第 三十五 章 · THE FIESTA

“Danzar sobre un volcán.”

By seven in the evening the guests had begun to arrive: first, the

lesser divinities, petty government officials, clerks, and merchants,

with the most ceremonious greetings and the gravest airs at the start,

as if they were parvenus, for so much light, so many decorations, and

so much glassware had some effect. Afterwards, they began to be more at

ease, shaking their fists playfully, with pats on the shoulders, and

even familiar slaps on the back. Some, it is true, adopted a rather

disdainful air, to let it be seen that they were accustomed to better

things—of course they were! There was one goddess who yawned, for she

found everything vulgar and even remarked that she was ravenously

hungry, while another quarreled with her god, threatening to box his

ears.

Don Timoteo bowed here and bowed there, scattered his best smiles,

tightened his belt, stepped backward, turned halfway round, then

completely around, and so on again and again, until one goddess could

not refrain from remarking to her neighbor, under cover of her fan: “My

dear, how important the old man is! Doesn’t he look like a

jumping-jack?”

Later came the bridal couple, escorted by Doña Victorina and the rest

of the party. Congratulations, hand-shakings, patronizing pats for the

groom: for the bride, insistent stares and anatomical observations on

the part of the men, with analyses of her gown, her toilette,

speculations as to her health and strength on the part of the women.

“Cupid and Psyche appearing on Olympus,” thought Ben-Zayb, making a

mental note of the comparison to spring it at some better opportunity.

The groom had in fact the mischievous features of the god of love, and

with a little good-will his hump, which the severity of his frock coat

did not altogether conceal, could be taken for a quiver.

Don Timoteo began to feel his belt squeezing him, the corns on his feet

began to ache, his neck became tired, but still the General had not

come. The greater gods, among them Padre Irene and Padre Salvi, had

already arrived, it was true, but the chief thunderer was still

lacking. The poor man became uneasy, nervous; his heart beat violently,

but still he had to bow and smile; he sat down, he arose, failed to

hear what was said to him, did not say what he meant. In the meantime,

an amateur god made remarks to him about his chromos, criticizing them

with the statement that they spoiled the walls.

“Spoil the walls!” repeated Don Timoteo, with a smile and a desire to

choke him. “But they were made in Europe and are the most costly I

could get in Manila! Spoil the walls!” Don Timoteo swore to himself

that on the very next day he would present for payment all the chits

that the critic had signed in his store.

Whistles resounded, the galloping of horses was heard—at last! “The

General! The Captain-General!”

Pale with emotion, Don Timoteo, dissembling the pain of his corns and

accompanied by his son and some of the greater gods, descended to

receive the Mighty Jove. The pain at his belt vanished before the

doubts that now assailed him: should he frame a smile or affect

gravity; should he extend his hand or wait for the General to offer

his? Carambas! Why had nothing of this occurred to him before, so that

he might have consulted his good friend Simoun?

To conceal his agitation, he whispered to his son in a low, shaky

voice, “Have you a speech prepared?”

“Speeches are no longer in vogue, papa, especially on such an occasion

as this.”

Jupiter arrived in the company of Juno, who was converted into a tower

of artificial lights—with diamonds in her hair, diamonds around her

neck, on her arms, on her shoulders, she was literally covered with

diamonds. She was arrayed in a magnificent silk gown having a long

train decorated with embossed flowers.

His Excellency literally took possession of the house, as Don Timoteo

stammeringly begged him to do. [71] The orchestra played the royal

march while the divine couple majestically ascended the carpeted

stairway.

Nor was his Excellency’s gravity altogether affected. Perhaps for the

first time since his arrival in the islands he felt sad, a strain of

melancholy tinged his thoughts. This was the last triumph of his three

years of government, and within two days he would descend forever from

such an exalted height. What was he leaving behind? His Excellency did

not care to turn his head backwards, but preferred to look ahead, to

gaze into the future. Although he was carrying away a fortune, large

sums to his credit were awaiting him in European banks, and he had

residences, yet he had injured many, he had made enemies at the Court,

the high official was waiting for him there. Other Generals had

enriched themselves as rapidly as he, and now they were ruined. Why not

stay longer, as Simoun had advised him to do? No, good taste before

everything else. The bows, moreover, were not now so profound as

before, he noticed insistent stares and even looks of dislike, but

still he replied affably and even attempted to smile.

“It’s plain that the sun is setting,” observed Padre Irene in

Ben-Zayb’s ear. “Many now stare him in the face.”

The devil with the curate—that was just what he was going to remark!

“My dear,” murmured into the ear of a neighbor the lady who had

referred to Don Timoteo as a jumping-jack, “did you ever see such a

skirt?”

“Ugh, the curtains from the Palace!”

“You don’t say! But it’s true! They’re carrying everything away. You’ll

see how they make wraps out of the carpets.”

“That only goes to show that she has talent and taste,” observed her

husband, reproving her with a look. “Women should be economical.” This

poor god was still suffering from the dressmaker’s bill.

“My dear, give me curtains at twelve pesos a yard, and you’ll see if I

put on these rags!” retorted the goddess in pique. “Heavens! You can

talk when you have done something fine like that to give you the

right!”

Meanwhile, Basilio stood before the house, lost in the throng of

curious spectators, counting those who alighted from their carriages.

When he looked upon so many persons, happy and confident, when he saw

the bride and groom followed by their train of fresh and innocent

little girls, and reflected that they were going to meet there a

horrible death, he was sorry and felt his hatred waning within him. He

wanted to save so many innocents, he thought of notifying the police,

but a carriage drove up to set down Padre Salvi and Padre Irene, both

beaming with content, and like a passing cloud his good intentions

vanished. “What does it matter to me?” he asked himself. “Let the

righteous suffer with the sinners.”

Then he added, to silence his scruples: “I’m not an informer, I mustn’t

abuse the confidence he has placed in me. I owe him, him more than I do

them: he dug my mother’s grave, they killed her! What have I to do with

them? I did everything possible to be good and useful, I tried to

forgive and forget, I suffered every imposition, and only asked that

they leave me in peace. I got in no one’s way. What have they done to

me? Let their mangled limbs fly through the air! We’ve suffered

enough.”

Then he saw Simoun alight with the terrible lamp in his hands, saw him

cross the entrance with bowed head, as though deep in thought. Basilio

felt his heart beat fainter, his feet and hands turn cold, while the

black silhouette of the jeweler assumed fantastic shapes enveloped in

flames. There at the foot of the stairway Simoun checked his steps, as

if in doubt, and Basilio held his breath. But the hesitation was

transient—Simoun raised his head, resolutely ascended the stairway, and

disappeared.

It then seemed to the student that the house was going to blow up at

any moment, and that walls, lamps, guests, roof, windows, orchestra,

would be hurtling through the air like a handful of coals in the midst

of an infernal explosion. He gazed about him and fancied that he saw

corpses in place of idle spectators, he saw them torn to shreds, it

seemed to him that the air was filled with flames, but his calmer self

triumphed over this transient hallucination, which was due somewhat to

his hunger.

“Until he comes out, there’s no danger,” he said to himself. “The

Captain-General hasn’t arrived yet.”

He tried to appear calm and control the convulsive trembling in his

limbs, endeavoring to divert his thoughts to other things. Something

within was ridiculing him, saying, “If you tremble now, before the

supreme moment, how will you conduct yourself when you see blood

flowing, houses burning, and bullets whistling?”

His Excellency arrived, but the young man paid no attention to him. He

was watching the face of Simoun, who was among those that descended to

receive him, and he read in that implacable countenance the sentence of

death for all those men, so that fresh terror seized upon him. He felt

cold, he leaned against the wall, and, with his eyes fixed on the

windows and his ears cocked, tried to guess what might be happening. In

the sala he saw the crowd surround Simoun to look at the lamp, he heard

congratulations and exclamations of admiration—the words “dining-room,”

“novelty,” were repeated many times—he saw the General smile and

conjectured that the novelty was to be exhibited that very night, by

the jeweler’s arrangement, on the table whereat his Excellency was to

dine. Simoun disappeared, followed by a crowd of admirers.

At that supreme moment his good angel triumphed, he forgot his hatreds,

he forgot Juli, he wanted to save the innocent. Come what might, he

would cross the street and try to enter. But Basilio had forgotten that

he was miserably dressed. The porter stopped him and accosted him

roughly, and finally, upon his insisting, threatened to call the

police.

Just then Simoun came down, slightly pale, and the porter turned from

Basilio to salute the jeweler as though he had been a saint passing.

Basilio realized from the expression of Simoun’s face that he was

leaving the fated house forever, that the lamp was lighted. Alea jacta

est! Seized by the instinct of self-preservation, he thought then of

saving himself. It might occur to any of the guests through curiosity

to tamper with the wick and then would come the explosion to overwhelm

them all. Still he heard Simoun say to the cochero, “The Escolta,

hurry!”

Terrified, dreading that he might at any moment hear the awful

explosion, Basilio hurried as fast as his legs would carry him to get

away from the accursed spot, but his legs seemed to lack the necessary

agility, his feet slipped on the sidewalk as though they were moving

but not advancing. The people he met blocked the way, and before he had

gone twenty steps he thought that at least five minutes had elapsed.

Some distance away he stumbled against a young man who was standing

with his head thrown back, gazing fixedly at the house, and in him he

recognized Isagani. “What are you doing here?” he demanded. “Come

away!”

Isagani stared at him vaguely, smiled sadly, and again turned his gaze

toward the open balconies, across which was revealed the ethereal

silhouette of the bride clinging to the groom’s arm as they moved

slowly out of sight.

“Come, Isagani, let’s get away from that house. Come!” Basilio urged in

a hoarse voice, catching his friend by the arm.

Isagani gently shook himself free and continued to stare with the same

sad smile upon his lips.

“For God’s sake, let’s get away from here!”

“Why should I go away? Tomorrow it will not be she.”

There was so much sorrow in those words that Basilio for a moment

forgot his own terror. “Do you want to die?” he demanded.

Isagani shrugged his shoulders and continued to gaze toward the house.

Basilio again tried to drag him away. “Isagani, Isagani, listen to me!

Let’s not waste any time! That house is mined, it’s going to blow up at

any moment, by the least imprudent act, the least curiosity! Isagani,

all will perish in its ruins.”

“In its ruins?” echoed Isagani, as if trying to understand, but without

removing his gaze from the window.

“Yes, in its ruins, yes, Isagani! For God’s sake, come! I’ll explain

afterwards. Come! One who has been more unfortunate than either you or

I has doomed them all. Do you see that white, clear light, like an

electric lamp, shining from the azotea? It’s the light of death! A lamp

charged with dynamite, in a mined dining-room, will burst and not a rat

will escape alive. Come!”

“No,” answered Isagani, shaking his head sadly. “I want to stay here, I

want to see her for the last time. Tomorrow, you see, she will be

something different.”

“Let fate have its way!” Basilio then exclaimed, hurrying away.

Isagani watched his friend rush away with a precipitation that

indicated real terror, but continued to stare toward the charmed

window, like the cavalier of Toggenburg waiting for his sweetheart to

appear, as Schiller tells. Now the sala was deserted, all having

repaired to the dining-rooms, and it occurred to Isagani that Basilio’s

fears may have been well-founded. He recalled the terrified countenance

of him who was always so calm and composed, and it set him to thinking.

Suddenly an idea appeared clear in his imagination—the house was going

to blow up and Paulita was there, Paulita was going to die a frightful

death. In the presence of this idea everything was forgotten: jealousy,

suffering, mental torture, and the generous youth thought only of his

love. Without reflecting, without hesitation, he ran toward the house,

and thanks to his stylish clothes and determined mien, easily secured

admittance.

While these short scenes were occurring in the street, in the

dining-kiosk of the greater gods there was passed from hand to hand a

piece of parchment on which were written in red ink these fateful

words:

Mene, Tekel, Phares [72]

Juan Crisostomo Ibarra

“Juan Crisostomo Ibarra? Who is he?” asked his Excellency, handing the

paper to his neighbor.

“A joke in very bad taste!” exclaimed Don Custodio. “To sign the name

of a filibuster dead more than ten years!”

“A filibuster!”

“It’s a seditious joke!”

“There being ladies present—”

Padre Irene looked around for the joker and saw Padre Salvi, who was

seated at the right of the Countess, turn as white as his napkin, while

he stared at the mysterious words with bulging eyes. The scene of the

sphinx recurred to him.

“What’s the matter, Padre Salvi?” he asked. “Do you recognize your

friend’s signature?”

Padre Salvi did not reply. He made an effort to speak and without being

conscious of what he was doing wiped his forehead with his napkin.

“What has happened to your Reverence?”

“It is his very handwriting!” was the whispered reply in a scarcely

perceptible voice. “It’s the very handwriting of Ibarra.” Leaning

against the back of his chair, he let his arms fall as though all

strength had deserted him.

Uneasiness became converted into fright, they all stared at one another

without uttering a single word. His Excellency started to rise, but

apprehending that such a move would be ascribed to fear, controlled

himself and looked about him. There were no soldiers present, even the

waiters were unknown to him.

“Let’s go on eating, gentlemen,” he exclaimed, “and pay no attention to

the joke.” But his voice, instead of reassuring, increased the general

uneasiness, for it trembled.

“I don’t suppose that that Mene, Tekel, Phares, means that we’re to be

assassinated tonight?” speculated Don Custodio.

All remained motionless, but when he added, “Yet they might poison us,”

they leaped up from their chairs.

The light, meanwhile, had begun slowly to fade. “The lamp is going

out,” observed the General uneasily. “Will you turn up the wick, Padre

Irene?”

But at that instant, with the swiftness of a flash of lightning, a

figure rushed in, overturning a chair and knocking a servant down, and

in the midst of the general surprise seized the lamp, rushed to the

azotea, and threw it into the river. The whole thing happened in a

second and the dining-kiosk was left in darkness.

The lamp had already struck the water before the servants could cry

out, “Thief, thief!” and rush toward the azotea. “A revolver!” cried

one of them. “A revolver, quick! After the thief!”

But the figure, more agile than they, had already mounted the

balustrade and before a light could be brought, precipitated itself

into the river, striking the water with a loud splash.