I heave a great sigh. It all takes me back to my youth in Cheapside, when the Rooster Charlie Gang and I would go to bull baitings, to work the crowds gathered there. Those proceedings didn't even have a trace of the bloody elegance of this Spanish bullfight where there is a chance that the bull out there could get lucky and the matador could get himself gored right proper and good for him. No, in London the poor bull was just tied to a stake and dogs—big bulldogs and mastiffs and such—were sent in to rip the poor beast apart. Never saw the sport in that, no I didn't. I mean, at the end, the poor helpless bull could only fall to his knees and bawl out his anguish as the dogs ripped out his throat. No, no sport at all—it was all just blood lust. But the crowds did drink a lot of gin and got worked up, so we were sometimes able to beg some tips for running betting slips, and maybe manage to pick a few pockets, too.
I have often wondered how people, even educated, highborn people, could excuse that kind of cruelty to animals. Maybe it goes back to that thing in the Bible where God gave man dominion over the beasts of the ield—I remember Pap Beam reciting that one to me when he and his boys had a rope around my neck and were preparing to string me up—and how the Church holds that animals ain't got souls, which I believe is wrong. I think animals got souls just like us ... and better ones than the ones we got, generally.
I shake myself out of that reverie and return myself to the present. Back here in Cuba, blood is spilled and the bull at last lies dead on the ground, gaily be-ribboned banderillas sticking out of his back. Trumpets blare, the matador parades around twitching his bum, and the ears and tail of the vanquished bull are cut off and presented to some simpering mantilla-clad señorita in the bleachers, and that is that. End of bull, end of contest. Come on, lads, let's get out of here.
We leave the arena and get back out into the plaza and cast about for the next thing to do. There are crowds in the town square and the mood is most festive. I like it. I like it a lot.
"Hey, how 'bout that over there?" asks Davy. I look and see from its sign over the door that it is a tavern called Café Americano, and I see many men going in and some coming out. Hmmmm ... I had overheard talk of this place in the last tavern. Apparently it is a very popular spot.
"Later, lads. We'll come back with my fiddle and whistle and maybe give 'em a few tunes, but right now, let's soak up some more of the local color. The Spanish lands do have their charms, you know. Ah! What's that?"
That is a large building at the side of the square, with many people pouring into it, mostly men. There are posters to either side of the doorway and they proclaim that a certain event is going to take place there.
"C'mon, let's go!" I crow to my mates and lead them into the place. Ah, yes, there's nothing I like better than goin' into a likely spot with my bully boys at my back!
It's a big circular room with a fenced-in pit area. There are tiers of seats all around. Most of the seats are taken, but I manage to elbow my way to the front. Hey, I'm a girl and that gives me some privileges. Davy and Tink worm their way in to stand beside me. I see that the sand in the pit has been raked clean of yesterday's blood and smoothed out. We settle in and wait for the main events. Small girls and boys come bearing trays of wine, rum, and tapas, and we take some and flip coins onto the trays in payment.
At the end of the pit are two closed doors, and a man with a sash across his chest stands in front of them, his arms crossed. Two men sit at a table next to the ring, with an hourglass between them—they will be the judges of the matches. It seems everything is in readiness.
"Did you lads ever go to the cockfights at MacMillan's back in Cheapside, when you were kids?" I ask.
Now, I had seen lots of cockfights back in London when I was runnin' with the Rooster Charlie Gang, and I gotta say they didn't bother me as much as the bull baiting ... or the bear baiting. After all, they were just chickens and doomed for the pot anyway and sometimes us orphans were able to pick up the bodies of the defeated birds. We would take them and wrap them in discarded clay from the potters and then roast them next to the blacksmith's fires till they were done. The clay took the feathers off and then we could pick at the bits of meat, which were wondrous good. Hey, I wasn't raised up proper, so sod off.
"Ah, yes," says Tink, and Davy nods in agreement. "Good pickin's there. Well worth the trouble of sneakin' through the Shankys' turf to get in."
The Shanky Boys were the biggest, meanest gang of street urchins in London, and we generally tried to stay well out of their way. I was glad to find, early in my days as a ship's boy on the Dolphin, that neither Tink nor Davy had been a Shanky, 'cause they were a nasty bunch. Tink, it turned out, had belonged to the Royal Street Rounders, and Davy to the King's Own Cavaliers. We all gave our gangs rough and glorious names, I guess to give us a bit of pride, knowin' that to the good people of London the whole lot of us weren't worth a handful of dirt. But once inside MacMillan's, it was neutral territory, with truce 'tween the gangs, like, 'cause if we got in a fight and raised a ruckus, we'd all get tossed out, and where would the profit be in that for any of us?
"Then we prolly saw each other there, sometimes, me bein' wi' the Rooster Charlie bunch," I says, fallin' back into the old Cockney way o' talkin', as I always do when I'm wi' me mates, or really scared or excited about somethin'.
"Aye," says Davy. "I knew Charlie, but I wouldna noticed you, being a stupid little rag of a girl like you was."
I give him an elbow and I'm about to frost him with a Lawson Peabody Look and comment on how I might've been little, but I warn't stupid, and ain't it strange how things work out sometimes, Common Seaman Jones, when—
"Hey," says Tink. "Looks like it's gonna start."
Sure enough, a trumpet blares a short trill and the doors behind the red-sashed man swing open and two men walk out, each clasping a gamecock to his chest. When the men get out into the open, one walks clockwise around the edge of the pit, while the other walks in the other direction.
The man in the red sash speaks up and points to one of the chickens. "Behold ... El Conquistador!" The man holding that particular fighter lifts him up for the scrutiny of the crowd and there are great cheers. El Conquistador has had both his cockscomb and his wattles cut off, making him more fit for battle. He also wears silver spurs over his natural ones—the ones he was born with are a scant half-inch long, while the silver ones are a full two inches and are razor sharp, with needle points. This c*ck is mainly black with some streaks of white, while the other has streaks of red in his feathers.
Red Sash points to the contender and says, "El Caballero!" and there are cheers for The Cowboy, as well. He, too, is in fighting trim—no cockscomb, no wattles.
"Engage!" The handlers stand facing each other, and holding their gamecocks tightly, they shove them together to get them really mad and in a mood to fight. It works. The cocks crow out their battle cries and struggle to get at each other. Then the men kneel down and wait for the call. There is a rush to get in last-minute bets, and I spot a man nearby naming the odds and taking bets. It seems El Conquistador is the heavy favorite. I hold up two fingers and cry out, "Dos pesos al Conquistador!"
I do like to be part of the action wherever I find myself.
The oddsmaker nods and writes a note on a tiny piece of paper and hands it to me. I give him my two coins and wait for the battle to begin.
"Fight!" shouts Red Sash. The judges turn over the sand glass and the handlers release their birds and step back.
The cocks fly at each other, wings wildly beating, necks stretched out and reaching for the other's throat, while their legs pump furiously trying to plunge their silver spurs into any part of their adversary. Neither succeeds right off, so they step back and strut for a moment, sizing up the enemy, and then they're back at it in a flurry of feathers and cackles. The crowd roars, and so do I. Come on, Conquistador, get him!
I can see why the birds' combs and wattles have been trimmed—if an opponent managed to get a spur through either of those things, then the fighter's head could be held to the ground and he would be finished.
When they part again, blood is beginning to show on the feathers of El Caballero. His step is not so sure and he shows signs of weakening. The sand is not halfway down the neck of the hourglass when El Conquistador, seeing an opening, leaps high in the air and brings his spurs straight down into the back of El Caballero.
The Cowboy is done. He staggers, croaks out a last crow of defiance, and then topples over. He tries to rise, but he cannot. He lowers his head and dies. There is a great roar from the crowd. Ole! El Conquistador! Ole!
The victorious c*ck is held aloft and paraded around the ring.
"It was a good, clean kill," says a man near to me, plainly an aficionado of this sport. He is well dressed in a white linen suit and matching hat. "It was a thing of beauty."
"Yes," says another. "And El Caballero, he fought well, and died well."
However well he died, the fallen warrior's dead and bloody body is picked up by his owner with, I think, a certain amount of tenderness and taken back through those same doors he had come through alive not ten minutes ago. I go to collect my winnings.
I hand over my chit and I get back my original two pesos and a peso and a half to boot. Hmmmm. Not so much as even money and not very good odds. El Conquistador is quite the formidable chicken, it seems. We shall see.
As the next match is being set up, I cast my eyes about the place. The swells seem to prefer the balcony—there are several small groups of women seated there, their dark eyes looking out over the tops of veils—and many welldressed men, some of whom are soldiers and some of whom are naval officers. I do not see Juan Carlos Cisneros, which is good.
Down here below, however, I see a much more diverse mix of people. Many men, of course, in various kinds of dress—planters, laborers, and free blacks, too—but many women as well. Some are with husbands and family, but some are plainly working girls. I also see a bunch of Spanish sailors leaning over the edge of the pit, and plainly well into their cups. They wear caps that have a headband that stretches across their foreheads, and stitched on that headband are the words San Cristobal.
How convenient. Well, I'm supposed to be a spy, so I might as well get to it.
"Lads," I say to my mates, "I'm going to sit out the next match and go over to talk to those sailors. Keep an eye on me, and if I draw my mantilla back up about my head, come and claim me. All right?"
"But why?" asks Tink.
"Because, Seaman Tinker, it might be handy to know when the San Cristobal will sail again and maybe cause us trouble. I'm sure those on the Dolphin will want to know, as they might have to fight that ship soon."
"Ah," says Tink, nodding. I pull my mantilla from my head and let it fall on my shoulders, thereby branding myself as a bad girl, and then I head off. I wriggle through the crowd and plant myself in the middle of the Spanish sailors, and with my palm modestly to my lips, I pretend to be surprised at finding myself in their manly midst.
I put the big eyes on the one who seems to be the leader of the group and say, "Cuánto lo siento, señores, but I seem to have lost my way."