A movement among the women kneeling before him distracted his attention, which had been absorbed in a plea for supernatural intervention whenever his life should be in danger.
A lady passed among the worshippers, attracting their notice; she was a tall, slender woman, of astounding beauty, dressed in light colors and wearing a great hat with plumes beneath which shone the luminous gold of her abundant hair.
Gallardo knew her. It was Doña Sol, the Marquis of Moraima's niece, the "Ambassadress," as they called her in Seville. She passed among the women paying no attention to their movements of curiosity, satisfied to win their glances and to hear the murmur of their words as though this were a natural homage that should follow her appearance in any public place. The foreign elegance of her dress and her enormous hat were outlined in their showy splendor against the dark mass of feminine toilettes. She knelt, inclined her head as if in prayer for a few moments, and then her light eyes of greenish blue, with their reflections of gold, roved about the temple tranquilly as though she were in a theatre examining the audience, searching for familiar faces. Those eyes seemed to smile when they encountered the face of a friend and persisted in their roving until they met Gallardo's, which were fixed upon her. The matador was not modest. Accustomed to being himself the object of contemplation of thousands and thousands of persons on bull-fight afternoons, he might well believe that, wherever he was, the looks of all must of course be meant for him. Many women, in hours of confidence, had revealed to him their emotion, the curiosity and desire they felt on seeing him for the first time in the ring. Doña Sol's gaze did not fall as it met the bull-fighter's; instead it remained fixed, with the frigidity of a great lady, obliging the matador, ever respectful to the rich, to turn his eyes away.
"What a woman!" thought Gallardo, with the petulance of a popular idol. "Can that gachí be for me?"
Outside of the church he felt a desire to wait, and he remained near the door. His heart warned him of something extraordinary, as on afternoons when good fortune was coming. It was that mysterious presentiment which in the ring made him deaf to the protests of the public, throwing himself headlong into the greatest dangers, and always with excellent results. When she came out of the church she again looked at him strangely, as if she had guessed that he would be waiting for her. She stepped into an open carriage accompanied by two friends, and when the coachman drove away she still turned her head to see the bull-fighter, a faint smile on her lips.
Gallardo was distracted the remainder of the afternoon—thinking of his former love affairs, of the triumphs of admiration and curiosity that his bull-fighter's arrogance had won for him; conquests that filled him with pride and made him think himself irresistible, but which now inspired him with a kind of shame. A woman like that, a great lady, who had travelled about the world and lived in Seville like an unthroned queen! That would be a conquest! To his admiration of beauty was united a certain reverence derived from ancient servitude, of respect for the rich in a country where birth and fortune possess great importance. If he should manage to claim the attention of that woman, what a tremendous triumph!
CHAPTER VI
THE VOICE OF THE SIREN
DON José, firm friend of the Marquis of Moraima, and related to the best families of Seville, had often talked to Gallardo concerning Doña Sol.
She had returned to Seville only a few months before, arousing the enthusiasm of the young people. She came, after a long absence in foreign lands, eager for everything pertaining to la tierra, enjoying the popular customs and finding it all very interesting, "very artistic." She went to the bull-fights arrayed in the ancient costume of a maja, imitating the dress and pose of the beautiful women painted by Goya. Strong, accustomed to sports, and a great horsewoman, the people saw her galloping around the outskirts of Seville, wearing with her black riding skirt a man's jacket, a red cravat, and a white beaver hat perched on top of her golden hair. Sometimes she carried a spear across the pommel of the saddle and with a party of friends converted into piqueros, she went to the pasture grounds to tease and upset bulls, enjoying this wild festivity, abounding as it did in danger. She was not a child. Gallardo had a confused recollection of having seen her in his youth on the paseo of Delicias, seated beside her mother and covered with white frills, like a luxurious doll in a show-case, while he, a miserable vagabond, dashed under the wheels of the carriage in search of cigar stubs. They were undoubtedly the same age,—she must be at the end of the twenties; but how magnificent! So different from other women! She seemed like an exotic bird, a bird of paradise, fallen into a farmyard among mere shiny, well fed hens.
Don José knew her history. An eccentric mind had Doña Sol! Her mother was dead and she had a considerable fortune. She had married in Madrid a certain man older than herself, who offered to a woman eager for splendor and novelty the advantages of travelling about the world as the wife of an ambassador who represented Spain at the principal courts.