Or the Bull Kills You

by Jason Webster

  ‘I agree, it isn’t always very attractive,’ Alicia said. ‘But it’s for two reasons. First to get a sense of how strong the bull is: does he charge headlong at the horse, or does he have to be coaxed to do so? And secondly, you have to take some of the bull’s strength away, to make him lower his head. Otherwise it would be virtually impossible to fight him.’

  The whistling from the crowd intensified as the picador went to thrust at the bull for a second time.

  ‘But the crowd don’t want the bull to be weakened too much,’ Alicia went on. ‘That’s why they complain at this point.’

  ‘You aficionados talk about this being about a man pitted against a mighty beast,’ Cámara said. ‘But it seems the odds are always stacked against the bull.’

  But Alicia wasn’t listening, standing up out of her seat along with most of the rest of the crowd as the picador went for a third, and highly unpopular, thrust. Everyone looked up at the president, waiting for him to give the signal for this tercio to end. Cámara remembered having to place the white handkerchief over the edge of the balcony himself at this stage, but he’d merely been taking orders from the two sitting next to him, understanding little of what was actually going on.

  Finally the sign was made, the horns blew, and the picadors walked their horses out of the ring, leaving the bull on his own. Time for the next section, the Tercio de Banderillas. This was the one part of the event that for Cámara seemed to have some kind of artistry to it, even if it meant further torture of the bull. With brightly coloured darts in their hands, about a metre in length, the toreros seemed to carry out a kind of dance in front of the bull, finally planting the banderillas in its back as they dodged within inches of its horns. This, according to Alicia, was designed to bring a bit of life back into the animal, the banderillas acting as a colourful spectacle meant to spur the bull on after the punishment of the picadors, before the final section, when the matador would face him alone.

  The banderilleros came and went, and the bull stood in the middle of the ring, with their red, yellow and blue darts hanging from his neck almost like a Red Indian’s headdress. Voices were lowered as the final moment approached, the Tercio de Muerte. Cámara watched as Cano was handed his red muleta cape and estoque – the same kind of sword with a slight curve at the end that had been used in the killings of both Blanco and Ruiz Pastor – and stepped out on to the sand. He stood for a moment in front of the president’s box, with his montera cap in hand, asking for permission to begin, and then once that had been given, he started walking towards the section of the ring where Cámara and Alicia were sitting.

  ‘This is when he dedicates the bull to someone,’ Alicia said. ‘He can do it either to an individual, or to the entire crowd.’

  Cano crossed the sand and stood at the edge of the burladero just in front of them, looking in their direction. Cámara glanced around him to see who Cano was about to dedicate the bull to, wondering if it might be for Alicia at his side. He smiled, but as Cano stood there expectantly, he felt Alicia nudge him in the ribs.

  ‘Stand up,’ she ordered. ‘It’s for you.’

  He felt several thousand eyes turn towards him as he got to his feet.

  ‘You honour us by being here, Chief Inspector,’ Cano called out from the arena, stepping through the burladero and handing his montera to him. Cámara felt the hat’s tight curly astrakhan fabric rubbing against his fingers as he reached down for it.

  ‘It is my honour to be here,’ he said, uttering the first thing that came into his head. Then Cano held his arms out towards him and the two men embraced.

  ‘I loved Blanco as a brother,’ Cano said in his ear as the audience around them broke into applause. ‘And I will fight this bull in his name.’

  Cámara’s attention was fully on the fight for the first time now as Cano crossed the sand again and focused on the bull. The burgundy of his traje de luces stood out against the bright yellow of the sand and seemed to echo the blood that was dripping off the bull’s back and falling in dark patches at its feet. Cano arranged the muleta and his sword and took a few steps towards the animal’s horns. He gave a cry and thrust the cape in the bull’s direction. At first it didn’t move, pausing before pawing the ground in anger. Again Cano flicked the red cape. This time it responded, lowering its head and suddenly charging at him. Deftly, Cano swept the muleta to one side and the bull passed within inches of his body. Turning on his heel, Cano flicked the muleta towards the bull on his other side, and again the animal charged, pushing forwards with his horns, passing even closer to the man this time as Cano gracefully passed the cape in front of him, slowing the bull down, never allowing the horns to actually touch the cloth. Again a turn, and again the bull thrust itself against the muleta.

  The first shouts of olé were being heard from the crowd by now and Cámara could feel how the concentration of the entire audience was fixed upon the dance that the man and the bull were performing in front of them. What was most extraordinary was that Cano had barely moved from his spot, keeping his feet planted firmly on the ground as the bull was made to pass him first on one side and then the other, circling around him as though the man had become a pillar in the sand, dominating the bull, making it move wherever and whenever he pleased, in total control.

  And as he watched, for a second, for a moment that was lost almost as soon as it came, something extraordinary happened. It was as if the division between Cano and the bull had disappeared, as though for a fleeting instant they had become one single being out there on the sand, unified by their fight and struggle: one entity separated not by their mutual wish to kill each other but almost as if by a kind of tenderness, a passion. It was as if, for a brief time, matador and bull were brought together and joined through something that felt almost like love. But it was not any kind of love that Cámara had ever sensed or been aware of before, nothing he had ever known. And yet it was there, binding them and making them one.

  It came in a flash, one exceptional moment, and then was gone. But the entire crowd had captured it as well, and a roar went up. Many were on their feet, clapping already, shouts of olé echoing around the ring. At the other side of the arena the band started up on a paso doble. People shouted and cried out: the maestro had come and shown them his best; up above, Blanco would be smiling.

  The bull had come to a standstill, its energy seemingly gone, and Cano stood as close as he could before its once powerful and feared horns, thrusting his chest out, before spinning around majestically and making a sweep with his estoque. The audience cheered: the beast had been beaten.

  Cámara felt as if he were in a trance. Something had just happened, something he struggled to identify or explain, but which had gripped him for a moment and then gone. It was absurd: the bull and the man were intent on killing one another; how could anything that was happening down on the sand have anything to do with love? Yet he failed to find any other word accurately to describe what he had experienced.

  He watched as Cano went through a few more passes, wondering if it would come back, if he would feel the same, but although the atmosphere inside the bullring was now alive in a very special sense, it failed to reappear quite as strongly. By the time Cano pulled out his sword to finish the bull off, Cámara had turned his head. Something magical had occurred, but he didn’t need to see this.

  Minutes later, with two trophy ears in his hands, Cano re-entered the callejón. He handed the ears to his mozo and then walked back to where Cámara and Alicia were sitting. Hands reached over the barrier from the audience in order to pat him on the back.

  ‘I’m glad you got to see that,’ Cano said as he paused in front of them. ‘Those moments are all too rare.’

  Alicia reached out and touched his arm.

  ‘Blanco deserved nothing less.’

  Fourteen

  When you choose to put your life on the line, you also earn the right to choose other things

  José Tomás

  A roar from the crowd inside the bull
ring hurtled down the stone steps and bounced off the brick walls as Cámara paced the empty corridor behind the seating area, smoking and enjoying a cool breeze. The smell of buñuelos – hot, sweet, battered pumpkin purée freshly fried, a Fallas delicacy – was inescapable now, with half a dozen stalls lining the sides of Xàtiva. This was one of the few main roads still fully open. Elsewhere, in the remaining streets that hadn’t been cut off completely, the cars had to steer carefully around falla statues like multicoloured kerbs of a chicane. Yet here the great city fiesta was still overwhelmingly present: teenage boys were throwing exploding chinos at each other, while most people were wearing the blue-and-white chequered neckerchief of the falleros. Occasionally a fallera beauty queen would appear, walking hurriedly in her flowery period dress as she dashed to some official ceremony. For a part of the world that had thrown away so much of its architectural heritage, the city went to great lengths to hang on to its traditions when it came to fiestas and folkloric costumes.

  Inside the corridor, a middle-aged woman with an overhanging gut was sweeping up behind one of the bars that had been serving drinks and cigars. Cámara had seen enough for one afternoon and had decided to go for a stroll. Leaving Alicia, he’d found refuge in the emptiness of the passageway. Briefly, when he was in his late teens in Albacete, he’d worked as a gatekeeper at a football stadium, and he’d enjoyed the sensation of being close to some great emotional event taking place just a few yards away, yet being separated from it at the same time. It was, he’d realised, a moment for savouring the calm which, curiously, seemed to exist at the edges of so much passion.

  The woman with the broom lifted her head and gave him a look as he stood there pondering. Without realising, he’d been staring at her for a few minutes, his mind drifting. He sniffed and turned to walk away.

  The floor was littered with the blackened butts of home-made caliqueño cigars as he made his way to the upper level and the next corridor above. From here he had an even better view of the street outside.

  Cámara pulled out his cigarettes, but shaking the packet he realised there were none left. Cursing, he screwed it up. Alicia would have some back inside, but the fight was still going on and once he’d squeezed past all those people to get to her he’d be obliged to stay. Better to remain out here enjoying the sensation of being set apart from the crowd. Silence was an impossibility in Valencia at this time of year, yet caught between the bullfight inside, and the fiesta outside, he felt that he’d found a temporary home – neither one nor the other. A no-man’s land.

  He began scouting around to see if any of the bars were still open and if they sold tobacco. The corridor led around the side of the building until he came to the west side flanked by the Calle Alicante. Was that an opening in the wall he could spot further down? He continued for a few more yards then slowed to a halt: there was nothing here. Perhaps downstairs again. The woman with the broom at the bar might be able to help.

  He drifted to the edge of the passageway, looking out over the street before heading off. Hundreds of people flowed backwards and forwards below him like tight currents in a troubled sea.

  Something caught his eye. Below, in the triangle of space between the outer edge of the bullring and the road, sat a lorry. It was blocking almost the entire space, but there was room just to slip past, as he could make out from where he was standing. To the side was a building set at right-angles to the bullring. At the edge of its outer wall, running very close to the bullring itself was a drainpipe – one of the older metal ones, square rather than rounded and with sturdy brackets every metre or so supporting it. Above it, where the top of the building touched the edge of the outer bullring wall, was a fan-like metal structure just over a metre across made up of steel spikes thrusting out horizontally, designed – it appeared – to dissuade any would-be intruders from trying to climb in. Cámara stepped in closer to have a look: the ‘spikes’ were no more threatening than the monkey bars he’d swung on as a child in the school playground, while the drainpipe made for an easy route both in and out of the bullring. Slip down there, invisible at this time of year thanks to the lorry blocking the view, and you could emerge into the street without anyone noticing you at all. While across the street were a couple of green plastic rubbish containers – ideally placed.

  The sound of piercing whistles penetrated through from inside the bullring: the picadors must have made a return. He took a last look at the drainpipe and walked off to find some more cigarettes, flicking his phone open and dialling Huerta’s number.

  The back of her hand brushed against his as they walked towards the Plaza San Agustín: it felt warm, smooth. Tonight was the Plantá – the official start of Fallas. But that was no more than a formality these days – almost every statue and street bar had been set up and in place for at least a week beforehand.

  ‘I know a place in the Barrio Chino,’ Alicia had said as they left the bullring together.

  They stopped at one of the stalls and ordered half a dozen buñuelos to share, licking their fingers clean of the sugar as they lifted them into their mouths, laughing.

  ‘I used to love these when I was a girl,’ Alicia said. ‘Eat hundreds of them every year. That was when I could afford to, though.’ And she patted her thighs.

  ‘I was the fallera beauty queen of our street one year,’ she said. ‘My elder brother was president of the panel. I think he fixed it so that they would choose me. Of course, as a thirteen-year-old it was the best moment of my life, putting on all those dresses and make-up. My mother spent four months solid sewing so it would all be ready on time.’

  They turned off the square and started heading down Barón de Cárcel Avenue. It was almost dark, and the usual night workers were starting to appear, waiting for the early-evening customers.

  ‘It was when I had my first kiss,’ Alicia went on. ‘Ramón Martínez. He was fifteen, the leader of our group.’

  ‘What happened to him?’ Cámara asked.

  ‘He married my best friend.’ She laughed. ‘A few years later, of course. They had a boy – he’s at university now; can’t remember what he’s studying. I saw Ramón for the first time in years only a month or so back. He told me what he’d been up to.’

  ‘And what did you tell him?’

  ‘Not much.’ She sighed.

  A dark-skinned woman was watching them from the side of the pavement as they walked slowly forwards. Standing under the harsh light of a street lamp, she wore black shiny platform boots that laced up to her knee, above which torn fishnet stockings barely covered her thighs. The black leather miniskirt seemed little more than an afterthought, while her breasts bulged over the top of a red plastic basque. She smiled at Cámara as he caught her eye, her teeth brilliant white against the heavy tan of her face.

  ‘¿Buscáis algo?’

  They walked on, pretending they hadn’t heard. From her accent Cámara suspected she might be Caribbean.

  ‘The bull represents male sexual energy,’ Alicia said as they slid back into the shade, away from the burning fluorescent of the street lamp. ‘In the bullfight. I’m sure you’ve already worked that out, though.’

  ‘So why kill it?’ Cámara asked.

  ‘I didn’t manage to convert you this afternoon,’ she said. ‘No wonder you went off wandering about on your own. Did you find anything?’

  ‘Secret,’ Cámara said.

  ‘Ooh, how exciting. The answer to your question, my dear,’ she said without pausing for breath, ‘is that the matador is supposed to absorb the potency from the bull he kills; he takes on the animal’s fertility.’

  Cámara felt a weight crushing him like a rock. Instinctively the hand in his pocket pushed down and over to feel the edge of his testicles, useless sacks hanging between his legs. Had he really forgotten about all that? For a moment he thought he had, but he knew that part of him was always dwelling on it. Somewhere inside him a fundamental reason for living had been taken away.

  ‘I found out a secret about you the
other day,’ Alicia said. The first cars were beginning to kerb-crawl. Valencia had one of the longest traditions in Europe for taking a more liberal attitude to the sex trade – a red-light district had been in existence since the fourteenth century. But some morally outraged civil governor during Franco’s time had decided to ban it. So the girls had simply walked out on to the streets below their brothels, not even bothering to change barrio, and here they had stayed ever since. Cruising at this festive time of year had become something of a tradition, and instead of falleras, the working girls were sometimes referred to as folleras – women who fuck.

  Cámara already knew the answer, but he felt compelled to ask.

  ‘What did you discover?’

  ‘Allegations of misconduct in an interrogation, going too far,’ Alicia said with open eyes and an expression of intrigue.

  Cámara frowned.

  ‘I hadn’t thought it warranted a news story.’

  ‘Oh, I didn’t get it looking through back copies of El Diario, if that’s what you mean.’

  Then: ‘You shouldn’t worry about it,’ Alicia said, trying to defuse the sudden tension. ‘I suppose things can get heated when you’re dealing with a vicious murderer—’

  ‘I got caught,’ Cámara interrupted her. ‘That’s what counts. It’s not because of what I did; they don’t care about it for any moral reason. It’s because I got caught.’

  ‘What was the guy’s name? Pedro Bautista? Stabbed his wife to death. Brutal case. How did you know they were filming the interrogation?’

  ‘Yes, all right.’

  ‘I suppose you thought those cameras never got switched on.’

  Cámara pretended he hadn’t heard.

  ‘Broke his jaw, I heard.’

  ‘OK, so you’ve done your research!’ Cámara raised his fist to his mouth. ‘Congratulations. Is that why you asked me out to—?’