The Reign of Greed Part 26

Carriage after carriage drove up; the actors and actresses arrived and entered by a separate door, followed by their friends and admirers.

After Paulita had gone in, Tadeo resumed: "Those are the nieces of the rich Captain D----, those coming up in a landau; you see how pretty and healthy they are? Well, in a few years they'll be dead or crazy. Captain D---- is opposed to their marrying, and the insanity of the uncle is appearing in the nieces. That's the Senorita E----, the rich heiress whom the world and the conventos are disputing over. h.e.l.lo, I know that fellow! It's Padre Irene, in disguise, with a false mustache. I recognize him by his nose. And he was so greatly opposed to this!"

The scandalized novice watched a neatly cut coat disappear behind a group of ladies.

"The Three Fates!" went on Tadeo, watching the arrival of three withered, bony, hollow-eyed, wide-mouthed, and shabbily dressed women. "They're called--"

"Atropos?" ventured the novice, who wished to show that he also knew somebody, at least in mythology.

"No, boy, they're called the Weary Waiters--old, censorious, and dull. They pretend to hate everybody--men, women, and children. But look how the Lord always places beside the evil a remedy, only that sometimes it comes late. There behind the Fates, the frights of the city, come those three girls, the pride of their friends, among whom I count myself. That thin young man with goggle-eyes, somewhat stooped, who is wildly gesticulating because he can't get tickets, is the chemist S----, author of many essays and scientific treatises, some of which are notable and have captured prizes. The Spaniards say of him, 'There's some hope for him, some hope for him.' The fellow who is soothing him with his Voltairian smile is the poet T----, a young man of talent, a great friend of mine, and, for the very reason that he has talent, he has thrown away his pen. That fellow who is trying to get in with the actors by the other door is the young physician U----, who has effected some remarkable cures--it's also said of him that he promises well. He's not such a scoundrel as Pelaez but he's cleverer and slyer still. I believe that he'd shake dice with death and win."

"And that brown gentleman with a mustache like hog-bristles?"

"Ah, that's the merchant F----, who forges everything, even his baptismal certificate. He wants to be a Spanish mestizo at any cost, and is making heroic efforts to forget his native language."

"But his daughters are very white."

"Yes, that's the reason rice has gone up in price, and yet they eat nothing but bread."

The novice did not understand the connection between the price of rice and the whiteness of those girls, but he held his peace.

"There goes the fellow that's engaged to one of them, that thin brown youth who is following them with a lingering movement and speaking with a protecting air to the three friends who are laughing at him. He's a martyr to his beliefs, to his consistency."

The novice was filled with admiration and respect for the young man.

"He has the look of a fool, and he is one," continued Tadeo. "He was born in San Pedro Makati and has inflicted many privations upon himself. He scarcely ever bathes or eats pork, because, according to him, the Spaniards don't do those things, and for the same reason he doesn't eat rice and dried fish, although he may be watering at the mouth and dying of hunger. Anything that comes from Europe, rotten or preserved, he considers divine--a month ago Basilio cured him of a severe attack of gastritis, for he had eaten a jar of mustard to prove that he's a European."

At that moment the orchestra struck up a waltz.

"You see that gentleman--that hypochondriac who goes along turning his head from side to side, seeking salutes? That's the celebrated governor of Pangasinan, a good man who loses his appet.i.te whenever any Indian fails to salute him. He would have died if he hadn't issued the proclamation about salutes to which he owes his celebrity. Poor fellow, it's only been three days since he came from the province and look how thin he has become! Oh, here's the great man, the ill.u.s.trious--open your eyes!"

"Who? That man with knitted brows?"

"Yes, that's Don Custodio, the liberal, Don Custodio. His brows are knit because he's meditating over some important project. If the ideas he has in his head were carried out, this would be a different world! Ah, here comes Makaraig, your housemate."

It was in fact Makaraig, with Pecson, Sandoval, and Isagani. Upon seeing them, Tadeo advanced and spoke to them.

"Aren't you coming in?" Makaraig asked him.

"We haven't been able to get tickets."

"Fortunately, we have a box," replied Makaraig. "Basilio couldn't come. Both of you, come in with us."

Tadeo did not wait for the invitation to be repeated, but the novice, fearing that he would intrude, with the timidity natural to the provincial Indian, excused himself, nor could he be persuaded to enter.

CHAPTER XXII

THE PERFORMANCE

The interior of the theater presented a lively aspect. It was filled from top to bottom, with people standing in the corridors and in the aisles, fighting to withdraw a head from some hole where they had inserted it, or to shove an eye between a collar and an ear. The open boxes, occupied for the most part by ladies, looked like baskets of flowers, whose petals--the fans--shook in a light breeze, wherein hummed a thousand bees. However, just as there are flowers of strong or delicate fragrance, flowers that kill and flowers that console, so from our baskets were exhaled like emanations: there were to be heard dialogues, conversations, remarks that bit and stung. Three or four boxes, however, were still vacant, in spite of the lateness of the hour. The performance had been advertised for half-past eight and it was already a quarter to nine, but the curtain did not go up, as his Excellency had not yet arrived. The gallery-G.o.ds, impatient and uncomfortable in their seats, started a racket, clapping their hands and pounding the floor with their canes.

"Boom--boom--boom! Ring up the curtain! Boom--boom--boom!"

The artillerymen were not the least noisy. Emulators of Mars, as Ben-Zayb called them, they were not satisfied with this music; thinking themselves perhaps at a bullfight, they made remarks at the ladies who pa.s.sed before them in words that are euphemistically called flowers in Madrid, although at times they seem more like foul weeds. Without heeding the furious looks of the husbands, they bandied from one to another the sentiments and longings inspired by so many beauties.

In the reserved seats, where the ladies seemed to be afraid to venture, as few were to be seen there, a murmur of voices prevailed amid suppressed laughter and clouds of tobacco smoke. They discussed the merits of the players and talked scandal, wondering if his Excellency had quarreled with the friars, if his presence at such a show was a defiance or mere curiosity. Others gave no heed to these matters, but were engaged in attracting the attention of the ladies, throwing themselves into att.i.tudes more or less interesting and statuesque, flashing diamond rings, especially when they thought themselves the foci of insistent opera-gla.s.ses, while yet another would address a respectful salute to this or that senora or senorita, at the same time lowering his head gravely to whisper to a neighbor, "How ridiculous she is! And such a bore!"

The lady would respond with one of her most gracious smiles and an enchanting nod of her head, while murmuring to a friend sitting near, amid lazy flourishes of her fan, "How impudent he is! He's madly in love, my dear."

Meanwhile, the noise increased. There remained only two vacant boxes, besides that of his Excellency, which was distinguished by its curtains of red velvet. The orchestra played another waltz, the audience protested, when fortunately there arose a charitable hero to distract their attention and relieve the manager, in the person of a man who had occupied a reserved seat and refused to give it up to its owner, the philosopher Don Primitivo. Finding his own arguments useless, Don Primitivo had appealed to an usher. "I don't care to,"

the hero responded to the latter's protests, placidly puffing at his cigarette. The usher appealed to the manager. "I don't care to," was the response, as he settled back in the seat. The manager went away, while the artillerymen in the gallery began to sing out encouragement to the usurper.

Our hero, now that he had attracted general attention, thought that to yield would be to lower himself, so he held on to the seat, while he repeated his answer to a pair of guards the manager had called in. These, in consideration of the rebel's rank, went in search of their corporal, while the whole house broke out into applause at the firmness of the hero, who remained seated like a Roman senator.

Hisses were heard, and the inflexible gentleman turned angrily to see if they were meant for him, but the galloping of horses resounded and the stir increased. One might have said that a revolution had broken out, or at least a riot, but no, the orchestra had suspended the waltz and was playing the royal march: it was his Excellency, the Captain-General and Governor of the islands, who was entering. All eyes sought and followed him, then lost sight of him, until he finally appeared in his box. After looking all about him and making some persons happy with a lordly salute, he sat down, as though he were indeed the man for whom the chair was waiting. The artillerymen then became silent and the orchestra tore into the prelude.

Our students occupied a box directly facing that of Pepay, the dancing girl. Her box was a present from Makaraig, who had already got on good terms with her in order to propitiate Don Custodio. Pepay had that very afternoon written a note to the ill.u.s.trious arbiter, asking for an answer and appointing an interview in the theater. For this reason, Don Custodio, in spite of the active opposition he had manifested toward the French operetta, had gone to the theater, which action won him some caustic remarks on the part of Don Manuel, his ancient adversary in the sessions of the Ayuntamiento.

"I've come to judge the operetta," he had replied in the tone of a Cato whose conscience was clear.

So Makaraig was exchanging looks of intelligence with Pepay, who was giving him to understand that she had something to tell him. As the dancing girl's face wore a happy expression, the students augured that a favorable outcome was a.s.sured. Sandoval, who had just returned from making calls in other boxes, also a.s.sured them that the decision had been favorable, that that very afternoon the Superior Commission had considered and approved it. Every one was jubilant, even Pecson having laid aside his pessimism when he saw the smiling Pepay display a note. Sandoval and Makaraig congratulated one another, Isagani alone remaining cold and unsmiling. What had happened to this young man?

Upon entering the theater, Isagani had caught sight of Paulita in a box, with Juanito Pelaez talking to her. He had turned pale, thinking that he must be mistaken. But no, it was she herself, she who greeted him with a gracious smile, while her beautiful eyes seemed to be asking pardon and promising explanations. The fact was that they had agreed upon Isagani's going first to the theater to see if the show contained anything improper for a young woman, but now he found her there, and in no other company than that of his rival. What pa.s.sed in his mind is indescribable: wrath, jealousy, humiliation, resentment raged within him, and there were moments even when he wished that the theater would fall in; he had a violent desire to laugh aloud, to insult his sweetheart, to challenge his rival, to make a scene, but finally contented himself with sitting quiet and not looking at her at all. He was conscious of the beautiful plans Makaraig and Sandoval were making, but they sounded like distant echoes, while the notes of the waltz seemed sad and lugubrious, the whole audience stupid and foolish, and several times he had to make an effort to keep back the tears. Of the trouble stirred up by the hero who refused to give up the seat, of the arrival of the Captain-General, he was scarcely conscious. He stared toward the drop-curtain, on which was depicted a kind of gallery with sumptuous red hangings, affording a view of a garden in which a fountain played, yet how sad the gallery looked to him and how melancholy the painted landscape! A thousand vague recollections surged into his memory like distant echoes of music heard in the night, like songs of infancy, the murmur of lonely forests and gloomy rivulets, moonlit nights on the sh.o.r.e of the sea spread wide before his eyes. So the enamored youth considered himself very wretched and stared fixedly at the ceiling so that the tears should not fall from his eyes.

A burst of applause drew him from these meditations. The curtain had just risen, and the merry chorus of peasants of Corneville was presented, all dressed in cotton caps, with heavy wooden sabots on their feet. Some six or seven girls, well-rouged on the lips and cheeks, with large black circles around their eyes to increase their brilliance, displayed white arms, fingers covered with diamonds, round and shapely limbs. While they were chanting the Norman phrase "_Allez, marchez! Allez, marchez!_" they smiled at their different admirers in the reserved seats with such openness that Don Custodio, after looking toward Pepay's box to a.s.sure himself that she was not doing the same thing with some other admirer, set down in his note-book this indecency, and to make sure of it lowered his head a little to see if the actresses were not showing their knees.

"Oh, these Frenchwomen!" he muttered, while his imagination lost itself in considerations somewhat more elevated, as he made comparisons and projects.

"_Quoi v'la tous les cancans d'la s'maine!_" sang Gertrude, a proud damsel, who was looking roguishly askance at the Captain-General.

"We're going to have the cancan!" exclaimed Tadeo, the winner of the first prize in the French cla.s.s, who had managed to make out this word. "Makaraig, they're going to dance the cancan!"

He rubbed his hands gleefully. From the moment the curtain rose, Tadeo had been heedless of the music. He was looking only for the prurient, the indecent, the immoral in actions and dress, and with his scanty French was sharpening his ears to catch the obscenities that the austere guardians of the fatherland had foretold.

Sandoval, pretending to know French, had converted himself into a kind of interpreter for his friends. He knew as much about it as Tadeo, but the published synopsis helped him and his fancy supplied the rest. "Yes," he said, "they're going to dance the cancan--she's going to lead it."

Makaraig and Pecson redoubled their attention, smiling in antic.i.p.ation, while Isagani looked away, mortified to think that Paulita should be present at such a show and reflecting that it was his duty to challenge Juanito Pelaez the next day.

But the young men waited in vain. Serpolette came on, a charming girl, in her cotton cap, provoking and challenging. "_Hein, qui parle de Serpolette?_" she demanded of the gossips, with her arms akimbo in a combative att.i.tude. Some one applauded, and after him all those in the reserved seats. Without changing her girlish att.i.tude, Serpolette gazed at the person who had started the applause and paid him with a smile, displaying rows of little teeth that looked like a string of pearls in a case of red velvet.

Tadeo followed her gaze and saw a man in a false mustache with an extraordinarily large nose. "By the monk's cowl!" he exclaimed. "It's Irene!"

"Yes," corroborated Sandoval, "I saw him behind the scenes talking with the actresses."