The six banderillas having been placed, another interval of harrying the unfortunate animal with minor exasperations of cloak-flapping followed: but at last the espatero, the swordsman, and the matador prepared to give the death stroke. Here again in first-class bullfighting probably the whole exhibition is one of supreme skill. We expected a certain number of showy passes with the scarlet flag, the matador keeping the bull circling about him--"wearing the bull as a waist-belt," as the saying is in Spain. Then a pause, a sudden thrust with the sword--and, with a groan, the bull is dead. It was not so. The espatero walked about flapping the cloak, at which sometimes the bull did charge, but more often did not. Several times the espatero had to run into a bolt-hole. The bull showed strong desires to go home: it went to the side of the ring and looked at the door from whence it had emerged, while more venturesome members of the audience leaned over the palisade and tried to snatch out a banderilla as a souvenir. The toreador chivied the bull round the ring, trying to get it face foremost. However, when he succeeded in this he did not seem satisfied, for though the people yelled: "Ahora! Ahora!"[10] the matador only flapped his cloak.
"He is rather a nervous espatero," said Luis, "so, when he does prepare to kill, look out. Sometimes the sword flies. Not very long ago it landed in the audience and killed a spectator." At last, however, the bull, tongue hanging out, foam dripping from its mouth, blood streaming from the lance and banderilla wounds in the shoulders, faced the matador with half lowered and sullen head. The matador, taking up the position of a man about to throw a javelin, aimed his sword, which was curiously curved in the blade, and with quick steps ran in, thrust, and side-stepped. The bull, taken by surprise, could not bring its weight into action rapidly enough, the upward tossing horns missed the man by inches: the bull rushed forward at another torero who had taken position in line to attract the animal's attention. The matador had made no master stroke, the sword stood eighteen inches out of the bull's shoulder. The bull showed no signs of death, so the matador went away to procure another sword. Finally the bull, stabbed by four swords, was worried to death rather than killed, after which the corpse was dragged triumphantly around the ring at the tail of the team of horses, while the spectators stood on the stone seats and cheered.