The Blood of the Arena Part 16

They must be cared for at all hours, heed must be taken in regard to their pasture and water, they must be moved from one place to another with changes of temperature. Each bull costs more to maintain than a family. And when he is ready he must be watched till the last minute so that he may not disgrace himself in the ring but do honor to the emblem of the breeder which he wears on his neck.

The Marquis had been compelled to quarrel with the managers and authorities of certain plazas, and had refused to furnish his animals because the band of music was placed over the bull-pens. The noise of the instruments upset the animals, taking away their courage and serenity when they entered the arena.

"They are just like ourselves," he said with tenderness. "They lack only speech. What do I say? Like us? There are some that are better than some people."

And he told about Lobito, an old bull, a leader, which he declared he would not sell even if they would give him the whole of Seville with its Giralda. He no sooner galloped in sight of the drove in which this jewel lived on the vast pastures, than a shout was enough to call his attention. "Lobito!" And Lobito, abandoning his companions, came to meet the Marquis, moistening the horseman's boots with his gentle muzzle; yet he was an animal of immense power and the rest of the herd lived in fear of him.

The breeder dismounted, and taking a piece of chocolate out of his saddle bags, he gave it to Lobito, who gratefully bowed his head armed with its gigantic horns. The Marquis advanced with an arm resting over the leader's neck, walking quietly through the drove of bulls, which grew restless and ferocious at the presence of the man. There was no danger. Lobito marched like a dog, covering the master with his body, looking in all directions, compelling respect among his companions with his flas.h.i.+ng eyes. If one more audacious drew near to nose the Marquis he encountered the threatening horns of the leader. If several united with dull stupidity to bar his pa.s.sage, Lobito thrust his armed head among them and opened the way.

An expression of enthusiasm and tenderness moved the Marquis' beardless lips and his white side-whiskers as he recalled the great deeds of some of the animals produced in his pastures.

"The bull! The n.o.blest animal in the world! If men were more like them the world would be better off. There was Coronel. Do you remember that treasure?"

And he showed an immense photograph with a handsome mounting, that represented himself in mountaineer dress, much younger and surrounded by several girls dressed in white, all seated in the centre of a meadow on a dark ma.s.s at one end of which was a pair of horns. This ma.s.s was Coronel. Immense and fierce toward his companions in the herd, he showed affectionate submission to the master and his family. He was like a mastiff, fierce to strangers, but letting the children pull him about by the tail and ears and put up with all their deviltry with growls of kindness. The Marquis had with him his young daughters, and the animal smelt of the little girls' white skirts as they timidly clung to their father's legs, until, with the sudden audacity of childhood, they ended by rubbing his nose. "Down, Coronel!" Coronel went down on his knees and the family seated themselves on his side, which moved up and down like a bellows with the _ru-ru_ of his powerful respiration.

One day, after much hesitation, the Marquis sold him to the plaza of Pamplona and attended the bull-fight. Moraima was moved by the recollection of this event; his eyes filled with emotion. He had never in all his life seen a bull like that. He came courageously into the arena and stood planted in the middle of it, surprised at the light after the darkness of the bull-pen, and at the clamor of thousands of persons after the silence of the stables. But the moment a _picador_ p.r.i.c.ked him he seemed to fill the whole plaza with his tremendous fierceness.

Before him, men, horses, nothing could stand. In one minute he threw the horses and tossed the _picadores_ into the air. The _peones_ ran. The plaza was like a regular branding-pen. The public shouted for more horses, and Coronel, in the meantime, stood waiting for some one to stand up and face him. Nothing like that for n.o.bility and power will ever be seen again.

As soon as they incited him to come on, he rushed up with a courage and speed that set the public wild. When they gave the sign to kill, with the fourteen stabs he had in his body, and the complete set of _banderillas_, he was as brave and valiant as though he had never gone out of the pasture. Then--

The breeder, when he arrived at this point, always stopped, to strengthen his voice, which grew tremulous.

Then--the Marquis of Moraima, who had been in a box, found himself, he knew not how, behind the barrier among attendants who were running about with the excitement of the eventful contest, and near to the _matador_, who was making ready his _muleta_ with a certain deliberation, as if wis.h.i.+ng to put off the moment for standing face to face with an animal of such power. "Coronel!" shouted the Marquis, leaning his body half over the barrier and beating the boards with his hands.

The animal stood still but raised his head at these cries--distant calls from a country he would never see again. "Coronel!" Turning his head the bull saw a man calling to him from the wall and he started in a direct line to attack him. But in the midst of his advance he slackened his pace and slowly approached until he touched with his horns the arms held out to him. His throat was varnished red with little streams of blood which escaped from the barbs buried in his neck and from the wounds in his hide, in which the blue muscle could be seen. "Coronel! My son!" And the bull, as if he understood these outbursts of tenderness, raised his dripping muzzle and dampened the Marquis' white beard. "Why hast thou brought me here?" those wild and blood-shot eyes seemed to say. And the Marquis, unheeding what he did, pressed kisses upon the animal's nose that was wet with his furious bellowings.

"Don't let him be killed!" shouted a good soul in the galleries; and as if these words reflected the mind of the public, an explosion of voices filled the plaza, while thousands of handkerchiefs fluttered above the tiers of seats like flocks of doves. "Don't let him be killed!" For a moment the mult.i.tude, moved by a vague tenderness, despised its own diversion, hated the bull-fighter with his glittering dress and his useless heroism, admired the valor of the animal, and felt inferior to it, recognizing that among so many thousands of reasoning beings the greater n.o.bility and sensibility were represented by the poor brute.

"I took him back," said the Marquis, with emotion. "I returned the management their two thousand _pesetas_. I would have given my whole hacienda. After he had been pastured in the meadow a month he didn't even have the scars on his neck. It was my intention to let that brave beast die of old age, but the good do not prosper in this world. A tricky bull that was not fit to look him in the face treacherously gored him to death."

The Marquis and his fellow cattle-breeders pa.s.sed suddenly from this tenderness toward the animals, to the pride they felt in their ferocity.

One should see the scorn with which they talked of the enemies of bull-fights, of those who protested against this art in the name of prevention of cruelty to animals. Foreigners' nonsense! Errors of ignoramuses, who only distinguish animals by their horns and think a slaughter-house ox the same as a fighting-bull! The Spanish bull was a wild-beast; the most heroic wild beast in the world. And they recounted the numerous combats between bulls and terrible felines, always followed by the noisy triumph of the national wild beast.

The Marquis laughed as he recollected another of his animals. A combat was arranged in a plaza between a bull, and a lion, and a tiger belonging to a certain famous tamer, and the breeder sent Barrabas, a wicked animal he had always kept by himself in the pasture because he was ever goring his companions, and had killed many cattle.

"I saw that, also," said Moraima. "A great iron cage in the centre of the ring, and in it was Barrabas. First they let the lion loose at him and the d.a.m.ned beast, taking advantage of the bull's lack of cunning, jumped onto his hind quarters and began to tear him with his claws and teeth. Barrabas jumped with fury to unfasten him and get him in front of his horns where his defences lay. At last, in one of his turns, he managed to toss the lion in front of him and gored him, and then, gentlemen, just like a ball, he smelled him from tip to tip a long while, shook him about like a figure stuffed with straw, till finally, as if he despised him, he tossed him to one side and there lay what they call the 'king of beasts' rolled up into a heap, mewing like a cat that has had a beating. Then they let the tiger at him and the affair was shorter yet. He had scarcely stuck his nose in before Barrabas hooked him and tossed him up, and after getting a good shaking, he went into the corner like the other, curling himself up and playing baby."

These recollections always provoked great laughter at the Forty-five.

The Spanish bull! Little wild beasts to face him! And in their joyful exclamations there was an expression of national pride, as if the arrogant courage of the Spanish wild beast signified equally the superiority of the land and race over the rest of the world.

At the time Gallardo began to frequent the Society, a new subject of conversation interrupted the endless discussions about bulls and the country's crops.

At the Forty-five, as well as all over Seville, they talked about "Plumitas," a bandit celebrated for his audacity, who each day acquired fresh fame by the fruitless efforts of his pursuers. The newspapers related his deeds as if he were a national personage; the Government was interpellated in the Cortes and promised an immediate capture which never took place; the civil guard concentrated and a regular army was mobilized for pursuing him while Plumitas, always alone, with no other auxiliary than his carbine and his restless steed, slipped in and out among them like a phantom. When their numbers were not great he faced them and dropped some one of them lifeless, and he was revered and a.s.sisted by the poor country people, miserable slaves on enormous estates, who saw in the bandit an avenger of the hungry, a quick and cruel justice, like that exercised by the ancient mail-clad knight errant. Plumitas demanded money from the rich and, with the air of an actor who sees himself watched by an immense audience, from time to time he succored some poor old woman or a laborer burdened with a family.

These acts of generosity were enlarged upon by the gossips of the rural mult.i.tude, who at all hours had the name of Plumitas on their lips but who were blind and dumb when questioned by the military or the police.

He pa.s.sed from one province to another with the ease of one who knew the country well, and the land-owners of Seville and Cordova contributed equally to his sustenance. Whole weeks would pa.s.s without talk of the bandit, when he would suddenly present himself on a plantation, or make his entrance into a town, scornful of danger.

At the Forty-five they had direct news of him, the same as if he were a killer of bulls.

"Plumitas was at my place yesterday," said a rich farmer. "The overseer gave him thirty _duros_ and he went away after breakfast."

They patiently tolerated this contribution and did not communicate the news to any but their friends. A denunciation meant declarations and all kinds of turmoil. Of what use? The civil guard pursued the bandit fruitlessly and when he became angry with the informers their property was at the mercy of his vengeance, utterly unprotected.

The Marquis talked about Plumitas and his deeds without dismay, smiling as if he were discussing a natural and inevitable calamity.

"They are poor boys that have been unlucky and have taken to the woods.

My father (may he rest in peace!) knew the famous Jose Maria and breakfasted with him twice. I have come across many of less fame who went around doing mischief. They are like bulls; courageous, simple people. They only attack when they are pressed, growing hotter under persecution."

"He had left orders at his farmhouses and at all the herders' huts on his vast territories for them to give Plumitas whatever he asked for.

According to tales of the overseers and cowboys, the bandit, with the old time respect of the peasant for good and generous masters, spoke in greatest praise of him, offering to kill any one who might offend the Senor Marques in the least. Poor fellow! For a pittance, which was what he asked when he presented himself, tired and hungry, it was not worth while to irritate him and attract his vengeance."

"The breeder, who galloped alone over the plains where his bulls pastured, had a suspicion of having several times crossed Plumitas' path without recognizing him. He must be one of those gaunt-looking hors.e.m.e.n he met in the country solitudes with no town in sight and who raised his hand to his grimy hat, saying with respectful simplicity:

"G.o.d be with you, Senor Marques!"

Moraima, when he talked of Plumitas, sometimes glanced at Gallardo, who, with the vehemence of the neophyte, railed against the authorities because they did not protect property.

"Some fine day he'll present himself to thee at La Rincona', boy," said the Marquis with his grave drawl.

"d.a.m.n it! Well, that will not please me, Senor Marques. Man alive! And must one pay such heavy taxes for that?"

No; it would not please him to run against that bandit on his excursions at La Rinconada. He was a brave man when killing bulls, and he forgot his life in the ring; but these professional man-killers inspired him with the terrors of the unknown.

His family was at his plantation. Senora Angustias loved country life after years spent in poverty in city houses. Carmen also enjoyed the peace of the country. Her industrious disposition inclined her to see to the work of the farm, enjoying the sweetness of owners.h.i.+p as she realized the extent of her property. Moreover, the leather-worker's children, those nephews and nieces who consoled her for her barrenness, needed the country air for the good of their health.

Gallardo had promised to join them, but put off his trip with all manner of pretexts. He lived in his city house without other companions.h.i.+p than that of Garabato, like a bachelor, and this permitted him complete liberty in his relations with Dona Sol. He thought this the happiest time of his life. Sometimes he even forgot the existence of La Rinconada and its inhabitants.

Mounted on fiery steeds he and Dona Sol rode out in the same costumes as on that day when they first met, sometimes alone, sometimes in the company of Don Jose, who by his presence seemed to mollify the scandal of the people at this exhibition. They were going to see bulls on the pastures near Seville, to test calves in the Marquis' herds, and Dona Sol, eager for danger, was enraptured when a young bull, instead of running away, turned against her at the p.r.i.c.k of her javelin and attacked her so that Gallardo had to rush to her rescue.

Again they went to the station at Empalme, if a s.h.i.+pment of bulls had been announced for the plazas which gave extra bull-fights late in the winter.

Dona Sol curiously examined this place, the most important centre of exportation for the taurine industry. Near the railroad there were extensive enclosures in which enormous boxes of gray wood, mounted on wheels, and with two lift-doors, stood by the dozens, awaiting the busy times of exhibitions, or the summer bull-fights. These boxes had travelled all over the Peninsula, carrying n.o.ble bulls to distant plazas and returning empty to be occupied by another, and yet another.

Human fraud and cunning succeeded in managing as easily as merchandise these wild beasts habituated to the freedom of the country. The bulls that were to be sent off on the train came galloping along a broad dusty road between two barbed wire fences. They came from far away pastures, and as they drew near Empalme their drivers started them on a disorderly race, so as to deceive them more completely by their scurrying speed. In advance, at full gallop, rode the overseers and herders, with pikes over their shoulders, followed by the prudent leaders covering the others with enormous horns, showing them to be old cattle. After them trotted the fierce bulls, the wild beasts destined for death, marching well flanked by tame bulls, who prevented their getting out of the road, and by strong cowboys who ran, sling in hand, ready to check with an unerring stone the pair of horns that separated from the group.

When they reached the enclosures the advance riders separated, remaining outside the gate, and the whole troop of bulls, an avalanche of dust, kicking, bellowing, and bell ringing, rushed impetuously into the place, the barricade suddenly closing behind the tail of the last animal.

People astride the walls or peering through the galleries excited them with shouts or by waving hats. They crossed the first enclosure, not noticing that they were shut in, but as though they still ran in the open country. The leaders, taught by experience and obedient to the herders, stood to one side as soon as they went through the door, letting the whirlwind of bulls that ran snorting after them, pa.s.s quietly through. They only stopped, with surprise and uncertainty, in the second enclosure, seeing the wall ahead of them, and as they turned, they found the gate closed in the rear.

Then the boxing up began. One by one the bulls were urged, by the waving of rags, by shouts and blows, toward a little lane in the centre of which was placed the travelling box with its lift-doors. It was like a little tunnel at the end of which could be seen the open s.p.a.ce of other gra.s.sy enclosures and leaders that walked peacefully about; a fiction of a far-away pasture which attracted the wild beast.

He advanced slowly along the lane, now suspicious of danger and fearing to set his feet on the gently sloping gangway that led to the box mounted on wheels. The bull divined peril in this little tunnel which presented itself before him as an inevitable pa.s.sage. He felt on his hind quarters the goad that urged him along the lane, obliging him to advance; he saw above him two rows of people looking over the barriers and exciting him with gesticulations and whistles. From the roof of the box, where the carpenters were hidden ready to let the doors fall, hung a red rag, waving in the rectangle of light framed by the other exit.

The p.r.i.c.ks, the shouts, the shapeless ma.s.s that danced before his eyes as if defying him, and the sight of his tranquil companions pastured on the other side of the pa.s.sage, finally decided him. He began to run through the little tunnel; he made the wooden inclined plane tremble with his weight, but he had scarcely entered the box when the door in front fell, and before he could turn back the one behind him slid down.

The loud grating of the locks was heard and the animal was swallowed up in darkness and silence, a prisoner in a little s.p.a.ce wherein he could only lie down with his legs doubled up. Through a trap in the roof armfuls of forage fell upon him; men pushed the perambulating dungeon on its little wheels toward the nearby railroad, and immediately another box was placed in the pa.s.sage, repeating the deception, until all the animals for the _corrida_ were ready to start on their journey.

Dona Sol admired these proceedings in the great national industry with all her enthusiasm for "color," and longed to imitate the overseers and cowboys. She loved life in the open, the gallop over the immense plains followed by sharp horns and bony foreheads that could give death with the slightest movement. Her soul overflowed with strong love for the pastoral life which we all feel sometimes within us, as an inheritance from remote ancestors in that epoch in which man, not yet knowing how to extract riches from the womb of the earth, lived by gathering the beasts together and depending on their products for his sustenance. To be a herder, and a herder of wild beasts, seemed to Dona Sol the most interesting and heroic of professions.