Davy had been 16 when he ran away to fight the Spanish Civil war. Well, that’s what he’d told his family he was off to do. He’d joined the Merchant Navy after leaving school at 14 and signed on as a galley boy helping the ship’s cook on board the SS Calabria. He travelled all the way to Australia and back again. He saw things his family could only imagine.
He came home on shore leave in 1936 and decided he’d go to Madrid. But he had no desire to fight in any war.
Davy wanted to fight the bulls.
He dreamt of a swirling red cape, bejewelled cap, and black bolero jacket. He’d dance and pirouette around an elderly bull. The bull, Freddie, would never be killed - Davy loved the white cattle of his uncle’s farm were he’d grown up and couldn’t imagine killing one for sport or entertainment. They were gentle giants, always pleased to see him, and if he bent down they’d lick his curly brown hair.
Davy intended to perform alongside Freddie - the two of them would show the Spanish audiences that there was another way - a way of entertainment and beauty. A way that would remind them of the old Cretan ways of bull-leaping and minotaurs. No animal would suffer. Davy and Freddie became the best of friends.
And they toured around the bullrings of Spain, loved by every audience. Davy and Freddie became famous and lifted the hearts of all who saw them. For a few years life was good, despite the war raging around Europe. Davy and Freddie danced and danced until poor old Freddie got too old and Davy had to do his duty in the war.
He returned home after the war and never told his family about his adventures. The gentle white cattle were all gone along with his uncle’s farm. Davy worked on farms in the cold north until he, like Freddie, got too old. He returned to his family’s village where it was warmer and the restaurant with its wooden bull’s head upon the dove grey wall reminded him of the years dancing and touring with Freddie, but no one ever knew that Davy had been a Bullfighter in Spain once upon a time.
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