Francisco Jose - Don Vicente - Two Novels

“Yes,” I said. “But you never knew it, did you? Father told me never to tell you. As a matter of fact, I burned the letters myself.”

Her face became blank. “And I thought all along he had decided to forget. I was all wrong,” she mumbled, a faraway look in her eyes. And then her head drooped, and her body shook with silent sobs.

“Clarissa.” I went to her. “Is there anything wrong?”

She kept sobbing for some time, and I stood before her, not knowing what to do. She looked up at me and hurriedly wiped her tears.

“Tell me,” I said. “Does Pedring beat you?”

A smile bloomed again. “Foolish!” she said, rising from her chair. She tweaked my ear. “Of course, he treats me well. He doesn’t beat me at all. Whoever gave you that idea?”

“Why are you crying, then?”

“You don’t understand,” she said. “You are too young.”

“Tell me,” I urged her. “I won’t tell your secret.”

She turned away. A trace of sadness lined her voice. “I was thinking of all those letters … and it seems as if it was only yesterday …”

“You’ve not grown up,” I said, but she did not hear, for the baby had started crying and she rushed to the crib, baby talk gushing from her lips.

Then June, and I was in college at last, engrossed with botany, zoology, chemistry, and a host of other subjects for preparatory medicine. College was an exhilarating experience, and for a time the old nagging aches were soothed and I was immersed in new interests.

Until one October afternoon: I was in the college cafeteria drinking Coke, when one of my classmates rushed to me white-faced and asked if I had seen the evening paper.

I shook my head. He thrust the front page in front of me and asked if the photograph before me was that of Father.

I could not believe what I read, how he was brought out of our house the evening before by men who were armed. The soldiers had gone after his kidnappers, so the paper reported, but they had returned empty-handed.

I rushed to the dormitory, and at the lobby I met the father dean. He must have read the story, too, and had come to tell me about it. He held my shoulders, and his cool blue eyes gazed into mine.

“You have to be brave,” he said.

I went to my room and shut the door. No tears came; a tightness gripped my chest, and I could not breathe. I lay on my cot and could not think.

At dusk Cousin Marcelo and Tia Antonia came mouthing platitudes. “Maybe,” they said, “the men did not harm him.” Cousin Pedring came, too, with Clarissa. He said he would leave for Rosales the following morning.

I did not go down for supper. My roommate came in shortly before lights-out and brought me a glass of warm milk and crackers.

After Three Days, Cousin Pedring came, the grime of travel still on his face. There was no news at all about Father. Then, after a week, a tenant stumbled upon Father in the delta. He had died terribly, said Cousin Marcelo, who came with the news. The body bore more than a dozen bolo wounds. The day they found Father, they buried him beside Mother’s grave.

“You do not have to go home,” Cousin Marcelo said. “There’s nothing you can do now.”

“But I’m going home,” I told him, suddenly aware that it was now my duty to look after his ledgers, the farm. “I’d like to look at the papers.”

“Yes, of course,” Cousin Marcelo said. “Now you have to study a lot of things and make decisions.” He looked ruefully at me. “And you … so young and not even through with school.”

But it would not do for me to stay in Rosales anymore; everywhere I would turn, there would always be something familiar, yet alien.

“You’ll be free now,” Cousin Marcelo said. “You must not be like your father. He was a slave to what he owned. You must begin again — that is most important.”

Words meant not to be heard, a few drops of rain on parched ground.

We arrived at the station at dusk. No one met us but the baggage boys, who recognized me at once. They gathered around, and one got hold of my canvas bag, while another hurried down the platform to hail a calesa . They did not speak much.

Even the calesa driver did not speak until we were close to home. Cousin Marcelo placed a salapi in his palm, and as we got down, he turned to me and said he was sorry about what had happened. Sepa could not contain herself when she saw me coming up the stairs. She waddled down and exclaimed: “You are so tall!” Then she broke down and cried. Cousin Marcelo held her shoulder, then freed me from her. I did not cry; for a long time now I have not tasted the salt of tears. Darkness fell quickly, and since it was too late to go to the cemetery, I hastened to my old room and unpacked.

The supper that Sepa prepared was excellent — roasted eggplant, crab and meat stew — but I had no appetite. I went to the azotea . Sepa followed me; she had lighted her hand-rolled cigar.

“Tell me,” I asked after some silence. “What has become of the people in Carmay? Who did it? Surely you have an idea.”

“I do not know,” she said feebly. She leaned on the azotea ledge and turned away. “I’m just an old, worthless woman imprisoned in the kitchen. All I know is this: death hides now, not only in the delta but in Carmay as well.”

“Will they kill me, too?”

“Drive the thought away,” the old woman said. “You are young and good, and you have no enemies.”

“And Father was old and bad and he had a hundred?”

Sepa flung her cigar away. In the soft dark I could make out her face. Her voice was sharp, “Your father was good. He was not seen clearly, that’s all. Now don’t let such thoughts grow lush in your mind. Drive them away quickly.”

Silence again.

“Tell me, what has happened to the people in Carmay?”

“There are a hundred people there,” she said, “and all of them are still alive.” Then she must have guessed what I wanted to know. “You are asking about Teresita?”

“I wrote to her many times,” I said. “She never answered. Not even once.”

“She died last month,” Sepa said softly. She shifted her weight on the ledge. “The old sickness in her family …”

I could not speak for some time. The old woman prattled on: “It wasn’t much of a funeral. I wanted someone to write a letter to you, but I couldn’t find anyone I could trust.”

“Maybe,” I said after another uneasy silence, “it’s better this way. She won’t suffer anymore.”

Sepa grunted: “Yes, death is a blessing. People who grow old should remember that. How is David?”

“I didn’t see him when I left,” I said. “Tia Antonia must be taking good care of him. He’s well, I suppose. I visited Tia Antonia often. But Old David, he always seemed busy. He avoided me. At first, it was difficult; I couldn’t understand. I do now.”

She grunted again.

“You have no news about Angel? Where is he now?”

“He’s lost,” Sepa said without emotion. “He is a soldier. But he is no problem, really, the way she is.”

“Who?” I asked, leaning over to hear her every word.

“Your father’s woman. It must be very sad, being cooped up in that house by the river, unable to show her face …”

“How did you know?” I asked. Sepa did not answer; she stood up shaking her head and left me to the night.

Morning came to Rosales in a flood of sunlight. I woke up, a stranger to my old room but not to the happy sounds of morning, the barking of dogs in the street and the cackling of hens in the yard. Cousin Marcelo was in the sala , waiting.

“I know my way to the cemetery,” I said.

He pressed my arm. “All right then, if you want to go alone. But be sure to be back as soon as you can. We have many things to talk about. You are an heir, remember.”