The Car of Destiny
tier of the audience, as a breeze blows over a wheat-field. The first part
had been but a pretty play; now was coming the real thing, with the best
bulls, and the best _espadas_ of Spain.
The bride in her white mantilla looked down at her fan, and counted the
gilded ivory sticks, when the first bull charged the first horse. She, the
Queen of Spain, must not seem to flinch, though her English eyes had never
seen such crimson sights as these. This was the national sport; she must
learn to understand that when men yelled, and even women cried “_Buena
vara!_” it was not with joy because a horse’s side was torn, but because a
picador had made the perfect thrust. She must seem to love what the people
loved, if she wished them to love her; but not far off sat another young
girl in white, who had no such compelling obligations.
Monica, warned beforehand perhaps, when she was forced to come, put up her
fan whenever a bull rushed towards a horse, and would no doubt have kept
it there had not her mother spoken to her more than once, peremptorily. As
for Pilar, though she did not lift her fan, she seemed to see nothing, for
she sat with her head bowed, only starting and looking up when the horn
sounded for a new bull.
At last there was no more question as to whether the King and Queen would
stay to see Vivillo play his part. The fourth bull had been dragged away
dead by the team of tasselled mules, and the piercing blast, which had
grown to sound tragic in my ears, summoned Vivillo, all unknowing, to his
fate. And the royalties kept their seats, though the afternoon waned, and
shadow—like the creeping shadow of death—darkened two-thirds of the arena.
So keen was my sympathy with Pilar that I felt my throat contract and my
mouth go dry. So must it be with her at this moment which called her brave
favourite to his death; so, like mine, only faster and more thickly, must
her heart be beating.
Could she, after all, bear the ordeal? Would she not turn and hurry out
before the first picador drew the blood she had tried so hard to save? But
no; she sat still, her eyes large, her face blanched, and one hand twisted
in the folds of her lace mantilla as it rose and fell on her breast.
Before the dead was well out of the ring, and his red track sanded, the
door of the _toril_ was thrown open for the fifth bull, said never to be a
coward. It was a compliment to Carmona and to Vivillo to be chosen for
this position on the programme, since it has become a proverb that the
pick of the _corrida_ should be fifth on the list. It was also a
compliment to Carmona that the King should wait to see how his Vivillo
would die.
The _buñolero_ sprang back as he opened the door, retiring more hastily
than was his wont into the space between the barriers out of the bull’s
way. It was as if he, too, expected the new-comer to be something beyond
the ordinary in ferocity or cunning; for Carmona’s bulls, like those of
the Muira breed, are famed for their terrible habit of ignoring the cloak
and charging at the body of the man who holds it.
Some bulls had rushed into the arena and blindly attacked the first object
which came within their dazed vision; but my heart had time to beat twice
before that noble form, which I had last seen in peaceful pasture, deigned
to show itself at the dark exit of the _toril_.
It was as if Vivillo wished to prove how he scorned the puny prick of that
fish-hook dart hidden by a rosette of green and purple ribbon, supreme
indifference to the strange scene which burst upon eyes accustomed for
long to darkness, and haughty superiority to thirst and hunger which
irritated weaker animals to frenzy. No one, seeing the great bull stand
with his head up, questioning, surprised, could have mistaken his attitude
for cowardice. There was something ominous, even terrible, in his pause;
and it gave the waiting audience time to appreciate the magnificence of
his proportions, the length and dagger-keenness of his horns, the rippling
of the muscles under the brown satin of his skin, in the great chest and
lean flanks.
“This is not a bull,—it is a mountain,” shouted a voice; and other voices
praised Vivillo’s perfections, so soon to vanish off the earth. “Grandly
armed!” “He would face a battalion!” “Let Fuentes look out for himself!”
For Fuentes, best _espada_ left in Spain, bravest fighter of bulls
according to the classic methods, was to give Vivillo the death stroke,
when picadores and _banderilleros_ had done with him.
The yells of the vast multitude in an instant changed the bull’s proud
astonishment to fury. He seemed to realize that this new world, so
different from the old sweet, green one, was a world of enemies, every
soul against him, and he was ready to fight them all to the death. He
neither pawed the sand nor bellowed, for these are puerile betrayals of
temper to which the noblest bulls do not descend. Like a tornado he swept
across the ring, killed a horse with a single thrust, sent the picador
crashing against the _barrera_; and quick as a wild cat, strong as an
African lion, wheeled to lift another animal and its rider on his horns.
Half the length of the arena he trotted, upholding both, whilst the
audience rose to him and yelled admiration of his savage strength.
“This is like the good old days. You don’t see such a bull in ten
thousand,” men said to each other, as Vivillo flung the dead horse on the
sand, tumbling the picador over the _barrera_ into the _callijon_, and
raced off gamely to a third duel.
When he had killed three horses (knowing no distinction between their
innocence and man’s cruelty, after his shoulders had felt the lance) he
was apparently as fresh as when he left the _toril_. At this stage of the
death drama most bulls would be breathing hard; but though the brown
velvet of Vivillo’s neck was stained dark crimson, neither fatigue nor
pain made his strong heart labour.
More horses were given him, to die as others had died, all save one, which
the bull refused to touch because it was of the colour he knew and was
friendly with at home. It was led at last unscathed; but Vivillo had now
six horses to his credit, and his popularity with the audience had already
risen far beyond that of his predecessors. Still, his activity, instead of
diminishing, seemed to grow with the rising fever of his fury.
In ordinary cases the trumpet would now have sounded for the second act,
dismissing the picadors and summoning the _banderilleros_; but Vivillo in
his present condition was too formidable a foe to be teased by the bravest
with barbed, beribboned darts; and “_Caballos—caballos!_” was the cry.
Four more sacrificial beasts were brought, and he dealt with all, so
nearly goring one picador that an _espada_, dashing to the rescue, was
raced to the barrier, and had his stocking crimsoned as he vaulted over
it.
Vivillo’s list of victims had now swelled to ten, and though he had
accepted thirty-three _varas_, or thrusts of the lance, his great
shoulders scarcely shuddered under the red rain of his blood. Still, the
first act could not be further prolonged. The sharp, cruel blast of the
cornet gave the signal for the second to begin.
Dick and I had not spoken, and I dared not look towards Pilar. As the
crowd shouted an imperious demand for the great Fuentes to come into the
ring as _banderillero_, it seemed to me that centuries were swept away by
their wild voices; that this was not the bull-ring of Madrid, but the
Coliseum of Rome.
Vivillo waited, his head up, undaunted; and though his face and attitude
were menacing, the brown eyes, set wide apart, were radiantly innocent. He
seemed a creature made up of nature’s best, a product of blue sky, sweet
meadow, and pure air; of his kind, perfection. Did he think now of his old
home in the rich pasture-land, and the tinkle of the friendly _cabestros’_
bells? If he did, the home-sick thought did not make him fear to face what
was to come. Never once had he followed the example of two or three among
his predecessors, and turned towards the shut door of the _toril_ as if
for refuge. Always he had faced the enemy; and now he rushed to play with
his horns for the glittering _banderillas_ which waited for his shoulders.
Fuentes was consenting to the wish of the public, but two ordinary
_banderilleros_ were to precede him. The famous _matador_, who was
afterwards to kill this most popular bull of the day, would plant the last
pair of the six.
The first man, sparkling in satin and silver, lifted on high his two
barb-tipped sticks, gaily ornamented with tinsel paper, and called Vivillo
from a distance. His mocking voice infuriated the bull, who rushed upon
him; then, as he swayed lightly aside, it was all he could do to save
himself from the great animal’s sudden, swift turn, without placing either
of his _banderillas_. Again and again the play was repeated, but the
audience were saying that Vivillo was becoming crafty as Shylock. At last
one gay-coloured stick—“half a pair”—hung from Vivillo’s shoulders; twice
and three times the attempt was made before the “pair” was complete; and
the second _banderillero_ succeeded no better. But as Fuentes entered the
ring, condescending to play at the game of which he was once master, there
went up a roar of applause. Fuentes never failed; and that trick of
his—planting both feet on a handkerchief, nor deigning to move save for a
swaying of the body while planting the two barbs—was famous, a sight worth
seeing when the bull was even half as good as this. But for once even
Fuentes’ brilliant tactics were at a loss. Vivillo had brains, and used
them. He used his eyes, too, before charging, which not one out of five
hundred bulls can do; and if Fuentes played with him, he played also, a
game whose zest came from a hint of pressing danger. Once it seemed that
Vivillo would be over the _barrera_, in the _callijon_, and there was a
stampede of all the onlookers there. Again he threatened to demolish the
wooden barrier with his horns, and there was a wilder scramble than
before. But the _banderillas_ were planted at last, and the blood on
Vivillo’s brown shoulders lay like a crimson cloak. The great round of
applause was as much for the bull as for the _banderillero_; and every
face in the audience was tense with excitement as the horn sounded for the
death scene. With such a king of the arena anything might happen. It was
well that a master like Fuentes was the _espada_ who would deal with him,
or he might deal with the _espada_.
And so it was to end in the usual tragedy, and after a few more brilliant
moments of play the brave heart of the beast must feel the sword. I had
known, of course, that it must be so, and yet until now it had not seemed
a cold certainty. Perhaps I had vaguely hoped that Vivillo would vault the
_barrera_, and refuse to be coaxed back again; but, even if he had, he
could not have saved himself, and might have had to die some death less
glorious than by the _espada’s_ blade.
Fuentes was bowing under the royal box, asking the King-President’s
gracious permission to kill Vivillo as so noble a bull should be killed.
Then, sword and red _muleta_ in hand, he went to meet Vivillo, an alert
look on his face; for this was no common _res_, but a brave and wary
foeman, most worthy of his steel.
The deep silence of the thirteen thousand spectators was as great a
compliment as could be paid to man or bull, and Fuentes knew it. He knew
that the audience expected such play, before the death stroke, as had not
been seen in Spain for years, and he did not mean to disappoint them.
Still marvellously fresh, considering his doughty feats and loss of blood,
Vivillo showed no distress. But he had become visibly thoughtful, as if