CHAPTER XXXVI
WHAT PEOPLE SAY AND THINK.
Day dawned at last for the terrorized people. The streets in which
the cuartel and the tribunal were situated were still deserted and
solitary. The houses showed no signs of life. However, a shutter was
opened with a creaking noise and an infant head stuck out and looked
in all directions... Slap!... A sound announces hard contact between
a strip of leather and a human body. The child made a grimace, closed
its eyes and disappeared. The shutter was closed again.
The example had been set. Without any doubt the opening and closing of
the shutter has been heard, for another window was opened very slowly
and cautiously and a wrinkled and toothless old woman thrust out her
head. She was called Sister Rute. She looked about, knit her brows,
spit noisily and then crossed herself. In the house opposite, a little
window was timidly opened and her friend, Sister Rufa appeared. They
looked at each other for a moment, smiled, made some signals, and
again crossed themselves.
"Jesus! It was like a thanksgiving mass," said Sister Rufa.
"Since the time that Balat sacked the town I have never seen a night
like it," replied Sister Pute.
"What a lot of shots! They say that it was old Pablo's gang."
"Tulisanes? It couldn't be. They say that it was the cuaderilleros
against the Civil Guards. For this reason, they have arrested Don
Filipo."
"Sanctus Deus! They say that there are no less than fourteen killed."
Other windows were opened and different faces appeared, exchanging
salutations and commenting on the affair.
In the light of the day-which promised to be a splendid one-could
be seen in the distance, like ash-colored shadows, soldiers hurrying
about in confusion.
"There goes another corpse!" said some one from one of the windows.
"One? I see two."
"And so do I. But do you know what it was?" asked a man with a
crafty face.
"Certainly. The cuaderilleros."
"No, Senor. An uprising at the cuartel."
"What uprising? The curate against the alferez?"
"No, nothing of the sort," said he who had asked the question. "The
Chinese have risen in revolt."
And he closed his window again.
"The Chinese!" repeated all, with the greatest astonishment.
In a quarter of an hour other versions of the affair were in
circulation. Ibarra, with his servants, it was said, had tried to
steal Maria Clara, and Captain Tiago, aided by the Guardia Civil had
defended her.
By this time the number of the dead was no longer fourteen, but
thirty. Captain Tiago, it was said, was wounded and was going right
off to Manila with his family.
The arrival of two cuaderilleros, carrying a human form in a
wheelbarrow, and followed by a Civil Guard, produced a great
sensation. It was supposed that they came from the convent. From the
form of the feet which were hanging down, they tried to guess who it
could be. By half-past seven, when other Civil Guards arrived from
neighboring towns, the current version of the affair was already
clear and detailed.
"I have just come from the tribunal, where I have seen Don Filipo
and Don Crisostomo prisoners," said a man to Sister Pute. "I talked
with one of the cuaderilleros on guard. Well, Bruno, the son of the
man who was whipped to death, made a declaration last night. As you
know, Captain Tiago is going to marry his daughter to a Spaniard. Don
Crisostomo, offended, wanted to take revenge and tried to kill all
the Spaniards, even the curate. Last night they attacked the convent
and the cuartel. Happily, by mercy of God, the curate was in Captain
Tiago's house. They say that many escaped. The Civil Guards burned
Don Crisostomo's house, and if they had not taken him prisoner,
they would have burned him, too."
"They burned the house?"
"All the servants were arrested. Why, you can still see the smoke
from here!" said the narrator, approaching the window. "Those who
come from there relate very sad things."
All looked toward the place indicated. A light column of smoke was
still ascending to the heavens. All made comments more or less pious,
more or less accusatory.
"Poor young man!" exclaimed an old man, the husband of Pute.
"Yes!" replied his wife. "But he did not order a mass for the soul
of his father, who undoubtedly needs it more than others."
"But wife, you don't have any pity..."
"Sympathy for the excommunicated? It is a sin to have pity for the
enemies of God, say the curates. Don't you remember? He ran over the
sacred burial ground as if he were in a cattle pen."
"But a cattle pen and a cemetery are much alike," responded the old
man, "except that but one class of animals enter the cemetery."
"What!" cried Sister Pute. "Are you still going to defend him whom
God so clearly punishes? You will see that they will arrest you,
too. You may support a falling house, if you want to!"
The husband became silent in view of this argument.
"Yes," continued the old woman, "after striking Father Damaso, there
was nothing left for him to do but to kill Father Salvi."
"But you can't deny that he was a good boy when he was a child."
"Yes, he was a good child," replied the old woman, "but he went to
Spain. All those who go to Spain return heretics, so the curates say."
"Oh!" exclaimed the husband, seeing his revenge. "And the curate,
and all the curates, and the Archbishops, and the Pope, and the
Virgin-are they not Spaniards? Bah! Are they heretics, too? Bah!"
Happily for Sister Pute, the arrival of a servant, who rushed in
confused and pale, cut off the discussion.
"A man hanged in a neighboring orchard!" she exclaimed breathless.
"A man hanged!" exclaimed all, full of amazement.
The women crossed themselves. No one could stir.
"Yes, Senor," continued the servant, trembling. "I was going to
gather some peas in... I looked into the orchard next door ... to
see if there ... I saw a man swinging... I thought it was Teo ... I
went nearer to gather peas, and I saw that it was not he but it was
another, and was dead ... I ran, ran and..."
"Let us go and see it," said the old man, rising. "Take us there."
"Don't go!" cried Sister Pute, seizing him by the shirt.
"You'll get into trouble! He has hanged himself? Then all the worse
for him!"
"Let me see it, wife! Go to the tribunal, Juan, and report it. Perhaps
he is not dead yet."
And he went ino[typo, should be into?] the orchard, followed by the
servant, who kept hid behind him. The women and Sister Pute herself
came along behind, full of terror and curiosity.
"There it is, Senor," said the servant stopping him and pointing with
her finger.
The group stopped at a respectful distance, allowing the old man to
advance alone.
The body of a man, hanging from the limb of a santol tree, was swinging
slowly in the breeze. The old man contemplated it for some time. He
looked at the rigid feet, the arms, the stained clothing and the
drooping head.
"We ought not to touch the corpse until some official has arrived,"
said he, in a loud voice. "He is already stiff. He has been dead for
some time."
The women approached hesitatingly.
"It is the neighbor who lived in that little house; the one who
arrived only two weeks ago. Look at the scar on his face."
"Ave Maria!" exclaimed some of the women.
"Shall we pray for his soul?" asked a young girl as soon as she had
finished looking at the dead body from all directions.
"You fool! You heretic!" Sister Pute scolded her. "Don't you know what
Father Damaso said? To pray for a damned person is to tempt God. He who
commits suicide is irrevocably condemned. For this reason, he cannot
be buried in a sacred place. I had begun to think that this man was
going to have a bad ending. I never could guess what he lived on."
"I saw him twice speaking with the sacristan mayor," observed a girl.
"It couldn't have been to confess himself or to order a mass!"
The neighbors gathered together and a large circle surrounded the
corpse which was still swinging. In half an hour some officers and
two cuaderilleros arrived. They took the body down and put it in
a wheelbarrow.
"Some people are in a hurry to die," said one of the officers,
laughing, while he took out the pen from behind his ear.
He asked some trifling questions; took the declaration of the servant,
whom he tried to implicate, now looking at her with evil in his eyes,
now threatening her and now attributing to her words which she did
not say-so much so that the servant, believing that she was going
to be taken to jail, began to weep and finished by declaring that
she was looking for peas, but that ... and she called Teo to witness.
In the meantime, a peasant with a wide hat and a large plaster on
his neck, was examining the body, and the rope by which it was hanging.
The face was no more livid than the rest of the body. Above the
rope could be seen two scars and two small bruises. Where the rope
had rubbed, there was no blood and the skin was white. The curious
peasant examined closely the camisa and the pantaloons. He noted that
they were full of dust and recently torn in some places. But what most
attracted his attention were the "stick-tights" [22] on his clothing,
even up to his neck.
"What do you see?" asked the officer.
"I was trying to identify him, senor," stammered the peasant, lowering
his hat further from his uncovered head.
"But haven't you heard that it was one Lucas? Were you sleeping?"
All began to laugh. The peasant, embarrassed, muttered a few words,
and went away with head down, walking slowly.
"Here! Where are you going?" cried the old man. "You can't get out
that way. That's the way to the dead man's house."
"That fellow is still asleep," said the officer with a jeer. "We'll
have to throw some water on him!"
Those standing around laughed again.
The peasant left the place where he had played so poor a part and
directed his steps toward the church. In the sacristy, he asked for
the sacristan mayor.
"He is still sleeping!" they replied gruffly. "Don't you know that
they sacked the convent last night?"
"I will wait till he awakes."
The sacristans looked at him with that rudeness characteristic of
people who are in the habit of being ill-treated.
In a dark corner, the one-eyed sacristan mayor was sleeping in a
large chair. His spectacles were across his forehead among his long
locks of hair. His squalid, bony breast was bare, and rose and fell
with regularity.
The peasant sat down near by, disposed to wait patiently, but a
coin fell on the floor and he began looking for it with the aid of a
candle, under the sacristan mayor's big chair. The peasant also noted
"stick-tights" on the sleeping man's pantaloons and on the arms of
his camisa. The sacristan awoke at last, rubbed his good eye, and,
in a very bad humor, reproached the man.
"I would like to order a mass said, senor," replied he in a tone
of excuse.
"They have already finished all the masses," said the one-eyed man,
softening his accent a little. "If you want it for to-morrow... Is
it for souls in Purgatory?"
"No, senor;" replied the peasant, giving him a peso.
And looking fixedly in his one eye, he added:
"It is for a person who is going to die soon." And he left the
sacristy. "I could have seized him last night," he added, sighingly
as he removed the plaster from his neck. And he straightened up and
regained the stature and appearance of Elias.