The Reign of Greed Part 32

"Called by you to fill the void that has been left in--"

"Plagiarism!" Sandoval interrupted him. "That speech was delivered by the president of our lyceum."

"Called by your election," continued the imperturbable Tadeo, "to fill the void that has been left in my mind"--pointing to his stomach--"by a man famous for his Christian principles and for his inspirations and projects, worthy of some little remembrance, what can one like myself say of him, I who am very hungry, not having breakfasted?"

"Have a neck, my friend!" called a neighbor, offering that portion of a chicken.

"There is one course, gentlemen, the treasure of a people who are today a tale and a mockery in the world, wherein have thrust their hands the greatest gluttons of the western regions of the earth--"

Here he pointed with his chopsticks to Sandoval, who was struggling with a refractory chicken-wing.

"And eastern!" retorted the latter, describing a circle in the air with his spoon, in order to include all the banqueters.

"No interruptions!"

"I demand the floor!"

"I demand pickles!" added Isagani.

"Bring on the stew!"

All echoed this request, so Tadeo sat down, contented with having got out of his quandary.

The dish consecrated to Padre Irene did not appear to be extra good, as Sandoval cruelly demonstrated thus: "Shining with grease outside and with pork inside! Bring on the third course, the friar pie!"

The pie was not yet ready, although the sizzling of the grease in the frying-pan could be heard. They took advantage of the delay to drink, begging Pecson to talk.

Pecson crossed himself gravely and arose, restraining his clownish laugh with an effort, at the same time mimicking a certain Augustinian preacher, then famous, and beginning in a murmur, as though he were reading a text.

"_Si tripa plena laudal Deum, tripa famelica laudabit fratres_--if the full stomach praises G.o.d, the hungry stomach will praise the friars. Words spoken by the Lord Custodio through the mouth of Ben-Zayb, in the journal _El Grito de la Integridad_, the second article, absurdity the one hundred and fifty-seventh.

"Beloved brethren in Christ: Evil blows its foul breath over the verdant sh.o.r.es of Frailandia, commonly called the Philippine Archipelago. No day pa.s.ses but the attack is renewed, but there is heard some sarcasm against the reverend, venerable, infallible corporations, defenseless and unsupported. Allow me, brethren, on this occasion to const.i.tute myself a knight-errant to sally forth in defense of the unprotected, of the holy corporations that have reared us, thus again confirming the saving idea of the adage--a full stomach praises G.o.d, which is to say, a hungry stomach will praise the friars."

"Bravo, bravo!"

"Listen," said Isagani seriously, "I want you to understand that, speaking of friars, I respect one."

Sandoval was getting merry, so he began to sing a shady couplet about the friars.

"Hear me, brethren!" continued Pecson. "Turn your gaze toward the happy days of your infancy, endeavor to a.n.a.lyze the present and ask yourselves about the future. What do you find? Friars, friars, and friars! A friar baptized you, confirmed you, visited you in school with loving zeal; a friar heard your first secret; he was the first to bring you into communion with G.o.d, to set your feet upon the pathway of life; friars were your first and friars will be your last teachers; a friar it is who opens the hearts of your sweethearts, disposing them to heed your sighs; a friar marries you, makes you travel over different islands to afford you changes of climate and diversion; he will attend your death-bed, and even though you mount the scaffold, there will the friar be to accompany you with his prayers and tears, and you may rest a.s.sured that he will not desert you until he sees you thoroughly dead. Nor does his charity end there--dead, he will then endeavor to bury you with all pomp, he will fight that your corpse pa.s.s through the church to receive his supplications, and he will only rest satisfied when he can deliver you into the hands of the Creator, purified here on earth, thanks to temporal punishments, tortures, and humiliations. Learned in the doctrines of Christ, who closes heaven against the rich, they, our redeemers and genuine ministers of the Saviour, seek every means to lift away our sins and bear them far, far off, there where the accursed Chinese and Protestants dwell, to leave us this air, limpid, pure, healthful, in such a way that even should we so wish afterwards, we could not find a real to bring about our condemnation.

"If, then, their existence is necessary to our happiness, if wheresoever we turn we must encounter their delicate hands, hungering for kisses, that every day smooth the marks of abuse from our countenances, why not adore them and fatten them--why demand their impolitic expulsion? Consider for a moment the immense void that their absence would leave in our social system. Tireless workers, they improve and propagate the races! Divided as we are, thanks to our jealousies and our susceptibilities, the friars unite us in a common lot, in a firm bond, so firm that many are unable to move their elbows. Take away the friar, gentlemen, and you will see how the Philippine edifice will totter; lacking robust shoulders and hairy limbs to sustain it, Philippine life will again become monotonous, without the merry note of the playful and gracious friar, without the booklets and sermons that split our sides with laughter, without the amusing contrast between grand pretensions and small brains, without the actual, daily representations of the tales of Boccaccio and La Fontaine! Without the girdles and scapularies, what would you have our women do in the future--save that money and perhaps become miserly and covetous? Without the ma.s.ses, novenaries, and processions, where will you find games of _panguingui_ to entertain them in their hours of leisure? They would then have to devote themselves to their household duties and instead of reading diverting stories of miracles, we should then have to get them works that are not extant.

"Take away the friar and heroism will disappear, the political virtues will fall under the control of the vulgar. Take him away and the Indian will cease to exist, for the friar is the Father, the Indian is the Word! The former is the sculptor, the latter the statue, because all that we are, think, or do, we owe to the friar--to his patience, his toil, his perseverance of three centuries to modify the form Nature gave us. The Philippines without the friar and without the Indian--what then would become of the unfortunate government in the hands of the Chinamen?"

"It will eat lobster pie," suggested Isagani, whom Pecson's speech bored.

"And that's what we ought to be doing. Enough of speeches!"

As the Chinese who should have served the courses did not put in his appearance, one of the students arose and went to the rear, toward the balcony that overlooked the river. But he returned at once, making mysterious signs.

"We're watched! I've seen Padre Sibyla's pet!"

"Yes?" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Isagani, rising.

"It's no use now. When he saw me he disappeared."

Approaching the window he looked toward the plaza, then made signs to his companions to come nearer. They saw a young man leave the door of the _pansiteria_, gaze all about him, then with some unknown person enter a carriage that waited at the curb. It was Simoun's carriage.

"Ah!" exclaimed Makaraig. "The slave of the Vice-Rector attended by the Master of the General!"

CHAPTER XXVI

PASQUINADES

Very early the next morning Basilio arose to go to the hospital. He had his plans made: to visit his patients, to go afterwards to the University to see about his licentiateship, and then have an interview with Makaraig about the expense this would entail, for he had used up the greater part of his savings in ransoming Juli and in securing a house where she and her grandfather might live, and he had not dared to apply to Capitan Tiago, fearing that such a move would be construed as an advance on the legacy so often promised him.

Preoccupied with these thoughts, he paid no attention to the groups of students who were at such an early hour returning from the Walled City, as though the cla.s.srooms had been closed, nor did he even note the abstracted air of some of them, their whispered conversations, or the mysterious signals exchanged among them. So it was that when he reached San Juan de Dios and his friends asked him about the conspiracy, he gave a start, remembering what Simoun had planned, but which had miscarried, owing to the unexplained accident to the jeweler. Terrified, he asked in a trembling voice, at the same time endeavoring to feign ignorance, "Ah, yes, what conspiracy?"

"It's been discovered," replied one, "and it seems that many are implicated in it."

With an effort Basilio controlled himself. "Many implicated?" he echoed, trying to learn something from the looks of the others. "Who?"

"Students, a lot of students."

Basilio did not think it prudent to ask more, fearing that he would give himself away, so on the pretext of visiting his patients he left the group. One of the clinical professors met him and placing his hand mysteriously on the youth's shoulder--the professor was a friend of his--asked him in a low voice, "Were you at that supper last night?"

In his excited frame of mind Basilio thought the professor had said _night before last_, which was the time of his interview with Simoun. He tried to explain. "I a.s.sure you," he stammered, "that as Capitan Tiago was worse--and besides I had to finish that book--"

"You did well not to attend it," said the professor. "But you're a member of the students' a.s.sociation?"

"I pay my dues."

"Well then, a piece of advice: go home at once and destroy any papers you have that may compromise you."

Basilio shrugged his shoulders--he had no papers, nothing more than his clinical notes.

"Has Senor Simoun--"

"Simoun has nothing to do with the affair, thank G.o.d!" interrupted the physician. "He was opportunely wounded by some unknown hand and is now confined to his bed. No, other hands are concerned in this, but hands no less terrible."

Basilio drew a breath of relief. Simoun was the only one who could compromise him, although he thought of Cabesang Tales.

"Are there tulisanes--"