"Did not Donna Antonia forbid her cavalier to attempt so rash an exploit?" asked Donna Maria.
"Forbid! oh no!" exclaimed the indignant Inez; "for an Aguilera to risk or to lose his life for her sake would be to her proud nature as the crowning triumph of her beauty! She will be there—Antonia will be in the Plaza de Toros, and she will look on with those calm, cruel eyes, whilst Alcala, my pride—my darling,"—Inez could not finish the sentence, but buried her face in her hands.
"Do not despair, cara amiga," said Donna Maria, laying her hand caressingly on the shoulder of the sobbing girl; "Donna Antonia de Rivadeo may see the triumph of your brother. Don Alcala is a good horseman, and a brave cavalier."
"Brave as a lion, and he rides like the Cid!" exclaimed Inez, raising her head, and speaking with animation. "But what will that avail him?" she added sadly. "Alcala has had no training for the bull-ring, as had knights and gentlemen of old. They had active and powerful steeds; Alcala has but poor old Campeador, who bore our father ten years ago—good faithful Campeador, whom I have often fed from my hand!"
"But your brother will not be alone in the arena," suggested Donna Maria; "there will be the matadors, the picadors, the chulos,[8] to divert the bull's attention, or to give him the coup-de-grace."
"May they come to the rescue! the blessing of all the saints be on them if they do!" cried Inez with fervour. "But oh! amiga mia, I hope little from those who make this horrible sport a profession. They are natural enemies of the caballero who dares to do for honour what they are trained to do for gold. These men are jealous, and they are cruel; is it not their very trade to torture and to kill? I never saw a bull-fight but once," continued Inez, speaking rapidly. "My father took me when I was a child; but he never ventured to take me again. The sight—the horrible sight of the poor gored horses madly rushing round the circus in their agony haunted me for weeks,—it brought on a nervous fever! And how the scene comes back on my memory now in terrible distinctness! I long lay awake last night trying, but trying in vain, to drive away thought by repeating aves and credos, till I dropped asleep at last, and then—and then," added Inez with a shudder, "I was in the dreadful arena! I saw the bull tearing onwards, the banderillas in his thick strong neck; with bloodshot eye, and head bent down, he made his furious charge! I shrieked so loud that I awoke my grandmother, who usually sleeps so soundly! I used to pity and grieve over her feebleness of mind,—I could almost envy it now; she is spared the horrors of my dream, and the worse misery of my waking!"
There was an oppressive silence for several seconds and then Donna Maria said, "Have you attempted to dissuade your brother from prosecuting this wild adventure?"
"Have I not?" exclaimed Donna Inez; "have I not knelt and clasped his knees, and implored as if for my life? I pained, but I could not move him; Alcala said that his honour was pledged."
"You have been preparing the picador costume," observed Donna Maria, glancing down at the embroidered jacket and scarlet scarf which lay beside her, faintly visible in the starlight.
"Yes; if Alcala must appear in the arena before all those gazing eyes, he shall appear as becomes an Aguilera," replied the Spanish maiden. She did not dwell on the theme, or tell how much of her brother's hardly-earned gains had been frittered away on that gaudy costume; nor how she had not only given the labour of her hands, but sacrificed every little silver ornament which she possessed to add to its value and beauty. Bitterly had the poor girl felt, as she plied her needle, that she was but, as it were, decking out a victim for slaughter.