He longed for the time to return to the circus. He felt greedy of fame and the applause of the populace, and in order to get quite strong he decided to spend the rest of the winter with his family at La Rinconada. There, hunting and long walks would strengthen his leg. Besides, he could ride about to overlook the work, and visit the herds of goats, the droves of pigs, the dairies and the mares grazing in the meadows.
The management of the farm had not been good, everything cost him more than it did other landlords, and the receipts were less. His brother-in-law, who had established himself at the farm as a kind of dictator to set things right, had only succeeded in disturbing the routine of the work, and rousing the labourers' anger. It was fortunate that Gallardo could count on the certain incomings from the corridas, an inexhaustible source of wealth, which would over and above recoup his extravagances and bad management.
Before leaving for La Rinconada, Señora Angustias wished her son to fulfil her vow of kneeling before the Virgin of Hope. It was a vow she had made that terrible night when she saw him stretched pale and lifeless on the litter. How many times she had wept before La Macarena, the beautiful Queen of Heaven, with the long eye-lashes and swarthy cheeks, imploring her not to forget Juanillo!
The ceremony was a popular rejoicing. All the gardeners of the suburb were summoned to the church of San Gil, which was filled with flowers, piled up in banks round the altars, and hanging in garlands between the arches and from the chandeliers.
The ceremony took place on a beautiful sunny morning. In spite of its being a working day, the church was filled with people from the suburb. Stout women with black eyes, wearing black silk dresses, and lace mantillas over their pale faces, workmen freshly shaved, and the beggars arrived in swarms, forming a double row at the church door.
A Mass was to be sung, with accompaniment of orchestra and voices; something quite out of the way, like the opera in the San Fernando theatre at Easter. And afterwards the priests would intone a Te Deum of thanksgiving for the recovery of Señor Juan Gallardo, the same as when the king came to Seville.
The party arrived, making their way through the crowd. The espada's mother and wife walked first, among relations and friends, dressed in rustling black silks, smiling beneath their mantillas. Gallardo came after, followed by an interminable escort of toreros and friends, all dressed in light suits, with gold chains and rings of extraordinary brilliancy, their white felt hats contrasting strangely with the women's black clothes.
Gallardo was very grave. He was a good believer. He did not often remember God, though he often swore by Him blasphemously at difficult moments, more by habit than anything else; but this was quite another affair, he was going to return thanks to the Santisima Macarena, and he entered the church reverently.
They all went in except El Nacional, who leaving his wife and children, remained in the little square.
"I am a freethinker," he thought it necessary to explain to a group of friends. "I respect all beliefs; but that inside there is for me ... rubbish. I do not wish to be wanting in respect to La Macarena, nor to take away any credit which is hers, but, comrades, suppose I had not arrived in time to draw away the bull when Juaniyo was on the ground!"...