"Within a week of Molly's downfall Lory was out on me one day, when up rides Jack and says:
"'There's a splendid hunter in me stable I want ye to have, Lory. Got more than I can keep, and your stable must be a bit shy since you parted with the white mare. He's the bay seventeen-hander in the Irish lot. Stands me over a thousand, but you can have him at your own price; don't want the hardest, straightest rider of the hunt shy of fit meat and bone to carry him.'
"Belikes it was the blarney caught him, but anyway Lory buried his muzzle in Jack's pail till he could see nothin' but what Jack said it held, and took the bay at six hundred dollars just on a casual lookover.
"It was a good action, a grand jumpin' form, and rare pace the bay showed on a short try-out that afternoon, so much so I overheard Lory tellin' himself, when he was after dismounting just outside me box: 'Gad! but ain't old Jack easy money!'
"But when Lory and the bay showed up at the next day's meet, I noticed the bay's ears layin' back or workin' in a way to tell any but a blind one it was dirty mischief he was plannin'. Nor was he long playin' it. For about a third of the run the bay raced like a steeplechaser tight on the heels of the hounds, leadin' even the master, for Lory could no more hold him than his own glee at the grand way they were takin' gates and walls. But suddenly that bay divil's-spawn swerves from the course, dashes up and stops bang broadside against a barn; and there, with ears laid back tight to his head and muzzle half upturned, for four mortal hours the bay held Lory's off leg jammed so tight against the barn that, rowel and crop-cut hard as he might, the only thing Lory was able to free was such a flow of language, it was a holy wonder Providence didn't fire the barn and burn up the pair of them.
"And as Jack passed them I heard the divil sing not [Transcriber's note: out?]: 'Ha! Ha! Lory! it was the gray mare wanted to jump but couldn't, and it's the bay can jump but won't! It's an "oh hell!" for you and a "ha! ha!" for me this time!'
"Which, while they're still fast friends, was the last word ever passed between them on the subject of the funker and the balker."
CHAPTER XII
EL TIGRE
"A cat may look at a king, but the son of a village lawyer may not venture to bare his heart to the daughter of the Duque de la Torrevieja. And yet a man of our blood was ennobled early in the wars with the Moors, while the Duke's forebears were still simple men-at-arms, knighted under a name that in itself carries the ring of the heroic deeds that earned it."
The speaker, Mauro de la Lucha-sangre (literally "Mauro of the Bloody Battle"), stood one June morning of 1874 beneath the shade of a gnarled olive-tree on the banks of the Guadaira River, rebelliously stamping a heel into the soft turf. Son of the foremost lawyer of his native town of Utrera, educated in Sevilla at the best university of his province, already at twenty-four himself a fully accredited licenciado, Mauro's future held actually brilliant prospects for a man of the station into which he was born. And yet, most envied of his classmates though he was, to Mauro himself the future loomed black, forbidding, cheerless.
Mauro's father, by legacy from his father, was the attorney and counsellor of the Duque de la Torrevieja; and so might Mauro have been for the next Duke had there not cropped out in him the daring, the love of adventure, the pride, and the confidence that had lifted the first Lucha-sangre above his fellows. It was a case of breeding back—away back over and past generations of fawning commoners to the times when Lucha-sangre swords were splitting Moorish casques and winning guerdons.
Nor in spirit alone was Mauro bred back. He was deep of chest, broad of shoulder, lithe and graceful. His massive neck upbore a head of Augustan beauty, lighted by eyes that alternately blazed with the pride and resolution of a Cid and softened with the musings of a Manrique. Mauro was a Lucha-sangre of the twelfth century, reincarnate.
Little is it to be wondered at that, as the lad was often his father's message-bearer to the Duke, he found favor in the eyes of the Duke's only daughter, Sofia; and still less is it to be wondered at that he early became her thrall. Of nights at the university he was ever dreaming of her; up out of his text-books her lovely face was ever rising before him in class.
Of a rare type was Sofia in Andalusia, where nearly all are dark, for she was a true rubia, blue of eye, fair of skin, and with hair of the wondrously changing tints of a cooling iron ingot.
And now here was Mauro, just back from Sevilla, almost within arms'-reach of his divinity, and yet not free to seek her. And as the rippling current of the Quadaira crimsoned and then reddened and darkened till it seemed to him like a great ruddy tress of Sofia's waving hair, Mauro sprang to his feet and fiercely whispered: "Mil demonios! but she shall at least know, and then I'll kiss the old padre, and his musty office good-bye and go try my hand at some man's task!"
Opportunity came earlier than he had dared hope. The very next morning the elder Lucha-sangre sent Mauro to the castle with some papers for the Duke's approval and signature. Still at breakfast, the Duke received him in the great banquet-hall of the castle, the walls covered with portraits of Torreviejas gone before, several of the earlier generations so dim and gray with age they looked mere spectres of the limner's art.
While the Duke was reading the papers, Mauro stood with eyes riveted to the newest portrait of them all, that of Sofia's mother—Sofia's very self matured—herself a native of a northern province wherein to this day red hair and blue eyes are a frequent, almost a prevailing type, that tell the story of early Gothic invasions. So absorbed in the picture, so completely possessed by it was Mauro, that when the Duke turned and spoke to him, he did not hear.
And so he stood for some moments while the Duke sat contemplating the fine lines of his face and the splendid pose of his figure; his eyes lightened with admiration, his head nodding approval.
Then gently touching Mauro's arm, the Duke queried: "And so you admire the Duchess, young man?"
With a start Mauro answered, after a dazed stare at the Duke: "A thousand pardons, Excellency! But yes, sir; who in all the world could fail to admire her?"
"Yes, yes," replied the Duke; "God never made but one other quite her equal, and her He made in her own very image—Sofia; que Dios la aguarda!"
Mauro gravely bowed, received the papers from the Duke, and withdrew.
Turning to his secretary, the Duke sighed deeply and murmured: "Dios mio! if only I had a son of my own blood like that boy! What a pity he should be tied down to paltry pettifoggery!"
Meantime Mauro, striding disconsolate past an angle of the narrow garden of the inner courtyard, was detained by a soft voice issuing from the seclusion of a bench beneath the drooping boughs of an ancient fig tree: "Buenos dias, Don Mauro. Bueno es verte revuelto."
"Buenos dias, Condesa; and it is indeed good to me to be back, good to hear thy voice—the first real happiness I have known since my ears last welcomed its sweet tones. Good to be back! ah! Condesa Sofia, for me it is to live again."
"But, Don Mauro—"
"A thousand pardons, Condesa, but thy duenna may join thee at any moment, and my heart has long guarded a message for thee it can no longer hold and stay whole,—a message thou mayest well resent for its gross presumption, and yet a message I would here and now deliver if I knew I must die for it the next minute.
"From childhood hast thus possessed me. Never a night for the last ten years have I lain down without a prayer to the Virgin for thy safety and happiness; never a day but I have so lived that my conduct shall be worthy of thee. Though I am the son of thy father's licenciado, thou well knowest the blood of a long line of proud warriors burns in my veins. Hope that thou mightst ever even deign to listen to me I have never ventured to cherish—"
"But Don Mauro—"
"Again a thousand pardons, Condesa, but I must tell thee thou art the light of my soul. Without thee all the world is a valley of bitterness; with thee its most arid desert would be an Eden. The birds are ever chanting to me thy name. Every pool reflects thy sweet face. Every breeze wafts me the f
ragrance of thy dear presence. Every thunderous roll of the Almighty's war-drums calls me to attempt some great heroic deed in thine honor, some deed that shall prove to thee the lawyer's son, in heart and soul if not in present station, is not unworthy to tell to thee his love. And—"
"But, Mauro, Mauro m—mio!" And with a sob she arose and actually fled through the shrubbery.
Two days later the betrothal of the Countess Sofia to the Count Leon, the eldest son and heir to the Duke de Oviedo, was announced by her father. And that, indeed, was what she had tried but lacked the heart to tell him—that, wherever her heart might lie, her father had already promised her hand!
It was a bitter night for Mauro, that of the announcement, and a sad one for his father. Their conference lasted till near morning. The son pleaded he must have a life of action and hazard; his country at peace, he would train for the bull ring.
"Why not the opera, my son?" the thrifty father replied. "Thou hast a grand tenor voice; indeed the Bishop has asked that thou wilt lead the choir of the Cathedral. With such a voice thou wouldst have action, see the world, gain riches, while all the time playing the parts, fighting the battles of some great historic character."
"But no, father," answered Mauro; "such be no more than sham fights. Not only must I wear a sword as did the early Lucha-sangres, but I must hear it ring and ring against that of a worthy foe, feel it steal within the cover of his guard, see the good blade drip red in fair battle. True, there be no Moors or French to fight, but what soldier on reddened field ever took greater odds than a lone espada takes every time he challenges a fierce Utrera bull? And I swear to thee, padre mio, whatever my calling, I shall ever be heedful of and cherish the motto that Lucha-sangre swords have always borne: 'No me sacas sin razon; no me metes sin honor.'" (Do not draw me without good cause; do not sheath me without honor!)
The less strong-minded of the two, the father yielded, and even furnished funds sufficient for a year's private tutoring by Frascuelo, then the greatest matador in all Spain.
Thus the first time Mauro ever appeared before a public assembly was a chief espada of a cuadrilla of his own, at Valladolid. An apt pupil from the start, bent upon reaching the highest rank, of extraordinary strength and activity, utterly fearless but cool headed, a natural general, at the close of his first corrida he was acclaimed the certain successor of the great Frascuelo himself, and at the same time christened El Tigre (the Tiger) for the feline swiftness of his movements and the ferocity of his attacks.
The next eight years were for El Tigre fruitful of fame and riches but utterly arid and barren of even the most casual feminine attachment. Well educated, clever, with the manners of a courtier, and with physical beauty and personal charm few men equalled, he was invited by the nobility often, received as an equal by the men and literally courted by the women. But the attentions of women were all to no purpose. For El Tigre only one woman existed—Sofia, now the Duchess de Oviedo—though he had never again set eyes on her from the hour of their parting beneath the fig tree.
Owners of large Mexican sugar estates in the valley of Cuautla, the Duke and Sofia divided their time between Paris and Mexico. Their marriage was far from happy. Before their union, busy tongues had brought Count Leon rumors of her admiration for Mauro, rousing suspicions that were not long crystallizing into certainty that, while she was a faithful, honest wife, he could never win of her the affection he gave and craved. Obviously proud of her, always devoted and kind, he received from her respect and consideration in return, which indeed was all she had to give, for the loss of Mauro remained to her an ever-gnawing grief.
Oddly enough, fate decreed that the destiny of Mauro and Sofia should be worked out far afield from their burning Utreran plains, high up on the cool plateau of Central Mexico.
For several years most generous offers had been made El Tigre to bring his cuadrilla to Mexico, but, surfeited with fame and rolling in riches, he had declined them. At last, however, in 188-, an offer was made him which he felt forced to accept—six thousand dollars a performance for ten corridas, to be given on successive Sundays in the Plaza Bucareli in the City of Mexico, all expenses of himself and his cuadrilla to be paid by the management. And so, late in April of that year El Tigre arrived in Mexico with his cuadrilla and (as stipulated in his contract) sixty great Utreran bulls, for the bulls of Utrera are famed in toreador history and song as the fiercest, most desperate fighters espada ever confronted.
At the first performance El Tigre took the Mexican public by storm. No such execution, daring, and grace had ever been seen in either Bucareli or Colon. El Tigre was the toast in every club and cafe of the city. Every shop window displayed his portrait. All the journals sung his praises. Maids and matrons sighed for him. Youth and age envied him. El Tigre's coffers were well-nigh bursting and his cups of joy overflowing, all but the one none but Sofia could fill.
Where she was at the time El Tigre had no idea. And yet, wholly unsuspected by him, not only were she and the Duke in Mexico, but both had attended all his performances at Bucareli, up to the last, inconspicuous behind parties of friends they entertained in their box.
Whether it was the Duke caught the pallor of Sofia's face in moments of peril for Mauro, or the light of pride and admiration in her eyes during his moments of triumph, sure it is the smouldering fires of the Duke's jealousy were rekindled, and he was prompted to plan a test of her bearing, when free of the restraint of his presence. On the morning of the last performance he announced that he must spend the afternoon with his attorneys, and must leave Sofia free to make her own arrangements for attendance at the last corrida.
And glad enough was she of the chance. The boxes were far too high above, and distant from, the arena. For days she had coveted any of the seats along the lower rows of open benches, close down to the six-foot barrier between the ring and the auditorium, close down where she could catch every shifting expression of Mauro's mobile face, and—where he could scarcely fail to see and recognize her. The thought of seeking in any way to meet or speak to him never entered her clean mind, but she had been more nearly a saint than a woman if she had been able to deny herself such an opportunity to convey to him, in one long burning glance, a knowledge of the endurance of the love her frightened "Mauro mio" had plainly confessed the night of their parting beneath the fig tree. So it naturally followed that the Duke was barely out of the house before Sofia rushed away a messenger to reserve a section of the lower benches immediately beneath the box of the Presidente, directly in front of which Mauro must come, at the head of his cuadrilla, to salute the Presidente.
The city was thronged with visitors come to see El Tigre. Hotels and clubs were overflowing with them. And thousands of poor peons had for months stinted themselves, often even gone hungry, to save enough tlacos to buy admission to the spectacle, to them the greatest and most magnificent it could ever be their good fortune to witness. The day was perfect, as indeed are most June days in Mexico. For two hours before the performance the principal thoroughfares leading to the Plaza Bucareli were packed solid with a moving throne all dressed en fete.
In no country in the world may one see such great picturesqueness, variety, and brilliancy of color in the costumes of the masses as then still prevailed in Mexico. Largely of more or less pure Indian blood, come of a race Cortez found habited in feather tunics and head-dresses brilliant as the plumage of parrots, great lovers of flowers, three and a half centuries of contact with civilization had not served to deprive them of any of their fondness for bright colors. Thus with the horsemen in the graceful traje de chorro—sombreros and tight fitting soft leather jackets and trousers loaded with gold or silver ornaments, the footmen swaggering in serapes of every color of the rainbow, the women wrapped in more delicately tinted rebosas and crowned with flowers, the winding streets looked like strips of flower garden ambulant.
Bucareli seated twenty thousand, and when all standing-room had been filled and the gates closed, thousands of late comers were shut out
.
The level, sanded ring, the theatre of action, was surrounded by a six-foot solid-planked barrier. Behind and above the barrier rose the benches of the auditorium, the "bleachers" of the populace; they rose to a height of perhaps forty or fifty feet, while above the uppermost line of benches were the private boxes of the elite. Within the ring were five heavily planked nooks of refuge, set close to the barrier, behind which a hard pressed toreador might find safety from a charging bull. These refuges were little used, however, except by the underlings, the capadores, or by capsized picadores; espadas and banderilleros disdained them. On the west of the ring was the box of the Presidente of the corrida (in this instance, the Governor of the Federal District); on the east the main gate of the ring through which the cuadrilla entered; on the north the gate of the bull pen.
At a bugle call from the Presidente's box, the main gate swung wide and the cuadrilla entered, a band of lithe, slender, clean-shaven men, in slippers, white stockings, knee breeches, and jackets of silk ornamented with silver, each wearing the little queue and black rosette attached thereto that from time immemorial Andalusian toreadores have sported.
El Tigre headed the squad, followed by two junior matadores, three banderilleros, three capadores, and two mounted picadores, while at the rear of the column came two teams of little, half-wild, prancing, dancing Spanish mules, one team black, the other white, each composed of three mules harnessed abreast as for a chariot race, but dragging behind them nothing but a heavy double tree, to which the dead of the day's fight might be attached and dragged out of the arena.
Each of the footmen was wrapped in a large black cloak passed over the left shoulder and beneath the right, the loose end of the cloak draped gracefully over the left shoulder, the right arm swinging free. The picadores were mounted (as usual) on old crowbaits of horses, mere bags of skin and bones, so poor and thin that neither could even raise a trot; a broad leather blindfold fastened to their head-stalls. Each rider was seated in a saddle high of cantle and ancient of form as those Knights Templar jousted in. The breast of each horse was guarded by a great side of sole leather falling nearly to the knees, while the right leg of each rider was incased in such a stiff and heavy leather leg-guard as to render him afoot almost helpless; and he was further guarded by still another side of sole leather swung from the saddle horn and covering his left leg and much of his horse's barrel. On the right stirrup of each picador rested the butt of his lance, a stout eight-foot shaft tipped with a sharp steel prod, barely long enough to catch and hold in the bull's hide.
The Red-Blooded Heroes of the Frontier Page 20