The Long Day of Revenge (21 page)

“Gaditano…”

Everyone saw, but no one understood. They only stared in silence and then burst into applause.

Gaditano gazed at his fallen opponent with the usual bovine blank look, then whirled and removed himself from the situation, tottering from the spot where his challenger fell. Yards away, he turned and awaited the next attack.

In the midst of death, there was life.

The banderilleros had come, dragging Manolo toward the fence. As the matador looked down, he saw a slight rip in his green pants where the horn had snared him, but the flesh had not been penetrated. Rafael was babbling something, but his words were far off.

“He could have killed you, and he didn’t, Manolo! This is no bull! This is something that isn’t even natural! You were meant for each other, Manolo! I know it now, like you knew all along! Now he’s waiting for you out there! Go back to him!”

Unharmed, Manolo rested his head against the fence, still dazed.

“Water.”

As a jug was forced into his hand, Manolo looked upward to see Don Eliseo and his wife both standing, trying to tell him not to return, but go to the infirmary and call it a loss.”

“No. This is my moment. No one steals it from me.”

He swished the water in his mouth and gave a spit, then held the jug up and dumped much of it over his head, reviving himself.

“Death to Gaditano!”

He heard himself shout the words as he hurled the jug against the fence, shattering it. With another motion, he demanded the equipment of his trade. With sword and lure in hand, he was going back to the waiting bull.

The band, which had gone silent with uncertainty as to whether Manolo was injured or not, played again.

“Gaditano! We are almost done! You and I are almost finished. A little more. A little more. Why not! Let us make history together as enemies. Let us make history and let your natural courage come into me, where it is not natural. Let us merge together.”

Romanticists would insist man and beast became one, sucking out each other’s traits in the moments that followed.

Manolo Garza adapted the relentless fury of a fighting bull, while Gaditano became as human, following the lure when he should have veered into the man and killed him.

Manolo did the arrucina several times more and then shifted his grip so the sword was in his right hand and the muleta in his left.

“Working with the left is a sign of a true master,” he whispered to the bull. “Let us see what we can do here. Let us bring the long day for revenge to a close. This is not just my day, but yours. It is ours together. You are truly more than just a bull.”
It was as if Gaditano understood the words. Like Lucinda at a training session, he attacked the lure, but never veered away. Time and time again, Manolo guided the beast. It must have been an incredible fifteen passes in a row.

On the last pass, he spun and lifted the lure, with Gaditano following it out and away.

“Now. Now we end it.”

It was time to kill.

Manolo profiled before the bull, forcing Gaditano to admit that he was the master.

Or was he?

No matter. It would be over soon. He had only to return to the fence, get the killing sword, and finish things.

It was at that moment a lone shout rocked through the bullring. It was a word Manolo never had anticipated, and the very sound of it brought a lightning bolt of dread through his body.

“Indulto!”

“No,” Manolo gasped as he heard it. “No!”

“Indulto!”

Someone else called it out, then another and another.

“No, you bastard! No!”

Manolo made a jabbing motion in the air with the sword, indicating he was going to make a kill. The gesture brought howls of disapproval from the crowd.

“Indulto! Indulto!”

It was now a growing chant, echoing from the front row to the cheapest of seats near the top of the plaza.

“Oh, my God,” Lucinda choked out. “Oh God…”

“What?” the reporter questioned.

Lucinda’s eyes were wide with fear over what was going to happen.

“They want the bull spared. They won’t let him kill it.”

Rage filled Manolo like never before. Now, in his greatest moment that he had spent so much of himself living for, the people had unknowingly stolen it from him, depriving him of the one thing that had meant so much for so long.

“No,” he muttered, again making a stabbing motion in the air. “NO!”

The crowd booed the gesture.

“Indulto! Indulto!”

Gaditano stood watching in the distance, and if an animal was capable of such a thing, he seemed to be laughing.

Manolo hoped beyond anything that he could change their minds. Rushing to the fence, he screamed for the killing sword.

“You can’t do it!” Rafael was shouting. “You kill that bull when they pardon it, and this crowd will kill you! It’ll be the death of both of you!”

“Give me the fucking sword!”

Manolo looked up at Lucinda with an expression of utter bewilderment, their eyes locking. Never had he seemed so helpless.

“They can’t do this!”

Taking the sword that was meant to bring death; he held it up for all to see, almost pleading.

“No! This bull must die! You can’t do this! Don’t do this to me!”

“Indulto! Indulto!”

Manolo looked up at the plaza judge who was his last avenue of hope, but there was no salvation to be found. The judge was standing, making a disapproving gesture with his hand.

The crowd roared as this authority signaled for the trumpet to sound, meaning the bull was to be let go. He would be returned to the ranch for breeding. He would live.

“No…”

Not to be dissuaded. Manolo hid the sword within the lure and darted toward the animal once more. The bull having rested, obediently charged as the man in gold and green dropped to his knees, wrapping himself in the lure once again. The molinete de rodillas, executed over and over to an untiring animal.

“No! He will die!”

The passes brought cheers, but no repose, as the chants for the indulto, already granted, grew even louder.

Manolo turned to face the beast on his knees, daring Gaditano to kill him.

“He’d rather die than let this bull live,” Lucinda whispered to the men on each side of her. She was starting to cry as she said this. “He’s going to force Gaditano to kill him. He wants both of them to kill each other!”

Wearily, Manolo arose and once more offered the sword to the crowd, holding it up in a questioning gesture.

Angered, the plaza judge ordered the trumpet sounded again, as if to emphasize the point.

“Oh, no!” Manolo snarled. “Oh, no! I have waited too long! I have felt way too much pain and lost too much time! Too much of a cost has come to me, and this one dies!”

Turning, he saw the moment was right. Unthinkingly, Gaditano’s head was low and the position was perfect for a thrust.

“Farewell, old enemy.”

Manolo profiled with the sword in his right hand and the lure in his left.

“Goodbye.”

It was then Gaditano refused to cooperate and raised his massive head once more.

Manolo knew.

The crowd was ready to riot after seeing their demands ignored. The matador was still standing there, aiming, preparing, but hesitating.

Manolo Garza would never speak of what went through his mind, leading the witnesses to make conjectures once more. Some liked to say the devil that had entered this young man in the hospital and forced him to wage war against the bulls in retaliation for the goring he had taken left him, returning to the flames where he came from. Others speculated that after their furious battle on the sand, both had ample chances to kill each other and now world worn, decided none of it was worth the cost at all. Others said Manolo just decided to listen to the plaza judge, who would have had him arrested if he made the fatal thrust if the crowd did not lynch him. No one knew for sure, but man and beast, so the secret between them would remain a mystery forever.

“In the midst of death, there will be life.”

For the first time ever, Manolo started to cry.

“Gaditano…”

Turning, he hurled the sword and cape to the sand and looked away, spotting Lucinda from afar. The gesture should have provoked a final charge and would have done so from any other bull, but not Gaditano. He declined this last effort to bring death to his antagonist and turned instead, and charged slowly to the bullring gate where he had entered from.

“He knows also,” Manolo muttered to himself. “He knows. This is no bull. It is an instrument of destiny.”

Manolo didn’t watch as the gate was opened.

Gaditano went back up the tunnel toward freedom and a redeemed life. There was other redemption to be found at this moment in time. Manolo Garza had conquered fear, conquered the bull, and conquered himself.

The banderilleros were rushing the sand, as was Rafael, embracing him. Once more, his manager blurted out barely distinguishable words.

“The greatest showing in the history of Nogales, Manolo! The greatest bullfight ever! You will live forever, Manolo! They’ll talk forever of what you and Gaditano did this day! You have become immortal here! This is the moment! You have made history with this bull! Life for both of you! Long life, Manolo! Long life! A new start…”

Manolo pushed free of his well-wishers and fell exhausted against the fence, still crying. He looked up at Eliseo Manzano and realized he was crying too, caught up in the emotion of the day. It was his brave bull that had now stepped into legend along with the man who could nearly have killed him. Manolo looked past him, however, and the words came.

“Lucinda…I…I do love you. I always have.”

Lucinda tossed his hat down to him and whispered back the words. Amid her tears, she also smiled, for the first time in as long as she could remember.

“He took from me, and he gave it all back,” Manolo mouthed to Rafael. “Now it’s over.”

As he looked down the passageway, he saw Fernando De La Torre and his mystical gypsy companion, laughing at the way things had ended. They were only there for a moment and gone, fading away.

The chanting was louder than warfare.

“Garza! Garza! Garza! Garza!”

From way back in Agua Prieta, he remembered vowing to Lucinda that the people would chant his name.

“Garza! Garza!”

Manolo turned and held his hands high, like a boxer who had just won a hard fought victory or a championship belt. Again and again, he pumped his arms, relishing the cheers that came down upon him.

“Garza! Garza! Garza! Garza! Garza!”

He looked to be leading the chant, not out of ego, bur relief.

“Garza! Garza! Garza!”

The celebration was cut short by a shrill trumpet call and a reminder there were still three more bulls to be fought.

Trying to catch a bit of rest in the few moments that followed, the exhausted matador stepped behind the fence to the safety it offered. As he did, he looked right at Lucinda once more.

“Manolo!” she called back to him.

The matador smiled and turned from her, directing his attention to the gate which was now opened. In moments, the second animal would be coming for him.

“Fight a bull,” he said reassuringly to himself and anyone close enough to hear. “That’s what I do. That is the way of things.”

And as a huge black bull, looking very similar to Gaditano tore into the ring, the crowd roared with expectation.

“Here we go,” Manolo whispered. “Here we go again.”

Soon he would be expected to come out and face this new challenger, but he would give it a minute. He needed and deserved the rest.

The long day of revenge had faded into a memory.

Chapter Sixteen

It was early in the morning of what would be a new day, though there was still a lot of nightfall left. Manolo and Lucinda rested naked beneath the sheets in the darkened bedroom of the hotel, too exhausted from all that had transpired in the past twenty four hours or so.

“So we’re going to try again?” Manolo questioned. They’d just made rabid love awhile back, so the answer was most assuredly obvious.

“Of course,” Lucinda whispered. “What is over, is over. All of the past died today.”

Manolo held her tightly.

“Let’s stay together forever. I wasn’t right in the head. I was sick. I think I was crazy, but now I feel well.”

Lucinda smiled in the night. She could tell the burden of over three years had been lifted.

“I’ll even take the spankings when I deserve them, but only when I have been bad. I don’t like it much, but I’ll accept it. Esmeralda taught me some things.”

“Just don’t be bad, and we won’t have to worry about it. Hell, I’m the one who should get the belt in this relationship. I’m the rotten one and not you.”

“Is that an invitation?” Lucinda asked.

There was silence in the room.

“No. No invitation.”

For a long time there was silence again. They badly needed to sleep, but were both too pumped to do so.

“Gaditano has taught me many things,” Manolo said in a voice uncommonly soft for him. “We made each other and nearly destroyed each other. We took and we gave it all back. We made each other, and out there we made history.”

The matador halted for a moment and then went on.

“They call it the greatest showing in the history of Mexican bullfighting, and that may be pushing it a little, but it sure was great. I just wish I could get my hands on whoever started that chant for the indulto. I don’t know whether to thank him or kill him.”

“Think back,” Lucinda offered. “Are you sure it wasn’t a female voice?”

“You!” Manolo exclaimed. “You started the chant?”

Once more, there was silence.

“Maybe,” she answered. “Just maybe. There are some things we are all better off not knowing.”

“If you started that chant, you should get a set of spankings,” he said, but this time he was not serious. “I…”

“You’ll never know.”

Lucinda grinned at Manolo’s wonderment. He would never be allowed to discover the answer.

In the midst of death they had found life.

They had found it together.

It was not an end, but a beginning.