María Clara divined that there must be some misfortune there, and full of interest she asked concerning the strange creature.
“He’s a leper,” Iday told her. “Four years ago he contracted the disease, some say from taking care of his mother, others from lying in a damp prison. He lives in the fields near the Chinese cemetery, having intercourse with no one, because all flee from him for fear of contagion. If you might only see his home! It’s a tumbledown shack, through which the wind and rain pass like a needle through cloth. He has been forbidden to touch anything belonging to the people. One day when a little child fell into a shallow ditch as he was passing, he helped to get it out. The child’s father complained to the gobernadorcillo, who ordered that the leper be flogged through the streets and that the rattan be burned afterwards. It was horrible! The leper fled with his flogger in pursuit, while the gobernadorcillo cried, ‘Catch him! Better be drowned than get the disease you have!’ ”
“Can it be true!” murmured María Clara, then, without saying what she was about to do, went up to the wretch’s basket and dropped into it the locket her father had given her.
“What have you done?” her friends asked.
“I hadn’t anything else,” she answered, trying to conceal her tears with a smile.
“What is he going to do with your locket?” Victoria asked her. “One day they gave him some money, but he pushed it away with a stick; why should he want it when no one accepts anything that comes from him? As if the locket could be eaten!”
María Clara gazed enviously at the women who were selling foodstuffs and shrugged her shoulders. The leper approached the basket, picked up the jeweled locket, which glittered in his hands, then fell upon his knees, kissed it, and taking off his salakot buried his forehead in the dust where the maiden had stepped. María Clara hid her face behind her fan and raised her handkerchief to her eyes.
Meanwhile, a poor woman had approached the leper, who seemed to be praying. Her long hair was loose and unkempt, and in the light of the torches could be recognized the extremely emaciated features of the crazy Sisa. Feeling the touch of her hand, the leper jumped up with a cry, but to the horror of the onlookers Sisa caught him by the arm and said:
“Let us pray, let us pray! Today is All Souls’ day! Those lights are the souls of men! Let us pray for my sons!”
“Separate them! Separate them! The madwoman will get the disease!” cried the crowd, but no one dared to go near them.
“Do you see that light in the tower? That is my son Basilio sliding down a rope! Do you see that light in the convento? That is my son Crispín! But I’m not going to see them because the curate is sick and had many gold pieces and the gold pieces are lost! Pray, let us pray for the soul of the curate! I took him the finest fruits, for my garden was full of flowers and I had two sons! I had a garden, I used to take care of my flowers, and I had two sons!”
Then releasing her hold of the leper, she ran away singing, “I had a garden and flowers, I had two sons, a garden, and flowers!”
“What have you been able to do for that poor woman?” María Clara asked Ibarra.
“Nothing! Lately she has been missing from the town and wasn’t to be found,” answered the youth, rather confusedly. “Besides, I have been very busy. But don’t let it trouble you. The curate has promised to help me, but advised that I proceed with great tact and caution, for the Civil Guard seems to be mixed up in it. The curate is greatly interested in her case.”
“Didn’t the alferez say that he would have search made for her sons?”
“Yes, but at the time he was somewhat—drunk.” Scarcely had he said this when they saw the crazy woman being led, or rather dragged along, by a soldier. Sisa was offering resistance.
“Why are you arresting her? What has she done?” asked Ibarra.
“Why, haven’t you seen how she’s been raising a disturbance?” was the reply of the guardian of the public peace.
The leper caught up his basket hurriedly and ran away.
María Clara wanted to go home, as she had lost all her mirth and good humor. “So there are people who are not happy,” she murmured. Arriving at her door, she felt her sadness increase when her fiancé declined to go in, excusing himself on the plea of necessity. María Clara went upstairs thinking what a bore are the fiesta days, when strangers make their visits.
XXVIII
Correspondence
Cada uno habla de la feria como le va en ella.82
As nothing of importance to our characters happened during the first two days, we should gladly pass on to the third and last, were it not that perhaps some foreign reader may wish to know how the Filipinos celebrate their fiestas. For this reason we shall faithfully reproduce in this chapter several letters, one of them being that of the correspondent of a noted Manila newspaper, respected for its grave tone and deep seriousness. Our readers will correct some natural and trifling slips of the pen. Thus the worthy correspondent of the respectable newspaper wrote:
“To the editor, my distinguished friend—Never did I witness, nor had I ever expected to see in the provinces, a religious fiesta
