ck!" gasped Dick. "A fighting bull! You're joking.
Say you mean an Irish bull, and put me out of misery."

"He's a true Spanish grandee of a bull, and my arms have been round his
neck often," said Pilarcita.

"Then he can't be very fierce."

"He can be terrible. He has nearly killed two men--strangers who teased
him, so he meant no harm, poor darling! and they daren't let any except
black horses come near him. No Muira bull is more savage than he if he's
roused. You know, the Duke of Carmona's bulls are as celebrated as the
Muiras themselves. But Vivillo has always loved me, and one or two
others--me best, though--and he'll eat out of my hand, the great brown
velvet beast, like a kitten."

"How long since he's seen you?" asked Dick.

"Six weeks."

"I wouldn't trust his memory."

"I trust it as I would my brother's. You shall see me petting him."

"Great Scott! you won't let her risk her life with this wild beast, will
you, Colonel O'Donnel?" Dick cried out.

But the Cherub smiled his placid smile.

"Don Cipriano calls her Una, because she can tame wild beasts," said he.

Dick's face became almost too expressive. If he did not want Pilar's eyes
to read his every emotion, I thought he would be wiser to put on his
motor-mask.

XXV

WHAT CORDOBA LACKED

Through a flowery field of cloth-of-gold we came, while the afternoon was
young, into Cordoba--"Kartuba the Important," lying like a grave entombing
its dead glory, prone at the foot of tombstone mountains.

After the dazzle of wild-flowers shining in the sun, and the ozone of
country breezes, a sudden entrance into the network of narrow streets was
like being thrown, without a clue, into the Minotaur's dark labyrinth.

I had thought that no town could have narrower streets than Toledo; but
the streets of Cordoba were mere slits between house-walls. As we scraped
through on the car, Dick likened the town to a huge white cake divided
into slices by a sharp knife, but left in shape with only one or two
pieces pulled out to loosen the mass.

Still, the stone-paved slits contrived to make pictures; with here and
there a pair of splendid Moorish doors, a row of ancient eastern-patterned
windows, or a fairy glimpse of a sunlit _patio_ beyond a tunnel of shadow;
a fountain spraying jewels, a waving of palms and glow of hanging roses.

"She's sure to be here," I said to myself, as we stopped at last before
the prin