Plácido was proceeding along the Paseo de Magallanes toward the breach—formerly the gate—of Santo Domingo, when he suddenly felt a slap on the shoulder, which made him turn quickly in ill humor.
“Hello, Penitente! Hello, Penitente!”
It was his schoolmate Juanito Pelaez, the barbero or pet of the professors, as big a rascal as he could be, with a roguish look and a clownish smile. The son of a Spanish mestizo—a rich merchant in one of the suburbs, who based all his hopes and joys on the boy’s talent—he promised well with his roguery, and, thanks to his custom of playing tricks on everyone and then hiding behind his companions, he had acquired a peculiar hump, which grew larger whenever he was laughing over his deviltry.
“What kind of time did you have, Penitente?” was his question as he again slapped him on the shoulder.
“So, so,” answered Plácido, rather bored. “And you?”
“Well, it was great! Just imagine—the curate of Tiani invited me to spend the vacation in his town, and I went. Old man, you know Padre Camorra, I suppose? Well, he’s a liberal curate, very jolly, frank, very frank, one of those like Padre Paco. As there were pretty girls, we serenaded them all, he with his guitar and songs and I with my violin. I tell you, old man, we had a great time—there wasn’t a house we didn’t try!”
He whispered a few words in Plácido’s ear and then broke out into laughter. As the latter exhibited some surprise, he resumed: “I’ll swear to it! They can’t help themselves, because with a governmental order you get rid of the father, husband, or brother, and then—merry Christmas! However, we did run up against a little fool, the sweetheart, I believe, of Basilio, you know? Look, what a fool this Basilio is! To have a sweetheart who doesn’t know a word of Spanish, who hasn’t any money, and who has been a servant! She’s as shy as she can be, but pretty. Padre Camorra one night started to club two fellows who were serenading her and I don’t know how it was he didn’t kill them, yet with all that she was just as shy as ever. But it’ll result for her as it does with all the women, all of them!”
Juanito Pelaez laughed with a full mouth, as though he thought this a glorious thing, while Plácido stared at him in disgust.
“Listen, what did the professor explain yesterday?” asked Juanito, changing the conversation.
“Yesterday there was no class.”
“Oho, and the day before yesterday?”
“Man, it was Thursday!”
“Right! What an ass I am! Don’t you know, Plácido, that I’m getting to be a regular ass? What about Wednesday?”
“Wednesday? Wait—Wednesday, it was a little wet.”
“Fine! What about Tuesday, old man?”
“Tuesday was the professor’s nameday and we went to entertain him with an orchestra, present him flowers and some gifts.”
“Ah, carambas!” exclaimed Juanito, “that I should have forgotten about it! What an ass I am! Listen, did he ask for me?”
Penitente shrugged his shoulders. “I don’t know, but they gave him a list of his entertainers.”
“Carambas! Listen—Monday, what happened?”
“As it was the first school-day, he called the roll and assigned the lesson—about mirrors. Look, from here to here, by memory, word for word. We jump all this section, we take that.” He was pointing out with his finger in the “Physics” the portions that were to be learned, when suddenly the book flew through the air, as a result of the slap Juanito gave it from below.
“Thunder, let the lessons go! Let’s have a dia pichido!”
The students in Manila call dia pichido a school-day that falls between two holidays and is consequently suppressed, as though forced out by their wish.
“Do you know that you really are an ass?” exclaimed Plácido, picking up his book and papers.
“Let’s have a dia pichido!” repeated Juanito.
Plácido was unwilling, since for only two the authorities were hardly going to suspend a class of more than a hundred and fifty. He recalled the struggles and privations his mother was suffering in order to keep him in Manila, while she went without even the necessities of life.
They were just passing through the breach of Santo Domingo, and Juanito, gazing across the little plaza25 in front of the old Customs building, exclaimed, “Now I think of it, I’m appointed to take up the collection.”
“What collection?”
“For the monument.”
“What monument?”
“Get out! For Padre Balthazar, you know.”
“And who was Padre Balthazar?”
“Fool! A Dominican, of course—that’s why the padres call on the students. Come on now, loosen up with three or four pesos, so that they may see we are sports. Don’t let them say afterwards that in order to erect a statue they had to dig down into their own pockets. Do, Plácido, it’s not money thrown away.”
He accompanied these words with a significant wink. Plácido recalled the case of a student who had passed through the
