Noli me tángere. English

by José Rizal

  CHAPTER IV

  Heretic and Filibuster

  Ibarra stood undecided for a moment. The night breeze, which duringthose months blows cool enough in Manila, seemed to drive from hisforehead the light cloud that had darkened it. He took off his hat anddrew a deep breath. Carriages flashed by, public rigs moved along at asleepy pace, pedestrians of many nationalities were passing. He walkedalong at that irregular pace which indicates thoughtful abstractionor freedom from care, directing his steps toward Binondo Plaza andlooking about him as if to recall the place. There were the samestreets and the identical houses with their white and blue walls,whitewashed, or frescoed in bad imitation of granite; the churchcontinued to show its illuminated clock face; there were the sameChinese shops with their soiled curtains and their iron gratings, inone of which was a bar that he, in imitation of the street urchins ofManila, had twisted one night; it was still unstraightened. "How slowlyeverything moves," he murmured as he turned into Calle Sacristia. Theice-cream venders were repeating the same shrill cry, "_Sorbeteee!_"while the smoky lamps still lighted the identical Chinese stands andthose of the old women who sold candy and fruit.

  "Wonderful!" he exclaimed. "There's the same Chinese who was hereseven years ago, and that old woman--the very same! It might be saidthat tonight I've dreamed of a seven years' journey in Europe. Goodheavens, that pavement is still in the same unrepaired conditionas when I left!" True it was that the stones of the sidewalk on thecorner of San Jacinto and Sacristia were still loose.

  While he was meditating upon this marvel of the city's stability ina country where everything is so unstable, a hand was placed lightlyon his shoulder. He raised his head to see the old lieutenant gazingat him with something like a smile in place of the hard expressionand the frown which usually characterized him.

  "Young man, be careful! Learn from your father!" was the abruptgreeting of the old soldier.

  "Pardon me, but you seem to have thought a great deal of my father. Canyou tell me how he died?" asked Ibarra, staring at him.

  "What! Don't you know about it?" asked the officer.

  "I asked Don Santiago about it, but he wouldn't promise to tell meuntil tomorrow. Perhaps you know?"

  "I should say I do, as does everybody else. He died in prison!"

  The young man stepped backward a pace and gazed searchingly at thelieutenant. "In prison? Who died in prison?"

  "Your father, man, since he was in confinement," was the somewhatsurprised answer.

  "My father--in prison--confined in a prison? What are you talkingabout? Do you know who my father was? Are you--?" demanded the youngman, seizing the officer's arm.

  "I rather think that I'm not mistaken. He was Don Rafael Ibarra."

  "Yes, Don Rafael Ibarra," echoed the youth weakly.

  "Well, I thought you knew about it," muttered the soldier in atone of compassion as he saw what was passing in Ibarra's mind. "Isupposed that you--but be brave! Here one cannot be honest and keepout of jail."

  "I must believe that you are not joking with me," replied Ibarra ina weak voice, after a few moments' silence. "Can you tell me why hewas in prison?"

  The old man seemed to be perplexed. "It's strange to me that yourfamily affairs were not made known to you."

  "His last letter, a year ago, said that I should not be uneasy ifhe did not write, as he was very busy. He charged me to continue mystudies and--sent me his blessing."

  "Then he wrote that letter to you just before he died. It will soonbe a year since we buried him."

  "But why was my father a prisoner?"

  "For a very honorable reason. But come with me to the barracks andI'll tell you as we go along. Take my arm."

  They moved along for some time in silence. The elder seemed to be indeep thought and to be seeking inspiration from his goatee, which hestroked continually.

  "As you well know," he began, "your father was the richest man inthe province, and while many loved and respected him, there werealso some who envied and hated him. We Spaniards who come to thePhilippines are unfortunately not all we ought to be. I say this asmuch on account of one of your ancestors as on account of your father'senemies. The continual changes, the corruption in the higher circles,the favoritism, the low cost and the shortness of the journey, are toblame for it all. The worst characters of the Peninsula come here,and even if a good man does come, the country soon ruins him. So itwas that your father had a number of enemies among the curates andother Spaniards."

  Here he hesitated for a while. "Some months after your departure thetroubles with Padre Damaso began, but I am unable to explain the realcause of them. Fray Damaso accused him of not coming to confession,although he had not done so formerly and they had nevertheless beengood friends, as you may still remember. Moreover, Don Rafael was avery upright man, more so than many of those who regularly attendconfession and than the confessors themselves. He had framed forhimself a rigid morality and often said to me, when he talked ofthese troubles, 'Senor Guevara, do you believe that God will pardonany crime, a murder for instance, solely by a man's telling it to apriest--a man after all and one whose duty it is to keep quiet aboutit--by his fearing that he will roast in hell as a penance--by beingcowardly and certainly shameless into the bargain? I have anotherconception of God,' he used to say, 'for in my opinion one evil doesnot correct another, nor is a crime to be expiated by vain lamentingsor by giving alms to the Church. Take this example: if I have killedthe father of a family, if I have made of a woman a sorrowing widowand destitute orphans of some happy children, have I satisfied eternalJustice by letting myself be hanged, or by entrusting my secret to onewho is obliged to guard it for me, or by giving alms to priests whoare least in need of them, or by buying indulgences and lamentingnight and day? What of the widow and the orphans? My consciencetells me that I should try to take the place of him whom I killed,that I should dedicate my whole life to the welfare of the familywhose misfortunes I caused. But even so, who can replace the love ofa husband and a father?' Thus your father reasoned and by this strictstandard of conduct regulated all his actions, so that it can be saidthat he never injured anybody. On the contrary, he endeavored by hisgood deeds to wipe out some injustices which he said your ancestorshad committed. But to get back to his troubles with the curate--thesetook on a serious aspect. Padre Damaso denounced him from the pulpit,and that he did not expressly name him was a miracle, since anythingmight have been expected of such a character. I foresaw that sooneror later the affair would have serious results."

  Again the old lieutenant paused. "There happened to be wandering aboutthe province an ex-artilleryman who has been discharged from the armyon account of his stupidity and ignorance. As the man had to live andhe was not permitted to engage in manual labor, which would injureour prestige, he somehow or other obtained a position as collector ofthe tax on vehicles. The poor devil had no education at all, a fact ofwhich the natives soon became aware, as it was a marvel for them to seea Spaniard who didn't know how to read and write. Every one ridiculedhim and the payment of the tax was the occasion of broad smiles. Heknew that he was an object of ridicule and this tended to sour hisdisposition even more, rough and bad as it had formerly been. Theywould purposely hand him the papers upside down to see his effortsto read them, and wherever he found a blank space he would scribblea lot of pothooks which rather fitly passed for his signature. Thenatives mocked while they paid him. He swallowed his pride and madethe collections, but was in such a state of mind that he had no respectfor any one. He even came to have some hard words with your father.

  "One day it happened that he was in a shop turning a document over andover in the effort to get it straight when a schoolboy began to makesigns to his companions and to point laughingly at the collector withhis finger. The fellow heard the laughter and saw the joke reflectedin the solemn faces of the bystanders. He lost his patience and,turning quickly, started to chase the boys, who ran away shouting _ba,be, bi, bo, bu_. [30] Blind with rage and unable to catch them, hethrew his cane and s
truck one of the boys on the head, knocking himdown. He ran up and began to kick the fallen boy, and none of thosewho had been laughing had the courage to interfere. Unfortunately,your father happened to come along just at that time. He ran forwardindignantly, caught the collector by the arm, and reprimanded himseverely. The artilleryman, who was no doubt beside himself with rage,raised his hand, but your father was too quick for him, and with thestrength of a descendant of the Basques--some say that he struck him,others that he merely pushed him, but at any rate the man staggeredand fell a little way off, striking his head against a stone. DonRafael quietly picked the wounded boy up and carried him to the townhall. The artilleryman bled freely from the mouth and died a fewmoments later without recovering consciousness.

  "As was to be expected, the authorities intervened and arrestedyour father. All his hidden enemies at once rose up and falseaccusations came from all sides. He was accused of being a hereticand a filibuster. To be a heretic is a great danger anywhere,but especially so at that time when the province was governed by analcalde who made a great show of his piety, who with his servants usedto recite his rosary in the church in a loud voice, perhaps that allmight hear and pray with him. But to be a filibuster is worse thanto be a heretic and to kill three or four tax-collectors who knowhow to read, write, and attend to business. Every one abandoned him,and his books and papers were seized. He was accused of subscribing to_El Correo de Ultramar_, and to newspapers from Madrid, of having sentyou to Germany, of having in his possession letters and a photographof a priest who had been legally executed, and I don't know whatnot. Everything served as an accusation, even the fact that he, adescendant of Peninsulars, wore a camisa. Had it been any one butyour father, it is likely that he would soon have been set free,as there was a physician who ascribed the death of the unfortunatecollector to a hemorrhage. But his wealth, his confidence in the law,and his hatred of everything that was not legal and just, wrought hisundoing. In spite of my repugnance to asking for mercy from any one,I applied personally to the Captain-General--the predecessor of ourpresent one--and urged upon him that there could not be anything ofthe filibuster about a man who took up with all the Spaniards, eventhe poor emigrants, and gave them food and shelter, and in whoseveins yet flowed the generous blood of Spain. It was in vain thatI pledged my life and swore by my poverty and my military honor. Isucceeded only in being coldly listened to and roughly sent away withthe epithet of _chiflado_." [31]

  The old man paused to take a deep breath, and after noticing thesilence of his companion, who was listening with averted face,continued: "At your father's request I prepared the defense in thecase. I went first to the celebrated Filipino lawyer, young A----,but he refused to take the case. 'I should lose it,' he told me,'and my defending him would furnish the motive for another chargeagainst him and perhaps one against me. Go to Senor M----, who is aforceful and fluent speaker and a Peninsular of great influence.' Idid so, and the noted lawyer took charge of the case, and conducted itwith mastery and brilliance. But your father's enemies were numerous,some of them hidden and unknown. False witnesses abounded, and theircalumnies, which under other circumstances would have melted awaybefore a sarcastic phrase from the defense, here assumed shape andsubstance. If the lawyer succeeded in destroying the force of theirtestimony by making them contradict each other and even perjurethemselves, new charges were at once preferred. They accused him ofhaving illegally taken possession of a great deal of land and demandeddamages. They said that he maintained relations with the tulisanes inorder that his crops and animals might not be molested by them. Atlast the case became so confused that at the end of a year no oneunderstood it. The alcalde had to leave and there came in his placeone who had the reputation of being honest, but unfortunately he stayedonly a few months, and his successor was too fond of good horses.

  "The sufferings, the worries, the hard life in the prison, or the painof seeing so much ingratitude, broke your father's iron constitutionand he fell ill with that malady which only the tomb can cure. Whenthe case was almost finished and he was about to be acquitted of thecharge of being an enemy of the fatherland and of being the murdererof the tax-collector, he died in the prison with no one at his side. Iarrived just in time to see him breathe his last."

  The old lieutenant became silent, but still Ibarra said nothing. Theyhad arrived meanwhile at the door of the barracks, so the soldierstopped and said, as he grasped the youth's hand, "Young man, fordetails ask Capitan Tiago. Now, good night, as I must return to dutyand see that all's well."

  Silently, but with great feeling, Ibarra shook the lieutenant's bonyhand and followed him with his eyes until he disappeared. Then heturned slowly and signaled to a passing carriage. "To Lala's Hotel,"was the direction he gave in a scarcely audible voice.

  "This fellow must have just got out of jail," thought the cochero ashe whipped up his horses.