The Blood of the Arena Part 17

Gallardo, when he had overcome the first intoxication of his good luck, contemplated the lady in wonder in the hours when they were alone, asking himself if all women of the great world were like her. Her caprices, her versatility, astounded him. He dared not _thou_ her; no, not that. She had never encouraged him to such familiarity, and once when he tried it, with hesitating tongue and trembling voice, he saw in her eyes of gilded splendor such an expression of aloofness that he drew back ashamed, returning to his old form of address.

She on the other hand used _thou_ in her speech to him, as did the great gentlemen friends of the bull-fighter, but this was only in hours of intimacy. Whenever she had to write him a short note, telling him not to come because she was obliged to go out with her relatives, she used _you_, and in her letters were no other expressions of affection than the coldly courteous ones which she might employ when writing to a friend of the lower cla.s.s.

"That _gachi!_" murmured Gallardo disheartened. "It seems as if she has always lived with scrubs who might show her letters to everybody and she is afraid. Anybody would say she doesn't think me a gentleman because I am a _matador!_"

Other peculiarities of the great lady made the bull-fighter sulky and sad. Sometimes, when he presented himself at her house, one of those servants who looked like fine gentlemen in reduced circ.u.mstances coldly barred the way. "The Senora is not in. The Senora has gone out." And he guessed it was a lie, feeling Dona Sol's presence a short distance away on the other side of door and curtains. No doubt she was getting tired, was feeling a sudden aversion to him, and just at the moment of the call gave orders to her servants not to receive him.

"Well; the coal is burned up!" said he as he walked away. "I'll never come back again. That _gachi_ is amusing herself with me."

But when he returned he was ashamed of having believed in the possibility of not seeing Dona Sol again. She received him holding out to him white firm arms like those of an Amazon, her eyes wide and wandering, with a strange light that seemed to reflect mental disorder.

"Why dost thou perfume thyself?" she complained, as though she perceived the most repugnant odors. "It is something unworthy of thee. I wish thee to smell of bulls, of horses. What rich odors! Dost thou not love them?

Tell me yes, Juanin; beast of G.o.d, my animal!"

One afternoon the bull-fighter, seeing her inclined to confidences, felt curiosity regarding her past and asked about the kings and great personages who, according to gossip, had crossed Dona Sol's life.

She responded with a cold look in her light eyes.

"And what does that matter to thee? Thou art jealous, maybe? And even if it were true, what then?"

She remained silent a long while, her gaze wandering, her look of madness accompanied always by fantastic thoughts.

"Thou must have beaten women," she said, looking at him with curiosity.

"Deny it not. That would greatly interest me! Not thy wife; I know that she is good. I mean other women, all those that bull-fighters meet; the women that love with more fury the more they are beaten. No? Truly hast thou never beaten one?"

Gallardo protested with the dignity of a brave man, incapable of ill-treating those who were not so strong as he. Dona Sol showed a certain disappointment on hearing his explanations.

"Some day thou must beat me. I want to know what that is." She spoke with resolution, and then her face clouded, her brows met, a blue effulgence animated the gold dust of her pupils.

"No, my strong man; mind me not; risk it not. Thou wouldst come out the loser."

The advice was valid and Gallardo had occasion to remember it. One day, in a moment of intimacy, a somewhat rude caress from his bull-fighter hands awoke the fury of this woman who was attracted to the fellow--and hated him at the same time. "Take that!" And her right hand, clenched and hard as a club, gave a blow up and down the swordsman's jaw, with an accuracy that seemed to follow fixed rules of defence.

Gallardo was stupefied with pain and shame, while the lady, as if she understood the suddenness of her aggression, tried to justify it with a cold hostility.

"That is to teach thee a lesson. I know what you are, you bull-fighters.

If I should let myself be trampled on once thou wouldst end by flogging me every day like a gypsy of Triana. That was well done. Distances must be preserved."

One afternoon, in the early spring, they were returning from a testing of calves in the Marquis' pasture. He, with a troop of hors.e.m.e.n, rode along the highway. Dona Sol, followed by the swordsman, turned her horse through the fields, enjoying the elasticity of the sod under the horses'

feet. The setting sun dyed the verdure of the plain a soft purple, the wild flowers dotted it with white and yellow. Across this expanse, on which the colors took the ruddy tone of distant fire, the shadows of the riders were outlined, long and slender. The spears they carried on their shoulders were so gigantic in the shadow that their dark lines were lost on the horizon. On one side shone the course of the river like a sheet of reddish steel--half hidden in the gra.s.s. Dona Sol looked at Gallardo with imperious eyes.

"Put thy arm around my waist!"

The swordsman obeyed and thus they rode, the two horses close together, the riders united from the waist up. The lady contemplated their blended shadows through the magic light of the meadow moving ahead of their slow march.

"It seems as though we were living in another world," she murmured, "a world of legend; something like the scenes one sees on tapestries or reads of in books of knight errantry; the knight and the Amazon travelling together with the lance over the shoulder, enamoured and seeking adventure and danger. But thou dost not understand that, beast of my soul. Isn't it true that thou dost not comprehend me?"

The bull-fighter smiled, showing his wholesome, strong teeth of gleaming whiteness. She, as if charmed by his rude ignorance, pressed her body against his, letting her head fall on his shoulder and trembling at the caress of Gallardo's breath upon her neck. Thus they rode in silence. Dona Sol seemed to be sleeping. Suddenly she opened her eyes and in them shone that strange expression that was a forerunner of the most extravagant questions.

"Tell me, hast thou ever killed a man?"

Gallardo was agitated, and in his astonishment drew away from Dona Sol.

Who? He? Never! He was a good fellow who had made his way without doing harm to anybody. He had scarcely ever quarrelled with his companions in the _capeas_, not even when they kept the copper coins because they were stronger. A few fisticuffs in some disputes with his comrades in the profession; a blow with a flask in a _cafe_; these were the sum of his deeds. He was inspired with an invincible respect for the life of man.

Bulls were another thing!

"So thou hast never had a desire to kill a man? And I thought that bull-fighters--!"

The sun hid itself, the meadow lost its fantastic illumination, the light on the river went out, and the lady saw the tapestry scene she had admired so much become dark and commonplace. The other hors.e.m.e.n rode far in advance and she spurred her steed to join the group, without a word to Gallardo, as if she took no heed of his following her.

CHAPTER VIII

DIAMONDS IN THE RING

Gallardo's family returned to the city for the _fiestas_ of Holy Week.

He was to fight in the Easter _corrida_. It was the first time he would kill in the presence of Dona Sol since his acquaintance with her, and this troubled him and made him doubt his strength.

Besides he could not fight in Seville without a certain emotion. He would be resigned to a calamity in any other town of Spain, knowing he would not return there for a long while; but in his own city, where were his greatest enemies!

"We shall see if thou dost shine," said the manager. "Think of those who will see thee. I want thee to be the greatest man in the world."

On Holy Sat.u.r.day the penning in of the bulls destined for the _corrida_ took place in the small hours of the night, and Dona Sol wished to a.s.sist in this operation as _piquero_. The bulls must be conducted from the pasture ground of Tablada to the enclosures in the plaza.

Gallardo did not a.s.sist, in spite of his desire to accompany Dona Sol.

The manager opposed it, alleging the necessity of his resting to be fresh and vigorous on the following afternoon. At midnight the road that leads from the pasture to the plaza was animated like a fair. The windows of the taverns were illuminated, and before them pa.s.sed linked shadows moving with the steps of the dance to the sound of the pianos.

From the inns, the red doorways flashed rectangles of light over the dark ground, and in their interiors arose shouts, laughter, tw.a.n.ging of guitars, and clinking of gla.s.ses, a sign that wine circulated in abundance.

About one in the morning a horseman pa.s.sed up the road at a short trot.

He was the herald, a rough herder who stopped before the inns and illuminated houses, announcing that the bulls for the penning-in were to pa.s.s in a quarter of an hour, and asking that the lights be put out and all remain in silence.

This command in the name of the national fiesta was obeyed with more celerity than an order from high authority. The houses were darkened and their whiteness was blended with the sombre ma.s.s of the trees; the people became quiet, hiding themselves behind window-grilles, palisades, and wire-fences, in the silence of those who await an extraordinary event. On the walks near the river, one by one the gas lights were extinguished as the herder advanced announcing the penning-in.

All was silent. In the sky, above the ma.s.ses of trees, the stars sparkled in the dense calm of s.p.a.ce; below, along the ground, a slight movement was heard, as if countless insects swarmed thick in the darkness. The wait seemed long until the solemn tinkling of far away bells rang out in the cool stillness. They are coming! There they are!

Louder rose the clash and clamor of the copper bells, accompanied by a confused galloping that made the earth tremble. First pa.s.sed a body of hors.e.m.e.n at full speed, with lances held low, gigantic in the obscure light. These were the herders. Then a troop of amateur lancers, among whom was Dona Sol, panting from this mad race through the shadows in which one false step of the horse, a fall, meant death by being trampled beneath the hard feet of the ferocious herd that came behind, blind in their disorderly race.

The bells rang furiously; the open mouths of the spectators hidden in the darkness swallowed clouds of dust, and the fierce herd pa.s.sed like a nightmare--shapeless monsters of the night that trotted heavily and swiftly, shaking their ma.s.ses of flesh, emitting hideous bellowings, goring at the shadows, but frightened and irritated by the shouts of the under-herder who followed on foot, and by the galloping of the hors.e.m.e.n that brought up the rear, hara.s.sing them with goads.

The pa.s.sage of this heavy and noisy troop lasted but an instant. Now there was nothing more to be seen. The crowd, satisfied at this fleeting spectacle after the long wait, came out of their hiding-places, and many enthusiasts started to run after the herd with the hope of seeing it enter the enclosures.

The amateur lancers congratulated themselves on the great success of the penning-in. The herd had come well flanked without a single bull straying or getting away or making trouble for lancers and _peones_.

They were fine-blooded animals; the very best of the Marquis' herd. On the morrow, if the _maestros_ showed bull-fighter pride, they were going to see great things. And in the hope of a grand _fiesta_ riders and _peones_ departed. One hour afterward the environs of the plaza were dark and deserted, holding in their bowels the ferocious beasts which fell quietly into the last sleep of their lives in this prison.

The following morning Juan Gallardo rose early. He had slept badly, with a restlessness that filled his dreams with nightmare.

He wished they would not give him _corridas_ in Seville! In other towns he lived like a bachelor, forgetting his family momentarily, in a strange room in a hotel that did not suggest anything, as it contained nothing personal. But to dress himself in his glittering costume in his own bed-chamber, seeing on chairs and tables objects that reminded him of Carmen; to go out to meet danger from that house which he had built and which held the most intimate belongings of his existence, disconcerted him and produced as great uneasiness as if he were going to kill his first bull. Ah! the terrible moment of leaving, when, dressed by Garabato in the shining costume, he descended to the silent courtyard! His nephews approached him awed by the brilliant ornaments of his apparel, touching them with admiration, not daring to speak; his be-whiskered sister gave him a kiss with an expression of terror, as if he were going to his death; his _mamita_ hid herself in the darkest rooms. No, she could not see him; she felt sick. Carmen was animated but very pale, her lips, purple from emotion, were compressed, her eye-lashes moved nervously in the effort to keep herself calm and when she at last saw him in the vestibule, she suddenly raised her handkerchief to her eyes, her body was shaken by tremendous sobs, and his sister and other women had to support her that she might not fall to the floor.