In the courtyard he had to stand aside to let some picadors pass who were returning to the circus.
The terrible news had begun to run through the Plaza. Gallardo was dead!... Some doubted the truth of the news, others affirmed it, but no one moved from their seats. They were going to loose the third bull. The corrida was only in its first half, and they really could not give it up.
Through the great doorway came the noise of the crowd and the sound of music.
The banderillero felt a fierce hatred arise in his heart for everything surrounding him; a disgust and aversion to his profession and to those who maintained it.
He thought of the bull who was now being dragged out of the arena, with his neck burnt and bloody, his legs stiff and his glassy eyes gazing up at the sky.
Then he thought of the friend lying dead a few paces from him, only the other side of a brick wall. His limbs also rigid, his stomach ripped open, and a mysterious dull light shining through his half open eyelids.
Poor bull! Poor espada!... And suddenly, as noisy cries of delight burst out in the circus applauding the continuation of the spectacle, El Nacional closed his eyes and clenched his fists.
It was the roaring of the wild beast, the true and only one.