by Nick Joaquin
[They fly apart—Paula to the left; Candida to the right—and turn on all the lights as Bitoy appears on the stair-landing.]
PAULA: Halt! Who goes there!
BITOY [blinking]: Why, Paula!
PAULA: Are you friend or foe?
BITOY: Friend!
PAULA: Advance, friend, and be recognized!
BITOY [walking in]: I have been looking for you everywhere.
CANDIDA: I sent him to look for you, Paula.
PAULA [clasping her hands to her breast]: My hero! And at last you have found me—in this enchanted castle!
BITOY [laughing]: What on earth has happened?
PAULA [whispering]: The evil spell has been broken!
CANDIDA: The enchantment has dissolved!
PAULA: The princesses will now return to their kingdoms—
CANDIDA: And live happily ever after!
BITOY: Don’t I get half of the kingdom?
PAULA: Beware, Bitoy! Our kingdom is a barren land; and the king, our father, an old man.
CANDIDA: Are you willing to carry him on your back?
BITOY: With all his ancestral gods!
PAULA: Candida, our first novice!
CANDIDA: Bitoy Camacho, I am delighted with you!
BITOY: And everything is all right now?
CANDIDA [her expression quickly changing]: No! No, not yet!
PAULA: Oh Candida, they are gathering now! They are coming!
BITOY: Who?
CANDIDA [giggling]: Oh, what shall we do, Paula? Where shall we hide!
BITOY: What is all this!
PAULA: Shh! Listen!
[They listen, looking toward stairway. Enter DON ALVARO & DOÑA UPENG.]
ALVARO: A holy and good evening to everyone in this house!
PAULA & CANDIDA [hurrying to meet visitors; finger on lips]: Shhh! Shhh!
ALVARO: Is your papa sick?
PAULA: Oh no, no, Don Alvaro!
CANDIDA: He is in the best of health!
PAULA [hurrying visitors into the room]: Come over here, Doña Upeng! Come over here, Don Alvaro! Oh, we are so glad you have come! Candida, some brandy for our guests!
CANDIDA: And of course you remember Bitoy Camacho. He was a regular member of our old tertulias. Bitoy, say good evening to your old friends.
BITOY: Good evening, Doña Upeng. Good evening, Don Alvaro.
PAULA: He, too, has come to celebrate the Naval with us!
ALVARO: You do well, my boy, to honor an old tradition before it disappears.
CANDIDA [as she offers glasses]: Disappears?
ALVARO: Yes—there is all this talk of war, war, war!
UPENG: And that is why we have come tonight. We wanted to salute the Virgin again from your balconies—as we used to do in the old days. Oh Paula, Candida—this may be the last time!
[Enter DON PEPE.]
PEPE: Yes, Upeng—this may well be the last time!
UPENG: Pepe! Pepe, you old carabao—where have you come from?
PEPE: Practically from the graveyard, Upeng. But I felt I had to come tonight—
PAULA [hurrying to meet him]: Shhh! Come over here, Don Pepe!
PEPE [as he is hurried into the room]: My dear Paula, what is happening?
ALVARO: Yes—just what is wrong, girls?
PAULA: Listen—we are in trouble—Candida and I.
CANDIDA: We need your help!
PEPE: Candida, Paula, we will do anything for you!
CANDIDA: Oh, thank God, you have come tonight!
PAULA: We need our old friends tonight!
PEPE: Well, here we are! [He glances toward stairway.] And here come some more of us! [He goes to stairway as DON MIGUEL & DOÑA IRENE come up; greeting them with finger on lips.] Shhh! Come over here, you two! Candida and Paula are in danger!
IRENE [kissing the sisters]: My dear Paula! And dearest Candida!
MIGUEL: What is it, girls? Can we help?
PAULA: Don Miguel, you have already helped us!
CANDIDA: Simply by coming tonight!
IRENE: Oh, we simply had to come tonight!
MIGUEL: They say a war is coming—a big war!
IRENE: Nothing will be left of what we have loved so much!
UPENG [taking the other woman’s hand]: Aie, Irene—not much is left—even now!
IRENE: No, Upeng. Not much is left even now . . .
PEPE: The wind is left anyway. Look at it blowing! It is the same wind, the good old wind of October! Oh, feel it, smell it—all of you! It is blowing from the old days, from the days of our youth! It is blowing from the old Manila—la Manila de nuestros amores!
MIGUEL: And here we are—gathered again—relics of the old dispensation . . .
[A pause, while they watch the blowing curtains of the balconies and listen to the sound of bells & approaching drums. The visitors are all very old, very frail, & very faded—but still talk & carry themselves with an air of grandeur, being impoverished gentlefolk. They are poorly but neatly dressed—canes & the “Americana Cerrada” for the men; fans & the starchy “saya” with train for the women; old shawls draped under their pañuelos.]
ALVARO: And what memories, eh? Personal memories, ancestral memories . . . That wind, those bells, this feast . . . La Naval de Manila! How the words ache in one’s heart!
MIGUEL: Ah, but you speak only for ourselves, Alvaro.
ALVARO: Yes. In this, we are the last of the generations.
MIGUEL: Already, for our children, these things awaken no special emotion, no memories, no filial pieties . . .
IRENE: The old traditions are dying . . .
PEPE: There is no need for a war to kill them.
[Enter DON ARISTEO.]
ARISTEO: Alas, no! And there is no need for a war to kill us either!
VISITORS: Aristeo!
ARISTEO: Caramba, you are all here!
VISITORS: Shhh!
ARISTEO: Huh?
PAULA [approaching; whispering]: Welcome again to our house, noble soldier!
ARISTEO [in booming voice]: Paula, I have dragged my dying bones up here to salute the Virgin for the last time!
VISITORS: Shhh!
ARISTEO: But what is the matter with all of you!
UPENG: Stop your shouting, Aristeo! Paula and Candida are in great peril!
IRENE: Their lives are threatened!
ARISTEO: Girls, is this true?
CANDIDA [smiling]: Will you defend us?
ARISTEO: Oh, I should have brought my pistol!
PAULA: We need only your presence, Noble Soldier! Candida, some brandy for our champion!
ARISTEO [taking her hands]: Wait a minute, Paula—let me look at you. Caramba, your hands are cold!
PAULA: Oh, truly?
ARISTEO [looking her in the eye]: Paula, all this is not . . . just a joke?
PAULA: Oh no, no!
ARISTEO: You are actually in grave danger?
PAULA [bending her face toward him]: Surely you can feel the floor trembling beneath us?
ARISTEO: I can feel your hands trembling, yes.
[She withdraws her hands, still smiling.]
What is it, girl?
PAULA [with a shrug]: Oh, this may be the last time, the last night, we shall stand here—Candida and I—in our own house.
ARISTEO: I see.
CANDIDA [offering him a glass]: But of course we mean to be stubborn!
PAULA: And listen—I am not afraid.
ARISTEO: Why should you be? Am I not here?
UPENG: And we will all stand with you, Paula and Candida!
ALVARO: You must remain in this house!
IRENE: We need you here in this house!
PEPE: To continue us—
UPENG: And to preserve us—
ALVARO: And as a symbol of permanence!
PEPE: This house is our assurance that life will go on!
MIGUEL: Exactly! Why, just look at us now. Terrified by rumors of destruction, we have all come running here as to a rock! Even so, for those great warriors of Thermopylae—
ARISTEO: My dear Miguel!
MIGUEL: My dear Aristeo!
ARISTEO: We are in no mood for orations! Candida, pass the brandy! Animo, amigos! Sursum corda! We all have no money in our pockets—but we are not dead yet! We can still drink!
CANDIDA [laughing]: Don Aristeo is always right! Come on, everybody—more brandy!
PAULA: Yes, let us all drink and be merry!
IRENE: And to whom shall we drink?
CANDIDA: To the Virgin! To the Virgin, of course!
ARISTEO: Amigos, let us drink to the Virgin. We are gathered here in her honor.
ALVARO: And this is our feast—
PEPE: And the feast of our fathers!
ARISTEO: And they still live—our fathers. Something of them is left; something of them survives, and will survive, as long as we live and remember—we who have known and loved and cherished these things . . .
MIGUEL: And we will live for a long time yet!
PEPE: We will live to be a hundred!
UPENG: Oh, what old fools we were—to be so timorous, to be so terrified!
IRENE: This time is not the last time!
UPENG: And tonight is not the last night!
ALVARO: We will live to be a thousand!
MIGUEL: We will live forever!
EVERYBODY: Viva!
PAULA: And listen, everybody—tertulia on Friday! Tertulia again on Friday!
CANDIDA: Yes, yes! Our house shall be open again as usual—next Friday—and every Friday! We must continue, we must preserve!
EVERYBODY: VIVA! VIVA!
PAULA [raising her glass]: Don Aristeo?
ARISTEO: Amigos y paisanos!
[He raises his glass.]
A la gran señora de Filipinas en la gloriosa fiesta de su Naval!
everybody: VIVA LA VIRGEN!
[They drink. Enter Pepang & Manolo, and advance grimly into the room, Paula & Candida are standing side by side at center. The visitors are grouped solidly behind them. Bitoy is standing a little apart at left, a worried on-looker.]
PAULA [gaily]: Pepang! Manolo!
CANDIDA: Have you also come to salute the Virgin?
MANOLO [grimly]: You know very well why we have come!
PAULA: Have you come to confess at last?
PEPANG: To confess!
MANOLO: Are you crazy? Is it we who—
PAULA: Confess, Manolo! Confess, Pepang! Oh, you will feel so happy afterward! You will be free! Look at us!
MANOLO: Yes, look at yourselves! Just look at yourselves! What a fine public spectacle you have made of yourselves!
PEPANG: Oh, this shameful, shameful scandal!
MANOLO: Go and get some clothes! You are both leaving this house at once!
CANDIDA: Where are your manners, Manolo? Do you not see we have visitors?
PEPANG: How can you have the nerve? You should be hiding your faces—if you have any shame left!
MANOLO: Tell these people to go away!
[The procession is now approaching: and the drums rumble ever closer, ever louder.]
ARISTEO [coming forward]: Caramba, it is Manolito! I hardly recognized you, my boy—you have grown so fat!
MANOLO: Don Aristeo, I am sorry but I must ask you to leave. My sisters and I have family matters to discuss.
ARISTEO: And is this Pepita?
MANOLO: Don Aristeo, did you hear what I said!
ARISTEO: Aie, Pepita—what an exquisite child you were: so tender, so affectionate! And how you loved to ride on my back, round and round this room—remember?
PEPANG: Don Aristeo, we have no time to—
ARISTEO: No time, no time! Always no time, always in a hurry! Relax, both of you! Here, sit down—have a drink—and let us talk about the old days!
MANOLO: Candida, will you send these people away!
ARISTEO: Tch! tch! And you used to be such a quiet boy—very thin, very dreamy—
MANOLO: Don Aristeo—
ARISTEO: Upeng, do you remember how you used to scold him for being so bashful?
UPENG [laughing]: Oh, he was always blushing—especially in the presence of the fair sex!
IRENE: And you blushed very charmingly, Manolito, when you were a boy!
MANOLO: I ask you politely—all of you—for the last time—
ALVARO: And always reading, always off in a corner with a book—
PEPE: Or playing his violin down there in the patio—
MIGUEL: Or directing a zarzuela, with Pepita here as the prima-donna—
MANOLO [shouting]: Will you let me speak!
ARISTEO: Oh, they were the most intellectual children I have ever known!
MANOLO: Don Aristeo, I beg you—
PEPANG: Oh, why do you waste your time, Manolo! It is useless to talk to them!
IRENE: And, Pepita, I will never forget how you used to recite the “Ultimo Adios” when you were hardly seven!
PEPE: It was I who taught her that poem!
UPENG: And it was I who taught you to dance, Manolo, on the night of your fifteenth birthday—remember?—right in this very room!
ALVARO: What gay memories this house holds for all of us!
MIGUEL: And how Manolo and Pepang must love this old scene of their childhood!
PAULA: Alas, no!
MIGUEL: They do not love it?
CANDIDA: They want it sold!
THE VISITORS: SOLD!
UPENG: Que horror!
IRENE: But why?
PAULA: That is something they refuse to confess, even to themselves!
ARISTEO: But, perhaps, they cannot afford this house any longer.
PAULA: Oh, it is not the expense!
CANDIDA: Although that is the reason they give!
PAULA: But they deceive themselves!
PEPANG: Paula! Candida!
PAULA: It is not the expense. Why, they throw money away right and left, night and day, at the gambling tables, and think nothing about it!
PEPANG: Manolo, are you going to stand there and let these—
PAULA: No, it is not the expense! They simply cannot stand this house, they cannot bear it!
CANDIDA: It haunts them, it spoils their fun!
PAULA: It is always rising before their eyes at the most inconvenient moments—
CANDIDA: When they are gossiping with their friends—
PAULA: Or playing mah-jongg—
CANDIDA: Or having a nice time at the races or at the Jai-Alai—
PAULA: Or when they cannot sleep—
CANDIDA: Suddenly—cataplum!—the shadow of this house falls upon them!
PAULA: And then their hands falter—
CANDIDA: Their blood turns cold!
ARISTEO: You mean, they are afraid of this house?
CANDIDA: And they want it destroyed!
ALVARO: But why?
PAULA: Because it is their conscience!
MANOLO & PEPANG: PAULA!
[The drums are now rumbling right under the balconies.]
PAULA [advancing slowly]: Yes, Manolo! Yes, Pepang! This house is your conscience—and that is why you hate it, that is why you fear it, that is why you have been craving so long and so desperately to destroy it! No, you can not afford it! You cannot afford to have a conscience! Because you know you will have no—
MANOLO [stepping back]: SHUT UP! SHUT UP!
PAULA [standing still]: You know you will have no peace as long as this ho
use stands here to rebuke you!
MANOLO: [raising his fists]: SHUT UP—or, by God, I’m going to—
[The balconies light up dazzlingly as the procession passes below.]
PAULA: And you will not rest—no—you will never rest until you have laid waste this house; until you have stripped it naked, and torn down its walls, and uprooted its very foundations!
PEPANG: Manolo, this is beyond endurance!
CANDIDA: Confess, Pepang! Confess, Manolo!
MANOLO: They have gone mad!
PAULA: Confess, confess—and be free!
PEPANG: Are you going to let them frighten you?
MANOLO: They are leaving this house this very moment!
PEPE: Oh no, Manolito—nobody can leave now!
UPENG [waving toward balconies]: Look! The procession!
ALVARO: The streets are closed!
IRENE: The Holy Virgin herself has come to save them!
MANOLO [advancing]: They are leaving this house right now if I have to throw them down the stairs!
ARISTEO: Then, you will first have to throw me down those stairs, Manolito!
PEPE [stepping forward]: And me!
UPENG [stepping forward]: And me!
IRENE [stepping forward]: And me!
MIGUEL: You will first have to throw all of us down those stairs, Manolito!
[Manolo stands still, staring.]
ARISTEO: Well, my boy—what do you say now?
CANDIDA: And that is not all, Manolo. There is father as well. Are you prepared to throw him also down those stairs?
PEPANG: Father hates you!
PAULA: Father stands with us!
CANDIDA: And we stand with father!
BITOY [suddenly shouting; with astonished gesture toward doorway]: AND HERE HE COMES! HERE HE COMES!
PEPANG [staring; gripping Manolo’s arm]: Manolo, look! It’s father!
[Chorus of “Lorenzo!” and “Here comes Lorenzo!” and “Hola, Lorenzo!” from the visitors as they all gaze, amazed, toward doorway. Candida & Paula, who have their backs to the doorway, turn around slowly & fearfully. But, suddenly, their faces light up & lift up; they gasp, they smile; they clasp their hands to their breasts.]
PAULA & CANDIDA [in ringing, rising, radiant exultation]: OH PAPA! PAPA! PAPA!
[From the street comes a flourish of trumpets as the band breaks into the strains of the Gavotta Marcha Procesional; and as Bitoy Camacho steps forward to his usual place at left front of stage, the “Intramuros Curtain” closes in on the sala scene, everybody inside remaining frozen.]