildings was full of the curious who wished to see the bull-fighters
at close range before taking their seats. Above the heads of the crowd
emerged the _picadores_ and guards on horseback in their seventeenth
century dress. At one side of the enclosure rose one-story brick
buildings with vines over the doors and pots of flowers in the windows,
a small community of offices, shops, stables, and houses in which lived
the stable boys, the carpenters, and other employees of the bull-ring.

The _matador_ pressed forward laboriously among the assemblage. His name
passed from mouth to mouth with exclamations of enthusiasm.

"Gallardo! Here is Gallardo! Hurrah! _Viva Espana_!"

And he, wholly preoccupied by the adoration of the public, advanced
swaggering, serene as a god, happy and satisfied, as if he were
assisting at a feast in his honor.

Suddenly two arms encircled his neck, and a strong stench of wine
assailed his nostrils.

"You smasher of women's hearts! You glorious one! Hurrah for Gallardo!"

It was a man of decent appearance; he rested his head on the
swordsman's shoulder and thus remained as though falling asleep in spite
of his enthusiasm. Gallardo's pushing, and the pulling of his friends,
freed the bull-fighter from this interminable embrace. The drunken man,
finding himself separated from his idol, broke out in shouts of
enthusiasm. "Hurrah! Let all the nations of the world come to admire
bull-fighters like this one and die of envy! They may have ships, they
may have money, but that's trivial! They have neither bulls nor youths
like this--no one to outstrip him in bravery. Hurrah, my boy! _Viva mi
tierra_!"

Gallardo crossed a great white washed hall bare of furniture where his
professional companions stood surrounded by enthusiastic groups. Way was
immediately made among the crowd which obstructed a door, and he passed
through it into a narrow, dark room, at the end of which shone the
lights of the chapel. An ancient painting representing the Virgin of the
Dove hung over the back of the altar. Four candles were burning before
it and branches of moth-eaten cloth flowers in vases of common
earthenware were falling to dust.

The chapel was full of people. The devotees of the humbler classes
crowded in to see the great men close by. They remained in the dimness
with uncovered head; some crowded into the foremost ranks, others stood
on chairs and benches, the majority of them with their backs to the
Virgin and looking greedily toward the door, ready to shout a name the
instant they discerned the glitter of a spangled costume.

The _banderilleros_ and _picadores_, poor devils who were going to
expose their lives as much as were the _maestros_, scarcely raised the
slightest murmur by their presence. Only the most fervent enthusiasts
recognized their nicknames.

Suddenly a prolonged buzzing, a name repeated from mouth to mouth:

"Fuentes!--That is Fuentes!"

And this elegant bull-fighter with his air of gentility and his cape
over his shoulder advanced to the altar and bent one knee with
theatrical arrogance, his gypsy-like eyes reflecting the lights and his
graceful and agile body thrown back as he looked upward. As soon as his
prayer was said and he had made the sign of the cross he rose, walking
backwards toward the door without losing sight of the image, like a
singer who retires bowing to the audience.

Gallardo was more simple in his devotions. He entered swaggering with no
less arrogance, cap in hand and his cape folded, but on finding himself
in the presence of the image he fell on both knees and gave himself up
to prayer, unconscious of the hundreds of eyes fixed on him. His simple
Christian soul trembled with fear and remorse. He asked protection with
the fervor of ingenuous men who live in continual danger and believe in
all kinds of adverse influences and in supernatural protection.

For the first time during the whole exciting day he thought of his wife
and mother. Poor Carmen, there in Seville awaiting the telegram! Senora
Angustias, happy with her chickens at the farm of La Rinconada, without
knowing for a certainty in what place her son fought the bulls to-day!
And he with the terrible presentiment that this afternoon something was
going to happen! Virgin of the Dove! Some little protection! He would
be good, he would forget the _other one_, he would live as God commands.

And with his superstitious spirit strengthened with this vain
repentance, he left the chapel with troubled eyes, still deeply stirred
and heedless of the people who obstructed the way.

Outside in the room where the bull-fighters were waiting, a shaven-faced
man, dressed in a black habit which he seemed to wear with a certain
slovenliness, greeted him.

"Bad sign!" murmured the bull-fighter, continuing on his way. "When I
say that something is going to happen to-day--"

The black-robed man was the chaplain of the plaza, an enthusiast in the
art of bull-fighting, who had come with the Holy Oils beneath his habit.
He was accompanied by a neighbor who served him as sacristan in exchange
for a seat to see the bull-fight. On bull-fight days he hired a
carriage, which the management paid for, and he chose by turns among his
friends and _proteges_ one on whom to confer the favor of the seat
destined for the sacristan, beside his own in the front row near the
doors of the bull-pen.

The priest entered the chapel with a proprietary air, scandalized at the
behavior of the congregation; all had their hats off, but were talking
in a loud voice and some were even smoking.

"Gentlemen, this is not a _cafe_. Be so kind as to go out. The
bull-fight is going to begin."

This news caused a dispersion, while the priest took out the hidden Holy
Oils and placed them in a box of painted wood. Then he too, as soon as
he had secreted the sacred articles, ran out to take his place in the
plaza before the appearance of the _cuadrilla_.

The crowd had disappeared. No one was to be seen in the enclosure but
men dressed in silk and embroidery, yellow horsemen with great beaver
hats, guards on horseback, and the assistants in their suits of gold and
blue.

The bull-fighters formed with customary promptness before the horses'
gate beneath an arch that gave exit to the plaza, the _maestros_ at the
front, then the _banderilleros_ keeping far apart, and behind them, in
the enclosure itself, stamped the sturdy rough squadron of the
_picadores_, smelling of burnt hide and dung, mounted on skeleton-like
horses with one eye bandaged. As rearguard of this army the teams of
mules intended for dragging out the slaughtered bulls fretted behind
them; they were restless, vigorous animals with shining coats, covered
with trappings of tassels and bells, and wore on their collars the
waving national flag.

Beyond the arch, above the wooden gates which half obstructed it, opened
a narrow space, leaving visible a portion of the sky, the tiled roof of
the plaza, and a section of seats with the compact multitude swarming
like ants, amid which fans and papers seemed to flutter like gayly
colored mosquitoes. Through this gallery entered a strong breeze--the
respiration of an immense lung. An harmonious humming was borne on the
undulations of the air, making certain distant music felt, rather
divined than heard.

About the archway peeped heads, many heads; those of the spectators on
the nearby benches were thrust forward, curious to see the heroes
without delay.

Gallardo arranged himself in line with the other bull-fighters, who
exchanged among themselves grave inclinations of the head. They did not
speak; they did not smile. Each one thought of himself, letting his
imagination fly far away; or he thought of nothing, lost in that
intellectual void produced by emotion. They occupied themselves with a
ceaseless arranging of the cape, throwing it loosely over the shoulder,
rolling its ends about the waist, and trying to make their legs, encased
in silk and gold, show agile and brave under this gorgeous funnel. Every
face was pale, not with a deathly pallor, but brilliant and livid, with
the sweaty gloss of emotion. They thought of the arena, still unseen,
experiencing that irresistible terror of events that take place on the
other side of a wall, that fear of the hidden, the unknown danger that
makes itself felt though invisible. How would the afternoon end?

Behind the _cuadrillas_ sounded the trotting of the horses that entered
through the outer arcades of the plaza. They bore the constables with
their long black cloaks and bell-shaped hats decorated with red and
yellow feathers. They had just cleared the ring, emptying it of the
curious, and they came to put themselves at the head of the
_cuadrillas_, serving them as advance guards.

The doors of the archway and those of the barrier wall opposite opened
wide. The great ring appeared, the real plaza, the circular space of
sand where the tragedy of the afternoon was to be enacted for the
excitement and entertainment of fourteen thousand souls. The harmonious
and confused buzzing increased, developing into gay and bizarre music, a
triumphal march of sounding brass that caused arms to swing martially
and hips to swagger. Forward, ye brave!

And the bull-fighters, winking at the violent transition, passed from
the shadow to the light, from the silence of the quiet gallery to the
roar of the ring on whose surrounding seats surged the crowd in waves of
curiosity, rising to their feet to see to better advantage.

The _toreros_ advanced, seeming suddenly to diminish in size in
comparison to the length of the perspective as they trod the arena. They
resembled brilliant little puppets, whose embroideries caught rainbow
reflections from the sun. Their graceful movements fired the people with
an enthusiasm like to that of the child in the presence of a wonderful
toy. The mad gust that stirred the crowds, causing their nerves to
tingle and their flesh to creep, they knew not why, moved the whole
plaza.

The people applauded, the more enthusiastic and nervous yelled, the
music rumbled and, in the midst of this outburst which spread in every
direction, from the door of the exit to the president's box, the
_cuadrillas_ advanced with solemn pace, the graceful movements of arms
and bodies compensating for the shortness of step. In the ring of blue
ether overhanging above the plaza white doves were winging as if
frightened by the roar that escaped from this crater of brick.

The athletes felt themselves different men as they advanced across the
arena. They exposed their lives for something more than money. Their
uncertainty and terror in the presence of the unknown were left behind
those barriers; now they were before the public; they faced reality. And
the thirst for glory in their barbarous and simple souls, the desire to
outstrip their comrades, their pride of strength and skill, blinded
them, made them forget fear and filled them with a brutal courage.

Gallardo had become transfigured. He walked erect, aspiring to be
taller; he moved with the arrogance of a conqueror. He gazed in all
directions with a triumphant air, as though his two companions did not
exist. Everything was his; the plaza and the public. He felt himself
capable of killing every bull that roamed the pastures of Andalusia and
Castile. All the applause was for him, he was sure of it. The thousands
of feminine eyes shaded by white _mantillas_ in boxes and benches, dwelt
only on his person. He had no doubt of it. The public adored him and, as
he advanced, smiling flippantly, as though the entire ovation were
directed to his person, he looked along the rows of seats on the rising
tiers knowing where the greater number of his partisans were grouped and
seeming to ignore those sections where his rivals' friends were
assembled.

They saluted the president, cap in hand, and the brilliant defile broke
up, lackeys and horsemen scattering about the arena. Then, while a guard
caught in his hat the key thrown by the president, Gallardo turned
toward the rows of seats where sat his greatest admirers and handed them
his glittering cape to keep for him. The handsome garment, grasped by
many hands, was spread over the wall as though it were a banner, a
sacred symbol of loyalty.

The most enthusiastic partisans stood waving hands and canes, greeting
the _matador_ with shouts manifesting their expectations. "Let the boy
from Seville show what he can do!"

And he, leaning against the barrier, smiling, sure of his strength,
answered, "Many thanks. What can be done will be done."

Not only were his admirers hopeful of him, but all the people fixed
their attention upon him in a state of great excitement. He was a
bull-fighter who seemed likely to meet with a catastrophe some day, and
the sort of catastrophe which called for a bed in the hospital.

Every one believed he was destined to die in the plaza as the result of
a horn-stab, and this very belief caused them to applaud him with
homicidal enthusiasm, with barbaric interest like that of the
misanthrope who follows an animal tamer from place to place, expecting
every moment to see him devoured by his wild beasts.

Gallardo laughed at the old professors of tauromachy who consider a
mishap impossible as long as the bull-fighter sticks to the rules of the
art. Rules! He knew them not and did not trouble himself to learn them.
Valor and audacity were all that were necessary to win. And, almost
blindly, without other guide than his temerity, or other support than
that of his physical faculties, he had risen rapidly, astonishing the
public into paroxysms, stupefying it with wonder by his mad daring.

He had not climbed up, step by step, as had other _matadores_, serving
long years first as _peon_ and _banderillero_ at the side of the
_maestros_. He had never known fear of a bull's horns. "Hunger stabs
worse." He had risen suddenly and the public had seen him begin as
_espada_, achieving immense popularity in a few years.

They admired him for the reason that they held his misfortune a
certainty. He fired the public with devilish enthusiasm for the blind
way in which he defied Death. They gave him the same attention and care
that they would give a criminal preparing for eternity. This
bull-fighter was not one of those who held power in reserve; he gave
everything, his life included. It was worth the money it cost. And the
multitude, with the bestiality of those who witness danger from a point
of safety, admired and urged the hero on. The prudent made wry faces at
his deeds; they thought him a predestined suicide, shielded by luck, and
murmured, "While he lasts!"

Drums and trumpets sounded and the first bull entered. Gallardo, with
his plain working-cape over one arm, remained near the barrier close to
the ranks of his partisans, in disdainful immobility, believing that the
whole plaza had their eyes glued on him. That bull was for some one
else. He would show signs of existence when his arrived. But the
applause for the skilful cape-work of his companions brought him out of
his quiet, and in spite of his intention he went at the bull, achieving
several feats due more to audacity than to skill. The whole plaza
applauded him, moved by predisposition in his favor because of his
daring.

When Fuentes killed the first bull and walked toward the president's
box, bowing to the multitude, Gallardo turned paler, as though all show
of favor that was not for him was equivalent to ignominious oblivion.
Now his turn was coming; great things were going to be seen. He did not
know for a certainty what they might be but he was going to astound the
public.

Scarcely had the second bull appeared when Gallardo, by his activity and
his desire to shine, seemed to fill the whole plaza. His cape was ever
near the bull's nose. A picador of his cuadrilla, the one called Potaje,
was thrown from his horse and lay unprotected near the horns, but the
maestro, grabbing the beast's tail, pulled with herculean strength and
made him turn till the horseman was safe. The public applauded, wild
with enthusiasm.

When the time for placing the _banderillas_ arrived, Gallardo stood
between the inner and outer barrier awaiting the bugle signal to kill.
Nacional, with the _banderilla_ in his hand, attracted the bull to the
centre of the plaza. No grace nor audacity was in his bearing; it was
merely a question of earning bread. Away in Seville were four small
children who, if he were to die, would not find another father. To
fulfil his duty and nothing more; only to throw his _banderillas_ like a
journeyman of tauromachy, without desire for ovations and merely well
enough to avoid being hissed!

When he had placed the first pair, some of the spectators in the vast
circle applauded, and others bantered the _banderillero_ in a waggish
tone, alluding to his hobbies.

"Less politics, and get closer!"

And Nacional, deceived by the distance, on hearing these shouts answered
smiling, like his master:

"Many thanks; many thanks."

When Gallardo leaped anew into the arena at the sound of the trumpets
and drums which announced the last play, the multitude stirred with a
buzzing of emotion. This _matador_ was its own. Now they were going to
see something great.

He took the _muleta_ from the hands of Garabato, who offered it folded
as he came inside the walls; he grasped the sword which his servant also
presented to him, and with short steps walked over and stood in front of
the president's box carrying his cap in his hand. All craned their
necks, devouring the idol with their eyes, but no one heard his speech.
The arrogant, slender figure, the body thrown back to give greater force
to his words, produced on the multitude the same effect as the most
eloquent address. As he ended his peroration with a half turn, throwing
his cap on the ground, enthusiasm broke out long and loud. Hurrah for
the boy from Seville! Now they were to see the real thing! And the
spectators looked at each other mutely, anticipating stupendous events.
A tremor ran along the rows of seats as though they were in the presence
of something sublime.

The profound silence produced by great emotions fell suddenly upon the
multitude as though the plaza had been emptied. The life of so many
thousands of persons was condensed into their eyes. No one seemed to
breathe.

Gallardo advanced slowly toward the bull holding the _muleta_ across his
body like a banner, and waving his sword in his other hand with a
pendulum-like movement that kept time with his step.

Turning his head an instant he saw that Nacional with another member of
his _cuadrilla_ was following to assist him, his cape over his arm.

"Stand aside, everybody!"

A voice rang out in the silence of the plaza making itself heard even to
the farthest seats, and a burst of admiration answered it. "Stand aside,
everybody!" He had said, "Stand aside, everybody!" What a man!

He walked up to the beast absolutely alone, and instantly silence fell
again. He calmly readjusted the red flag on the stick, extended it, and
advanced thus a few steps until he almost touched the nose of the bull,
which stood stupefied and terrified by the audacity of the man.

The public dared not speak nor even breathe but admiration shone in
their eyes. What a youth! He walked in between the very horns! He
stamped the ground impatiently with one foot, inciting the beast to
attack, and that enormous mass of flesh, defended by sharp horns fell
bellowing upon him. The _muleta_ passed over his horns, which grazed the
tassels and fringes of the dress of the bull-fighter standing firm in
his place, with no other movement than a backward bending of his body. A
shout from the crowd answered this whirl of the _muleta_. Hurrah!

The infuriated beast returned; he re-attacked the man with the "rag,"
who repeated the pass, with the same roar from the public. The bull,
made more and more furious by the deception, attacked the athlete who
continued whirling the red flag within a short distance, fired by the
proximity of danger and the wondering exclamations of the crowd that
seemed to intoxicate him.

Gallardo felt the animal snort upon him; the moist vapor from its muzzle
wet his right hand and his face. Grown familiar by contact he looked
upon the brute as a good friend who was going to let himself be killed
to contribute to his glory.

The bull stood motionless for some seconds as if tired of this play,
gazing with hazy eyes at the man and at the red scarf, suspecting in his
obscure mind the existence of a trick which with attack after attack was
drawing him toward death.

Gallardo felt the presentiment of his happiest successes. Now! He rolled
the flag with a circular movement of his left hand around the staff and
he raised his right hand to the height of his eyes, standing with the
sword pointing towards the neck of the beast.

The crowd was stirred by a movement of protest and horror.

"Don't strike yet," shouted thousands of voices. "No, no!"

It was too soon. The bull was not in good position; he would make a
lunge and catch him. But Gallardo moved regardless of all rules of the
art. What did either rules or life matter to that desperate man?

Suddenly he threw himself forward with his sword held before him, at the
same time that the wild beast fell upon him. It was a brutal, savage
encounter. For an instant man and beast formed a single mass and thus
moved together several paces, no one knowing which was the conqueror,
the man with an arm and part of his body lying between the two horns, or
the beast lowering his head and trying to seize with his defences the
puppet of gold and colors which seemed to be slipping away from him.

At last the group parted, the _muleta_ lay on the ground like a rag, and
the bull-fighter, his hands free, went staggering back from the impulse
of the shock until he recovered his equilibrium a few steps away. His
clothing was in disorder; his cravat floated outside his vest, gored and
torn by one of the horns.

The bull raced on impelled by the momentum of his start. Above his broad
neck the red hilt of the sword embedded to the cross scarcely protruded.
Suddenly the animal paused, shuddering with a painful movement of
obeisance, doubled his fore legs, inclined his head till his bellowing
muzzle touched the sand, and finished by lying down with shudders of
agony.

It seemed as if the very building would fall, as if the bricks dashed
against one another, as if the multitude was about to fly
panic-stricken, by the way it rose to its feet, pale, tremulous,
gesticulating and throwing its arms. Dead! What a stroke! Every one had
believed for a second that the _matador_ was caught on the horns. All
had felt sure they would see him fall upon the sand stained with blood
and, as they beheld him standing up still giddy from the shock but
smiling, surprise and amazement augmented the enthusiasm.

"How fierce!" they shouted from the tiers of seats, not finding a more
fitting word to express their astonishment--" How rash!"

Hats flew into the arena and a deafening roar of applause, like a shower
of hail, ran from row to row of seats as the _matador_ advanced around
the ring until he stood in front of the president's box.

The ovation burst out clamorously when Gallardo, extending his arms,
saluted the president. All shouted, demanding for the swordsman the
honors due to mastery. They must give him the ear. Never was this
distinction so merited; few sword-thrusts like that had ever been seen;
and the enthusiasm increased when a _mozo_ of the plaza handed him a
dark triangle, hairy and blood-stained--the point of one of the beast's
ears.

The third bull was now in the ring, but the ovation to Gallardo
continued as though the public had not yet recovered from its amazement;
as though all that might occur during the rest of the bull-fight would
be tame in comparison.

The other bull-fighters, pale with professional envy, strove valiantly
to attract the attention of the public. Applause was given, but it was
weak and faint after the former ovations. The public was exhausted by
the delirium of its enthusiasm and heeded absent-mindedly the events
that took place in the ring. Fiery discussions broke out and ran from
tier to tier. The adherents of other bull-fighters, serene and unmoved
by the transports that had overcome the people, took advantage of the
spontaneous movement, to turn the discussion upon Gallardo. Very
valiant, very daring, a suicide, they said, but that was not art. And
the vehement adherents of the idol, proud of his audacity and carried
away by their own feelings, became indignant like the believer who sees
the miracles of his favorite saint held in doubt.

The attention of the public was diverted by incidents that disturbed the
people on some of the tiers of seats. Suddenly those in one section
moved; the spectators rose to their feet, turning their backs to the
ring; arms and canes whirled above their heads. The rest of the crowd
ceased looking at the arena, directing their attention to the seat of
trouble and to the large numbers, painted on the inner wall, that marked
the different sections of the amphitheatre.

"Fight in the third!" they yelled joyfully. "Now there's a row in the
fifth!"

Following the contagious impulse of the crowd, all became excited and
rose to their feet to see over their neighbors' heads but were unable to
distinguish anything except the slow ascent of the police who, opening a
passage from step to step, reached the group where the dispute had
begun.

"Sit down!" exclaimed the more prudent, deprived of their view of the
ring where the bull-fighters continued the game.

Little by little the waves of the multitude calmed, the rows of heads
assumed their former regularity on the circular lines of the benches,
and the bull-fight went on. But the nerves of the audience were shaken
and their state of mind manifested itself in unjust animosity toward
certain fighters or by profound silence.

The public, exhausted by the recent intense emotion, found all the
events tame. They sought to allay their ennui by eating and drinking.
The venders in the plaza went about between _barreras_, throwing with
marvellous skill the articles bought. Oranges flew like red balls to the
highest row, going from the hand of the seller to those of the buyer in
a straight line, as if pulled by a thread. Bottles of carbonated drinks
were uncorked. The liquid gold of Andalusian wines shone in little
glasses.

A movement of curiosity circulated along the benches. Fuentes was about
to fix the _banderillas_ in his bull and every one expected some
extraordinary show of skill and grace. He advanced alone to the centre
of the plaza with the _banderillas_ in one hand, serene, tranquil,
walking slowly, as though he were to begin a game. The bull followed his
movements with curious eyes, amazed to see the man alone before him
after the former hurly-burly of fluttering and extended capes, of cruel
barbs thrust into his neck, of horses that came and stood within reach
of his horns, as if offering themselves to his attack.

The man hypnotized the beast. He drew near until he could touch his poll
with the point of the _banderillas_, then he ran slowly away, with short
steps, the bull after him, as though persuaded into obedience and drawn
against his will to the extreme opposite side of the plaza. The animal
seemed to be mastered by the bull-fighter; he obeyed him in all his
movements until the man, calling the game ended, extended his arms with
a _banderilla_ in each hand, raised his small, slender body upon his
toes, advanced toward the bull with majestic ease, and thrust the gayly
colored darts into its neck.

Three times he performed the same feat, applauded by the public. Those
who considered themselves connoisseurs retaliated now for the explosion
of enthusiasm provoked by Gallardo. This was a bull-fighter! This was
pure art.

Gallardo, standing near the barrier, wiped the sweat off his face with a
towel which Garabato handed him. Then he turned his back on the ring to
avoid seeing the prowess of his companion. Outside of the plaza he
esteemed his rivals with that feeling of fraternity established by
danger; but as soon as they stepped into the arena all were enemies and
their triumphs pained him as if they were offences. Now the enthusiasm
of the public seemed to him a robbery that diminished his own great
triumph.

When the fifth bull came out, it was for him, and he sprang into the
arena anxious to again startle the public by his daring.

When a _picador_ fell he threw his cape and enticed the bull to the
other side of the ring, confusing him with a series of movements until
the beast became stupefied and stood motionless. Then Gallardo touched
his nose with one foot, and took his cap and put it between the horns.
Again, he took advantage of the animal's stupefaction and thrust his
body forward as an audacious challenge, and knelt at a short distance,
all but lying down under the brute's nose.

The old _aficionados_ protested loudly. Monkey-shines! Clown-tricks,
that would not have been tolerated in olden days! But they had to
subside, wearied by the tumult of the public.

When the signal for the _banderillas_ was given the people were thrown
into suspense by seeing that Gallardo took the darts from Nacional and
walked towards the beast with them. There was an exclamation of protest.
_He_ to throw the _banderillas_! All knew his inexperience in that
direction. This ought to be left to those who had risen in their career
step by step, for those who had been _banderilleros_ many years at the
side of their _maestros_ before becoming bull-fighters; and Gallardo had
begun at the top, killing bulls ever since he stepped into the plaza.

"No! No!" clamored the multitude.

Doctor Ruiz shouted and gesticulated from the _contrabarrera_.

"Leave off that, boy! Thou knowest but the great act--to kill!"

But Gallardo scorned the public and was deaf to its protests when he
felt the impulse of audacity. Amidst the outcries he went directly
towards the bull, which never moved and, _zas!_ he stuck in the
_banderillas_. The pair lodged out of place, and only skin deep, and one
of the sticks fell at the beast's movement of surprise. But this
mattered not. With that lenity the multitude ever feels for its idols,
excusing and justifying their defects, the entire public commended this
piece of daring by smiling. He, growing more rash, took other
_banderillas_ and lodged them, heedless of the protests of the people
who feared for his life. Then he repeated the act a third time, each
time doing it crudely but with such fearlessness that what in another
would have provoked hisses was received with great explosions of
admiration. What a man! How luck aided this daring youth!

The bull stood with only four of the _banderillas_ in his neck, and
those so lightly embedded that he did not seem to feel them.

"He is perfectly sound," yelled the devotees on the rows of seats,
alluding to the bull, while Gallardo, grasping sword and _muleta_,
marched up to him, with his cap on, arrogant and calm, trusting in his
lucky star.

"Aside, all!" he shouted again.

Divining that some one was near him giving no heed to his orders he
turned his head. Fuentes was a few steps away. He had followed him, his
cape over his arm, feigning inattention but ready to come to his aid as
though he felt a premonition of an accident.

"Leave me alone, Antonio," said Gallardo, with an expression that was at
once angry and respectful, as though he were talking to an elder
brother, at which Fuentes shrugged his shoulders as if he thus threw off
all responsibility, and turned his back and walked away slowly, but
feeling certain of being needed at any moment.

Gallardo waved his flag in the beast's very face and the latter
attacked. "A pass! Hurrah!" the enthusiasts roared. But the animal
suddenly returned, falling upon the _matador_ again and giving him such
a violent blow with his head that the _muleta_ was knocked from his
hands. Finding himself unarmed and hard-pressed he had to make for the
_barrera_, but at the same instant Fuentes' cape distracted the animal.
Gallardo, who divined during his flight the beast's sudden halt, did
not jump over the _barrera_; he sat on the vaulting wall an instant,
contemplating his enemy a few paces away. The rout ended in applause for
this show of serenity.

Gallardo recovered the _muleta_ and sword, carefully arranged the red
flag, and again stood in front of the beast's head, less calmly, but
dominated instead by a murderous fury, by a desire to kill instantly the
animal that had made him run in sight of thousands of admirers.

He had scarcely made a pass with the flag when he thought the decisive
moment had arrived and he squared himself, the _muleta_ held low, the
hilt of the sword raised close to his eyes.

The public protested again, fearing for his life.

"He'll throw thee! No! _Aaay!_"

It was an exclamation of horror that moved the whole plaza; a spasm that
caused the multitude to rise to its feet with eyes staring while the
women covered their faces or grasped the nearest arm in terror.

At the bull-fighter's thrust the sword struck bone, and, delayed in the
movement of stepping aside on account of this difficulty, Gallardo had
been caught by one of the horns and now hung upon it by the middle of
his body. The brave youth, so strong and wiry, found himself tossed
about on the end of the horn like a miserable manikin until the powerful
beast, with a shake of his head, flung him some yards away, where he
fell heavily on the sand with arms and legs extended, like a frog
dressed in silk and gold.

"He is killed! A horn-stab in the belly!" They shouted from the rows of
seats.

But Gallardo got up amidst the capes and the men who rushed to cover
and save him. He smiled; he tested his body; then he raised his
shoulders to indicate to the public that it was nothing. A jar--no more,
and the belt torn to shreds. The horn had only penetrated the wrapping
of strong silk.

Again he grasped the instruments of death, but now nobody would remain
seated, divining that the encounter would be short and terrible.
Gallardo marched towards the beast with a blind impulse determined to
kill or die immediately, without delay or precaution. The bull or he! He
saw red, as if blood had been injected into his eyes. He heard, as
something distant that came from another world, the outcry of the
multitude counselling calmness.

He made only two passes, aided by a cape that he held at his side, then
suddenly, with the swiftness of a dream, like a spring that is loosed
from its fastening, he threw himself upon the bull, giving him a stab
that his admirers said was swift as a lightning stroke. He thrust his
arm so far over that on escaping from between the horns he received a
blow from one of them which sent him staggering away; but he kept on his
feet, and the beast, after a mad run, fell at the extreme opposite side
of the plaza and lay with his legs bent under him and the top of his
head touching the sand until the _puntillero_ came to finish him. The
public seemed to go mad with enthusiasm. A glorious bull-fight! It was
surfeited with excitement. That fellow Gallardo did not rob one of his
money; he responded with excess to the price of entrance. The devotees
would have material to talk about for three days at their meetings at
the _cafe_. How brave! how fierce! And the most enthusiastic, with
warlike fervor, looked in every direction as if searching for enemies.

"The greatest _matador_ in the world! And here am I to face whoever dare
say to the contrary!"

The remainder of the bull-fight scarcely claimed attention. It all
seemed tasteless and colorless after Gallardo's daring.

When the last bull fell upon the sand a surging crowd of boys, of
popular devotees, of apprentices of the art of bull-fighting, invaded
the ring. They surrounded Gallardo, following him on his way from the
president's box to the door of exit. They crowded against him, all
wishing to press his hand or touch his dress, and at last, the most
vehement, paying no attention to the gesticulations of Nacional and the
other _banderilleros_, caught the master by the legs and raised him to
their shoulders, carrying him around the ring and through the galleries
to the outer edge of the plaza.

Gallardo, taking off his cap, bowed to the groups that applauded his
triumph. Wrapped in his glittering cape, he allowed himself to be
carried like a divinity, motionless and erect above the current of
Cordovan hats and Madrid caps, amidst acclamations of enthusiasm.

As he stepped into his carriage at the lower end of Alcala Street,
hailed by the crowd that had not seen the bull-fight, but which already
knew of his triumphs, a smile of pride, of satisfaction in his own
strength, illuminated his sweaty countenance over which the pallor of
emotion still spread.

Nacional, anxious about the master's having been caught and about his
violent fall, wished to know if he felt any pain, and if he should call
Doctor Ruiz.

"It's nothing; a petting, nothing more. No bull alive can kill me."

But as though in the midst of his pride arose the recollection of his
past weaknesses, and as though he thought he saw in Nacional's eyes an
ironic expression, he added:

"Those are things that affect me before going to the plaza; something
like hysteria in women. But thou art right, Sebastian. How sayest thou?
God or Nature, that's it; neither God nor Nature should meddle in
affairs of bull-fighting. Every one gets through as he can, by his skill
or by his courage, and recommendations from earth or from heaven are of
no use to him. Thou hast talent, Sebastian; thou shouldst have studied
for a career."

In the optimism of his joy he looked upon the _banderillero_ as a sage,
forgetting the jests with which he had always received the latter's
topsy-turvy reasoning.

When he reached his lodging he found many admirers in the vestibule
anxious to embrace him. They talked of his deeds with such hyperbole
that they seemed altered, exaggerated, and transfigured by the comments
made in the short distance from the plaza to the hotel.

Upstairs his room was full of friends, gentlemen who _thoued_ him, and,
imitating the rustic speech of the country people, shepherds and
cattle-breeders, said to him, slapping his shoulders:

"Thou hast done very well; but really, very well!"

Gallardo freed himself from this enthusiastic reception and went out
into the corridor with Garabato.

"Go and send a telegram home. Thou knowest what to say: '_As usual_.'"

Garabato protested. He must help the _maestro_ undress. The servants of
the hotel would take charge of sending the despatch.

"No, I wish it to be thou. I will wait. Thou must send another telegram.
Thou already knowest who to--to that lady; to Dona Sol. Also '_As
usual_.'"




CHAPTER III

BORN FOR THE BULL-RING


When Senora Angustias was bereft of her husband, Senor Juan Gallardo,
the well known cobbler established in a _portal_ in the ward of the
Feria, she wept with the disconsolateness due the event, but at the same
time, in the depths of her soul, she felt the satisfaction of one who
rests after a long journey, freed from an overwhelming burden.

"Poor fellow, joy of my heart! May God keep him in His glory. So good!
So industrious!"

During twenty years of life together, he had not caused her greater
sorrows than those the rest of the women of the ward had to bear. Of the
three _pesetas_ he averaged as a result of his labor he handed over one
to Senora Angustias for the support of the house and family, using the
other two for personal entertainment and for keeping up appearances
among his friends. He was obliged to respond to the attentions of his
companions when they invited him to a convivial glass, and the famous
Andalusian wine, since it is the glory of God, costs dear. Also it was
inevitable that he should go to see the bulls, because a man who does
not drink nor attend bull-fights--why is he in the world?

Senora Angustias with her two children, Encarnacion and little Juan, had
to sharpen her wits and develop numerous talents in order to keep the
family together. She worked as a servant in the houses nearest her
ward, sewed for the women of the neighborhood, sold clothing and
trinkets for a certain brokeress, a friend of hers, and made cigarettes
for the gentlemen, recalling her youthful aptitude when Senor Juan, an
enthusiastic and favored lover, used to come and wait for her at the
door of the Tobacco Factory.

Never could she complain of infidelity or ill-treatment on the part of
her husband. On Saturdays when the cobbler used to come home drunk in
the late hours of the night supported by his friends, joy and tenderness
came with him. Senora Angustias had to drag him into the house, for he
was determined to remain outside the door clapping his hands and
intoning, with slobbery voice, tender love songs dedicated to his
corpulent companion. And when the door was at last closed behind him,
depriving the neighbors of a source of entertainment, Senor Juan, in a
state of sentimental drunkenness, insisted on seeing the sleeping
children; he kissed them, wetting their little faces with great
tear-drops, and repeated his verses in honor of Senora Angustias
(Hurrah! the greatest woman in the world!) till finally the good wife
was compelled to cease frowning and to laugh while she undressed him and
managed him as if he were a sick child.

This was his only vice. Poor fellow! There was not a sign of women or of
gambling. His self-esteem which made him go well dressed while the
family went in rags, and his unequal division of the products of his
labor, were both compensated by generous incentives. Senora Angustias
recollected with pride the great feast days when Juan had her put on her
Manila shawl, her wedding _mantilla_, and, with the children walking in
advance, he strode at her side with white Cordovan hat and silver
handled cane, taking a walk along Delicias with the same air as any
shopkeeper's family from Sierpes Street. On cheap bull-fight days he
courted her pompously before going to the plaza, offering her glasses of
wine at La Campana or at a _cafe_ in the New Plaza. This happy time was
now but a faint and pleasant memory in the recollection of the poor
woman.

Senor Juan fell ill of phthisis and for two years the wife had to care
for him, making still greater exertions in her industries to compensate
for the lack of the _peseta_ her husband used to turn over to her. At
last he died in the hospital, resigned to his fate, convinced that
existence was of no value without Andalusian wine and without bulls, and
his last look of love and gratitude was for his wife, as if he would
call out with his eyes: "Hurrah! the greatest woman in the world!"

When Senora Angustias was left alone her position did not change for the
worse,--rather for the better. She enjoyed greater liberty in her
movements, freed from the man who for the last two years had weighed
more heavily upon her than the rest of the family. Being an energetic
woman and of prompt decision, she immediately marked out a career for
her children. Encarnacion, who was now sixteen, went to the Tobacco
Factory, where her mother was able to introduce her, thanks to her
relations with certain friends of her youth who had become overseers.
Juanillo, who as a lad had passed his days in the _portal_ of the Feria
watching his father work, should be a shoemaker, according to the will
of Senora Angustias. She took him out of school, where he had learned
to read but poorly, and at twelve he became an apprentice to one of the
best shoemakers in Seville.

And now the martyrdom of the poor woman began.

Ah, that boy! Son of such honorable parents! Almost every day, instead
of going to his master's shop he went to the slaughter-house with
certain rascals who had their meeting place on a bench in the Alameda of
Hercules and who delighted to flaunt a cape under the nose of young
bullocks for the entertainment of herders and butchers, generally
getting upset and trampled upon. Senora Angustias, who often toiled far
into the night, needle in hand, so that the boy might go to the shop
neat, with his clothing clean and mended, met him at the door when he
came home with his pantaloons torn, his jacket dirty, and his face
covered with lumps and scratches, afraid to enter yet without courage to
flee owing to his hunger.

The welts made by his mother's blows and the marks of the broom-handle
were added to the bruises of the treacherous bullocks, but the hero of
the slaughter-house suffered them all, provided he did not lack his
daily rations. "Beat me, but give me something to eat." And with his
appetite awakened by violent exercise, he devoured the hard bread, the
spoiled beans, the stale cod-fish, all the cheap food the diligent woman
sought in the shops in the effort to maintain the family on her scanty
earnings.

Toiling all day scrubbing floors, only now and then did she have an
afternoon in which she could concern herself with her son's welfare and
go to the cobbler's to learn of the progress of the apprentice. When she
returned from the shoe-maker's shop she was puffing and blowing with
anger and resolved upon terrible punishments to correct the vagabond.

Most of the time he failed to present himself at the shop at all. He
spent the morning at the slaughter-house and in the afternoons he formed
one of the group of vagabonds collected at the entrance of Sierpes
Street, admiring at close range the bull-fighters out of work who
gathered in Campana Street, dressed in new clothes, with resplendent
hats but with no more than a _peseta_ in their pockets, though each one
was bragging of his exploits.

Little Juan contemplated them as if they were beings of marvellous
superiority, envying their fine carriage and the boldness with which
they flattered the women. The idea that each of these had at home a suit
of silk embroidered with gold, and that with it on he strode before the
multitude to the sound of music, produced a thrill of respect.

The son of Senora Angustias was known as the Little Cobbler among his
ragged friends, and he showed satisfaction at having a nickname, as have
nearly all the great men who appear in the ring. A foundation must be
laid somewhere. He wore around his neck a red handkerchief which he had
pilfered from his sister, and from beneath his cap his hair fell over
his ears in thick locks which he carefully plastered down. He wore his
plaited blouses of drill tucked into his trousers, which were ancient
relics of his father's wardrobe made over by Senora Angustias; he
insisted these must be high in the waist with the legs wide and the hips
well tightened, and wept with humiliation when his mother would not
yield to these exactions.

A cape! If only he might possess a fighting cape and not have to beg
from other more fortunate boys the loan of the coveted "rag" for a few
minutes! In a poor little room at home lay an old forgotten empty
mattress case. Senora Angustias had sold the wool in days of stress. The
Little Cobbler spent a morning locked in the room, taking advantage of
the absence of his mother who was working as a servant in a priest's
house.

With the ingenuity of a shipwrecked mariner on a desert isle who, thrown
upon his own resources, must construct everything necessary to his
existence, he cut a fighting cape from the damp and half-frayed cloth.
Then he boiled in a pot a handful of red aniline bought at a druggist's,
and dipped the ancient cotton in this dye. Little Juan admired his
work--a cape of the most vivid scarlet that would arouse the greatest
envy at the bull-baiting in the surrounding towns! Nothing remained but
to dry it and he hung it in the sun beside the neighbor women's white
clothes. The wind blew the dripping cloth about, bespattering the
nearest pieces, until a chorus of curses and threats, clenched fists,
and mouths that pronounced the ugliest of words against him and his
mother, obliged the Little Cobbler to grasp his mantle of glory and take
to his heels, his hands and face dyed red as though he had just
committed a murder.

Senora Angustias, a strong, corpulent, be-whiskered woman who was not
afraid of men, and inspired the respect of women for her energetic
resolutions, was disheartened and weak in the presence of her son. What
could she do? Her hands had pummelled every part of the boy's body;
brooms were broken on him without beneficial results. That little imp
had, according to her, the flesh of a dog. Accustomed outside of the
house to the tremendous butting of the steers, to the cruel trampling
of the cows, to the clubs of herders and butchers who beat the band of
vagabond bull-fighters without compassion, his mother's blows seemed to
him a natural event, a continuation of his life outside prolonged inside
the home, and he accepted them without the least intention of mending
his ways, as a fee which he must pay in exchange for his sustenance,
chewing the hard bread with hungry enjoyment, while the maternal
maledictions and blows rained on his back.

Scarcely was his hunger appeased when he fled from the house, taking
advantage of the freedom in which Senora Angustias left him when she
absented herself on her round of duties.

In Campana Street, that venerable haunt of the bull-fighters where the
gossip of the great doings of the profession circulated, he received
information about his companions that gave him tremors of enthusiasm.

"Little Cobbler, a bull-fight to-morrow."

The towns in the province celebrated the feasts of their patron saints
with cape-teasing of bulls which had been rejected from the great
plazas, and to these the young bull-fighters went in the hope of being
able to say on their return that they had held the cape in the glorious
plazas of Aznalcollar, Bollullos, or Mairena. They started on the
journey at night with the cape over the shoulder if it were summer, or
wrapped in it if winter, their stomachs empty, their heads full of
visions of bulls and glory.

If the trip were of several days' journey they camped in the open, or
they were admitted through charity to the hayloft of an inn. Alas for
the grapes, melons, and figs they found by the way in those happy
times! Their only fear was that another band, another _cuadrilla_,
possessed of the same idea, would present itself in the _pueblo_ and set
up an opposition.

When they reached the end of their journey, with their eyebrows and
mouths full of dust, tired and foot-sore from the march, they presented
themselves to the alcalde and the boldest among them who performed the
functions of director talked of the merits of his men. All considered
themselves happy if the municipal generosity sheltered them in a stable
of the hostelry and regaled them with a pot of stew in addition, which
they would clean up instantly. In the village plaza enclosed by wagons
and boards, they let loose aged bulls, regular forts of flesh covered
with scabs and scars, with enormous saw-edged horns; cattle which had
been fought many years in all the feasts of the province; venerable
animals that "understood the game," such was their malice. Accustomed to
one continual bull-fight they were in the secret of the tricks of the
contest.

The youths of the _pueblo_ pricked on the beasts from their place of
safety and the people longed for an object of diversion greater than the
bull--in the bull-fighters from Seville. These waved their capes, their
legs trembling, their courage borne down by the weight of their
stomachs. A tumble, and then great clamor from the public! When one in
sudden terror took refuge behind the palisades, rural barbarity received
him with insults, beating the hands clutching at the wood, pounding him
on the legs to make him jump back into the ring. "Get back there,
poltroon! Fraud, to turn your face from the bull."

At times one of the young swordsmen was borne out of the ring by four
companions, pale as a sheet of white paper, his eyes glassy, his head
fallen, his breast like a broken bellows. The veterinary came, quieting
them all on seeing no blood. The boy was suffering from the shock of
being thrown some yards and falling on the ground like a rag torn from a
piece of clothing. Again it was the agony of having been stepped on by a
beast of enormous weight. A bucket of water was thrown on his head and
then, when he recovered his senses, they treated him to a long drink of
brandy. A prince could not be better cared for!

To the ring again! And when the herder had no more bulls to let out and
night was drawing near, two of the _cuadrilla_ grasped the best cape
belonging to the society and holding it by its edges went from one
viewing stand to another soliciting a contribution. Copper coins fell
upon the red cloth in proportion to the pleasure the strangers had given
the country people; and, the bull-baiting ended, they started on their
return to the city, knowing that they had exhausted their credit at the
inn. Often they fought on the way over the distribution of the pieces of
copper which they carried in a knotted handkerchief. Then the rest of
the week, they recounted their deeds before the fascinated eyes of their
companions who had not been members of the expedition.

Once Senora Angustias spent an entire week without hearing from her son.
At last she heard vague rumors of his having been wounded in a
bull-scrimmage in the town of Tocina. _Dios mio_! Where might that town
be? How reach it? She gave up her son for dead, she wept for him, she
longed to go; and then as she was getting ready to start on her
journey, she saw little Juan coming home, pale, weak, but talking with
manly joy of his accident.

It was nothing--a horn-stab in one thigh; a wound a fraction of an inch
deep. And in the shamelessness of triumph he wanted to show it to the
neighbors, affirming that a finger could be thrust into it without
reaching its end. He was proud of the stench of iodoform that he shed as
he walked, and he talked of the attention they had shown him in that
town, which he considered the finest in Spain. The wealthiest citizens,
one might say the aristocracy, interested themselves in his case, the
alcalde had been to see him and later paid his way home. He still had
three _duros_ in his pocket, which he handed to his mother with the
generosity of a great man. So much glory at fourteen! His satisfaction
was yet greater when some genuine bull-fighters in Campana Street fixed
their attention on the boy and asked him how his wound was getting
along.

His companion in poverty was Chiripa, a boy of the same age, with a
small body and malicious eyes, without father or mother, who had tramped
about Seville ever since he had attained the use of his faculties.
Chiripa was a master of the roving life and had travelled over the
world. The two boys started on a journey empty of pocket, without other
equipment than their capes, miserable cast-offs acquired for a few
_reales_ from a second-hand clothing store.

They clambered cautiously into trains and hid under seats. Often they
were surprised by a trainman and, to the accompaniment of kicks and
blows, were left by him on the platform of some solitary station while
the train vanished like a lost hope. They awaited the arrival of
another, spending the night in the open, employing the cunning of
primitive man to satisfy their necessities, crawling round about country
houses to steal some solitary chicken, which, after wringing the fowl's
neck, they would broil over a fire of dry wood and devour scorched and
half raw, with the voracity of young savages.

Often when they slept in the open air near a station awaiting the
passing of a train, a couple of guards would come up to them. On seeing
the red bundles that served as pillows for these vagabonds, their
suspicions were quieted. They gently removed the boys' caps, and on
finding the hairy appendage they went away laughing without further
investigation. These were not young thieves; they were apprentices who
were going to the _capeas_. And in this tolerance there was a mixture of
sympathy for the national sport and of respect for the obscure
possibilities of the future. Who could tell if one of these ragged
youths, despite his present appearance of poverty, might not in the
future be a "star of the art," a great man who would kill bulls for the
entertainment of kings, and live like a prince, and whose deeds and
sayings would be exploited in the newspapers?

One afternoon, the Little Cobbler was left alone in a town of
Extremadura. For the admiration of the rustic audience which applauded
the famous bull-fighters "come purposely from Seville," the two boys
threw _banderillas_ at a fierce and ancient bull. Little Juan stuck his
pair into the beast and was posing near a view-stand, proudly receiving
the popular ovation of tremendous hand-clappings and proffers of cups of
wine, when an exclamation of horror sobered him in his intoxication of
glory. Chiripa was no longer on the ground of the plaza; only the
_banderillas_ rolling in the dust, one slipper and a cap were there. The
bull was moving about as if irritated by some obstacle, carrying hooked
on one of his horns a bundle of clothing resembling a puppet. With the
violent tossing of his head the shapeless roll was loosened from the
horn, ejecting a red stream, but before touching the ground it was
caught by the opposite horn which in its turn tossed it about during
what seemed an interminable time. At last, the sorry bulk fell to the
dust and there it stayed, flabby and inert, like a punctured wine-skin
expelling its contents.

The herder with his leaders took the bull into the corral, for no one
else dared go near him, and poor Chiripa was carried upon a stretcher to
a wretched little room in the town-house that served as a jail. His
companion looked at him with a face as white as if made of plaster.
Chiripa's eyes were glazed and his body was red with the blood which
could not be stopped by the cloths wet with water and vinegar, which
were applied in lieu of anything better.

"Adio', Little Cobbler!" he moaned. "Adio', Juanito!"

And he said no more. The companion of the dead youth, terrified, started
on his return to Seville still seeing his glassy eyes, hearing his
mournful good-bye. He was filled with fear. A gentle cow appearing in
his path would have made him run. He thought of his mother and of the
prudence of her counsel. Would it not be better to dedicate himself to
shoemaking and live tranquilly? But these resolutions only lasted while
he was alone. When he reached Seville he felt the return of
exhilaration. Friends rushed to him to hear about the death of poor
Chiripa in every detail. Professional bull-fighters questioned him in
Campana Street, remembering with pity the little vagabond with the
pock-marked face who had often run errands for them. Juan, fired by such
signs of consideration, gave rein to his powerful imagination,
describing how he had thrown himself upon the bull when he had seen his
poor companion hooked, how he had grabbed the beast by the tail and
achieved even more wonderful feats, in spite of which the other boy had
left this world.

The impulse of fear vanished. Bull-fighter--nothing but a bull-fighter!
Since others were, why should he not be one? He recollected his mother's
spoiled beans and hard bread; the deprivation each pair of new
pantaloons had cost him; the hunger, that inseparable companion of many
of his expeditions. Moreover he had a vehement desire for all the joys
and displays of life; he gazed with envy at the coaches and the horses;
he stood transfixed before the doors of the great houses through whose
iron grilles he saw courtyards of Oriental sumptuousness and arcades of
colored tiles, pavements with marble and chattering fountains casting a
stream of pearls day and night into a basin surrounded by foliage. His
fate was sealed. To kill bulls or die! To be rich, to have the
newspapers talk of him, and to have the people bow to him, even though
it were at the price of his life. He despised the lower grades of the
art. He saw the _banderilleros_ expose their lives equally with the
swordsmen in exchange for thirty _duros_ for each bull-fight; and, after
a round of toil and horn-stabs, become old, with no other future than
some wretched business bought with paltry savings, or else a position at
the slaughter-house. Some died in the hospital; others begged alms from
their youthful companions. He would have nothing to do with
_banderilleros_ nor with spending long years in a _cuadrilla_ in
submission to the despotism of a _maestro_. He would begin with killing
bulls; he would tread the sand of the plazas as a swordsman!

The misfortune of poor Chiripa gave him a certain ascendency over his
companions, and he formed a _cuadrilla_ of ragged youths who marched
behind him to the _capeas_ of the _pueblos_. They respected him because
he was braver and better dressed. Some young girls of the street,
attracted by the manly beauty of the Little Cobbler, who was now in his
eighteenth year, and predisposed by his _coleta_, disputed in noisy
competition the honor of taking care of his comely person. Moreover he
counted on a patron, an old magistrate who had a weakness for the
courage of young bull-fighters and whose friendship infuriated Senora
Angustias and caused her to let loose some most indecent expressions
which she had learned at the Tobacco Factory in her younger days.

The Little Cobbler dressed himself in suits of English cloth well fitted
to the elegance of his figure, and his hat was always resplendent. His
friends took scrupulous care of the whiteness of his collars and
furbelows, and on certain days he proudly wore on his waistcoat a heavy
gold chain, a loan from his respectable friend, that had already figured
around the necks of other "boys who were starting out."

He mingled with broken-down bull-fighters; he could pay for the drinks
of the old _peones_ who recalled the deeds of famous swordsmen. It was
believed for a certainty that some protectors were exerting themselves
in favor of this "boy," awaiting a propitious occasion for him to make
his _debut_ in a fight of young bullocks in the plaza of Seville.

The Little Cobbler was now a _matador_. One day, at Lebrija, when a
lively little young bull came into the plaza, his companions had urged
him on to the greatest luck. "Dost thou dare to kill him?" And he killed
him! Henceforward, fired by the ease with which he had escaped danger,
he went to all the _capeas_ in which they announced that a bull was to
be killed, and to all the granges where bulls were to be fought to the
death.

The proprietor of La Rinconada, a rich farmer with a small bull-ring,
was an enthusiast who kept his table set and his hayloft open for all
the hungry who wished to divert him by fighting his cattle. Juan went
there in days of poverty with other companions, to eat and drink to the
health of the rural hidalgo, although it might be at the price of some
rough tumbling. They arrived afoot after a two days' tramp and the
proprietor, seeing the dusty troop with their bundles of capes, said
solemnly:

"Whoever does the best work, I'll buy him a ticket that he may return to
Seville on the train."

Two days the lord of the farm spent smoking on the balcony of his plaza
while the boys from Seville fought young bulls, being frequently caught
and trampled.

He sharply reproved a poorly executed cape-play, and called out, "Get up
off the ground, you big coward! Come, give him wine to get him over his
fright," when a boy persisted in remaining stretched on the ground after
a bull had passed over his body.

The Little Cobbler killed a bull in a manner so much to the liking of
the owner that the latter seated him at his table while his comrades
stayed in the kitchen with the herders and farm laborers, dipping their
horn spoons into the steaming broth.

"Thou hast earned the return by railroad, my brave youth. Thou wilt
travel far if thou dost not lose heart. Thou hast promise."

The Little Cobbler, starting on his return to Seville second class while
the _cuadrilla_ tramped afoot, thought that a new life was beginning for
him, and he cast a look of covetousness at the enormous plantation with
its extensive olive orchards, its fields of grain, its mills, its
meadows stretching out of sight in which were pasturing thousands of
goats, while bulls and cows lay quietly chewing the cud. What wealth! If
only he might some day come to possess something like that!




CHAPTER IV

AT CARMEN'S WINDOW-GRILLE


Gallardo's prowess in fighting young bulls in the _pueblos_, heralded in
Seville, caused the restless and insatiable amateurs, ever seeking a new
luminary to eclipse those already discovered, to fix their attention
upon him.

"He certainly is a boy of wonderful promise," they used to say, on
seeing him pass along Sierpes Street with short step, swinging his arms
arrogantly. "He must be seen on classic ground." This ground for them
and for the Little Cobbler was the ring of the plaza at Seville. The boy
was soon to find himself face to face with the real thing. His protector
had acquired for him a spangled costume, somewhat worn, a cast-off of
some bull-fighter who had failed to win a name. A _corrida_ of young
bulls was arranged for a benefit, and influential devotees, eager for
novelty, managed to include him in the programme gratuitously, as
_matador_.

The son of Senora Angustias declined to appear in the announcements
under his nickname of Little Cobbler, which he desired to forget. He
would have nothing to do with stage names, and less with menial offices.
He wished to be known by the names of his father, he desired to be Juan
Gallardo; no nickname should recall his origin to the great people who
undoubtedly would become his friends of the future.

The whole ward of the Feria flocked _en masse_ to the _corrida_ with a
noisy and patriotic fervor. The dwellers in the ward of Macarena also
showed their interest and the other popular wards allowed themselves to
be carried away with equal enthusiasm. A new _matador_ for Seville!
There was not room for all and thousands were left outside the plaza
anxiously awaiting the news of the _corrida_.

Gallardo fought, killed, was knocked down by a bull without being hurt,
and kept the public in constant anxiety by his daring, which generally
resulted fortunately and provoked colossal bellowings of enthusiasm.
Certain devotees, esteemed for their opinions, smiled complacently. He
had much to learn but he had courage and ambition, which is the
important thing.

"Above all, he goes in to really kill 'in classic style,' and he keeps
inside the field of reality."

At the opposite side of the plaza the old magistrate smiled
compassionately beneath his white beard, admiring the boy's bravery and
the fine appearance he made in the spangled costume. When he saw him
knocked down by the bull he fell back into his seat as if he were going
to faint. That was too much for him.

In one section proudly strutted the husband of Encarnacion, Gallardo's
sister, a leather-worker by trade, a prudent man, an enemy of vagrancy,
who had married the cigarette girl, captured by her charms, but under
the express condition of having nothing to do with her scamp of a
brother.

Gallardo, offended by his brother-in-law's distrust, had never ventured
into his shop, which was situated in the outskirts of Macarena, nor
descended from the ceremonious you when now and then of an afternoon he
met him at his mother's house.

"I am going to see how that shameless brother of thine dodges the
oranges," he had said to his wife as he set out for the plaza.

And now, from his seat, he bowed to the swordsman, calling him Juaniyo,
saying _thou_, playing the peacock, content when the young bull-fighter,
attracted by the many shouts, saw him at last and returned the greeting
with a salute of his sword.

"He is my brother-in-law," said the leather-worker so that those near
him might admire him. "I have always known the boy would amount to
something at bull-fighting. My wife and I have helped him much."

The finale was triumphal. The multitude rushed impetuously upon
Juanillo, as if they were about to devour him by their outbursts of
enthusiasm. Fortunately the brother-in-law was present to impose order,
to shield him with his body, and to conduct him to the hired coach in
which he seated himself at the bull-fighter's side.

When they arrived at the house in the ward of the Feria an immense crowd
was following the carriage with shouts of joy and acclamations of praise
that brought the people crowding to the doors. The news of the triumph
had reached there ahead of the swordsman and the neighbors ran out to
see him and to press his hand.

Senora Angustias and her daughter were at the door. The leather-worker
stepped out almost arm in arm with his brother-in-law, monopolizing him,
shouting and gesticulating in the name of the family that nobody should
touch him, as if he were a sick man.

"Here he is, Encarnacion," he said, shoving him toward his wife, "Not
even Roger de Flor himself--"

And Encarnacion had no need to ask more, for she knew that her husband
vaguely considered this historic individual the personification of all
greatness and that he only ventured to connect his name with portentous
circumstances.

Certain enthusiastic neighbors who came from the _corrida_ flattered
Senora Angustias, crying, "Blessed be the mother that has given birth to
such a valiant youth!"

Her friends overwhelmed her with their exclamations. What luck! And what
sums of money he soon was going to earn!

The poor woman wore in her eyes an expression of astonishment and doubt.
And was it really her little Juan that had made the people run with such
enthusiasm? Had they gone mad?

But she suddenly fell upon him as if all the past had vanished; as if
her worry and fretting were a dream; as if she confessed a shameful
error. Her great flabby arms wound around the bull-fighter's neck and
her tears wetted his cheeks.

"My son! Little Juan! If thy poor father could only see thee!"

"Don't cry, mother--for this is a day of joy. You shall see. If God
gives me luck I will build you a house and your friends shall see you in
a carriage and you shall wear all the Manila shawls you want."

The leather-worker received these promises of greatness with signs of
affirmation in the presence of his astonished wife, who had not yet
recovered from her surprise at this radical change.

"Yes, Encarnacion; this youth will do it all if he undertakes it. It was
extraordinary. Not even Roger de Flor himself--!"

That night in the taverns and _cafes_ of the popular wards they talked
only of Gallardo. The bull-fighter of the future! He has flourished like
the very roses. This boy is going to get away the favors from all the
Cordovan caliphs.

In these assertions was revealed Sevillian pride in constant rivalry
with the people of Cordova, which was also a land of good bull-fighters.

Gallardo's existence changed completely from this day. The young
gentlemen greeted him and made him sit among them around the doors of
the _cafes_. The pretty girls who formerly satisfied his hunger and took
care of his adornment, found themselves little by little repelled with
smiling disregard. Even the old protector prudently withdrew in view of
a certain indifference and bestowed his tender friendship on other boys
who were just beginning.

The management of the bull-plaza sought out Gallardo, humoring him as if
he were already a celebrity. By announcing his name on the programmes
success was assured, the plaza filled. The masses applauded wildly the
"boy of Senora Angustias," giving tongue to tales of his valor.
Gallardo's fame extended through Andalusia, and the leather-worker,
without being solicited, mixed in everything and played the part of
defender of his brother-in-law's interests. A thoughtful and expert man
in business, according to himself, he saw the course of his life marked
out.

"Thy brother," he would say to his wife at night as they went to bed,
"needs a practical man at his side to manage his interests. Dost thou
suppose he would think well of naming me his manager? A great thing for
him! Not even Roger de Flor himself! And for us--?"

The leather-worker contemplated in imagination the great riches Gallardo
was going to gain, and he thought also of his own five sons and those
that were still to come. Who could tell if what the swordsman earned
should fall to his nephews?

For a year and a half Juan killed bullocks in the best plazas of Spain.
His fame had reached Madrid. The devotees at the capital felt a
curiosity to see the "Sevillian boy" of whom the newspapers talked so
much and of whom the "intelligent" Andalusians boasted.

Gallardo, escorted by a group of friends from his native city who were
residing in Madrid, strutted along the sidewalk of Seville Street near
the Cafe Ingles. The pretty girls smiled at his compliments and their
eyes followed the toreador's heavy gold chain and his big diamond
ornaments acquired with his first earnings and on credit--discounting
the future. A _matador_ must show that he has an overplus of money by
decorating his person and treating everybody generously. How far away
were those days when he, with poor Chiripa, tramped along that same
pavement, afraid of the police, contemplating the bull-fighters with
admiration and picking up the stubs of their cigars!

His work in Madrid was lucky. He made friends and formed around him a
group of enthusiasts hungry for novelty who also proclaimed him the
"bull-fighter of the future" and complained because he had not yet
received the "alternative."

"He's going to earn money by basketfuls, Encarnacion," said the
brother-in-law. "He is going to have millions, if he doesn't have some
bad luck."

The life of the family changed completely. Gallardo, mingling with the
young gentlemen of Seville, did not wish his mother to continue living
in the house where she had passed her days of poverty. On his account
they had moved to a better street in the city, but Senora Angustias
inclined to remain faithful to the ward of the Feria, with the love
which simple people feel as they grow old for the places where their
youth was spent.

They lived in a much better house. The mother did not work and the
neighbors paid her homage, finding in her a generous lender in their
days of stress. Juan possessed, besides the loud and showy jewels with
which he adorned his person, that supreme luxury of every bull-fighter,
a powerful sorrel mare, with a cowboy saddle and a fine blanket bordered
with multicolored fringe across the pommel. Mounted on her he trotted
along the streets with no other object than to receive the homage of his
friends, who greeted his elegance with noisy _"Oles!"_ This satisfied
his desire for popularity for the moment. On other occasions he rode
with the young bloods, forming a sightly troop of horsemen, to the
pasture of Tablada, on the eve of a great _corrida_, to see the herd
that others had to kill.

"When I take the 'alternative,'" he was saying at every step, making all
his plans for the future depend on that.

He deferred until then a series of projects that would surprise his
mother, poor woman, overcome by the good fortune fallen suddenly upon
her house, and which, she thought, could not be surpassed.

The day of the "alternative" came at last, the day of Gallardo's
recognition as a killer of bulls. A celebrated _maestro_ ceded to him
his sword and _muleta_ in the open ring of Seville and the crowd went
mad with enthusiasm, seeing how he felled with a single sword-thrust the
first "formal" bull that appeared before him. The following month, this
tauromachic degree was bestowed again in the plaza of Madrid where
another _maestro_, not less celebrated, again gave him the "alternative"
in a _corrida_ of Miura bulls.

He was no longer a _novillero_; he was a _matador_, and his name figured
beside those of old swordsmen whom he had worshipped as unapproachable
gods when he was going about among the little towns taking part in the
bull-baitings. He remembered having lain in wait for one of them at a
station near Cordova to ask aid from him when he passed through on the
train with his _cuadrilla_. That night he had something to eat, thanks
to the generous fraternity that exists among the people of the queue
which impels a swordsman of princely luxury to hand out a _duro_ and a
cigar to the unfortunate little vagabond on the road to his first
_capeas_.

Contracts began to shower upon the new swordsman. In all the plazas of
the Peninsula they desired to see him, moved by curiosity. The
newspapers devoted to the profession popularized his picture and his
life, distorting the latter with novel episodes. No other _matador_ had
so many engagements. He was going to make money abundantly.

Antonio, his brother-in-law, told of this success with clouded brow and
loud protestations to his wife and her mother. The swordsman was an
ungrateful fellow--the history of all who rise suddenly. And he had
worked so hard for Juan! With what firmness had he argued with the
managers when the bullock-fight was arranged for him. And now that he
was a _maestro_ he had as a manager a gentleman he had met only a short
time ago; one Don Jose who was not one of the family but one for whom
Gallardo showed esteem on account of his prestige as an old connoisseur.

"And he will be sorry for it," he ended, adding, "A man has only one
family and where will he find such loving care as we have given him ever
since he was little? He is the loser. With me he would flourish like
Roger de--"

He interrupted himself, swallowing the famous name for fear of the jokes
of the _banderilleros_ and amateurs who frequented the house and who had
no respect for the historical object of the leather-worker's adoration.

Gallardo, with the generosity of a victor, gave some satisfaction to his
brother-in-law by putting him in charge of the house he was having
built, with _carte blanche_ as to expenses. The swordsman, overcome by
the ease with which money came into his hands, was willing to let his
brother-in-law rob him, thus compensating him for not having been chosen
as manager.

The _torero_ was to realize his desire of building a house for his
mother. She, poor woman, who had spent her life scrubbing floors for the
rich, should have her beautiful courtyard with marble pavements, with
tiled wainscot, and rooms with furniture like those of the gentry, with
servants, yes, many servants to wait upon her. He also felt united by a
traditional affection to the ward where his childish poverty had slipped
from him. He rejoiced to outshine the very people who had employed his
mother as a servant and to give a handful of _pesetas_, in moments of
need, to those who had taken shoes to his father or who had given him a
crumb in those sorrowful days. He bought several old houses, one of them
the same in whose _portal_ the cobbler had worked. He had them torn down
and began to build an edifice that was to have white walls with green
painted grilles, a vestibule lined with tiles, and a barred gate of
delicately wrought iron through which should be seen the courtyard with
its fountain in the centre and its marble columns, between which should
hang gilded cages with chattering birds.

Antonio's satisfaction at having full license in the direction and
profit of the works was diminished somewhat by terrible news,--Gallardo
had a sweetheart! He was travelling now in mid-summer, running over
Spain from one plaza to another, making famous sword-thrusts and
receiving applause; but almost daily he sent a letter to a certain girl
in the ward and in the short respites between wandering from one
_corrida_ to another abandoned his companions and took the train to
spend the night in Seville, courting her.

"Have you seen?" shouted the leather-worker, scandalized at what was
taking place "in the bosom of the home" before the very eyes of his wife
and mother-in-law. "A sweetheart! without saying a word to the family,
which is the only thing worth while in the whole world! The Senor wants
to marry. Without doubt he is tired of us. What a shameless fellow!"

Encarnacion approved these assertions with rude grimaces of her strong,
fierce face, content to be able to express herself thus against the
brother who filled her with envy by his good fortune. Yes, he had ever
been a shameless fellow.

But the mother protested. "No, indeed! I know the girl and her poor
mother was a chum of mine in the Factory. She is as pure as nuggets of
gold, trim, good, fine-looking. I have already told Juan that it would
please me and the sooner the better."

She was an orphan, living with an aunt and uncle who kept a little
grocery store in the ward. Her father, an old-time dealer in brandies,
had left her two houses on the outskirts of Macarena.

"A little thing," said Senora Angustias, "but the girl doesn't come
empty-handed. She brings something of her own. And as for
clothes--_Josu!_ you ought to see her little hands of gold; how she
embroiders the clothes, how she is preparing her trousseau."

Gallardo vaguely recollected having played with her when they were
children near the _portal_ where the cobbler worked while the two
mothers chatted. She was a sprightly creature, thin and dark, with eyes
of a gypsy--the pupils black and sharply rounded like drops of ink, the
corneas bluish white and the corners a pallid rose-hue. In their races
she was as agile as a boy and her legs looked like reeds; her hair hung
about her head in thick rebellious locks twisting like black snakes.
Then she had dropped out of his sight and he did not meet her until many
years afterward when he was a _novillero_, and had begun to make a name.

It was one Corpus Christi day--one of the few feasts when the women,
shut up in the house through Oriental laziness, go out upon the streets
like Moorish women at liberty, wearing _mantillas_ of silk lace and
carnations on their breasts. Gallardo saw a young girl, tall, slender,
and at the same time strongly built, the waist confined in handsome firm
curves with all the vigor of youth. Her face, of a rice-like pallor,
colored on seeing the bull-fighter; her great luminous eyes hid
themselves beneath their long lashes.

"That girl knows me," said Gallardo to himself. "She must have seen me
in the ring."

And when, after having followed her and her aunt, he heard that it was
Carmen, the companion of his infancy, he was astonished and confused by
the marvellous transformation from the dark thin girl of the past. They
became sweethearts and all the neighbors discussed their affair, seeing
in them a new honor for the neighborhood.

"This is how it is with me," said Gallardo to his enthusiasts, adopting
a princely air. "I don't want to imitate other bull-fighters who marry
_senoritas_ that are all hats and feathers and flounces. For me, those
of my own class; a rich _mantilla_, a fine carriage, grace; that's what
I want--_Ole!_"

His friends, enraptured, spoke highly of the girl,--a splendid lass,
with curves to her body that would set any one wild, and what an air!
But the bull-fighter only made a wry face. The less they talked of
Carmen the better.

In the evening, as he conversed with her through a grated window,
contemplating her Moorish face framed in the flowering vines, the
servant of a nearby tavern presented himself, carrying glasses of
Andalusian wine on a painted tray. He was the envoy who came to collect
the toll, the traditional custom of Seville, which demanded pay from
sweethearts who talk through the grille.

The bull-fighter drank a glass, offering another to the girl, and said
to the boy:

"Give the gentlemen my thanks, and say I'll come along by the shop after
a while. Also tell Montanes to allow no one else to pay, that Juan
Gallardo will pay for everybody."

And when he had finished his talk with his betrothed he went into the
tavern where he was awaited by the tipplers, some enthusiastic friends,
others unknown admirers anxious to toast the health of the bull-fighter
in tall glasses of wine.

On returning from his first trip as a full-fledged matador he spent the
winter evenings close by Carmen's grated window, wrapped in his cape of
greenish cloth, which had a narrow collar and was made generously ample,
with vines and arabesques embroidered in black silk.

"They say that thou dost drink much," sighed Carmen, pressing her face
against the bars.

"Nonsense! Courtesies of friends that one has to return and nothing
more. Thou knowest that a bull-fighter is--a bull-fighter, and he is not
going to live like a begging friar."

"They say that thou goest with bad women."

"That's a lie! That was in other days, before I met thee. Man alive! I
would like to meet the son of a goat that carries thee such tales."

"And when shall we get married?" she continued, cutting off her
sweetheart's indignant remarks by a question.

"As soon as the house is finished, and would to God it were to-morrow!
That worthless brother-in-law of mine will never get it done. He knows
that it's a good thing for him and he is sleeping on his luck."

"I'll set things to rights, Juaniyo, after we are married. Thou shalt
see how well everything will run along. Thou shalt see how thy mother
loves me."

And so their dialogues continued while waiting for the hour of the
wedding which was being talked about all over Seville. Carmen's aunt and
uncle and Senora Angustias discussed it whenever they met, but in spite
of this the bull-fighter scarcely ever entered the home of his
betrothed. They preferred to see one another through the grille,
according to custom.

The winter passed. Gallardo mounted his horse and went hunting in the
pasture lands of some gentlemen who _thou_-ed him with a protecting air.
He must preserve the agility of his body by continual exercise, in
preparation for the next bull-fight season. He feared losing his
strength and nimbleness.

The most tireless propagandist of his glory was Don Jose, a gentleman
who performed the office of his manager, and always called him _his
matador_. He intervened in all Gallardo's affairs, not admitting a
better right even to his own family. He lived on his rents with no other
occupation than talking about bulls and bull-fighters. For him
bull-fights were the only interesting thing in the world and he divided
the human race into two classes, the elect nations who had bull-rings,
and the dull ones for whom there is no sun, nor joy, nor good
Andalusian wine--in spite of which they think themselves powerful and
happy though they have never seen even a single ill-fought _corrida_ of
bullocks.

He brought to his enthusiasm the energy of a warrior and the faith of an
inquisitor. Fat, still young, bald, and with a light beard, this father
of a family, happy and gay in everyday life, was fierce and stubborn on
the benches of a ring when his neighbors expressed opinions contrary to
his. He felt himself capable of fighting the whole audience in defence
of a bull-fighter friend, and he disturbed the ovations with
extemporaneous protests when they were offered to an athlete who failed
to enjoy his affection.

He had been a cavalry officer, more from love of horses than of war. His
corpulence and his enthusiasm for the bulls had caused him to retire
from the service. He spent the summer witnessing bull-fights and the
winter talking about them. He was eager to be the guide, the mentor, the
manager of a bull-fighter, but all the _maestros_ had their own and so
the advent of Gallardo was a stroke of fortune for him. The slightest
aspersion cast upon the merits of his favorite turned him red with fury
and converted the tauromachic dispute into a personal question. He
counted it as a glorious act of war to have come to blows in a _cafe_
with a couple of contemptuous amateurs who criticised _his matador_ as
being too boastful.

He felt as though there were not enough papers printed to publish
Gallardo's glory, and on winter mornings he would go and place himself
on a corner touched by a ray of sunlight at the entrance of Sierpes
Street, and as his friends passed, he would say in a loud voice, "No!
there is only one man!" as if he were talking to himself, affecting to
not see those who were drawing near. "The greatest man in the world! And
let him that thinks to the contrary speak out. The only one!"

"Who?" asked his friends, jestingly, pretending not to understand him.

"Who can it be? Juan!"

"What Juan?"

With a gesture of indignation and surprise he would answer, "What Juan
could it be? As if there were many Juans! Juan Gallardo."

"But, man alive," some of them would say to him, "one might think you
two lie down together! It is thou, may be, that is going to get married
to him?"

"Only because he don't want it so," Don Jose would stoutly answer, with
the fervor of idolatry.

And on seeing other friends approach, he forgot their jibes and
continued repeating:

"No! there is only one man. The greatest in the world. And he that
doesn't believe it let him open his beak, for here am I!"

Gallardo's wedding was a great event. The new house was opened with
it--the house of which the leather-worker was so proud, where he showed
the courtyard, the columns, the tiles, as if all were the work of his
hands.

They were married in San Gil, before the Virgin of Hope, called the
Virgin of Macarena. At the church door the hundreds of Chinese shawls
embroidered with exotic flowers and birds, in which the bride's friends
were draped, glistened in the sunshine.

A deputy to the Cortes stood as best man.

Above the black and white felts of the majority of the guests rose the
shining tall hats of the manager and other gentlemen, Gallardo's
devotees. All of them smiled with satisfaction at the deference of
popularity that was shown them on going about with the bull-fighter.

Alms were given at the door of the house during the day. The poor came
even from the distant towns, attracted by the fame of this gorgeous
wedding.

There was a great feast in the courtyard. Photographers took
instantaneous views for the Madrid newspapers. Gallardo's wedding was a
national event. Far into the night guitars strummed with melancholy
plaint, accompanied by hand-clapping and the click of castanets. The
girls, their arms held high, beat the marble floor with their little
feet, whirling their skirts and _mantillas_ around their slender bodies,
moving with the rhythm characteristic of the _Sevillanas_. Bottles of
rich Andalusian wines were uncorked by the dozen; from hand to hand
passed cups of ardent sherry, of strong _montilla_, and of the wine of
San Lucar, pale and perfumed. Every one was drunk but their intoxication
left them sweet, subdued, and sad, with no other manifestation than
sighs and songs, many starting at once to intone melancholy chants that
told of prisons, of deaths, and of the poor mother, the eternal theme of
the popular songs of Andalusia.

The last guests took their leave at midnight and the bride and groom
were left in the house with Senora Angustias. The leather-worker, going
out with his wife, made a gesture of desperation. He was drunk and
furious because no one had paid him any attention during the entire
day. As if he were nobody! As if the family did not exist!

[Illustration: Gallardo's wedding was a national event. Far into the
night guitars strummed with melancholy plaint.... Girls, their arms held
high, beat the marble floor with their little feet]

"They cast us out, Encarnacion. That girl, with her little face like the
Virgin of Hope, is going to be mistress of everything and there won't be
even a crumb left for us. Thou shalt see how they will fill the place
with children."

And the prolific man grew indignant thinking of Gallardo's future
offspring being brought into the world with no other purpose than to
harm his own.

Time went on. A year passed without Senor Antonio's prediction being
fulfilled. Gallardo and his wife appeared at all the functions with the
pomp and show of a rich and popular bridal pair; she with _mantillas_
that drew forth screams of admiration from the poor women; he, wearing
his brilliants and ever ready to draw out his pocket-book to treat the
people and to succor the beggars that came in bands. The gypsies,
coppery of skin and chattering like witches, besieged Carmen with happy
prophesies. Might God bless her! She was going to have a boy, a little
prattling babe, more beautiful than the sun itself. They read it in the
white of her eyes.

But in vain Carmen flushed with joy and modesty, lowering her eyes; in
vain the _espada_ walked erect, proud of his achievements, believing
that the coveted fruit would soon appear.

And then another year passed without the realization of their hopes.
Senora Angustias was sad when they spoke to her about it. She had other
grandchildren, Encarnacion's little ones, who by order of the
leather-worker spent the day in their grandmother's house trying in
every way to please their uncle. But she, wishing to compensate
Gallardo for the hardships of the past, prayed with fervent affection
for a child of his to care for, yearning to shower upon him all the love
she could not give the father in his infancy because of her poverty.

"I know what is the matter," said the old woman sadly, "poor Carmen has
no peace of mind. Thou shouldst see that unhappy creature when Juan is
travelling about the world."

During the winter, in the season of rest when the bull-fighter was at
home or went to the country testing bullocks and joining in the hunt,
all was well. Carmen was then content knowing that her husband was in no
danger. She laughed on the slightest pretext; she ate heartily; her face
was animated by the color of health; but as soon as the spring came and
Juan left home to fight bulls in the rings of Spain the poor girl, pale
and weak, would fall into a painful stupefaction, her eyes enlarged by
fear and ready to shed tears.

"Seventy-two bull-fights this year," said the friends of the house,
commenting on the swordsman's contracts. "No one is so sought after as
he."

And Carmen smiled with a grimace of pain. Seventy-two afternoons of
agony like a criminal doomed to death, awaiting the arrival of the
telegram at nightfall and at the same time dreading it! Seventy-two days
of terror, of vague superstitions, thinking that a word forgotten in a
prayer might influence the luck of the absent one! Seventy-two days of
painful paradox, living in a tranquil house, seeing the same people, her
accustomed existence running on, calm and peaceful as though nothing
extraordinary were happening in the world, hearing the play of her
husband's nephews in the courtyard and the flower-seller's song on the
street, while far, very far away, in unknown cities, her Juan, in the
presence of thousands of eyes, fought with wild beasts, seeing death
pass close to his breast at each movement of the red rag he held in his
hands!

Ah! those days of bull-fights, feast-days, on which the sky seemed more
beautiful and the once solitary street resounded beneath the feet of the
holiday crowd, when guitars strummed with accompaniment of hand-clapping
and song in the tavern at the corner. Carmen, plainly dressed, with her
_mantilla_ over her eyes, left the house as if fleeing from evil dreams,
going to take refuge in the churches. Her simple faith, which
uncertainty burdened with superstitions, made her go from altar to altar
as she recalled to mind the merits and miracles of each image. She went
to San Gil, the church that had seen the happiest day of her existence,
she knelt before the Virgin of Macarena, provided candles, many candles,
and by their ruddy glow contemplated the brown face of the image with
its black eyes and long lashes, which, it was said, resembled her own.
In her she trusted. For a good reason was she Our Lady of Hope. Surely
at this very hour she was protecting Juan by her divine power.

But suddenly indecision and fear rudely burst through her beliefs,
tearing them asunder. The Virgin was a woman and women are so weak! Her
destiny was to suffer and weep, as she wept for her husband, as the
other had wept for her Son. She must confide in stronger powers; she
must implore the aid of a more vigorous protection. And, in the stress
of her agony, abandoning the Macarena without scruple as a useless
friendship is forgotten, she went at other times to the church of San
Lorenzo in search of Jesus, He of the Great Power, the Man-God crowned
with thorns with the cross on his back, sweaty and tearful, the work of
the sculptor Montanes, an awe-inspiring image.

The dramatic sadness of the Nazarene stumbling against the stones and
bent beneath the weight of the cross seemed to console the poor wife.
Lord of the Great Power! This vague and grandiose title tranquillized
her. If the god dressed in brown velvet and gold would but deign to
listen to her sighs, to her prayers repeated in eager haste, with dizzy
rapidity, she was sure that Juan would walk unscathed out of the ring
where he was at that moment. Again she would give money to a sacristan
to light candles, and she passed hours contemplating the vacillating
reflection of the red tongues on the image, believing she saw in the
varnished face, by these alternations of shade and light, smiles of
consolation, kind expressions that promised felicity.

The Lord of Great Power did not deceive her. On her return to the house
she was presented with the little blue paper which she opened with a
trembling hand: "_As usual_." She could breathe again, she could sleep
like the criminal that is freed for the instant from immediate death;
but in two or three days again came the agony of uncertainty, the
terrible torture of doubt.

Carmen, in spite of the love she professed for her husband, had hours of
rebellion. If she had known what this existence was before she married!
At certain moments, craving the sisterhood of pain, she went in search
of the wives of the bull-fighters who figured in Juan's _cuadrilla_,
hoping they could give her news.

Nacional's good woman, who kept a tavern in the same ward, received the
master's wife with tranquillity, wondering at her fears. She was
accustomed to such an existence. Her husband must be all right since he
sent no word. Telegrams cost dear and a _banderillero_ earns little. If
the newsboys did not shout an accident it was because none had happened.
And she continued attentive to the service of her establishment as if no
trace of worry could make its way into her blunted sensibility.

Again, crossing the bridge, Carmen went to the ward of Triana in search
of the wife of Potaje, the _picador_, a kind of gypsy that lived in a
hut like a hen-house surrounded by coppery, dirty youngsters whom she
threatened and terrified with stentorian yells. The visit of the
master's wife filled her with pride, but the latter's anxiety almost
made her laugh. She ought not to be afraid. Those on foot always escaped
the bull and Senor Juan Gallardo's good angel watched over him when he
threw himself upon the beasts. The bulls killed but few. The terrible
thing was being thrown from the horse. It was known to be the end of all
_picadores_ after a life of horrible falls; those who did not die
suddenly from an unforeseen and thundering accident finished their days
in madness. Thus poor Potaje would die--and so many hard struggles in
exchange for a handful of _duros_,--while others--

This last she did not say but her eyes revealed the protest against the
favoritism of Fate for those fine youths who, by a thrust of the sword,
took the applause, the popularity, and the money, with no greater risks
than those faced by their humbler associates.

Little by little Carmen grew accustomed to this new life. The cruel
suspense on bull-fight days, the visits to the saints, the
superstitious fears, she accepted them all as incidents necessary to her
existence. Moreover, her husband's good luck and the continual
conversation in the house on the events of the contest finally
familiarized her with the danger. The fierce bull became for her as for
Gallardo a generous and noble beast come into the world with no other
purpose than to enrich and give fame to those who kill him.

She never attended a bull-fight. Since that afternoon on which she saw
him who was to be her husband in his first _novillada_, she had not
returned to the plaza. She lacked courage to witness a bull-fight, even
one in which Gallardo did not take part. She would faint with terror on
seeing other men face the danger dressed in the same costume as her
Juan.

In the third year of their marriage Gallardo was wounded at Valencia.
Carmen did not know it at once. The telegram arrived on time with the
customary, "_As usual_." It was a merciful act of Don Jose, the manager,
who, visiting Carmen every day and resorting to skilful jugglery to
prevent her reading the papers, put off her knowledge of the misfortune
for a week.

When Carmen heard of it through the indiscretion of some neighbor women
she wished to take the train immediately to go to her husband, to take
care of him, for she imagined him abandoned. It was not necessary.
Before she could start the swordsman arrived, pale from the loss of
blood, and with one leg doomed to a long season of immobility, but happy
and anxious to tranquillize his family. The house was from that time a
kind of sanctuary, hundreds passing through the courtyard to greet
Gallardo, "the greatest man in the world," seated there in a big willow
chair with his leg on a tabourette and smoking as tranquilly as though
his body were not torn by an atrocious wound.

Doctor Ruiz, who came with him to Seville, prophesied that he would be
well before a month, marvelling at the energy of his constitution. The
facility with which bull-fighters were cured was a mystery to him in
spite of his long practice of surgery. The horn, dirty with blood and
animal excrement, often breaking into splinters at the blow, tore the
flesh, scratched it, perforated it, making at once a deep penetrating
injury and a bruised contusion, and yet these atrocious wounds healed
with greater ease than those in ordinary life.

"I don't know what it is, this mystery," said the old surgeon with an
air of doubt. "Either those boys have got the flesh of a dog, or else
the horn, with all its filth, carries a curative virtue that is unknown
to us."

A short time afterward, Gallardo went back to bull-fighting, his ardor
uncooled by the accident, contrary to the prediction of his enemies.

Four years after his marriage the swordsman gave his wife and mother a
great surprise. They were becoming landed proprietors, yea, proprietors
on a great scale, with lands "stretching beyond view," with olive
orchards, mills, great flocks and herds, and a plantation like those of
the rich gentlemen of Seville.

Gallardo experienced the desire of all bull-fighters, who long to be
lords over lands, breeders of horses, and owners of herds of cattle.
Urban wealth? No. Values in paper do not tempt them nor do they
understand them. The bull makes them think of the green meadow; the
horse recalls the country to their minds. The continual necessity of
movement and exercise, the hunt, and constant travel during the winter
months, cause them to desire the possession of land. According to
Gallardo the only rich man was he who owned a plantation and great herds
of animals. Since his days of poverty, when he had tramped along the
roads through olive orchards and pasture grounds, he had nursed his
fervent desire to possess leagues and leagues of land, enclosed with
barbed-wire fences against the depredation of other men.

His manager knew these desires. Don Jose it was who took charge of his
affairs, collecting the money from the ring-managers and carrying an
account that he tried in vain to explain to his _matador_.

"I don't understand that music," said Gallardo, content in his
ignorance, "I only know how to despatch bulls. Do whatever you wish, Don
Jose; I have confidence in you and I know that you do everything for my
good." So Don Jose, who scarcely ever thought about his own property,
leaving it to the weak administration of his wife, occupied himself at
all hours with the bull-fighter's fortune, placing his money at interest
with the heart of a usurer to make it fruitful. One day he fell upon his
client joyfully.

"I have what thou desirest, a plantation like a world, and besides, it
is very cheap; a regular bargain. Next week we will get it into
writing."

Gallardo was eager to know the name and situation of the plantation.

"It is called La Rinconada."

His desires were fulfilled! When Gallardo went with his wife and mother
to take possession of the plantation he showed them the hayloft where
he had slept with the companions of his wandering misery, the room in
which he had dined with the master, and the little plaza where he had
stabbed a calf, earning for the first time the right to travel by train
without having to hide beneath the seats.




CHAPTER V

THE LURE OF GOLDEN HAIR


On winter evenings when Gallardo was not at La Rinconada, a company of
friends gathered in the dining-room of his house after supper. Among the
first arrivals were the leather-worker and his wife, who always had two
of their children in the swordsman's home. Carmen, wishing to forget her
barrenness and oppressed by the silence of the great dwelling, kept her
sister-in-law's youngest children with her most of the time. They,
partly from spontaneous affection and partly by command of their
parents, affectionately caressed with kissings and cat-like purrings
their handsome aunt and their generous and popular uncle.

When Nacional came to spend an hour with them, although the visit was
rather a matter of duty, the circle was always enlivened. Gallardo,
dressed in a rich jacket like a country gentleman, his head uncovered,
and his coleta smooth and shiny, received his _banderillero_ with
waggish amiability. What were the devotees saying? What lies were they
circulating? How was the republic coming along?

"Garabato, give Sebastian a glass of wine."

But Nacional refused this courtesy. No wine for him! He did not drink.
Wine was to blame for the failures of the laboring class; and the whole
party on hearing this broke out into a laugh, as though he had made
some witty remark which they had been expecting. Then the
_banderillero_ began to be entertaining.

The only one who remained silent, with hostile eyes, was the
leather-worker. He hated Nacional, regarding him as an enemy. He also
was prolific in his fidelity, as befits a man of good principles, so
that a swarm of young children buzzed about the little tavern clinging
to the mother's skirts. Gallardo and his wife had been god-parents to
the two youngest, thus uniting the swordsman and the _banderillero_ in
the relationship of _compadres_. Hypocrite! Every Sunday he brought the
two god-children, dressed in their best, to kiss the hand of their
sponsors in baptism, and the leather-worker paled with indignation
whenever he saw Nacional's children receive a present. They came to rob
his own. Maybe the _banderillero_ even dreamt that a part of the
swordsman's fortune might fall into the hands of these god-children.
Thief! A man who was not of the family!

When he did not receive Nacional's words in silence and with looks of
hatred he tried to censure him, showing himself in favor of the
immediate shooting of all who stir up rebellion and are in consequence a
danger to good citizens.

Nacional was ten years older than the _maestro_. When Gallardo began to
fight in the capeas he was already a _banderillero_ in professional
_cuadrillas_ and he had been to America where he had killed bulls in the
plaza at Lima. At the beginning of his career he enjoyed a certain
popularity on account of being young and agile. He had also shone for a
few days as "the bull-fighter of the future," and the Sevillian
connoisseurs, their eyes upon him, expected him to eclipse the
bull-fighters from other lands. But this lasted only a short while. On
his return from his travels with the prestige of hazy and distant
exploits, the populace rushed to the bull-plaza of Seville to see him
kill. Thousands were unable to get in; but at the moment of final trial
"he lacked heart," as the amateurs said. He lodged the _banderillas_
with skill, like a conscientious and serious workman who fulfils his
duty, but when he went in to kill the instinct of self-preservation,
stronger than his will, kept him at a distance from the bull and
prevented his taking advantage of his stature and his strong arm.
Nacional renounced the highest glories of tauromachy. _Banderillero_,
nothing more! He resigned himself to be a journeyman of his art, serving
others younger than himself and earning a meagre salary as a _peon_ to
support his family and lay by some scanty savings to establish a small
industry by and by. His kindness and his honest habits were proverbial
among the people of the _coleta_. The wife of his _matador_ was fond of
him, believing him a kind of guardian angel of her husband's fidelity.

When, in summer, Gallardo with all his people went to a music hall in
some provincial capital, eager for gambling and sport after having
despatched the bulls in several _corridas_, Nacional remained silent and
grave among the singing girls with their gauzy dress and their painted
lips, like an anchorite from the desert in the midst of the courtesans
of Alexandria. He was not scandalized but he grew sad thinking of the
wife and children that waited for him in Seville. All defects and
corruptions in the world were, in his opinion, the result of lack of
education. Of course those poor women did not know how to read and
write. The same was true of himself and, as he attributed his
insignificance and poverty of intellect to that, he laid all misery and
degradation in the world to the same cause. In his early youth he had
been an iron-founder and an active member of the International Workmen's
Union, an assiduous listener to his more fortunate fellow-workmen who
could read in a loud voice what the newspapers said of the welfare of
the people. He played at soldiering in the days of the national militia,
figuring in the battalions which wore the red cap as the sign of being
implacable federalist propagandists. He spent whole days before the
platforms raised in the public squares, where various societies declared
themselves in permanent session and orators succeeded one another day
and night, haranguing with Andalusian fluency about the divinity of
Jesus and the increase in the price of articles of prime necessity,
until, when hard times came, a strike left him in the trying situation
of the workman black-listed on account of his ideas, finding himself
turned away from every shop.

He liked bull-fighting and he became a _torero_ at twenty-four, just as
he might have chosen any other trade. He, moreover, knew a great deal
and talked with contempt of the absurdities of the present state of
society. Not for nothing does one spend years hearing the papers read!
However ill he might fare at bull-fighting he would surely earn more and
have an easier life than if he were a skilled workman. The people,
remembering the time when he shouldered the musket of the popular
militia, nicknamed him Nacional.

He spoke of the taurine profession with a certain regret, in spite of
the years he had spent therein, and he apologized for belonging to it.
The committee of his district, who had decreed the expulsion of all who
attended bull-fights on account of their barbarous and retrograding
influence, had made an exception in his favor, retaining him as an
active member in good standing.

"I know," he said in Gallardo's dining-room, "that this business of the
bulls is a reactionary thing--something belonging to the times of the
Inquisition; I don't know whether I explain myself. The people need to
learn to read and write as much as they need bread and it is not well
for them to spend their money on us while they so greatly lack
schooling. That is what the papers that come from Madri' say. But the
club members appreciate me, and the committee, after a long preachment
from Don Joselito, have agreed to keep me on the roll of membership."

Don Joselito, the school teacher and chairman of the committee of the
district, was a learned young man of Israelitish extraction who brought
to the political struggle the ardor of the Maccabees and was
undistressed by his brown ugliness and his small-pox scars because they
gave him a certain likeness to Danton. Nacional always listened to him
open-mouthed.

When Don Jose, Gallardo's business manager, and other friends of the
master, jokingly disputed his doctrines at those after-dinner
gatherings, making extravagant objections, poor Nacional was in
suspense, scratching his forehead from perplexity.

"You are gentlemen and have studied and I don't know how to read or
write. That is why we of the lower class are like sheep. But if only Don
Joselito were here! By the life of the blue dove! If you could hear him
when he lets loose and talks like an angel!"

To fortify his faith, somewhat weakened by the assaults of the jokers,
he would go the following day to see Don Joselito, who seemed to
luxuriate in bitterness, as a descendant of the persecuted chosen
people, and look over what Joselito called his museum of horrors. The
Hebrew, returned to the native land of his forefathers, was collecting
relics of the Inquisition in a room of the school, with the vengeful
accuracy of a prisoner who might reconstruct bone by bone the skeleton
of his jailor. In a bookcase stood rows of parchment tomes--decrees of
sentences pronounced by the Inquisition and catechisms for interrogating
the offender undergoing torture. On one wall hung a white banner with
the dreaded green cross. In the corners were heaped instruments of
torture--frightful scourges and fiendish devices for cleaving, for
stripping and tearing human flesh, that Don Joselito found in the shops
of the curio-dealers and catalogued as ancient belongings of the Holy
Office. Nacional's kind and simple soul, easily roused to anger, rose in
rebellion at the sight of these rusty irons and green crosses.

"Man alive! And yet there are those that say--! By the life of the dove!
I would like to see some folks here!"

Often in summer, when the _cuadrilla_ was going from one province to
another and Gallardo went into the second class carriage in which "the
boys" were travelling, some rural priest or pair of friars would get on
board. The _banderilleros_ would nudge each other with their elbows and
wink one eye looking at Nacional, who seemed even more grave and solemn
in the presence of the enemy. The _picadores_, Potaje and Tragabuches,
lusty aggressive fellows, lovers of riots and fights who felt a decided
aversion to the ecclesiastical dress, urged him on in a loud voice.

"There's thy chance! Go at him for the good cause! Lodge one of thy
yarns in the nape of his neck."

The _maestro_, with all his authority as chief of _cuadrilla_, against
which none may parley nor argue, rolled his eyes, and looked at
Nacional, who maintained a silent obedience. But stronger than duty was
the impulse of his simple soul to convert, and an insignificant word was
enough to open a discussion with the travellers, to try to convince them
of the truth; and the truth was for him a kind of confused and
disordered remnant of arguments learned from Don Joselito.

His comrades looked at each other astonished at the wisdom of their
companion, well pleased that one of them should face professional people
and put them in a tight place, for they were almost invariably priests
of little learning. And the holy men, astounded at Nacional's confused
reasoning and the smiles of the other bull-fighters, finally resorted to
an extreme measure. Did men who continually exposed their lives to peril
take no thought of God and believe in such things as he said? At this
very moment how their wives and mothers must be praying for them!

The men of the _cuadrilla_ grew serious, thinking with timorous gravity
of the scapularies and medallions feminine hands had sewed to their
fighting garments before they left Seville. The _matador_, his sleeping
superstition aroused, was angry with Nacional, as though in this lack of
piety he foresaw danger to his life.

"Keep still and don't talk any more of your crudities. Pardon, Senores!
He is a good man but his head has been turned by so many lies. Shut up
and don't give me any impertinence. Damn it all!"

And Gallardo, to tranquillize these gentlemen whom he believed to be
trustees of the future, overwhelmed the _banderillero_ with threats and
curses.

Nacional took refuge in disdainful silence. All ignorance and
superstition! All from lack of knowing how to read and write! And firm
in his beliefs, with the simplicity of a man who possesses only two or
three ideas and will not let go of them, he took up the discussion again
in a few hours--paying no heed to the anger of the _matador_.

He carried his impiety even into the midst of the ring, among _peones_
and pikemen who, after having said a prayer in the chapel of the plaza,
went into the arena with the hope that the sacred emblems sewed to their
clothing would deliver them from danger.

When the time came to stick the barbs into some enormous bull of great
weight, thick neck, and deep black color, Nacional stood up before him
with his arms extended and the barbs in his hands, shouting insults at
him:

"Come on, you old priest!"

The "priest" dashed forward furiously, and as he approached, Nacional
lodged the _banderillas_ in the nape of his neck with all his strength,
saying in a loud voice, as if he had gained a victory:

"For the clergy!"

Gallardo ended by laughing at Nacional's extravagances.

"Thou makest me ridiculous. Our _cuadrilla_ will be branded as a herd of
heretics. Thou knowest that some audiences don't like that. The
bull-fighter should only fight bulls."

Nevertheless, he loved his _banderillero_, mindful of his attachment
which had sometimes risen to the point of sacrifice. Nacional cared not
if he were hissed when he lodged the _banderillas_ carelessly in
dangerous bulls as a result of his desire to get through quickly. He
cared nothing for glory and only fought bulls for his wage. But the
moment Gallardo walked sword in hand toward a treacherous bull the
_banderillero_ kept near him, ready to aid him with his heavy cape and
his strong arm which had humbled the necks of so many wild beasts. Twice
when Gallardo rolled on the sand, nearly caught by the dagger-like
horns, Nacional threw himself upon the animal forgetting his wife, his
children, his little tavern, everything, ready to die to save his
_maestro_. He was received in Gallardo's dining-room in the evenings,
therefore, as though he were a member of the family.

Gallardo and Don Jose, who sat across the table smoking, the glass of
cognac within reach of the hand, liked to start Nacional to talking so
as to laugh at his ideas, and they teased him by insulting Don
Joselito--a liar who turned the heads of the ignorant!

The _banderillero_ took the jokes of the swordsman and his manager
calmly. Doubt Don Joselito? Such an absurdity could not move him--no
more than if they should attack his other idol, Gallardo, telling him he
did not know how to kill a bull.

But when the leather-worker, who inspired him with an irresistible
aversion, began to joke him he lost composure. Who was that hungry
fellow who lived by hanging onto his master, to dare to dispute him!
And losing self-command, forgetting the presence of the master's wife
and mother and of Encarnacion, who, imitating her husband, curled her
be-whiskered lip and looked scornfully at the _banderillero_, he rushed
down grade into an exposition of his views with the same fervor with
which he discoursed in the committee. For lack of better arguments he
overwhelmed the ideas of the jokers with insults.

"The Bible? _Liquid!_ That nonsense about creation of the world in six
days? _Liquid!_ That about Adam and Eve? _Liquid_, also! All lies and
superstition."

And the word _liquid_, applied to whatever he believed false or
insignificant, fell from his lips as a strong expression of scorn. "That
about Adam and Eve" was for him a subject of sarcasm. How could all
human beings be descendants from one pair only?

"My name is Sebastian Venegas; and thou, Juaniyo, thy name is Gallardo;
and you, Don Jose, have your surname; and every one has his own, only
those of the parents being alike. If we were all grandchildren of Adam,
and Adam, for example, was named Perez, we would all have Perez for a
surname. Is that clear? But every one of us has his own because there
were many Adams and what the priests tell is all _liquid!_ Superstition
and ignorance! We lack education and they deceive us; I think I explain
myself."

Gallardo, throwing himself back with laughter, saluted his
_banderillero_, imitating the bellowing of a bull. The business manager,
with Andalusian gravity, offered him his hand, congratulating him.

"Shake, old boy! Thou hast done well! Not even Castelar could have done
better!"

Senora Angustias was indignant at hearing such things in her house,
horrified with the terror of an old woman who sees the end of her
existence drawing near.

"Shut up, Sebastian; shut thy big, wicked mouth, lost soul, or into the
street thou goest! Thou shalt not say those things here, thou devil! If
I did not know thee--If I did not know that thou art a good man--"

Finally she became reconciled to the _banderillero_, remembering how
much he loved her Juan and what he had done for him in moments of
danger. Moreover, it gave her and Carmen great ease of mind to know that
this serious man of decent habits worked in the _cuadrilla_ by the side
of the other "boys" and of the _matador_ himself, who, when he was
alone, was excessively gay in disposition and let himself be carried
away by the desire to be admired by women.

The enemy of the clergy and of Adam and Eve guarded a secret of his
_maestro_, however, that made him reserved and grave when he saw him at
home with his mother and Senora Carmen. If these women knew what _he_
knew!

In spite of the respect which every _banderillero_ should show his
_matador_ Nacional had dared one day to talk to Gallardo with rough
frankness, relying on his years and on their old friendship.

"Be careful, Juaniyo, for everybody in Seville knows the whole story!
They talk of nothing else and the news is going to reach your house and
there'll be such a riot it'll set fire to the hair of God himself--Don't
forget about that affair with the singing girl; and that was nothing!
This creature is more forceful and more dangerous."

"But what creature is that? And what riots are those thou art talking
about?"

"Who can it be? Dona Sol; that great lady who makes so much talk. The
niece of the Marquis of Moraima, the cattle-breeder."

And as the swordsman was smiling and silent, flattered by Nacional's
exact information, the latter continued with the air of a preacher
proclaiming the vanities of this world, "The married man should above
all things seek the tranquillity of his house. Women! _Liquid!_ They are
all alike and it is nonsense to embitter one's life jumping from one to
another. I am a married man and in the twenty-four years I have lived
with my Teresa I have never been faithless to her even in thought,
although I am a bull-fighter; and I had my day and more than one lass
has cast tender eyes at me."

Gallardo burst out laughing at his _banderillero_. He talked like a
father-superior. And was this the same man that wanted to eat the
priests up raw?

"Nacional, don't be hard on me. Every one is what he is and since the
women come, let them come. What does one live for? Any day he may go out
of the ring foot foremost. Besides, thou knowest nothing of the affair,
nor what a lady is. If thou couldst _see_ that woman!"

Then he ingenuously added, as if he wished to counter-act the expression
of scandal and sadness engraved on Nacional's countenance:

"I love Carmen very much, dost thou understand? I love her as well as
ever; but the other I love too. That is different. I don't know how to
explain it to thee. That's another matter. Drop it!"

And the _banderillero_ could make no further headway in his
expostulation with Gallardo.

Months before, when with the autumn came the end of the bull-fighting
season, the swordsman had had an adventure at the Church of San Lorenzo.
He was resting in Seville a few days before going to La Rinconada with
his family. To kill more than a hundred bulls a year with all the danger
and strain of the contest did not weary him so much as the ceaseless
travel from one end of Spain to the other during a period of several
months. These journeys were made in mid-summer, under a blistering sun,
over parched plains and in old cars whose roofs seemed to be on fire.
The water-jar belonging to the _cuadrilla_, filled at every station, was
not enough to quench the thirst. Moreover, the trains ran crowded with
passengers--people going to the fairs in the cities to see the
bull-fights. Often Gallardo, for fear of missing the train, killed his
last bull in one plaza, and, still dressed in his fighting costume,
rushed to the train, passing like a meteor of light and color among the
groups of travellers and baggage trucks, and changed his clothes in a
first-class compartment under the gaze of the passengers, who were glad
to travel with a celebrity.

When he arrived, worn-out, at some city where the streets were in festal
array, decorated with banners and arches, he had to endure the torment
of enthusiastic adoration. The connoisseurs and his personal adherents
met him at the station and accompanied him to his hotel. They were
well-rested and happy folk who grasped him by the hand and expected to
find him expansive and loquacious, as though on meeting them he must
perforce experience the greatest pleasure.

Frequently a single _corrida_ was not all. He had to fight bulls three
or four days in succession, and when night came, exhausted from
weariness and lack of sleep on account of his recent excitement, he gave
up all social affairs and sat at the door of the hotel in his
shirt-sleeves, enjoying the fresh air of the street. The "boys" of the
_cuadrilla_ lodged at the same inn and kept near the _maestro_, like a
brotherhood in a cloister. Some of the most audacious would ask
permission to take a walk along the illuminated streets and out to the
fair grounds.

"Miuras to-morrow!" said the _matador_. "I know what those walks are.
Thou wilt return at daybreak with two glasses too many and thou'lt not
fail to have some kind of an affair to take thy strength. No; thou canst
not go. When we get through thou mayest play."

And the work over, if there were a few days of liberty before the next
_corrida_ in some other city, the _cuadrilla_ would put off the trip,
and then the gay time would begin, far from the restraint of their
families, with abundance of wine and women in company with enthusiastic
devotees, who imagined this to be the everyday life of their idols.

The divers dates of the _fiestas_ obliged the swordsman to take absurd
journeys. He would leave one city to work in the other extreme of Spain,
and four days later he would return, fighting bulls in a town near the
first one. He almost spent the summer months, when _corridas_ were most
frequent, in the train, making a continual zigzag over all the railroads
of the Peninsula, killing bulls in the plazas, and sleeping on the
cars.

"If all my summer travel were arranged in a straight line," said
Gallardo, "it would sure reach to the North Pole."

At the beginning of the season he started on his travels with
enthusiasm, thinking of the multitude that talked of him throughout the
whole year, impatiently awaiting his coming; he thought of the
unforeseen events; of the adventures that feminine curiosity would
frequently yield him; of the life from hotel to hotel, with its changes,
its annoyances, its varied meals, that contrasted strongly with the
placid existence in Seville and the days of mountain solitude at La
Rinconada. But after a few weeks of this giddy life, in which he earned
five thousand pesetas for each afternoon of work, Gallardo began to
lament, like a child far from its family.

"Ah! My cool house in Seville! Poor Carmen who keeps it shining like a
little silver cup! Ah! _Mamita's_ cooking! So rich!"

He only forgot Seville on holiday nights, when he did not have to fight
bulls the following day; when all the _cuadrilla_, surrounded by
devotees anxious to give them a good impression of the city, gathered at
a _cafe flamenco_ where women and songs were all for the _maestro_.

When Gallardo went home to recuperate during the remainder of the year
he felt the satisfaction of the mighty who, forgetting honors, give
themselves up to the comforts of ordinary life.

He slept late, free from the tyranny of train schedules and unstirred by
any emotion when he thought of bulls. Nothing to do this day, nor the
next, nor the next! His travel ended at Sierpes Street, or the plaza of
San Fernando. The family seemed changed, happier and in better health,
having him safe at home for a few months. He went out with his hat on
the back of his head, twirling his gold-headed cane and admiring the big
brilliants on his fingers. In the vestibule some men were waiting for
him,--sun-browned men with a sour, sweaty, stench, wearing dirty blouses
and broad hats with ragged rims. Some were field laborers out on a
tramp, who thought it quite natural on passing through Seville to obtain
help from the famous _matador_ whom they called Senor Juan. Others lived
in the city, and _thou_-ed the bull-fighter, calling him Juaniyo.

Gallardo, with a memory for faces characteristic of a public man,
recognized them and permitted their familiarity. They were comrades of
his few school days or his youthful vagabondage.

"Business not going well, eh? Times are hard for everybody."

And before this friendliness could encourage them to greater intimacy he
turned to Garabato who stood holding the gate open.

"Tell the _senora_ to give thee a couple of _pesetas_ for each one."

Then he went out into the street whistling, pleased with his generosity
and the beauty of his life. He was detained on the next block by a
couple of old women, friends of his mother, who asked him to stand as
godfather to the grandchild of one of them. Her poor daughter was about
to become a mother at any moment; her son-in-law, an ardent Gallardist,
had come to blows several times going out of the plaza in defence of his
idol but dared not speak to him.

"But, damn it! Do you take me for the director of an orphan asylum?
I've got more god-children than there are in the poor-house."

To rid himself of them he told them to see his _mamita_. Whatever she
said should stand! And he went on, not stopping until he reached Sierpes
Street, bowing to some and giving others the honor of walking at his
side in glorious intimacy before the gaze of the passersby.

He looked in at the Forty-five Club, to see if his manager were there.
This was an aristocratic society of a limited membership, as its title
indicated, in which the talk was only of bulls and horses. It was
composed of gentlemen-amateurs and cattle-breeders, the Marquis of
Moraima figuring preeminently, like an oracle.

On one of these walks, one afternoon, Gallardo found himself sauntering
along Sierpes Street, and took a notion to enter the parish chapel of
San Lorenzo. In the little square before it stood luxurious carriages.
On this day the best families were wont to pray to the miraculous image
of Our Lord Jesus of the Great Power. Ladies stepped out of the coaches,
dressed in black, with rich _mantillas_; and men went into the church
attracted by the feminine assemblage.

Gallardo entered also. A bull-fighter must take advantage of
opportunities to rub elbows with persons of high position. The son of
Senora Angustias felt the pride of a conqueror when rich gentlemen bowed
to him and elegant ladies murmured his name, turning their eyes upon
him. Moreover, he was a devotee of the Lord of the Great Power. He
tolerated in Nacional his opinions on "God or Nature" without being much
shocked, for the Divinity meant for him something vague and indefinite,
like the existence of a great lord about whom one might listen calmly
to all kinds of blasphemy, because he is only known by hearsay. But the
Virgin of Hope and Jesus of the Great Power he had been accustomed to
seeing since his earliest years, and these must not be maligned. The
susceptibilities of the lusty youth were touched by the theatrical agony
of the Christ with the cross on his back, the sweaty countenance,
painful and livid like that of comrades he had seen stretched out in the
infirmaries of the bull-plazas. He must be on good terms with this
powerful lord and he fervently uttered several _pater-nosters_, standing
before the image, with the candles like red stars reflected in the
corneas of his Moorish eyes.

A movement among the women kneeling before him distracted his attention,
which had been absorbed in a plea for supernatural intervention whenever
his life should be in danger.

A lady passed among the worshippers, attracting their notice; she was a
tall, slender woman, of astounding beauty, dressed in light colors and
wearing a great hat with plumes beneath which shone the luminous gold of
her abundant hair.

Gallardo knew her. It was Dona Sol, the Marquis of Moraima's niece, the
"Ambassadress," as they called her in Seville. She passed among the
women paying no attention to their movements of curiosity, satisfied to
win their glances and to hear the murmur of their words as though this
were a natural homage that should follow her appearance in any public
place. The foreign elegance of her dress and her enormous hat were
outlined in their showy splendor against the dark mass of feminine
toilettes. She knelt, inclined her head as if in prayer for a few
moments, and then her light eyes of greenish blue, with their
reflections of gold, roved about the temple tranquilly as though she
were in a theatre examining the audience, searching for familiar faces.
Those eyes seemed to smile when they encountered the face of a friend
and persisted in their roving until they met Gallardo's, which were
fixed upon her. The _matador_ was not modest. Accustomed to being
himself the object of contemplation of thousands and thousands of
persons on bull-fight afternoons, he might well believe that, wherever
he was, the looks of all must of course be meant for him. Many women, in
hours of confidence, had revealed to him their emotion, the curiosity
and desire they felt on seeing him for the first time in the ring. Dona
Sol's gaze did not fall as it met the bull-fighter's; instead it
remained fixed, with the frigidity of a great lady, obliging the
_matador_, ever respectful to the rich, to turn his eyes away.

"What a woman!" thought Gallardo, with the petulance of a popular idol.
"Can that _gachi_ be for me?"

Outside of the church he felt a desire to wait, and he remained near the
door. His heart warned him of something extraordinary, as on afternoons
when good fortune was coming. It was that mysterious presentiment which
in the ring made him deaf to the protests of the public, throwing
himself headlong into the greatest dangers, and always with excellent
results. When she came out of the church she again looked at him
strangely, as if she had guessed that he would be waiting for her. She
stepped into an open carriage accompanied by two friends, and when the
coachman drove away she still turned her head to see the bull-fighter, a
faint smile on her lips.

Gallardo was distracted the remainder of the afternoon--thinking of his
former love affairs, of the triumphs of admiration and curiosity that
his bull-fighter's arrogance had won for him; conquests that filled him
with pride and made him think himself irresistible, but which now
inspired him with a kind of shame. A woman like that, a great lady, who
had travelled about the world and lived in Seville like an unthroned
queen! That would be a conquest! To his admiration of beauty was united
a certain reverence derived from ancient servitude, of respect for the
rich in a country where birth and fortune possess great importance. If
he should manage to claim the attention of that woman, what a tremendous
triumph!




CHAPTER VI

THE VOICE OF THE SIREN


Don Jose, firm friend of the Marquis of Moraima, and related to the best
families of Seville, had often talked to Gallardo concerning Dona Sol.

She had returned to Seville only a few months before, arousing the
enthusiasm of the young people. She came, after a long absence in
foreign lands, eager for everything pertaining to _la tierra_, enjoying
the popular customs and finding it all very interesting, "very
artistic." She went to the bull-fights arrayed in the ancient costume of
a _maja_, imitating the dress and pose of the beautiful women painted by
Goya. Strong, accustomed to sports, and a great horsewoman, the people
saw her galloping around the outskirts of Seville, wearing with her
black riding skirt a man's jacket, a red cravat, and a white beaver hat
perched on top of her golden hair. Sometimes she carried a spear across
the pommel of the saddle and with a party of friends converted into
_piqueros_, she went to the pasture grounds to tease and upset bulls,
enjoying this wild festivity, abounding as it did in danger. She was not
a child. Gallardo had a confused recollection of having seen her in his
youth on the _paseo_ of Delicias, seated beside her mother and covered
with white frills, like a luxurious doll in a show-case, while he, a
miserable vagabond, dashed under the wheels of the carriage in search of
cigar stubs. They were undoubtedly the same age,--she must be at the
end of the twenties; but how magnificent! So different from other women!
She seemed like an exotic bird, a bird of paradise, fallen into a
farmyard among mere shiny, well fed hens.

Don Jose knew her history. An eccentric mind had Dona Sol! Her mother
was dead and she had a considerable fortune. She had married in Madrid a
certain man older than herself, who offered to a woman eager for
splendor and novelty the advantages of travelling about the world as the
wife of an ambassador who represented Spain at the principal courts.

"The way that girl has amused herself, Juan!" said the manager. "The
heads she has turned in ten years from one end of Europe to the other!
She must be a regular geography with secret notes at the foot of each
page. Surely she cannot look at the map without making a little cross of
memory near all the great capitals. And the poor ambassador! He died, of
despondency, no doubt, because there was no longer any place to which he
could be sent. The good gentleman, accredited to represent our country,
would go to a court and inside of a year, behold! the queen or the
empress of that land was writing to Spain asking the minister to retire
the ambassador and his dreaded consort, whom the newspapers called 'the
irresistible Spanish woman.' The crowned heads that _gachi_ has turned!
Queens trembled when they saw her come, as if she were the Asiatic
cholera. At last the poor ambassador saw no other place for his talents
but the republics of America, but as he was a gentleman of good
principles and the friend of kings, he preferred to die. And don't think
that the girl contented herself only with personages who eat and dance
in royal palaces. Not if what they say be true! That child is all
extremes; it is all or nothing! She will as soon go after one that digs
in the ground as the highest above it. I have heard that there in Russia
she was running after one of those bushy-haired fellows that throw
bombs, a youth with a woman's face, who paid no attention to her because
she disturbed him in his business. But the girl kept chasing and chasing
after him until finally they hung him. They say, too, that she had an
affair with a painter in Paris, and they even say he painted her in the
nude, with one arm over her face so as not to be recognized, and that
the picture travels around that way on match-boxes. That must be false;
an exaggeration! What seems more certain is that she was the great
friend of a German, a musician--one of those who write operas. If thou
couldst hear her play the piano! And when she sings! Just like one of
those singers that come to the theatre of San Fernando in the Easter
season. And think not that she sings in Italian only; she talks
anything--French, German, English. Her uncle, the Marquis of Moraima,
when he talks about her at the Forty-five says he has his suspicions
that she speaks Latin. What a woman! Eh, Juanillo? What an interesting
creature!

"In Seville," he went on, "she leads an exemplary life. On that account
I think what they tell of her foreign affairs may be false; lies of
certain young cocks that go for grapes and find them sour."

And laughing at the spirit of this woman, who at times was as bold and
as aggressive as a man, he repeated the rumors that had circulated in
certain clubs on Sierpes Street. When the "Ambassadress" came to live in
Seville, all the young people had formed a court around her.

"Imagine, Juanillo, an elegant woman, different from those around here,
bringing her clothes and hats from Paris, her perfume from London;
besides being a friend of kings, branded with the brand of the finest
stock in Europe, so to speak. They followed in her wake like mad men,
and the girl permitted them certain liberties, wanting to live among
them like a man. But some of them transgressed the bounds, mistaking
familiarity for something else, and, at a loss for words, they made too
free with their hands. Then there were blows, Juan, and something worse.
That young lady is dangerous. It seems that she shoots at a mark, that
she knows how to box like an English sailor, and knows besides, that
Japanese way of fighting that they call _jitsu_. To sum it all up, if a
Christian dares to give her a pinch, she, with her dainty little fists,
without even getting angry, will grasp thee and leave thee torn to
shreds. Now they attack her less, but she has enemies who go about
talking evil of her; some praising what is a lie, others even denying
that she is clever."

Dona Sol, according to the manager, was enthusiastic over life in
Seville. After a long sojourn in cold, foggy lands she admired the
intensely blue sky and the winter sun of soft gold, and she discoursed
on the sweetness of life in this country--_so picturesque!_

"The simplicity of our customs fills her with enthusiasm. She is like
one of those English women that come in Holy Week--as if she had not
been born in Seville; as if she saw it for the first time! They say she
spends her summers in foreign cities and her winters here. She is tired
of her life in palaces and courts, and if thou didst but see the people
she goes with! She has made them receive her like a sister in the
convent of Cristo de Triana and that of the Most Holy Cachorro, and she
has spent a pot of money on wine for the brotherhood. Some nights she
fills her house with guitarists and dancers, for so many girls in
Seville are good singers and dancers. With them go their teachers and
their families, even to their most distant relatives; they all stuff
themselves with olives, sausages, and wine, and Dona Sol, seated in a
big chair like a queen, spends the hours demanding dance after dance,
all which must be native to the country. They say this is a diversion
equal to that which was given to I don't know what king, who had operas
sung for himself alone. Her servants, foreign fellows that have come
with her, long-faced and serious as parrots, go about in their evening
dress with great trays, passing glasses to the dancers who in plain
sight box their ears and snap olive stones in their eyes. Most honest
and diverting games! Now, Dona Sol receives Lechuzo in the mornings, an
old gypsy who gives guitar lessons, master of the purest style; and when
her visitors don't find her with the instrument on her lap, she is with
an orange in her hand. The oranges that creature has eaten since she
came! And still she isn't satisfied!"

Thus continued Don Jose, explaining to his _matador_ the eccentricities
of Dona Sol.

Four days after Gallardo had seen her in the parish church of San
Lorenzo, the manager approached the _matador_ in a _cafe_ on Sierpes
Street with an air of mystery.

"_Gacho_, thou art a child of good fortune. Knowest who has been talking
to me about thee?"

And putting his mouth close to the bull-fighter's ear he whispered,
"Dona Sol!"

She had asked him about his _matador_, and expressed a desire to meet
him. She was such an original type! So Spanish!

"She says she has seen thee kill several times, once in Madrid and
again, I know not where. She has applauded thee. She recognizes that
thou are very brave. What if she should take up with thee! Imagine it!
What an honor! Thou wouldst be a brother-in-law, or something like that,
of all the high-toned fellows on the European calendar of swells."

Gallardo smiled modestly, lowering his eyes, but at the same time he
twisted his handsome person proudly as if he did not consider his
manager's hypothesis either difficult or extraordinary.

"But do not form illusions, Juanillo," continued he; "Dona Sol wishes to
study a bull-fighter at close range, with the same interest that she
takes lessons from the master Lechuzo. Local color and nothing more!
'Bring him day after to-morrow to Tablada,' she told me. Thou knowest
what that will be--a baiting of the cattle of the Moraima herd; an
entertainment the Marquis has gotten up to divert his niece. We will go;
she has invited me also."

Two days later, in the afternoon, the _maestro_ and his manager started
from the ward of the Feria like gentlemen _picadores_, eagerly watched
by the people who peeped out of the doors and stood in groups on the
sidewalks.

"They are going to Tablada," they said. "There is to be a bull-baiting."

The manager, mounted on a large-boned mare, was in the dress of the
country, short jacket, cloth trousers with yellow gaiters, and leather
leggings. The swordsman had arrayed himself for the event in his usual
bizarre dress of the ancient bull-fighters, before modern fashion had
levelled their apparel to that of other mortals. A crush hat of velvet
with a plaited band was held on by a chin-strap; the collar of the
shirt, innocent of cravat, was fastened with a pair of brilliants and
two larger ones sparkled on the undulating bosom; the jacket and
waistcoat were of wine-colored velvet with black loops and hangings;
lastly there was a red silk belt and tight knee-breeches of dark mixed
weave bound at the knees with garters of black braid. His leggings were
amber-colored, with leather fringes along the side, and boots of the
same color, half hidden in the wide Moorish stirrups, exposed to view
great silver spurs. Over the saddle-horn, on top of the gay Jerez
blanket whose tassels hung on both sides of the horse, lay a gray jacket
with black trimmings and red lining.

The two horsemen rode at a gallop, carrying on their shoulders javelins
made of fine elastic wood, with balls on the end to guard the tip. Their
passage through the populous ward aroused an ovation. Hurrah! The women
waved their hands.

"God be with you, Senores! Amuse yourself, Senor Juan!"

They spurred their horses to escape from the crowd of youngsters that
ran after them, and the narrow lanes with their blue pavements and white
walls rang with the rhythmic beat of the horseshoes.

On the quiet street of manorial houses with massive grilled gates and
great balconies, where Dona Sol lived, they met other riders before the
door, sitting on their horses, leaning on their lances. They were young
gentlemen, relatives or friends of the lady, who greeted the
bull-fighter with amiable familiarity, happy to have him in the party.
The Marquis of Moraima came out of the house and immediately mounted his
horse.

"The child will be down immediately. Everybody knows the women--how long
they take to get ready."

He said this with the sententious gravity that he gave to all his words,
as if he were uttering oracles. He was a tall, big-boned old man, with
long white whiskers in the midst of which his mouth and eyes preserved
an infantile ingenuousness. Courteous and measured in his speech,
genteel in manner, moderate in his smile, the Marquis of Moraima was a
fine gentleman of the type of by-gone days. He was dressed almost always
in riding clothes, hating the city life, bored by the social demands of
his family when detained by them in S

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