Mexico (5 page)

Victoriano repeated: "No more pictures. He's a ghoul, hoping I'll be gored so the pictures will make his story more interesting."

A crowd had gathered, captivated by the excitement of the scene. A husky young workman shouted, "By God, it's Victoriano!" And instantly this fellow had the young man on his shoulders. Immediately others rushed forward to support the figure thus held aloft, and I returned to my camera, but before I could snap the shutter, the crowd had moved across the road and onto the terrace of the hotel.

"Victoriano!" I shouted.

He turned and smiled professionally, knowing that this would be a favorite shot. His two young companions, always mindful that effective photography can make a matador, moved in quickly and took their places by the husky young workman who carried him, and the white-haired old man assumed a pose that showed his craggy profile.

They formed a magnificent pyramid there in the dusk, the godlike young matador, his two rugged assistants and their white-haired father resembling a centaur with a wreath of flowers about his head. I knew I had an extraordinary shot, and so did Victoriano, who twisted his head so that I could catch a more favorable profile.

"Two more!" I pleaded, and the onlookers elbowed in, hoping that I would take their picture as they mingled with the four Leals.

When I finished, the man carrying Victoriano set him carefully down on the steps of the hotel, and the crowd swirled into the hotel. I rewound my film and reloaded my camera. The first of the duelists had arrived, the delicate fencer, but the rowdy swordsman who thrashed about with his saber was still to come. And from his plinth, the little Indian who had started it all, Ixmiq of thirteen hundred years ago, gazed down approvingly.

Chapter
2.

THE SPANIARD

VICTORIANO LEAL, SLIM-HIPPED and twenty-seven, was considered by many the best matador in Mexico and possibly the world. He was handsome, graceful and a joy to the eye as he led the bull past his chest, and I had come to Mexico to see him duel a stubborn, awkward little Indian, perhaps to the death.

In this contest, which would be taking place in my hometown, I could not be neutral. Victoriano I had known for some years, Gomez I had only spoken to, and that briefly. But each had made himself into a serious matador, worthy of respect and the attention my magazine was willing to focus on them.

I had abandoned Toledo in my voluntary exile long before Victoriano burst onto the taurine scene, but I'd heard rumors of his successes in Mexico so that when I was sent to Spain to write an in-depth article about who might succeed General Franco when the aging dictator died and saw in the papers that Victoriano Leal would be fighting in Madrid on Sunday, I sought permission to interview him. He was told that I was an American writer knowledgeable about bullfighting and that the publicity my magazine might provide could be profitable to him internationally.

When we met, he surprised me by saying: "I am eager to speak with you. Your Ernest Hemingway made many matadors famous by writing about them in English. For me, maybe the same." But our interview would have been quite ordinary except that at one point he asked, "Where did you learn such good Spanish?"

"I was born in a Mexican city you've probably heard of. Toledo of the silver mines."

"Toledo! I've had some of my best afternoons in that plaza!" He paused, then said enthusiastically: "And I've taken part in some great tientas at the Palafox ranch. Don Eduardo, he's like the old-time breeders."

"Don Eduardo is my uncle."

He drew back, studied me and asked carefully: "Don Eduardo? You, a norteamericano? How?"

"My mother was a Palafox and I married Don Eduardo's niece. He's not really my uncle, but it's nearly the same."

"A Palafox!" He shook his head in amazement, and from then on we were friends.

I found myself quite intrigued by this young comer and had a feeling he might one day be a big success. During some of my free hours when I wasn't working on my Franco story, I hung around the bullring and picked up stories about Victoriano and his brilliant bullfighting family. They were so entertaining that I made notes on them in one of the little books I always carry with me. Years later, when Drummond cabled me in Cuba with my Toledo assignment, I was able to dig the old notebook out of my trunk, reconstruct the key moments from Victoriano's past, and cable it all to Drummond before even leaving Havana.

To summarize the history of this brilliant young matador I can do no better than cite the essential passages I had so far sent Drummond.

Seville, 1886. It was a hot, song-filled afternoon in the Sierpes, that cramped alleyway that has always served as the heart of Seville. In the small plaza that fronted a restaurant known for the past three hundred years as the Arena, a wedding party was under way celebrating the marriage of a matador, who had gained local fame, and a popular flamenco dancer. All who loved bullfighting were in attendance, but the guest of chief interest was Don Luis Mazzantini, down from Madrid in honor of the occasion, and those who were particularly addicted to the art of running the bulls kept close to the majestic Italian, hoping that he might speak to them.

Don Luis was a phenomenon, one of the. most popular fighters in Spain and the most unusual ever to have followed the art. His father was an Italian lyric tenor who had fled the chaos of his homeland to seek refuge in Spain, and his mother was a well-born Spaniard. Don Luis inherited both a love of opera and a passion for bullfighting. He had reached his twenties still torn between the desire to become a principal tenor at La Scala opera house in Milan or to be a master bullfighter in Madrid. After much vacillation he settled upon the latter. He was very tall, finely built and quite bald. He was good in all aspects of the fight, but in the difficult final act of killing he was one of the best who ever lived. Out of the ring he manifested an interest in liberal politics, the arts, high society and the company of well-bred men and women. It was therefore extremely gratifying that Don Luis had deigned to grace the wedding.

Toward seven in the evening, when the celebration had calmed down somewhat, Don Luis announced with a flourish of his ivory-headed cane: 'The main reason I came to Seville was to find an especially skilled peon to accompany me on my grand tour of Mexico. I'm seeking a helper who's superb with the banderillas to show the Mexicans how this art ought to be performed."

He had hardly stopped speaking when a wiry, blue-eyed young man leaped before him and said softly: "I am the man."

Don Luis leaned back, clasped his manicured hands over his cane and studied the intruder. He saw an insolence that he liked, a quick movement that was essential, and an inherent grace that sometimes came with a Sevillian bullfighter. "Your name?" he asked.

"Bernardo Leal," the young man replied.

"Your age?"

'Twenty-six."

"If you're twenty-six and any good, why haven't I heard of you?"

"Because you are from Madrid, Don Luis," the young man replied with quiet assurance. "In Seville everyone has heard of me. There is no better banderillero."

"You!" the Italian called imperiously to a youth pressing forward to hear the conversation. "You are the bull." And he gave the lad two forks to serve as horns. Then he grabbed two knives and threw them to Leal. 'These are your banderillas. Let me see you place a pair power-to-power."

The wedding guests fell back to form a small ring that included Mazzantini, who leaned forward in his chair. The "bull" stood off to one side, pawing with his feet and lowering his head with thumbs pressed against his temples, his forefingers thrust forward like horns.

Bernardo Leal, knowing that his future depended upon this moment, tucked in his shirt and tightened his belt in order to display his trim torso. Mazzantini marked this and approved: "The young man is aware of his lithe figure. That's good." But what the great Italian saw next was much better. Leal raised his arms until they were extended full length above his head and, arching his back, thrust his head and neck forward. Then, with swaying body and mincing steps he started his approach to the bull, and when it charged, snorting like a real animal, Leal broke into a deft run, allowed the bull almost to gore him, leaped into the air like a dancer, and came down with the two knives exactly in the hump of the bull's neck.

"
Ole
!" shouted the wedding guests, rewarding Leal with the traditional cry of praise for a bullfighter who has done well. Mazzantini made no sign of approval, but merely gave a new command: "Now a pair shifting the body."

Leal complied, gaining fresh oles. His examiner, somewhat irritated by the intrusive enthusiasm of the crowd, commanded, "From the barrier."

This was one of the more difficult ways of placing the banderillas, for the fighter had to stand close to the wooden barrier while inciting the bull to charge directly at him. At the last moment the man was supposed to swing clear, place the sticks as the bull thundered past parallel to the barrier, and make his escape from the horns by pressing himself back against the boards.

"You," Mazzantini shouted at some of the guests, "you be the barrier." Quickly the men formed a segment of circle against which Leal took his position. The bull was pawing the pavement and snorting, waiting for the incitement to charge, when young Leal had an inspiration. Grasping the two knives in his right hand, he raised them over his head, caught the free end with his left, and made believe that he was bringing them down forcefully over the imaginary barrier, thus breaking them in two. Throwing away the invisible long ends, he displayed the supposedly shortened sticks to the crowd. A great cheer went up at this gesture, for placing short sticks against the barrier was extremely perilous.

"Ho, bull, ho!" Leal cried, moving his hips to attract the animal. The bull pawed again, snorted furiously, and charged at his tormentor. With exquisite grace Leal threw his left hip toward the face of the bull, then withdrew the lure and placed the shortened sticks as the bull swept past.

The crowd exploded with joy and even Mazzantini applauded politely: "Can you do these things with a real bull?" Bernardo Leal replied, in the hearing of all the wedding guests, "Like you, matador, I do my finest work only with real bulls."

The tall Italian looked down at the would-be peon and said, "You shall come with me to Mexico, and I suppose you will never see Seville again, for if you play with real bulls in that manner, sooner or later they must kill you."

Toledo, 1891. Before I explain the significance of this unusual day in the life of Victoriano Leal, who wasn't even born till forty-two years later, I must explain why, in my reports to Drummond in New York, I shied away from using Spanish words in describing the specific acts of the bullfight. Since Spanish was my first tongue, it would have been natural for me to utilize Spanish words when attempting to describe anything relating to the Spanish world. For example, when I was trailing President Eisenhower through South America I found myself repeatedly falling into using a Spanish vocabulary. Fortunately, at the other end in New York I had a Spanish specialist who knew when to keep my words and when to translate them, but in this bullfight story I could not rely upon such a specialist. Drummond was in charge of features, like this duel of the matadors, and he insisted that stories be kept as simple as possible. I could therefore sympathize with his reactions when he received the following copy from me:

Drummond, you might want to describe briefly old Bernardo Leal's initial appearance in Mexico City in 1886. As banderillero in the cuadrilla of the espada Mazzantini, Leal placed a great pair uno al sesgo, but the toro embisted quickly from the medios, the banderillas dangling perfectly from his morilla, and viciously lunged at Leal, who was already acknowledging the oles. The crowd gasped and this warned him of the toro's approach, so with four swift strides he struck the estribo, vaulted over the barrera, and intended landing nimbly in the callejon. But the toro was too quick, and with his left cornupeta caught the banderillero in the seat of his pants, lending him an additional impulse that carried him clear over the tablas, landing him uninjured in the tendidas, where he looked up in surprise to find himself seated among the spectators, who applauded loudly. Wit
h p
erfect composure he bowed, then descended calmly to the ruedo.

About two hours after filing this I received spirited reaction from New York, and from the unusual time of its arrival I knew that something had gone wrong. Before I opened the message I thought, "Damn, they're dragging me off this bullfight thing." And I did not want to give up the story because I was hooked on it. My earlier friendship with Victoriano and my immersion in the taurine world now reminded me of the exciting days of my youth when my father would say, "Let's see what's happening at the bullring today," and we would see Luis Freg or Juan Silveti, or even the great Gaona, who was Mexican and the best in the world. Bullfighting had been bred into me. I was therefore relieved to read the telegram:

Your account of the grandfather's being hoisted into the stands by a mad bull makes fascinating reading. But why so many Spanish words? Are you trying to impress a bunch of beatniks in some San Diego pad? Cut the enchiladas. They are pretentious and useless.

I restudied my dispatch about the grandfather's debut in Mexico City and had to confess that I had used rather more Spanish words than were required, but it was also true that I had used some that could not be avoided if one wanted to narrate accurately what I was trying to describe: the moves of life and death in a bullring. Accordingly I wired back: