"Friend Gallardo," it began, in a delicate handwriting which made the torero's eyes brighten, and it ended "Your friend, Sol," all in a coldly friendly style, writing to him as "Usté"[21] with an amiable tone of superiority, as though the words were not between equals, but fell in mercy from on high.
As the torero looked at the letter, with the adoration of a man of the people little versed in reading, he could not suppress a certain feeling of annoyance, as though he felt himself despised.
"That gachí!" he murmured, "What a woman! No one can discompose her! See how she writes to me as 'Usté!' 'Usté'—to me!"
But pleasant memories made him smile with self-satisfaction. That cold style was for letters only,—the ways of a great lady,—the precautions of a woman of the world. His annoyance soon turned to admiration.
"How clever she is! A cautious minx!"
He smiled a smile of professional satisfaction, the pride of a tamer who enhances his own glory by exaggerating the strength of the wild beast he has overcome.
While Gallardo was admiring his letter, his servant Garabato passed in and out of the room, laden with clothes and boxes which he spread on a bed.
He was very quiet in his movements, very deft of hand, and seemed to take no notice of the matador's presence.
For many years past he had accompanied the diestro to all his bull-fights as "Sword carrier."[22] He had begun bull-fighting at the "Capeas"[23] at the same time as Gallardo, but all the bad luck had been for him and all the advancement and fame for his companion.
He was dark, swarthy, and of poor muscular development, and a jagged, badly joined scar crossed his wrinkled, flabby, old-looking face like a white scrawl. It was a goring he had received in the Plaza of some town he had visited and which had nearly been his death, and besides this terrible wound, there were others which disfigured parts of his body which could not be seen.