Jacinto Quesada's eyes smiled, and his whole face beamed, as he looked at him, for he recognized in this man whom he had long admired because of his splendid courage in the bull ring a kindred spirit.
"And how are the wife and the children, Manuel?" he asked.
"Most excellent in health, thank you, Jacinto! And you? And your family?"
"Superb! But ah, Morales, what would I not give to be watching you killing your bulls in the Seville bull ring at this moment, instead of doing what I am—setting my dogs of ladrones upon you to rob you of your hard-earned money! Say but the word, and you will be exempted from this indignity!"
"A thousand thanks; but no, I would rather not! It is too much honor!"
"Too much honor for you, one of the three bravest men in Spain? You, whom I have ridden fifty miles many times to see give the suerte de matar, the stroke of death! Why, to sit in the sun and watch you perform, I have ventured into Seville in disguise when the men of the Guardia Civil were as thick about the bull ring as flea-bitten curs about a camp of Gitanos; and I have counted the risk nothing!"
"But if I am one of the three bravest men in Spain, as you say, who are the others? Who is the second? Who is the third?"
"The second! Can you not guess?"
"Ah, chispas! yes. Yourself, Jacinto Quesada, of course!"
"And the third?"