Meanwhile Andres, delighted to have found the manola, paid little attention to the preliminaries of the fight, and the first bull had already ripped up a horse before he bestowed a single look upon the arena. He gazed at the young girl by his side, with an intentness that would doubtless have embarrassed her had she perceived it. He thought her more charming than ever; and certainly a more perfect type of Spanish beauty had never sat upon the blue granite benches of the Madrid circus. With admiration amounting to ecstasy, Andres contemplated the delicate profile, the thin, well-formed nose, with nostrils pink-tinted, like the interior of a tropical shell; the full temples, where, beneath the slightest possible tint of amber, meandered an imperceptible network of blue veins; the mouth, fresh as a flower, ripe and ruddy as a fruit, slightly opened by a half smile, and illuminated by a gleam of mother-of-pearl; and above all, the eyes, whose glances, passing between a thick double fringe of black lashes, possessed an irresistible fascination. It was the Greek form with the Arab character: the style of beauty would have had something startling in a London or Paris drawing-room, but was perfectly in its place at a bull-fight and under the ardent sky of Spain. The old woman, less attentive than the young one to the progress of the sport, watched the proceedings of Andres with the look of a dog who scents a thief. As he persisted in his contemplation of his pretty neighbour, the old lady's anger gradually increased; she fidgeted on her seat, rattled her fan, pushed her companion with her elbow, and asked her all sorts of questions to oblige her to turn her head. But the young girl either did not or would not understand; she gave short answers, and resumed her attentive and serious attitude. "The devil take the old witch!" muttered Andres. "Tis a thousand pities they have abolished the Inquisition! With such a face as that, she would have been treated, without form of trial, to a ride on an ass, dressed in a _san-benito_ and a sulphur shirt. She belongs to the seminary of Barahona, and washes young girls for the sorcerers' sabbath." Juancho, whose turn to kill had not yet come, stood carelessly in the centre of the circus, paying no more attention to the bulls than if they had been so many sheep. He scarcely deigned to take two or three steps aside when the furious beasts showed a disposition to attack him. His large bright black eye glanced round boxes, galleries, and benches, where thousands of fans, of every hue, fluttered and palpitated like butterflies' wings. He evidently sought some one. At last a gleam of joy flashed across his brown features, and he made the slightest possible movement of his head, the sort of salutation that actors sometimes address to their acquaintances before the curtain. It was directed to the bench on which sat the old woman and the young girl.