Free Circles of Fate by Anne Saunders Page A

his head lower and lower, exciting the bull and also preparing a target for the matador’s sword.
    Now everything was ready for the final part. The matador dedicated the bull to the president of the ring. His sweetheart, if he had one, was obviously not in attendance or he would have dedicated the bull to her. He changed his cape for a smaller one on a slender stick, called a muleta.
    Expectancy was high. Cathy felt as though her lungs had been turned into a furnace and her breath blistered her throat.
    â€œHe’ll make seven passes,” she hissed excitedly to Edward. “You see if he doesn’t!”
    Seven times the bull plunged, seven times he found only a fluttering red cape. He was as exasperated as the crowd was thrilled. Exasperated, puzzled, weakened and weary. It was time for the kill. “Death to the bull,” roared the frenzied crowd. “ Muerte! Muerte! ”
    This was the most tense moment of all. To kill the bull the matador must lean between the horns. He is wide open to danger because he cannot know that the bull will not suddenly lift or turn his head. At that moment all that protects him is his own bravery, which is tested to the limit.
    The sword sank into the hulking body, finding its mark between the bull’s shoulder blades. It was a good clean stroke. The bull lunged and appeared to fall. The matador’s bow to the crowd was a little precipitant because the bull, although dying, had not yet fallen to his knees. Screams and shocked gasps expelled as the bull made one last thrust with his horns, grazing the matador’s hand, drawing blood.
    The matador proudly brushes it off. No one can work too close to the horns and not receive wounds. “It is nothing,” he tells the crowd. “A mere scratch.”
    For a superficial wound there seemed to be a lot of blood, although some surface wounds do bleed profusely and, surely, if there had been injury to the bone the matador wouldn’t look so chirpy. It was sweet relief to see the blood apparently contained, if not altogether staunched, in a make-shift pad until it could be medically attended to and that same hand raised in a gesture of exaggerated triumph.
    Cathy rolled her eyes round to meet Edward’s, dizzy with relief and happiness. “The president of the bull-ring will award the matador an ear from the bull now,” she confidently told him. “He might think the fight exceptional enough to award him both ears. I say! Are you all right?”
    â€œYes,” said Edward. But when he tried to get up and walk, he weaved about like a drunk, and his pallor was decidedly green.
    â€œWhere’s Edward?” was the first thing Anita said.
    â€œIndisposed.” Cathy suppressed a giggle. “Don’t worry. We bumped into Claude Perryman – my boss, remember?” As if Anita could forget him. “He’s taken Edward to his house to lie down for a while. He’ll have recovered for the procession.”
    â€œEdward is never ill,” said Anita. “What is the matter with him?”
    â€œHis first bullfight. It affects a lot of people that way. Come on. I can’t wait to show off my costume.”
    Anita wasn’t surprised. It was pale green, high at the waist, low at the neck. A pearl on a thin pendant chain lay in the dip of her breasts. She piled her red hair high in a style befitting of the Empress Josephine. It made her neck look longer, her arms and waist slighter, and the pearl acted as a magnet, drawing eyes to her superb bosom.
    â€œDare I?” she said, looking at her revealed curves.
    â€œOf course you dare,” said Anita emphatically. “Zip me up and help me put on my armour.”
    Cathy assured her she looked exquisite, a fact also confirmed by Cathy’s full-length mirror, because the dainty ankle-length dress which Cathy had kindly loaned her suited her youthful, supple body. Her eyes, deftly if heavily made-up, were lost in depths