The bull turned like a cat and charged Algabeno and Algabeno met him with the cape. Once,
twice, three times he made the perfect, floating, slow swing with the cape, perfectly,
graceful, debonair, back on his heels, baffling the bull. And he had command of the
situation. There never was such a scene at any world's series game.
There are no substitute matadors allowed. Maera was finished. His wrist could not lift a
sword for weeks. Olmos had been gored badly through the body. It was Algabeno's bull.
This one and the next five.
He handled them all. Did it all. Cape play easy, graceful, confident. Beautiful work with
the muleta. And serious, deadly killing. Five bulls he killed, one after the other, and
each one was a separate problem to be worked out with death. At the end there was nothing
debonair about him. It was only a question if he would last through or if the bulls would
get him. They were all very wonderful bulls.
"He is a very great kid," said Herself. "He is only twenty."
"I wish we knew him," I said.
"Maybe we will some day," she said. Then considered a moment. "He will probably be
spoiled by then."
They make twenty thousand a year.
That was just three months ago. It seems in a different century now, working in an
office. It is a very long way from the sun baked town of Pamplona, where the man race
through the streets in the mornings ahead of the bulls to the morning ride to work on a
Bay-Caledonia car. But it is only fourteen days by water to Spain and there is no need
for a castle. There is always that room at 5 Calle de Eslava, and a son, if he is to
redeem the family reputation as a bull fighter, must start each early.