Several strings of mules had gone already and others were just getting away, their bells jingling merrily and their drivers in full cry. “Arre, ar-r-r-e, ar-r-r-r e!” rent the air to the accompaniment of cracking whips and thwacking cork-sticks. The courtyard was so nearly cleared that Rafael easily made his way over to Tenorio.
“Is that Uncle Manuel’s mule?” he asked.
“Ay, his Coronela, and a pampered beast she is,” answered the Galician. “The master loves her so well that he would give her white bread and eat black himself. But what do you think of our cavalry here?”
Then Rafael saw that Pedrillo and Hilario were getting a bunch of pack-mules into line. Their loads were piled high, but they were stolid, heavy beasts, unlike the riding mules, and though they grunted under the burden and tried to get rid of their packages by rubbing against one another, they were so docile that a touch of the staff would send each to its place. But Bastiano, he of the surly voice, was having difficulties with a new mule, white and sleek, that he was lading. Blanco’s head was roped up; the two bales, having been carefully poised to make sure that they were of equal weight and would balance each other, had been slung over his back, but as Bastiano was about to lash them on, Blanco plunged and the load was tumbled to the ground.
“Ha, Tough-Hide!” snarled Bastiano. “That is the trick you would play on me, is it?”
And plucking up a large stone, he struck the animal cruelly on the side of the head.
“No, no!” cried a childish voice, and Pilarica was clinging to his arm. “You mustn’t hurt the poor mule like that. Oh, you mustn’t! You mustn’t!”
“It’s the only talk he understands,” muttered Bastiano, his lean brown face slowly flushing under the horror in those dusky eyes. “You can’t treat mules like bishops.”
“Why not?” asked Pilarica.
“The world is coming to a pretty pass when a man can’t bang his beast,” growled Bastiano, dropping the stone, while Blanco planted his four feet wide apart in stubborn resistance to anything and everything that might be demanded of him.