Bull Wronged

Shouts of men, screams of women, and the deep bellowing of a bull deeply wronged, enlivened, last week, the vivacious street life of downtown Madrid. Heartless butchers had wronged the bull by buying and attempting to slaughter him. With daring and originality he had escaped from the slaughter house by leaping out a low window. Now, with tail up and lashing, with head low and small eyes rolling wickedly, he purposed to charge down a street thronging with pre-dinner-time crowds. Stalked fear, reigned panic. Suddenly from the doorway of an office building emerged the great matador* Fortuna. 'He had been upstairs signing a contract. He carried no bull baiting gear, wore an inconspicuous rain coat. Even . thus he was instantly recognized. Screamed women: "Save us Fortuna!" Throated men: "Kill the bull:" Serene, the great Fortuna moved with unhurried, catlike swiftness to satisfy the unreasonable demands of his public. Stripping off his rain coat he stepped before the bull, swirling the garment through classic florcos as though it were a bullfighter's cloak, "Go Alfonso!" he cried to a friend in the crowd, "Run! Get me a sword! Our little one (gesturing at the bull, now beginning to charge) will die when you return. . . ." Charged the bull--deftly drawn by Fortuna's flirting rain coat away from the crowds and toward a stone wall against which horns scraped as the master leaped clear. Eight times this sport was repeated, on the rough, treacherous street. Then Fortuna's frenzied amigo arrived, panting, to proffer him a sword. "Too bad, my little one," cried Fortuna to the bull. "We should have met fairly in the ring. . . . So! . . . So . . . ," and he withdrew a dripping sword.

--Literally, "killer."