Dusk: A Novel (Modern Library Paperbacks)

by F. Sionil Jose

  Even at this time of the year, when the land was scorched, the forest was a deep green, throbbing with secret life. Farther up the mountain, the green turned into a purplish black that cloaked the foothills all the way up to the peaks.

  The forest was hostile, with unseen threats, but every year before the rains started he and the old priest had ventured without fear into it and beyond to the land of the Bagos—the Igorots, the ancient enemies of his people. He had listened, entranced, to the dal-lot and the life of Lam-ang, the epic hero whose courage and strength were tested in battles with them.

  In times of peace, the Bagos came down, half-naked, their torsos caked with dirt, their spears glinting and awe-inspiring. But they did not come to fight, merely to trade their baskets, their dried deer meat for dogs, tobacco, and fibers for their looms. He could recognize them even if they dressed like Christians because they were short and squat, their backs broad, their legs muscular. They chewed betel nut continuously and their teeth were blacker than those of his own people. As a boy in Po-on he did not fear them; it was the Komaw that frightened him, that huge and ugly kidnapper of children who would take him away if he did not behave as his mother instructed him.

  Only the Bagos lived in these mountains, kindred to the wild boar and the python. They were hunters who could merge with the foliage, become one with the bush until they assumed the mystery of the forest as well, sharing its darkness and its sensuous promise. But there was no promise in the forest now. It was a black redoubt to be sundered so that its soil would bear the seed. It cannot be, it must not be the haven of those who fear the light—and Istak recalled again the dim sacristy of the church in Cabugaw and how secure he felt there with the ghosts of the past, of the nameless and innumerable dead in all those records that he had kept, his fear melting in the air he breathed. It was a far more mysterious forest which they would now face, and perhaps—he shuddered at the thought—they would not be able to go beyond it.

  It was the fourth day since the first two carts had left carrying Bit-tik and his aunt Simang. All the departures from the hollow of the hill were timed so that the carts would be on the coastal road late in the night or in the deep, deep dawn. It was Ba-ac who went first on foot and alone, balancing on his shoulder a small sack of rice, his stub of an arm on a sling of coarse Ilokano cloth. He was carrying this sack of rice as a wedding present to a niece in Candon; he was walking all the way even at night, hoping he would not miss the wedding. Istak had been to Candon, of course—it was a very prosperous town, one of the stations where Padre Jose used to stop for additional provisions before they turned left toward Tirad and the perpetual challenge of the Cordilleras.

  Four days, and Istak wondered if all that he had taught them would be remembered, if they would be able to pretend that their destinations were not the same.

  Now it was his turn and Dalin’s. They had spent the last three days waiting. Dalin was never idle; she had tended the bull, done some sewing and cooking. There was always something a woman could do while a man mused and pondered his fate. The day comes different from all others, night quickly falls, and sometimes it is best to be silent, to be alone with one’s thoughts. But for her I would be dead—but for her—there must be some purpose for this long journey other than shredding the soles, just as life is one journey from one night to another. So it must be, exitus and reditus, leaving and coming, and in between, the uncertainty which numbs the heart and lacerates the soul. But perhaps, though it is broken now, the body will be reborn—just as a tree might be ravaged by all forms of blight, yet in spite of its frailty, its fruit can be sweet because the tree itself comes from a good seed.

  Dalin had calculated the distance very well; they left the hollow after they had supped on green papayas with pieces of chicken. She had cooked the food before sundown when the cooking fire would not reveal their presence. For a while, Dalin walked the bull through thickets of bamboo and shallow gullies; inside the cart, Istak remained still, braced as he was between two sacks so that the wound would not reopen.

  Then, after a while, the cart stopped. From the rear of the cart, Dalin took the oil lamp out. It had not been used for a long time and the wick was dry, but soon it sputtered into a flame. She brought the lamp to the front.

  Istak lay down. The light cast patterns on the canopy. The ride was smooth; they were no longer on rough ground or fallow fields but on the cobbled Spanish road, a light proclaiming their presence—persons of peace on a long journey. They were moving slowly, steadily, the wheels creaking, Dalin before him framed by the doorway of the cart, and beyond, the night dangerous and vast; Dalin near him, comforting him with her presence, easing the knot in his heart.

  They had rehearsed what they would say—they were newly weds going to settle with relatives in Pangasinan. As for their being married, “I hope it will be true someday,” Istak told her.

  He slept fitfully and though he often asked Dalin to lie down while he kept watch, she had refused. Once, he woke up to find that the cart was not moving, that the shadows the lamp cast were still. The bull was chewing its cud but Dalin was nowhere. He half rose in fright and saw that they were by the roadside, and Dalin was seated on a rock, resting the bull, while below them, the waves murmured on the rocks and the air was salty and clean.

  “Please come and sleep now, and I will watch,” he said. Dalin mounted the cart again.

  “We have passed the two posts where we should have been checked,” she said softly. “There”—she pointed to the distance where a lighthouse beam shone—“that was the last one.”

  “And they did not stop you?”

  “Who would bother with a cart at this time of night? The sentries were probably all asleep.”

  He was right, then. The other carts must have passed the sieve.

  Morning comes to the Ilokos quickly, the sun rising from beyond the mountains and flooding the land with amber light. They were still on the Spanish road, for in this part of the country the mountains and the sea often meet, and the narrow road followed the coastline through narrow plains and villages that had begun to stir.

  To their right, a few fishing boats sat motionless in the water, while beyond, a ship with smoke trailing long and black from its funnel headed toward the north. Perhaps it was one of the Spanish boats headed for Aparri, or even to Hong Kong. Toward midmorning, six horsemen followed by four carriages came thundering down the highway. One of the horsemen roared at them to get off the road and, for an instant, fear gripped Istak. But the man merely wanted the road to be cleared, for soon after Dalin had dismounted and led the bull aside, the four carriages rolled on, their well-dressed passengers chatting, among them a priest—perhaps a bishop, in his resplendent finery, on his way to officiate at some festivity.

  Where possible, Dalin took the cart away from the main road and then ventured through seaside hamlets. This was what traders often did and in each she asked if there was any dried fish she could buy. For traveling, it was much better than dried meat, as it was not likely to spoil quickly.

  By nightfall, they had to be on the road again. They were near the Abra River now. Istak knew this almost by instinct, and if it had been the rainy season, they would have had to cross the river by ferry. The river would be dry in parts and where the water was still running it would be shallow. There would be many travelers along the stretch of riverbed, for there they paused to cook their meals and do their washing before journeying onward to La Union and Pangasinan.

  They stopped for the night in a village far from the road, their presence known to the villagers who on occasion would receive travelers seeking company and perhaps protection from the highwaymen who roamed these parts. And in the early dawn, long before daybreak, Dalin hitched the cart again.

  They reached the river before noon. Bit-tik, who had waited along the road, rushed to them breathless with the good news: they had all managed to get through the eye of the needle—they were together again, farther along, down the wide are of the riverbed, hidden b
y tall grass.

  Dalin took the cart down a well-traveled gully. Along the way, close to the narrow stream of water, were the ashes of cooking fires, traces of a night’s habitation, laundry spread out in the sun to bleach on the stones, women washing their hair, and children splashing about.

  There were a few Igorots in loincloths. It would be a long way back across the mountains to their villages and for the moment, they were here in peace, although once in their own domain, they could be the fiercest hunters of heads. They could be Tinguianes, Istak told Dalin, who cringed when one of them approached the cart, baring teeth stained by betel nut, and asked in Ilokano if they had any sugar to sell.

  They had none, of course, and after he had left and joined his companion, Istak assured Dalin she was in no danger, not while Bit-tik was with them. “Toward that turn of hill, that is where they are waiting,” Bit-tik told them, pointing. They would get there by noon.

  All of them had bathed and their faces shone. But no one lived here, they said; who would be able to grow anything on this desert of pebble and sand? Even the camachile trees remained stunted.

  Ba-ac would tell them again and again afterward how he had fooled the Guardia, how everyone was asleep at the first station except for one sentry. He had approached the sentry and asked first if he could have a drink, and after that, if he could just rest his tired legs and, perhaps, go to sleep nearby till daybreak, for here he felt completely safe—what with the rice and, perhaps, his only good shirt in the sack—he, a defenseless old man. He would relate many times till everyone knew it by heart, how the sentry did not even bother asking him where he came from, but had, instead, complained about the mosquitoes that infested the air, while below, the waves slapped sonorously and soon lulled him to sleep. In the early dawn, Ba-ac had asked if there were more sentries down the road where he could possibly rest again, and he was told there were a couple more, but who would travel on foot at this time except a crazy old man worrying about something as trifling as a few gantas of rice?

  In the evening when they made ready to leave the riverbed, Ba-ac came to see him again. “You are much better, son,” he said. “You are no longer as pale as a banana stalk. It is good that you have Dalin to take care of you. Now, at least, you can sit up and show us the way. You know it better than any of us, at least all the way to Candon. And from there, Dalin will be our guide.” Ba-ac turned to the woman who was leading the bull to the yoke. “You are one of us now, young woman,” Ba-ac told her warmly.

  “Thank you, Apo,” she said.

  “Where is An-no, Father?” Istak asked. He could not forget how his younger brother had railed against him, how he wanted Dalin for himself.

  “You are brothers,” Ba-ac said. “There is no distance between you that cannot be bridged.”

  It was a cryptic reply. Did the old man know of the rift between the brothers that Dalin was the center of? Did he know how Mayang had looked at his relationship with Dalin to be as ominous as sin?

  They would no longer use the Spanish road; again, they would take the circuitous route close to the foothills, away from the towns. They still had a long way to go before they reached Candon, where Ba-ac had second cousins who would probably give them shelter for a day. A long journey ahead still, and no peace with An-no in sight, only this silence and this distance that could widen if he did not move wisely.

  It was all routine now, the women cooking the meals, the men walking ahead and behind the carts, particularly where the grass was dense and the farms far between, places where brigands could lie in wait.

  Then, the plain narrowed again as the mountain dropped to the sea. An-no had gone miles out in front to check if there was any outpost where they could be challenged. He had returned with the glad news that the road was free. They waited till dark and only then did they come down from a fold in the hill.

  The mountains gave way to fields, the plain unfurled. Beyond the bamboo brakes, Istak recognized it at once—Mount Tirad, stabbing the sky like a spearhead. He knew the way not just to Tirad but beyond, and if it had just been the menfolk with him, he would have suggested that they cross over to the valley through the pass. But there were women and children, and a venture into the land of the Igorots without Padre Jose was always dangerous.

  Before the day would be over, they would reach Candon.

  It was one of the richest towns in the southern portion of the Ilokos. Even from a distance the spires of its magnificent church could be seen in the sunlight. The plains around it swelled with green, and to the left, up the foothills of the Cordilleras, were the ranches. From here, some of the best cattle and horses from the Ilokos were raised. Market days, as in most Ilokano towns, were festive as well. From the villages, the people came to buy their weekly ration of salt, oil, thread, matches, even books—cheap novels in Iloko. Istak loved the days when they sojourned in Candon, particularly the marketplace, where he saw so many goods on display, sometimes even better than those in the market in Vigan.

  But the people they were going to see were not in town; they lived close to the foothills. Like Ba-ac, they did not know how to read and write, and they worked the land with diligence, for that was the only thing they knew.

  They had been traveling slowly, determinedly, for ten days. The wound in Istak’s chest had completely closed, but it was still painfully sensitive, its edges now hardened with pus which had turned to a scab that would soon fall off.

  Every day, at his instruction, Dalin washed the wound with warm water that had been boiled with guava leaves, and her hands were ever gentle. He was still weak. Though he could sit with her in the front of the cart, he could not walk around as much as he wanted to.

  They had paused in the shade of a lomboy tree and across the expanse of fallow land were the houses of a sitio where, Ba-ac said, his cousins lived. They had settled in this part of Sur some twenty years ago after one of them married a local girl.

  “Do we have to see them, Father?” Istak asked. “And what will we tell them? And how do we explain to them why we do not have with us our house posts?”

  “They are relatives, son,” Ba-ac said. “They will understand our silence. They may even help us with provisions that we do not have.”

  “Why don’t you go first by yourself, Father?” Istak suggested. “They know you—and then, when everything is clear, we can follow …”

  Bit-tik went with his father to the sitio while the men unhitched the bull carts and the women started to prepare the noonday meal.

  They would not venture into town, they would never go to places where there were people and, therefore, the Guardia and the priests. Not till they were far, far away from the Ilokos and all its encumbrances.

  Ba-ac and Bit-tik returned while they were about to eat a meal of catuday flowers, eggplants, and tomatoes scrounged from the marginal farms they had passed.

  “Blas and the others—they are all gone,” Ba-ac said softly. “The houses are there, but they are empty—all three of them. Not one chick, not one piglet left—they must have left within the last two days—there were still fresh ashes in the stoves, and there is no dust on the floors …”

  Could they have been ordered away, too? The thought hovered in Istak’s mind. Could they have left because they could no longer endure the harshness of living in the Ilokos?

  An-no, who had scouted the way farther ahead, returned in time for lunch. The way was clear and good, and there were no houses close by. Now it was Dalin’s turn to be the guide, to stay in the lead cart—it was she who knew the way, for Candon was the southernmost point that Istak had ever reached.

  By nightfall, they were crossing the Tagudin River, and though it was wide, a child could wade through the deepest part. The bull strained over stones. Across the bank, behind a screen of camachile trees, they stopped for the night. They would bathe again, do their washing, and in the morning they would be on their way. They slept well, except for the two men who stood guard quietly, ears alert to every sound; but there were no
ne which presaged danger—just the wind soughing in the grass, the grunt of animals, the stirring of dogs, the murmur of the river as it coursed through, and the distant crowing of cocks.

  In the morning, they were surprised to find that three carts had stopped nearby. Istak woke up to Ba-ac’s happy shouts: his cousins were in the carts, and to them he ran, waving his one good hand. It was years since he had seen them last, but memory holds on to images, to joys that were shared.

  Ba-ac’s cousins and their wives came to them soon after with their daughters and sons. They were going to the valley, they had left Candon forever, and like those who came from Po-on, they, too, had been ordered to leave their farms.

  Now there were ten carts. Istak had his doubts but he kept them to himself; he did not want to hurt his father, to suspect their distant relatives of some future perfidy. Did Ba-ac tell them everything? The reason why they were taking such a tortuous way to the new land? They would soon know, and they would then be afraid. If threatened by the Guardia, they would probably betray Ba-ac.

  In afterthought, he need not have worried. He should have simply relied on the Ilokano iron sense of loyalty to friend and family. Istak was particularly happy with his new uncle, Blas, who was a man of words. A big, bluff man, he had been and still was the poet capable of stringing the honeyed phrases that could waylay the most aloof of women. But he was unable to bend to his will a girl from Candon who had come to Po-on to visit. He had followed her to Candon some twenty years or so earlier and in the custom of those who were not favored by either the parents or the object of desire herself, he had served in her household, working the land as a farmhand with no pay at all, except for his meals. He slept below the granary, apart from the house and close to the work animals—for he was almost treated as one—and for a year ingratiated himself with the girl’s family, returning on occasion to Po-on to be the object of jokes from Ba-ac and all his relatives, why with his silver tongue he was not able to convince a simple girl to accept him after a few days.