got into the stream. Past the various clubs she went where majos, the 'lady-killers,' still loitering over their last drinks, eyed her and commented on the shapeliness of her buttocks.
She preferred to walk instead of taking her carriage because she felt that, in that way, she was doing penance for the sin she had committed against El Gallo.
When she finally arrived at the Plaza, she was tired. But there was a warm glow within her. For she was soon to see her beloved El Gallo once more.
Already she could feel little goose pimples of expectation crawling up her arm. And the short hairs on the nape of her neck stood up like little penises. For she was riggish. She was as riggish for a man as she had ever been in her life. She wanted to be seized, to be held tightly, to be kissed, to be fucked as no man had ever fucked her, by only one certain man-El Gallo. And as she walked into her box-seat, she seemed to know that soon her expectations would be fulfilled.
An immense crowd had already gathered. She looked around. Across from her, on the sunny side of the ring in the cheaper seats, there appeared to be only a solid mass of yellow and red and green handkerchiefs and parasols and mantillas. On the shady side, where she was sitting, white mantillas prevailed, for there were the better class of aficionados, bullfight fans. Vendors coursed through the aisles selling beer and gaseosas (pop). Others, unable to reach patrons with their wares, threw them accurately across a dozen rows and, in turn, received their money in the same way. A general feeling of good humour prevailed, for it was an ideal day for a bullfight.
La Tarantula looked around for some sight of El Gallo. In the callejon, the runway that circled the ring, she saw the sword handlers with their jugs of water, sponges, piles of folded muletas and heavy leather sword cases together with the bull ring servants, the police in their patentleather hats, several plainclothesmen who were there so as to be ready for any amateur matadors who thought they could jump over the barrera to handle the bull as they saw fit, photographers, doctors and the delegates of the government. Everyone was there but he for whom La Tarantula sought. But she knew that soon her lover would appear.
She was conscious of a hundred pairs of opera glasses being trained on her from men scattered around the ring. But she gave them no heed.
Her thoughts were only of one man, El Gallo. She knew that he would be in the patio de los caballos where the horses were. Soon, he would line up with the other matadors, three abreast, their picadors and banderilleros strung out behind them. Then the trumpet would blow for the fighting to begin.
She looked up at the president's box. Sure enough, at that same moment, she saw the president enter. A buzz of excitement swept through the crowd. Matters took a busy turn. The ring servants in their red vests became more active. Everyone took on a look of motion.
Suddenly, the trumpet blew. The president had waved his handkerchief for it. A burst of clapping ensued. And, from the patio de los caballos, two mounted men dressed in ancient costume issued forth and rode across the sand of the ring. They galloped across the ring, doffed their hats and bowed low to the president's box. Then the music of the band started and from the opening in the courtyard of the horses came the procession of the bullfighters in paseo parade. The three matadors walked abreast. Their dress capes were furled and wrapped around their left arms while their right arms were balanced. All walked with a loose-hipped stride, their arms swinging, their chins up, their eyes on the president's box. Behind them filed the picadors and banderilleros.
La Tarantula shuddered. For as they came closer to her to bow to the president in his box, she saw that the familiar figure which she had come for was not there. El Gallo was not among the matadors!
Immediately, a concerted growl came up from the audience. They had come to see El Gallo, the great El Gallo. But El Gallo was not in the parade.
Tears came to La Tarantula's eyes. Her face fell to her lap. Suddenly, a roar arose from the crowd. From all sides she heard the name of El Gallo! El Gallo! bravo El Gallo! A loud period of hand-clapping and whistling resulted. La Tarantula looked up. Far in the distance, coming out of the horse yard, she saw the strangely lonesome figure of a matador dragging his cape on the ground, slumping tiredly across the sand. It was El Gallo. But this was a whipped El Gallo. His eyes were dead. His body was listless. His arms hung down from his shoulders like wooden weights.
Something in his pitiful bedraggled figure caught at La Tarantula's throat. She could not control herself any longer. With a sigh, she leaped down the tiers of steps, down, down, avoiding the grasps of those who tried to stop her, crying aloud, 'El Gallo! El Gallo!'
At the barrera that separated the seats from the ring proper, she was seized by one of the plain-clothesmen stationed there. But she tore herself from his grasp and threw herself over the fence. She fell but she got up and started to run after the figure of the man she loved, still calling his name.
He stopped dead in his tracks. But when he saw that it was La Tarantula who had called him, the deadness in his eyes became alive.
His deadweight arms took on life. The fingers in his hand twitched for the feel of her. And when she threw herself stumbling, weeping hysterically into his arms, he knew that once more life was going to be worth living. And he, too, wept. And there, in front of fourteen thousand aficionados who had come to see him kill bulls, he kissed her again and again on her lips and her nose and her eyes, murmuring all the while that he loved her.
'We were mad last night!' she moaned.
'That was last night!' he cried.
'Oh! take me! take me!' she managed to gasp out between her racking sobs. 'I have been so lonely for you!' She saw him look around. 'There's still time for your killings. Let the other matadors kill first. You shall have the last bulls. I must have you first!' she implored him.
El Gallo hesitated momentarily. But when he looked down into her tearful face, when he saw the bulge of her bosom at her bodice promising a bevy of beautiful breasts, when he saw her nostrils dilating in passion for him, he realized that he could decide in only one way. So, taking her up in his arms, he carried her to one side where the infirmary was. And all the while, the thousands, sensing his object, laughed and cheered and whistled and called bits of advice for him.
Zurito, the master's picador, came rushing over to him. 'But not before the fight, master!' he protested.
'Go fuck yourself!' El Gallo called out gaily.
But Zurito was happy. For, all night before, he had seen the mad light in El Gallo's eyes. Now, the mad light was gone. He was happy once more. Perhaps this fuck before a fight might weaken him. But, after all, he was El Gallo, than whom there was no better matador. He would be somewhat weak, but there was no bull born yet who could subdue the master matador, El Gallo. And so Zurito stared at his master staggering with his load of woman into the infirmary, and sighed and returned to his place in the parade.
In the infirmary, the pair found the place empty. The doctors and internes and nurses had all left for their seats in the ring to view the fights. Not until someone got a cuerno from a bull would they interrupt their lovemaking. Both of them hoped fervently that none would be gored by the bulls that afternoon so that they could fuck to their hearts' content without fear of being bothered by interlopers.
'Hurry! hurry!' La Tarantula murmured as El Gallo began to divest himself of the heavily embroidered jacket he wore in the bull ring, the while she began to take her own clothing off.
'No!' he commanded, 'that is for me! I shall undress you!' and with these words, he threw his jacket aside and leaped to her as she stood next to a low hung operating table covered with a white sheet. Almost tearing the hooks away, he seized her dress and lifted it tenderly as though he were drawing away the holy veil from the temple of Isis.
Underneath he discovered only pure clean nakedness, the delicious nakedness of La Tarantula's warm luscious body. He took a soughing intake of breath at the sight that confronted him. Entirely unashamed, La Tarantula now stood in front of him, displaying all of her varied charms. Her long black silk stockings, drawn almost to the cleft of her cunt, accentuated the lighter shades of her olive skin. Her breasts rose and fell in the rhythm of passion that had seized her in its toils and was tightening in her with an iron vicelike hold. Nakedly, unashamedly, she allowed his gaze to wander to her hair fringed cunt and his eyes lingered there, like a food connoisseur who is loathe to take his eyes from a choice viand, taking in each curve, each line, each intimate detail of her femininity.
'Take me!' she implored, holding her arms up to him. El Gallo stepped up to her. Wonder was in his eyes. Desire was in his fingers. Passion was in his cock which had already doubled itself in size and rigidity. And as he
