The Reign of Greed - 15

initiated the applause to encourage her, for Serpolette deserved it.
Meanwhile, the young men were waiting for the cancan. Pecson became
all eyes, but there was everything except cancan. There was presented
the scene in which, but for the timely arrival of the representatives
of the law, the women would have come to blows and torn one another's
hair out, incited thereto by the mischievous peasants, who, like our
students, hoped to see something more than the cancan.

Scit, scit, scit, scit, scit, scit,
Disputez-vous, battez-vous,
Scit, scit, scit, scit, scit, scit,
Nous allons compter les coups.

The music ceased, the men went away, the women returned, a few at
a time, and started a conversation among themselves, of which our
friends understood nothing. They were slandering some absent person.
"They look like the Chinamen of the _pansiteria!_" whispered Pecson.
"But, the cancan?" asked Makaraig.
"They're talking about the most suitable place to dance it," gravely
responded Sandoval.
"They look like the Chinamen of the _pansiteria_," repeated Pecson
in disgust.
A lady accompanied by her husband entered at that moment and took her
place in one of the two vacant boxes. She had the air of a queen and
gazed disdainfully at the whole house, as if to say, "I've come later
than all of you, you crowd of upstarts and provincials, I've come later
than you!" There are persons who go to the theater like the contestants
in a mule-race: the last one in, wins, and we know very sensible men
who would ascend the scaffold rather than enter a theater before the
first act. But the lady's triumph was of short duration--she caught
sight of the other box that was still empty, and began to scold her
better half, thus starting such a disturbance that many were annoyed.
"Ssh! Ssh!"
"The blockheads! As if they understood French!" remarked the lady,
gazing with supreme disdain in all directions, finally fixing her
attention on Juanito's box, whence she thought she had heard an
impudent hiss.
Juanito was in fact guilty, for he had been pretending to understand
everything, holding himself up proudly and applauding at times as
though nothing that was said escaped him, and this too without guiding
himself by the actors' pantomime, because he scarcely looked toward
the stage. The rogue had intentionally remarked to Paulita that,
as there was so much more beautiful a woman close at hand, he did
not care to strain his eyes looking beyond her. Paulita had blushed,
covered her face with her fan, and glanced stealthily toward where
Isagani, silent and morose, was abstractedly watching the show.
Paulita felt nettled and jealous. Would Isagani fall in love with
any of those alluring actresses? The thought put her in a bad humor,
so she scarcely heard the praises that Doña Victorina was heaping
upon her own favorite.
Juanito was playing his part well: he shook his head at times in sign
of disapproval, and then there could be heard coughs and murmurs in
some parts, at other times he smiled in approbation, and a second later
applause resounded. Doña Victorina was charmed, even conceiving some
vague ideas of marrying the young man the day Don Tiburcio should
die--Juanito knew French and De Espadaña didn't! Then she began to
flatter him, nor did he perceive the change in the drift of her talk,
so occupied was he in watching a Catalan merchant who was sitting
next to the Swiss consul. Having observed that they were conversing in
French, Juanito was getting his inspiration from their countenances,
and thus grandly giving the cue to those about him.
Scene followed scene, character succeeded character, comic and
ridiculous like the bailiff and Grenicheux, imposing and winsome like
the marquis and Germaine. The audience laughed heartily at the slap
delivered by Gaspard and intended for the coward Grenicheux, which was
received by the grave bailiff, whose wig went flying through the air,
producing disorder and confusion as the curtain dropped.
"Where's the cancan?" inquired Tadeo.
But the curtain rose again immediately, revealing a scene in a servant
market, with three posts on which were affixed signs bearing the
announcements: _servantes_, _cochers_, and _domestiques_. Juanito, to
improve the opportunity, turned to Doña Victorina and said in a loud
voice, so that Paulita might hear and he convinced of his learning:
"_Servantes_ means servants, _domestiques_ domestics."
"And in what way do the _servantes_ differ from the
_domestiques_?" asked Paulita.
Juanito was not found wanting. "_Domestiques_ are those that are
domesticated--haven't you noticed that some of them have the air of
savages? Those are the _servantes_."
"That's right," added Doña Victorina, "some have very bad manners--and
yet I thought that in Europe everybody was cultivated. But as it
happens in France,--well, I see!"
"Ssh! Ssh!"
But what was Juanito's predicament when the time came for the opening
of the market and the beginning of the sale, and the servants who were
to be hired placed themselves beside the signs that indicated their
class! The men, some ten or twelve rough characters in livery, carrying
branches in their hands, took their place under the sign _domestiques_!
"Those are the domestics," explained Juanito.
"Really, they have the appearance of being only recently domesticated,"
observed Doña Victorina. "Now let's have a look at the savages."
Then the dozen girls headed by the lively and merry Serpolette, decked
out in their best clothes, each wearing a big bouquet of flowers at
the waist, laughing, smiling, fresh and attractive, placed themselves,
to Juanito's great desperation, beside the post of the _servantes_.
"How's this?" asked Paulita guilelessly. "Are those the savages that
you spoke of?"
"No," replied the imperturbable Juanito, "there's a mistake--they've
got their places mixed--those coming behind--"
"Those with the whips?"
Juanito nodded assent, but he was rather perplexed and uneasy.
"So those girls are the _cochers_?"
Here Juanito was attacked by such a violent fit of coughing that some
of the spectators became annoyed.
"Put him out! Put the consumptive out!" called a voice.
Consumptive! To be called a consumptive before Paulita! Juanito
wanted to find the blackguard and make him swallow that
"consumptive." Observing that the women were trying to hold him back,
his bravado increased, and he became more conspicuously ferocious. But
fortunately it was Don Custodio who had made the diagnosis, and he,
fearful of attracting attention to himself, pretended to hear nothing,
apparently busy with his criticism of the play.
"If it weren't that I am with you," remarked Juanito, rolling his
eyes like some dolls that are moved by clockwork, and to make the
resemblance more real he stuck out his tongue occasionally.
Thus that night he acquired in Doña Victorina's eyes the reputation
of being brave and punctilious, so she decided in her heart that
she would marry him just as soon as Don Tiburcio was out of the
way. Paulita became sadder and sadder in thinking about how the girls
called _cochers_ could occupy Isagani's attention, for the name had
certain disagreeable associations that came from the slang of her
convent school-days.
At length the first act was concluded, the marquis taking away as
servants Serpolette and Germaine, the representative of timid beauty
in the troupe, and for coachman the stupid Grenicheux. A burst of
applause brought them out again holding hands, those who five seconds
before had been tormenting one another and were about to come to blows,
bowing and smiling here and there to the gallant Manila public and
exchanging knowing looks with various spectators.
While there prevailed the passing tumult occasioned by those who
crowded one another to get into the greenroom and felicitate the
actresses and by those who were going to make calls on the ladies in
the boxes, some expressed their opinions of the play and the players.
"Undoubtedly, Serpolette is the best," said one with a knowing air.
"I prefer Germaine, she's an ideal blonde."
"But she hasn't any voice."
"What do I care about the voice?"
"Well, for shape, the tall one."
"Pshaw," said Ben-Zayb, "not a one is worth a straw, not a one is
an artist!"
Ben-Zayb was the critic for _El Grito de la Integridad_, and his
disdainful air gave him great importance in the eyes of those who
were satisfied with so little.
"Serpolette hasn't any voice, nor Germaine grace, nor is that
music, nor is it art, nor is it anything!" he concluded with marked
contempt. To set oneself up as a great critic there is nothing like
appearing to be discontented with everything. Besides, the management
had sent only two seats for the newspaper staff.
In the boxes curiosity was aroused as to who could be the possessor
of the empty one, for that person, would surpass every one in chic,
since he would be the last to arrive. The rumor started somewhere
that it belonged to Simoun, and was confirmed: no one had seen the
jeweler in the reserved seats, the greenroom, or anywhere else.
"Yet I saw him this afternoon with Mr. Jouay," some one said. "He
presented a necklace to one of the actresses."
"To which one?" asked some of the inquisitive ladies.
"To the finest of all, the one who made eyes at his Excellency."
This information was received with looks of intelligence, winks,
exclamations of doubt, of confirmation, and half-uttered commentaries.
"He's trying to play the Monte Cristo," remarked a lady who prided
herself on being literary.
"Or purveyor to the Palace!" added her escort, jealous of Simoun.
In the students' box, Pecson, Sandoval, and Isagani had remained,
while Tadeo had gone to engage Don Custodio in conversation about
his projects, and Makaraig to hold an interview with Pepay.
"In no way, as I have observed to you before, friend Isagani,"
declared Sandoval with violent gestures and a sonorous voice, so
that the ladies near the box, the daughters of the rich man who was
in debt to Tadeo, might hear him, "in no way does the French language
possess the rich sonorousness or the varied and elegant cadence of the
Castilian tongue. I cannot conceive, I cannot imagine, I cannot form
any idea of French orators, and I doubt that they have ever had any
or can have any now in the strict construction of the term orator,
because we must not confuse the name orator with the words babbler
and charlatan, for these can exist in any country, in all the regions
of the inhabited world, among the cold and curt Englishmen as among
the lively and impressionable Frenchmen."
Thus he delivered a magnificent review of the nations, with his
poetical characterizations and most resounding epithets. Isagani nodded
assent, with his thoughts fixed on Paulita, whom he had surprised
gazing at him with an expressive look which contained a wealth of
meaning. He tried to divine what those eyes were expressing--those
eyes that were so eloquent and not at all deceptive.
"Now you who are a poet, a slave to rhyme and meter, a son of the
Muses," continued Sandoval, with an elegant wave of his hand, as
though he were saluting, on the horizon, the Nine Sisters, "do you
comprehend, can you conceive, how a language so harsh and unmusical
as French can give birth to poets of such gigantic stature as our
Garcilasos, our Herreras, our Esproncedas, our Calderons?"
"Nevertheless," objected Pecson, "Victor Hugo--"
"Victor Hugo, my friend Pecson, if Victor Hugo is a poet, it is
because he owes it to Spain, because it is an established fact, it
is a matter beyond all doubt, a thing admitted even by the Frenchmen
themselves, so envious of Spain, that if Victor Hugo has genius, if
he really is a poet, it is because his childhood was spent in Madrid;
there he drank in his first impressions, there his brain was molded,
there his imagination was colored, his heart modeled, and the most
beautiful concepts of his mind born. And after all, who is Victor
Hugo? Is he to be compared at all with our modern--"
This peroration was cut short by the return of Makaraig with a
despondent air and a bitter smile on his lips, carrying in his hand
a note, which he offered silently to Sandoval, who read:

"MY DOVE: Your letter has reached me late, for I have already
handed in my decision, and it has been approved. However,
as if I had guessed your wish, I have decided the matter
according to the desires of your protégés. I'll be at the
theater and wait for you after the performance.
"Your duckling,
"CUSTODINING."

"How tender the man is!" exclaimed Tadeo with emotion.
"Well?" said Sandoval. "I don't see anything wrong about this--quite
the reverse!"
"Yes," rejoined Makaraig with his bitter smile, "decided
favorably! I've just seen Padre Irene."
"What does Padre Irene say?" inquired Pecson.
"The same as Don Custodio, and the rascal still had the audacity
to congratulate me. The Commission, which has taken as its own the
decision of the arbiter, approves the idea and felicitates the students
on their patriotism and their thirst for knowledge--"
"Well?"
"Only that, considering our duties--in short, it says that in order
that the idea may not be lost, it concludes that the direction
and execution of the plan should be placed in charge of one of
the religious corporations, in case the Dominicans do not wish to
incorporate the academy with the University."
Exclamations of disappointment greeted the announcement. Isagani rose,
but said nothing.
"And in order that we may participate in the management of the
academy," Makaraig went on, "we are intrusted with the collection
of contributions and dues, with the obligation of turning them over
to the treasurer whom the corporation may designate, which treasurer
will issue us receipts."
"Then we're tax-collectors!" remarked Tadeo.
"Sandoval," said Pecson, "there's the gauntlet--take it up!"
"Huh! That's not a gauntlet--from its odor it seems more like a sock."
"The funniest, part of it," Makaraig added, "is that Padre Irene has
advised us to celebrate the event with a banquet or a torchlight
procession--a public demonstration of the students _en masse_ to
render thanks to all the persons who have intervened in the affair."
"Yes, after the blow, let's sing and give thanks. _Super flumina
Babylonis sedimus_!"
"Yes, a banquet like that of the convicts," said Tadeo.
"A banquet at which we all wear mourning and deliver funeral orations,"
added Sandoval.
"A serenade with the Marseillaise and funeral marches," proposed
Isagani.
"No, gentlemen," observed Pecson with his clownish grin, "to celebrate
the event there's nothing like a banquet in a _pansitería_, served
by the Chinamen without camisas. I insist, without camisas!"
The sarcasm and grotesqueness of this idea won it ready acceptance,
Sandoval being the first to applaud it, for he had long wished to see
the interior of one of those establishments which at night appeared
to be so merry and cheerful.
Just as the orchestra struck up for the second act, the young men
arose and left the theater, to the scandal of the whole house.


CHAPTER XXIII
A CORPSE

Simoun had not, in fact, gone to the theater. Already, at seven o'clock
in the evening, he had left his house looking worried and gloomy. His
servants saw him return twice, accompanied by different individuals,
and at eight o'clock Makaraig encountered him pacing along Calle
Hospital near the nunnery of St. Clara, just when the bells of its
church were ringing a funeral knell. At nine Camaroncocido saw him
again, in the neighborhood of the theater, speak with a person who
seemed to be a student, pay the latter's admission to the show,
and again disappear among the shadows of the trees.
"What is it to me?" again muttered Camaroncocido. "What do I get out
of watching over the populace?"
Basilio, as Makaraig said, had not gone to the show. The poor student,
after returning from San Diego, whither he had gone to ransom Juli,
his future bride, from her servitude, had turned again to his studies,
spending his time in the hospital, in studying, or in nursing Capitan
Tiago, whose affliction he was trying to cure.
The invalid had become an intolerable character. During his bad spells,
when he felt depressed from lack of opium, the doses of which Basilio
was trying to reduce, he would scold, mistreat, and abuse the boy, who
bore it resignedly, conscious that he was doing good to one to whom
he owed so much, and yielded only in the last extremity. His vicious
appetite satisfied, Capitan Tiago would fall into a good humor, become
tender, and call him his son, tearfully recalling the youth's services,
how well he administered the estates, and would even talk of making him
his heir. Basilio would smile bitterly and reflect that in this world
complaisance with vice is rewarded better than fulfilment of duty. Not
a few times did he feel tempted to give free rein to the craving and
conduct his benefactor to the grave by a path of flowers and smiling
illusions rather than lengthen his life along a road of sacrifice.
"What a fool I am!" he often said to himself. "People are stupid and
then pay for it."
But he would shake his head as he thought of Juli, of the wide
future before him. He counted upon living without a stain on his
conscience, so he continued the treatment prescribed, and bore
everything patiently.
Yet with all his care the sick man, except for short periods of
improvement, grew worse. Basilio had planned gradually to reduce
the amount of the dose, or at least not to let him injure himself
by increasing it, but on returning from the hospital or some visit
he would find his patient in the heavy slumber produced by the opium,
driveling, pale as a corpse. The young man could not explain whence the
drug came: the only two persons who visited the house were Simoun and
Padre Irene, the former rarely, while the latter never ceased exhorting
him to be severe and inexorable with the treatment, to take no notice
of the invalid's ravings, for the main object was to save him.
"Do your duty, young man," was Padre Irene's constant admonition. "Do
your duty." Then he would deliver a sermon on this topic with such
great conviction and enthusiasm that Basilio would begin to feel
kindly toward the preacher. Besides, Padre Irene promised to get him a
fine assignment, a good province, and even hinted at the possibility
of having him appointed a professor. Without being carried away by
illusions, Basilio pretended to believe in them and went on obeying
the dictates of his own conscience.
That night, while _Les Cloches de Corneville_ was being presented,
Basilio was studying at an old table by the light of an oil-lamp, whose
thick glass globe partly illuminated his melancholy features. An old
skull, some human bones, and a few books carefully arranged covered
the table, whereon there was also a pan of water with a sponge. The
smell of opium that proceeded from the adjoining bedroom made the
air heavy and inclined him to sleep, but he overcame the desire by
bathing his temples and eyes from time to time, determined not to go
to sleep until he had finished the book, which he had borrowed and
must return as soon as possible. It was a volume of the _Medicina
Legal y Toxicología_ of Dr. Friata, the only book that the professor
would use, and Basilio lacked money to buy a copy, since, under
the pretext of its being forbidden by the censor in Manila and the
necessity for bribing many government employees to get it in, the
booksellers charged a high price for it.
So absorbed wras the youth in his studies that he had not given any
attention at all to some pamphlets that had been sent to him from
some unknown source, pamphlets that treated of the Philippines, among
which figured those that were attracting the greatest notice at the
time because of their harsh and insulting manner of referring to the
natives of the country. Basilio had no time to open them, and he was
perhaps restrained also by the thought that there is nothing pleasant
about receiving an insult or a provocation without having any means
of replying or defending oneself. The censorship, in fact, permitted
insults to the Filipinos but prohibited replies on their part.
In the midst of the silence that reigned in the house, broken only by
a feeble snore that issued now and then from the adjoining bedroom,
Basilio heard light footfalls on the stairs, footfalls that soon
crossed the hallway and approached the room where he was. Raising
his head, he saw the door open and to his great surprise appeared
the sinister figure of the jeweler Simoun, who since the scene in
San Diego had not come to visit either himself or Capitan Tiago.
"How is the sick man?" he inquired, throwing a rapid glance about the
room and fixing his attention on the pamphlets, the leaves of which
were still uncut.
"The beating of his heart is scarcely perceptible, his pulse is very
weak, his appetite entirely gone," replied Basilio in a low voice
with a sad smile. "He sweats profusely in the early morning."
Noticing that Simoun kept his face turned toward the pamphlets and
fearing that he might reopen the subject of their conversation in
the wood, he went on: "His system is saturated with poison. He may
die any day, as though struck by lightning. The least irritation,
any excitement may kill him."
"Like the Philippines!" observed Simoun lugubriously.
Basilio was unable to refrain from a gesture of impatience, but he
was determined not to recur to the old subject, so he proceeded as if
he had heard nothing: "What weakens him the most is the nightmares,
his terrors--"
"Like the government!" again interrupted Simoun.
"Several nights ago he awoke in the dark and thought that he had
gone blind. He raised a disturbance, lamenting and scolding me,
saying that I had put his eyes out. When I entered his room with a
light he mistook me for Padre Irene and called me his saviour."
"Like the government, exactly!"
"Last night," continued Basilio, paying no attention, "he got up
begging for his favorite game-cock, the one that died three years
ago, and I had to give him a chicken. Then he heaped blessings upon
me and promised me many thousands--"
At that instant a clock struck half-past ten. Simoun shuddered and
stopped the youth with a gesture.
"Basilio," he said in a low, tense voice, "listen to me carefully,
for the moments are precious. I see that you haven't opened the
pamphlets that I sent you. You're not interested in your country."
The youth started to protest.
"It's useless," went on Simoun dryly. "Within an hour the revolution
is going to break out at a signal from me, and tomorrow there'll
be no studies, there'll be no University, there'll be nothing but
fighting and butchery. I have everything ready and my success is
assured. When we triumph, all those who could have helped us and did
not do so will be treated as enemies. Basilio, I've come to offer
you death or a future!"
"Death or a future!" the boy echoed, as though he did not understand.
"With us or with the government," rejoined Simoun. "With your country
or with your oppressors. Decide, for time presses! I've come to save
you because of the memories that unite us!"
"With my country or with the oppressors!" repeated Basilio in a low
tone. The youth was stupefied. He gazed at the jeweler with eyes
in which terror was reflected, he felt his limbs turn cold, while a
thousand confused ideas whirled about in his mind. He saw the streets
running blood, he heard the firing, he found himself among the dead and
wounded, and by the peculiar force of his inclinations fancied himself
in an operator's blouse, cutting off legs and extracting bullets.
"The will of the government is in my hands," said Simoun. "I've
diverted and wasted its feeble strength and resources on foolish
expeditions, dazzling it with the plunder it might seize. Its heads
are now in the theater, calm and unsuspecting, thinking of a night
of pleasure, but not one shall again repose upon a pillow. I have
men and regiments at my disposition: some I have led to believe that
the uprising is ordered by the General; others that the friars are
bringing it about; some I have bought with promises, with employments,
with money; many, very many, are acting from revenge, because they are
oppressed and see it as a matter of killing or being killed. Cabesang
Tales is below, he has come with me here! Again I ask you--will you
come with us or do you prefer to expose yourself to the resentment
of my followers? In critical moments, to declare oneself neutral is
to be exposed to the wrath of both the contending parties."
Basilio rubbed his hand over his face several times, as if he were
trying to wake from a nightmare. He felt that his brow was cold.
"Decide!" repeated Simoun.
"And what--what would I have to do?" asked the youth in a weak and
broken voice.
"A very simple thing," replied Simoun, his face lighting up with a
ray of hope. "As I have to direct the movement, I cannot get away from
the scene of action. I want you, while the attention of the whole city
is directed elsewhere, at the head of a company to force the doors of
the nunnery of St. Clara and take from there a person whom only you,
besides myself and Capitan Tiago, can recognize. You'll run no risk
at all."
"Maria Clara!" exclaimed Basilio.
"Yes, Maria Clara," repeated Simoun, and for the first time his voice
became human and compassionate. "I want to save her; to save her I
have wished to live, I have returned. I am starting the revolution,
because only a revolution can open the doors of the nunneries."
"Ay!" sighed Basilio, clasping his hands. "You've come late, too late!"
"Why?" inquired Simoun with a frown.
"Maria Clara is dead!"
Simoun arose with a bound and stood over the youth. "She's dead?" he
demanded in a terrible voice.
"This afternoon, at six. By now she must be--"
"It's a lie!" roared Simoun, pale and beside himself. "It's
false! Maria Clara lives, Maria Clara must live! It's a cowardly
excuse! She's not dead, and this night I'll free her or tomorrow
you die!"
Basilio shrugged his shoulders. "Several days ago she was taken ill
and I went to the nunnery for news of her. Look, here is Padre Salvi's
letter, brought by Padre Irene. Capitan Tiago wept all the evening,
kissing his daughter's picture and begging her forgiveness, until at
last he smoked an enormous quantity of opium. This evening her knell
was tolled."
"Ah!" exclaimed Simoun, pressing his hands to his head and standing
motionless. He remembered to have actually heard the knell while he
was pacing about in the vicinity of the nunnery.
"Dead!" he murmured in a voice so low that it seemed to be a ghost
whispering. "Dead! Dead without my having seen her, dead without
knowing that I lived for her--dead!"
Feeling a terrible storm, a tempest of whirlwind and thunder without
a drop of water, sobs without tears, cries without words, rage in his
breast and threaten to burst out like burning lava long repressed,
he rushed precipitately from the room. Basilio heard him descend the
stairs with unsteady tread, stepping heavily, he heard a stifled cry,
a cry that seemed to presage death, so solemn, deep, and sad that
he arose from his chair pale and trembling, but he could hear the
footsteps die away and the noisy closing of the door to the street.
"Poor fellow!" he murmured, while his eyes filled with tears. Heedless
now of his studies, he let his gaze wander into space as he pondered
over the fate of those two beings: he--young, rich, educated, master