In his paroxysm of grief the unfortunate father tore away the bandage, reopening a wound in his forehead from which gushed a stream of blood.
“I respect your sorrow,” said Elías, “and I understand your desire for revenge. I, too, am like you, and yet from fear of injuring the innocent I prefer to forget my misfortunes.”
“You can forget because you are young and because you haven’t lost a son, your last hope! But I assure you that I shall injure no innocent one. Do you see this wound? Rather than kill a poor cuadrillero, who was doing his duty, I let him inflict it.”
“But look,” urged Elías, after a moment’s silence, “look what a frightful catastrophe you are going to bring down upon our unfortunate people. If you accomplish your revenge by your own hand, your enemies will make terrible reprisals, not against you, not against those who are armed, but against the peaceful, who as usual will be accused—and then the cases of injustice!”
“Let the people learn to defend themselves, let each one defend himself!”
“You know that that is impossible. Sir, I knew you in other days when you were happy; then you gave me good advice, will you now permit me—”
The old man folded his arms in an attitude of attention.
“Sir,” continued Elías, weighing his words well, “I have had the good fortune to render a service to a young man who is rich, generous, noble, and who desires the welfare of his country. They say that this young man has friends in Madrid—I don’t know myself—but I can assure you that he is a friend of the Captain-General’s. What do you say that we make him the bearer of the people’s complaints, if we interest him in the cause of the unhappy?”
The old man shook his head. “You say that he is rich? The rich think only of increasing their wealth, pride and show blind them, and as they are generally safe, above all when they have powerful friends, none of them troubles himself about the woes of the unfortunate. I know all, because I was rich!”
“But the man of whom I speak is not like the others. He is a son who has been insulted over the memory of his father, and a young man who, as he is soon to have a family, thinks of the future, of a happy future for his children.”
“Then he is a man who is going to be happy—our cause is not for happy men.”
“But it is for men who have feelings!”
“Perhaps!” replied the old man, seating himself. “Suppose that he agrees to carry our cry even to the Captain-General, suppose that he finds in the Cortes126 delegates who will plead for us; do you think that we shall get justice?”
“Let us try it before we resort to violent measure,” answered Elías. “You must be surprised that I, another unfortunate, young and strong, should propose to you, old and weak, peaceful measures, but it’s because I’ve seen as much misery caused by us as by the tyrants. The defenseless are the ones who pay.”
“And if we accomplish nothing?”
“Something we shall accomplish, believe me, for all those who are in power are not unjust. But if we accomplish nothing, if they disregard our entreaties, if man has become deaf to the cry of sorrow from his kind, then I will put myself under your orders!”
The old man embraced the youth enthusiastically. “I accept your proposition, Elías. I know that you will keep your word. You will come to me, and I shall help you to revenge your ancestors, you will help me to revenge my sons, my sons that were like you!”
“In the meantime, sir, you will refrain from violent measures?”
“You will present the complaints of the people, you know them. When shall I know your answer?”
“In four days send a man to the beach at San Diego and I will tell him what I shall have learned from the person in whom I place so much hope. If he accepts, they will give us justice; and if not, I’ll be the first to fall in the struggle that we will begin.”
“Elías will not die, Elías will be the leader when Capitan Pablo fails, satisfied in his revenge,” concluded the old man, as he accompanied the youth out of the cave into the open air.
XLVI
The Cockpit
To keep holy the afternoon of the Sabbath one generally goes to the cockpit in the Philippines, just as to the bullfights in Spain. Cockfighting, a passion introduced into the country and exploited for a century past, is one of the vices of the people, more widely spread than opium-smoking among the Chinese. There the poor man goes to risk all that he has, desirous of getting rich without work. There the rich man goes to amuse himself, using the money that remains to him from his feasts and his masses of thanksgiving. The fortune that he gambles is his own, the cock is raised with much more care perhaps than his son and successor in the cockpit, so we have nothing to say against it. Since the government permits it and even in a way recommends it, by providing that the spectacle may take place only in the public plazas, on holidays (in order that all may see it and be encouraged by the example?), from the high mass until nightfall (eight hours), let us proceed thither to seek out some of our acquaintances.
The cockpit of San Diego does not differ from those to be found in other towns, except in some details. It consists of three parts, the first of which, the entrance, is a large rectangle some twenty meters long
