The bull-fighter deceived himself with these illusions, taking what was a caprice, dead forever, for a momentary aversion that he could conquer by force of prowess.

Doña Sol arose. The call had been long and the bull-fighter did not seem disposed to go; he was content to be near her, vaguely trusting to circumstance to draw them together. But he was obliged to imitate her. She excused herself, pleading an engagement. She was expecting her friend; they were going together to the Prado Gallery.

Then she invited him to breakfast the next morning; a quiet breakfast in her apartments. Her friend would also come. Undoubtedly it would be a pleasure to him to see a bull-fighter at close range. He scarcely spoke Spanish but he would be pleased to meet Gallardo.

The swordsman pressed her hand, answering with incoherent words, and left the room. Fury clouded his vision; his ears buzzed.

Thus she bade him good-bye—coldly, as she would an occasional friend. And that was the same woman he had known in Seville! And she invited him to breakfast with her friend who would amuse himself by examining him close at hand, as if he were a rare beast.

Curse it! He was a brave man. He was done. He would never go to see her again.

CHAPTER XV
BEHIND THE SCENES

JUST at that time Gallardo received several letters from Don José and from Carmen. The manager tried to encourage his matador, counselling him to walk straight up to the bulls—"Zas! a thrust and thou wilt put him in thy pocket." But underlying his enthusiasm a certain depression might be detected, as if his faith were dwindling and he had begun to doubt that Gallardo was "the greatest man in the world." He knew of the discontent and hostility with which the public received him. The last bull-fight in Madrid disheartened Don José completely. No; Gallardo was not like other swordsmen who went on in spite of public derision, satisfied with earning money. His matador had bull-fighter pride and could only show himself in the ring to advantage when received with great enthusiasm.

Don José pretended to understand what ailed his swordsman. Want of courage? Never. He would suffer death before he would recognize this defect in his hero. It was because he was tired, because he was not yet recovered from his goring. "And so," he advised in all his letters, "it would be better for thee to retire and rest a season. Afterward thou wilt fight again like thine old self." He offered to arrange everything. A doctor's certificate was enough to certify his temporary weakness, and the manager would settle with the plaza impresarios to arrange the pending contracts by sending a matador from the beginners' ranks, who would substitute Gallardo for a modest sum. They would still make money by this arrangement.

Carmen was more vehement in her petitions. He must retire immediately; he must "cut his queue." She was more afraid now than in the first years of her married life, when the bull-fights and the fearful suspense seemed to her conditions of existence that destroyed her peace of mind. Her heart told her, with that feminine instinct seldom mistaken in its forebodings, that something grave was going to happen. She scarcely slept; she dreaded the night hours, broken as they were by sanguinary visions. She waxed furious at the public in her letters—a crowd of ingrates who forgot what the bull-fighter had done when he was himself; evil-minded people who wished to see him die for their diversion, as though she did not exist, as though he had no mother. "Juan, Mamita and I ask it of thee. Retire. Why go on bull-fighting? We have enough to live on and it pains me to have to see thee insulted by people who are beneath thee. And if another accident should happen—Heavens!—I believe I should go mad."