Francisco Jose - Dusk

Near the town of Alcala, just as light was about to break, intermittent gunfire erupted from across the expanse of ripening grain. Then silence again, the crowing of cocks. Now, a sallow light upon a land rimmed by flounces of bamboo, woods, and farmers’ homes. Close to the right was a village. The people there would no longer be Ilokanos but Pangasiñenses. He had learned a little of their language from Dalin, so he would be able to ask directions. How would they greet him, a stranger with a beautiful horse?

He rode swiftly through a line of trees to the village. He was wrong — it was still Ilokano, and at the well, a group of women were filling their earthen jars. They looked at him passively as he approached. Why had he come this early? And not through the village road but across the field?

“I was lost,” he lied, allaying their suspicions immediately. “My horse needs a drink, and so do I …”

One of the women filled a wooden tub and Istak led the horse to it. Kimat took long drafts, and shook his mane after he was full.

“I am on my way to Bayambang,” he said. “And on the way, I saw the Americans — I did not want them to take my horse, so I cut across the fields.”

“Were you the one they fired at?” one of them asked, her eyes wide with expectation. “We were wakened by the shooting.”

“No,” he said with a smile. “It seems God is very kind to me. They did not see me at all.”

A farmer and his sons appeared with sickles; they were on their way to harvest before the sun came out in full force.

“Follow the village road,” the man said, “then turn right at the fork till you reach the river. From there, just follow the river to the west. You will be in Bayambang.”

He was hungry; he wanted to cook his breakfast and roast the dried beef. But the man’s wife, who was among those by the well, said there was still enough rice, coffee, and fried fish waiting in their kitchen.

Beyond the fork of the road, as the man had said, Istak came upon the Agno and its wide delta. He was familiar with the delta in Carmay, how the waters came cascading down the mountains and every year wrought new channels upon it. But the river, giver of life, was also cruel. Again memories — how his mother was swept away and he was unable to help her. Where in its long and uneven course did she finally surface? Or had her body sunk to the bottom? Through the years, all through the length of the river that he could reach, he asked so that there would be one spot at least where he and his children could pray, where they could light the votive candles when the Day of the Dead came. He never found out; the whole river, then, was Mayang’s burial ground, each drop sacred.

Alcala was now behind him; would he be too late? But the president did not travel alone, unguarded or without arms. And the men who had passed him in the night could not have been more than a hundred.

Beyond the narrow strip of delta was the ferry, a huge raft made of three tiers of bamboo strapped together by rattan. At one end of the big raft was a hut where the ferryman stayed when it rained or when it was hot. It was the start of the dry season and the Agno was no longer wild and deep. One man with a pole could push the raft to the other side. But during the typhoon season when the river swelled and giant whirlpools sucked away in the current, four men would have difficulty guiding the raft across.

Istak dismounted at the river’s edge where the ferry was moored. The ferryman, like the drivers of the carriages and the bull carts that carried commerce between the towns, would be a rich source of information. He was small, dressed in loose, tattered clothes that seemed to hang from a frame about to collapse. He was eating a breakfast of dried fish and freshly cooked rice, and a couple of fish were still roasting over the coals in the stove by the hut. The strong aroma reached out to Istak.

“Let us eat,” the ferryman said in greeting.

Istak said he had already eaten, then asked the ferryman if he had heard the gunfire early that morning. The ferryman nodded between mouthfuls. “It must be the rear guard of the president,” he said.

The president had been able to escape, then. “Three days ago,” the ferryman said. He had finished eating and was dipping the tin plate into the calm brownish water to wash it.

“Did they cross here?” Istak asked.

“No,” the man replied. “There were so many of them, I would have had to make a lot of trips. Farther up the river — in Bayambang. They crossed over the bridge. Hundreds of them, with guns, big bundles, and women and children.”

The man gazed at the broad spread of water. “Still, there were those who crossed here.” He turned to Istak. “Years ago, we had that ferry in Bayambang — but then they built the railroad and that bridge, and we earn so little.”

“Can you take me across?” Istak asked. There was no need for him to proceed to Bayambang.

“Are you a soldier?”

Istak shook his head. “Just a farmer in a hurry to see my dying father.”

The man continued: “It was three days ago that they left Bayambang — that is what my passengers told me.”

Three days — if they marched every day, they would already be far, far away, well into La Union. There was not one moment to squander.

“Will you take me across?” he said.

“You are alone,” the ferryman said. “You must wait for the others. There should be more in a short while.”

“I am in a hurry,” Istak said.

The ferryman grumbled.

“You just had a very good breakfast,” Istak said.

“If you are alone, you have to pay benting . And your horse, that is another benting . That is salapi . A man’s wage for two days. Are you sure you want to cross alone? Wait till there are at least five of you so you will pay only micol .”

Istak shook his head. “ Benting it will be,” he said, and proceeded to the shallow rim of the river, Kimat in tow.

The man strained at the bamboo pole, and slowly the raft floated toward the deeper reaches. It was quite placid, unlike the last time he had crossed, when it was a massive tide of brown. Again, an ancient grief swept over him. How many lives had this river taken?

“There are portions which are not deep,” Istak said. “At this time, it is possible to wade across.”

The ferryman laughed. “If I told you where it is shallow, what would happen to me? Everyone would wade across. I should really tell you that it is dangerous to travel alone.”

“My horse is swift,” Istak said.

The ferryman looked at Kimat; the horse was erect, undaunted by the waters eddying around the raft.

“The Americans,” the ferryman said. “I have heard so many bad things about them, how they tortured and killed. And you have a horse which they might take.”

“But I am not going to Bayambang,” Istak said.

“Yes, but they have already crossed the river, too. Yesterday, in large numbers. That was what I was told.”

“They can have my horse,” Istak said. “What can they do to me? Just a poor farmer … the horse is not even mine.”

The sun now blazed down, burnishing the delta with brilliant white. In midstream, the current was hardly discernible and the ferryman guided the raft deftly. On the other bank, a row of trees and the deep gully through which he must pass. Where the raft would be moored, a couple of women were waiting, their bamboo baskets filled with greens.

“The roads are not safe at night,” the ferryman warned.

“And the Americans? What advice can you give if I should meet them?”

“They don’t bother us little people,” the ferryman said.

Up the incline, more ripening fields shimmered in the morning sun. To his right, several women were already harvesting the grain with hand scythes. There would always be a few stalks left for gleaners and those who would glean would most probably be Ilokanos, just like the first settlers in this part of Pangasinan.