Francisco Jose - Don Vicente - Two Novels

“Just now, Apo.”

“How long have you been tending horses, David?” Cousin Andring asked. “You were not able to cure this one, even with your experience.”

“The Apo knows I’ve been in this household since I was a child. Ever since, I have tended not only horses but also children. One can cure sickness, but death …”

“Tell us, then,” Cousin Andring leaned forward, his eyes bulging with inspiration, “about your experiences tending horses. God, let us saddle up David and have some fun,” he said, turning to our other relatives, all of whom smiled approval.

The old servant moved to the middle of the hall near the table stacked with wine and food. He looked anxiously at Father, but Father was now occupied with the leg of a fried chicken. When he caught Father’s eye, Father merely nodded and said, “Go ahead, David. Speak up.”

Old David blinked, wiped his bloodshot eyes with his shirt-sleeve.

“Here,” Cousin Andring said, rising and offering the old man his unfinished glass of Scotch. “You may have had too much, but this is different. It may even refresh your memory.”

“Thank you,” Old David said. He took the proffered glass and emptied it into the brass flower vase on the table. Again, the bumptious howling.

Cousin Andring relished it. “If you can’t tell us about horses, David,” he went on, “tell us the story of your life. Anyone who has lived as long as you, and has drunk as much, must have an interesting life.”

Old David turned briefly to me, but I could not look at him; I felt dismal and responsible for his predicament. He turned to Father, but again Father nodded.

“My life,” he said finally, softly, without the slightest trace of emotion, his red eyes steady on my Cousin Andring, “is like an insect’s. So small it can be crushed with the fingers like this.” He paused, and with his thumb and forefinger lifted, he made the motions of crushing an imaginary insect.

“Ah, but for an insect — a flea, for instance — you are very durable,” Cousin Andring said. The guests smiled.

“Now tell us,” Cousin Andring said, “your life as a man, not as a butterfly.” More laughter. Cousin Andring beamed. He was apparently enjoying himself.

Old David held the table edge. His voice was calm. “Yes, I’ll tell you all.” His eyes swept the hall.”I was born here. I knew this place when it was a wilderness, when the creek … you’d be surprised — it wasn’t wide then. Why, there were some parts of it that one could cross merely by jumping. And the fish …

“I have watched young people grow so quickly like the shoots of bamboo. Most of you here, Benito, Antonia, Marcelo — all of you. And I said, someday, maybe, among these fine children, there would be one like their father. You must all revere his name, you whose lips still smell of milk …”

“And Carlos Primero!” Cousin Andring roared. Laughter swelled in the hall again.

“There was kindness in the hearts of men,” Old David said, undistracted. “I recall similar parties like this, which your grandfather used to give. His servants — us — we did not eat in the yard. We ate with him at his table, and we drank wine from the same cup he used!”

“More wine!” Cousin Andring howled again.

“There was less greed, less faithlessness. Men were brothers — the rich and the poor. It was a day for living, but now the past is forgotten and it can never be relived again even by those who used to belong to it. It was a good time, a time for loving one another, for forgiving one’s faults and understanding one’s weaknesses. Now the people don’t even know what kindness means to a horse …”

“Let’s drink to the health of the horse,” Cousin Andring said. “By God, we’ll give that horse a decent funeral, eh, Tio?” Cousin Andring winked at Father.

More laughter. The guests raised their glasses of wine and beer and smacked their lips. Then they fell to eating again, nibbling at drumsticks, reaching for the mountains of prawn and crab on the table.

Old David turned to Father and said in a quavering voice, “I have said enough, Apo.”

Father laid the spoon on his plate. “All right, David. We lost all the horses. No, I am not blaming you and your drinking. After all, even horses die. Now, maybe, I’ll buy a pickup truck, a jeep, or a car. You can’t drive — and even if you can, I won’t let you be the driver. What good would you be in the household then?”

“There is still the garden, Apo,” Old David said. He bent forward, his arms twitching. “And I can clean the car, wash it every day, till it shines like the bronze studs of the harness. And I can help in the housekeeping. I’ll sweep the yard twice a day, Apo. Even the streetfront of the house …”

“You are too old for that, David,” Father said, smiling wryly.

“And too slow,” Tia Antonia chimed in, “and too drunk.”

Cousin Andring stood up and faced the old man. “Well,” he said, gesturing with his fat hands. “Since you seem to have no more use for David here, we can bring him with us to the city.” He turned to Father. “What do you say, Tio? You don’t know the trouble with the servants we are having there. You cannot trust anyone except those whom you have known long and well. Tell Tio, Mother, about our last maid who ran off with the houseboy across the street, bringing with her your pearl earrings and some of the silver. David drinks too much, more than he can hold, but …”

Tia Antonia nudged Father. “It is true,” she said gravely.

“I’d rather stay here, Apo,” Old David said, his eyes pleading. “I was born here. I’ll die here.”

Father grumbled. “Don’t worry about dying, David. You’ll live to be a hundred. You’ll still be around long after we are turned to dust.” Father turned to his sister: “I have no objection.” Then to the old man, “You’ll go, David. Maybe just for half a year—”

“My days are numbered, Apo. I feel it in my bones, in the lungs that are dried in my chest,” Old David said.

“Who wants to live forever?” Cousin Andring asked. “Drink, David.” He extended another glass of Scotch. “There’s more of this where you are going. None of the cheap nipa wine and gin you have here.”

But the old man did not even look at my cousin; he turned and shuffled out of the hall.

The next morning the house was quiet again. Several women from Carmay stayed behind, and, after the guests had gone, they swept the yard, then scrubbed the narra floors. The stable was being torn down by the boys. Earlier, the horse had been dragged to the nearby field and buried there.

I lingered in the stable, waiting for Old David to go. He was dressed in his best denim — a little faded on the knees and on the buttocks but still quite new because, unlike his other pair of pants, it was not patched. He watched the planks being torn down. The dirty harnesses cluttered up a corner together with those that he had cleaned, their bronze plates polished to a sheen. His battered bamboo suitcase, lashed tight with abaca twine, was beside him.

“When will you return?” I asked.

His eyes were smoky red as they always were. He gazed at the ground, at the black streaks of molasses, which the boys had carelessly spilled in their hurry to dismantle the stable. Upstairs in the house, Cousin Andring traded parting pleasantries with Father. Then they came noisily down the stairs.

“Must you really go?” I asked the old man again.

Old David’s voice was hollow and distant. “So it must be. This is the time for leaving. Just as there was a time for beginning, planting, growing. I watched them all grow — your uncles, your father — all of them. Your grandfather — he was a spirited young man. I remember how he dared his father’s wrath, how he would flee to the forest with me in search of game. We swam the swollen creek together, even when logs hurtled down with the current. Ay, he was not born to the wilderness, but he defeated me in almost every contest except running. We would race to the edge of the river, but my legs — they were young and agile then, and they always carried me there first. He could shoot straight with the bow or with a gun. But he died, too.” A long pause. “Then your father — I would carry him perched on my shoulders, just like you. I used to drive him around, just the two of us, in the calesa to Calanutan and Carmay. I remember we spilled out once when the wheel fell into a deep rut and broke. I carried him to town on my shoulders, and never once did I put him down. Balungao it was, and that’s five kilometers away.”