ENGL 235: Introduction to Philippine Literature -- a compilation of short stories written by Filipino authors

1. Central Luzon State University
Science City of Muñoz, Nueva Ecija
ENG 235: Introduction to Philippine Literature
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Andrea May C. Malonzo
1st Semester 2012-2013

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WAYWAYA –------------------------------------------------------------------------- pg 3
THE WEEDING DANCE –----------------------------------------------------------- pg 15
DEAD STARS –----------------------------------------------------------------------- pg 21
SMALL KEY -–------------------------------------------------------------------------- pg 35
ZITA -–--------------------------------------------------------------------------------- pg 39
FOOTNOTE TO YOUTH -–---------------------------------------------------------- pg 47
MIDSUMMER -–------------------------------------------------------------------ --- pg 51
HOW MY BROTHER LEON BROUGHT HOME A WIFE –--------------------- pg 55
MAGNIFICENCE -–------------------------------------------------------------------ pg 61
MAY DAY EVE -–-------------------------------------------------------------------- pg 65
THE SUMMER SOLSTICE -–------------------------------------------------------ pg 70
THE DAY THE DANCERS CAME -–---------------------------------------------- pg 81

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Author: F. Sionil José or in full Francisco Sionil José (born December 3, 1924) is one of the most widely
read Filipino writers in the English language. His novels and short stories depict the social
underpinnings of class struggles and colonialism in Filipino society. José's works - written in English -
have been translated into 22 languages, including Korean, Indonesian, Russian, Latvian, Ukrainian and
Dutch.
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he first time Dayaw crossed the river, he felt fulfilled, as if he had finally passed the
greatest test of all. It was so unlike that leap over the flaming pit the feat of strength that
would have assured his father, the Ulo, that he was no weakling, that in spite of his seeming indolence
and love of poetry and singing, he was capable nonetheless of courage as were the bravest warriors
of Daya. All his life he had been cooped up like the pigs his mother fattened in the pit before they were
taken out for the feasts. Daya, after all, was hemmed in to the east by the sea, vast and mysterious,
and to the west, this mighty river, for beyond it was forest and mountain, land of the Laga Laud, the
ancient and indomitable enemy of his people.
He had made the crossing at night after he had blackened his face and bodywith soot, carrying
with him nothing but a coil of maguey twine and his long knife, he had dashed from the cover of reeds
near the river's bank, for while Apo Bufan showed the way, it would also reveal him to whoever
watched the river. Days afterwards, he tried to fathom the reasons for the deed, why he went alone,
and for what. For one the river was there, a barrier to knowledge of new things, new sights, and
perhaps a new life. He was, indeed, aglow with wanting to know; how many times he had mused,
gazing at the changing cloud patterns in the sky, the shapes of the waves as they broke and foamed
on the beach, the track of ants, the wheeling of birds they all seemed to follow a design that could not
know what lay beyond the river and the sea without crossing them.
Once, he climbed the lofty dalipawen at the edge of the communal farms and as if he was on
some promontory, he scanned the world around himthe shining sea in the east and beyond the green,
mangy top of the forest, far down the horizon to the west, the mountains, purplish green in the last
light of day. He envied those who lived there for they could see everything. Was it possible for them
to know everything as well? Wading across the river in the dry season was not difficult; there were
islands of reeds and upturned trees ragged down from the mountains with their catch of moss of
dried leaves, and clear pools where there would be silverfish and shells. This was how it felt then, to
ford this limit of what was safe. From the very beginning, it was dinned to him, and to all the young
Taga Daya to cross the river meant going to war.
The first time he came to this river was when he was thirteen and was with some twenty boys
of the same age; they had marched for one day and one night, in anxiety and fear, for they had no
warriors to protect them but this old, shriveled healer who made this journey every year. They had
been taught stealth and cunning, and once they entered the forest beyond the cultivated fields and
cogon wastes, it was possible for the enemy to be lurking there. They were not warriors they would
be hog-tied and brought to Laud as slaves. For a day, they walked without eating and by the morning
of the next day, when they finally reached the river, they were weak, hungry and ready to die. Only
the fear of capture kept them alive. There, on the sandy bank, behind the tall reeds that had flowered
with plumes of dazzling white, they lined up, squatting while the healer sharpened his knife and
prepared the strange mixture of tobacco and weeds with which he treated their wounds after he had
circumcised them.
T

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He was now on his third night and the relentless sense of danger that hounded him was no
longer as keen as it had been on the first, particularly when a dog had howled and a man had come
out with a lighted pine splinter and a spear, wondering perhaps what lizard was out there after his
chickens. He had slithered into the recesses of the bush and returned afterwards. He knew the town
by then, and in the waning moonlight, he stole away from it, detoured through terraces in the
mountains, then down to the forest of scrub and cogon, making a new way each time. It was still dark
when he reached the river. He had already satisfied most of his curiosities, heard their songs, their
conversations. He had looked at their handiwork, their fields of sweet potato and rice, and marveled
at the quality of their crafts. He returned to the cove which was actually a small turn of the river that
was hidden by a wall of low branches. Within it was a pool that was fed by a spring and beyond the
spring, up a sandy bar, was a sprout of cogon behind which he had slept the night before. He had
taken care that there was no trace of him in the sand so that when he went to the spring to drink, he
had wiped out his tracks carefully.
Now he went to sleep, and once rested, he would merely race across the river to the sanctuary
of his own land. It was long past morning when he woke up, alive to the twitter of birds, the jabber of
monkeys, the scent of moss and green living things. He lay on his back motion less for some time,
gazing at the cloud-flecked sky. It was then that a rustling to his right jarred him from his reverie; he
keened to the footfalls on the grass and dried leaves. Whoever was approaching was not trying to
hide his presence. Then he burst into view, a girl lovely as morning and just as fair, her hair knotted
to the left above her ear. A fine, blue tattoo of flower designs ran in a thin line down her arms to her
wrists. She knelt down before the rim of the pool and gazed at her reflection there, then stood up,
untied the knot of her blue sack dress on her shoulder and let it slip down to her feet. She stood naked
and true and beautiful, her face upraised to such a bit of sun, her breasts and nipples touched with
pink. Her stomach was flat and below the patch of pubic hair, her legs were supple well shaped; she
stooped and untied the thongs of her leather sandals then she walked nimbly into the water,
shivering at first as she tested it with her toe. Then she plunged and splashed about. She dived to the
shallow depths an in the clear water, he could follow her lissome figure turning, then surfacing to
float on her back, so that her breasts were shiny with water and sun.
Dayaw watched, keeping cats keen; he wanted to know if she had companions but he could
hear only the rustle of the wind in the trees, the gurgling of the river as it coursed through boulders
and shallows. He had stashed across the river an iron plowshare, a piece of newly woven cloth, a
quiver iron tipped arrows. Now, he would also bring home a slave—healthy, young and good to look
at. With her sandals, her bangles of gold, she was no simple peasant; she must come from the upper
class of Laud. His agile mind quickly devised a way by which he could capture her with her least
resistance and trouble. It seemed that she would swim forever but finally, she made for her clothes.
By then, Dayaw had crouched closer to her things and as she stooped to gather them, he rushed out
and pinned her arms, clamping a band over her mouth. That was a mistake for she bit his hand; the
pain was sharp and his response was immediate. He spun her around and struck her in the jaw. There
was this dumb, surprised look on her face as she staggered backwards and fell. Dayaw bound her
hands and feet, and gagged her mouth. He gathered her clothes, her sandals, then erased the signs of
struggle on the sand. And heaving her on his shoulders, he headed for the river.
It did not matter very much that he would cross now in the daylight; if they pursued him, he
could easily outrace them, and once he was in the sanctuary of his forest, it was a brave man who
would follow him. Once or twice, while he was knee-deep in the water, he turned to look, and again
when he was finally across, no one had seen him. Once across, he laid her on the grass, still naked,
while he went back to the water to wash the soot of three days from his face and body. When he
returned, she had revived and she cringed at his approach. “You are heavy!” Dayaw said, smiling.

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“And look at my hand—you little wildcat!” He waved his right hand which had begun to swell, her
teeth marks deeply imprinted still below the thumb. She made angry protesting sounds, shaking her
head. She tried to rise but when she realized it was useless to struggle, she did not move anymore.
In the sunlight, looking closer at her, she seemed fairer and prettier than when he first saw
her. That was what the Taga Laud women were noted for, unlike the women of Daya, who had darker
skin. “You are good for the eyes,” Dayaw said, moving closer and tweaking her nipples. She glared at
him but did not move and very soon the nipples hardened. Pleased with himself, Dayaw smiled. “If
you promise not to make trouble,” he said with a laugh, “I will give you back your clothes.” She nodded
quickly. “We have a long way to go—a long day’s march, and I don’t want to carry you.” He helped
her to her feet and as she stood up, he realized that she was tiny, she did not even reach up to his
shoulder. He went beside her and ran a hand down the curve of her back to her buttocks. Then he
untied her hands and feet. Free at last, she stretched her arms and stamped her feet. She picked the
sack dress up and put it on. When she looked at him again, entreaty was in her eyes. “Yes, I will hit
you again,” he said, raising his fist, “if you cannot be tamed. And I don’t want to dothat.” Shortly before
midday, he found the water tubes, the dried meat and the cakes of brown sugar that he had hidden
under the trunk of the dead tree. He ate ravenously and when he was through, he gave her a little of
what was left. She was hungry, and thirsty, too, but she refused what he offered her. Dayaw shrugged,
“if you don’t want to eat, then march on an empty stomach.” By nightfall, she still had not spoken a
word. Her jaw had begun to swell and he wondered if he had hit her so hard that her tongue had been
cut. In the dimming light, he held her face. She winced. “Open your mouth,” he said, but she refused.
He glared at her and raised his fist. Slowly, she opened her mouth. No, her tongue was not cut and
her breath was warm and sweet like a baby upon his face. He gazed at the sullen eyes, at the mouth,
the nose; yes, he really had a good-looking slave, perhaps better looking than anyof the young women
he know, even Liwliwa with whom he already spent many nights.
They reached the gulley where saplings grew and at this time of the year, the gulley was dry.
He told her to recline against a sapling. He tied her hands behind the young tree and then her feet. It
was not that he feared treachery; it was that she might run away and be captured by another Taga
Daya and he would then lose all claims to her. She seemed resigned and not once did he protest. The
dark came quickly. Fireflies emerged from the tall grass and winked at them. The stars were out;
would be some time before the rains came. He was tired but sleep was slow in coming. He turned on
his side. She was leaning against the tree, her legs raised. In the soft dark, he could see the outline of
her face in quiet repose. “What is your name?” She did not answer. “I am Dayaw,” he said, “the older
son of the Ulo. My younger brother, Parbangon, will be circumcised before the rains start. Do you
know any Laud songs?” No reply. “I like to sing. I make my own songs. Listen.” He quickly formed the
lines and gave a tune to them: “The river is deep But we can ford it. Who will make the bridge?
Perhaps love will do it. Perhaps time will prove it…” He paused, “do you like it?” The pensive face was
immobile, the eyes closed as if in thought. “You don’t like music,” he said, “you silly girl, going there
alone and so far away from home. What were you doing there by yourself, anyway?” he paused and
laughed, “well, you may just as well ask what was I doing there, too.” Silence again, the soughing of
the wind in the grass, crickets alive in the bushes. “It was Apo Langit that brought me there, that
brought you there. It was Apo Langit that made you my slave.” For an instant, he vanquished the
thought; he was not going to use the force, she should go to him because she wanted to the way
Liwliwa wanted him. And it was Liwliwa and her promise of welcome that was in his thoughts when
sleep finally claimed him.
In the morning, he was rudely wakened and when he opened his eyes, he realized that she
had kicked him, not in anger but because she was in pain. She had slipped, twisted her back and could
not rise. He stood up and looked at her wrists: they were swollen. He was determined to teach her

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obedience, to humble her, but the pain in her face touched him and he untied the twine that abound
her wrists. She quickly withdrew her hands from behind her. He untied her legs next and free at last.
She stood up and limped to the bushes down the gulley. He did not go after her---she was going to
urinate but when she did not return, he followed her. She was lying on her stomach on the grass and
crying silently. Then she turned to him. “Why don’t you kill me and let me suffer no more?” It was the
first time that she had spoken and he understood everything; but for the different intonation, she was
speaking in her own tongue. “You are in our own land now,” he said coldly “You are a captive, a slave
and you will be killed, of course if you try to run away. You know that. Your life is in your hands.”
Then abruptly, as a warrior would speak: “Let us go.” She stood up and followed him quickly. Before
noon, they reached the fringes of Daya, the well-groomed fields that were being prepared for the
seed. His first impulse was to do what was customary, to strip her, parade her through the town and
humiliate her. The swelling of her jaw was subsided and its place was a dark bruise. Her wrists had
bled when the twine was cut. But he did not undress her; he merely tied her wrist again, this time
loosely, and then marched her in town. Thinking about it later, he was to realize why he did not want
her naked. He had seen her in her glory; he covered her and did not want others to see her as he had
seen her then.
Out of their houses, where they were cooking the noon day meal, came the women, the
children, and the menfolk who were not working in the fields or at the beach. The children gathered
around her, fingering her dress, touching her bangles and jeering at her. Her head erect she looked
straight ahead as she walked but her eyes were frightened and once or twice she stumbled. “Dayaw
that is some trophy!” “Can she cook?” “Can she weave?” “Can she gyrate her hips?” “Is she juicy and
tight?” They shrieked and laughed and Dayaw laughed with them, acknowledging their greetings,
pleased that they knew where he had been, proud that they could see his slave and also the new
quiver, the piece of cloth slung on his shoulder and the plowshare under his arm. He let the day
lengthen though courtesy demanded that she should have gone straight to the Ulo, his father, or tell
him that he was back. He had not told anyone where he was going, not even Parbagon who often
came to his house to listen to his songs and his kutibeng.
Liwliwa came shortly after noon with a bowl of eggplants, and bitter melons cooked with
tomatoes, onions and dried fish, and a pot of rice. Her hair was glossy with coconut oil, and while he
reclined after they had eaten she kneaded his muscles with oil and stirred him; and while the slave
girl washed the pots outside, she closed the bamboo door and welcomed him in the way he had
expected it. When he woke up, Liwliwa had gone his slave was in the room, fanning with him a small
palm leaf. He showed her where she should sleep, a corner of the kitchen, among the fish traps and
cooking pots, and told her what her chores would be, from sunup to sundown. She listened intently.
Women passed and peeped, and children who had not seen her earlier shouted obscenities to her.
“Now, what should I call you?” he asked, as he made ready to visit the Ulo. “Waywaya,” she
said, bowing. He could see that she was crying again and he hated the sight of women in tears. At this
time of day, the Ulo would be in the community house, acting out his duties, dispensing advice and
help to those who needed it, allocating seed rice for the next planting season as well as new plots to
be cleared and new duties. Dayaw loved his father and had not meant to appear disobedient, but
through the years, his interest has veered; while theother youths would listen tothe talk of the elders,
he got bored and would go by himself to the forest or to the beach. He was no weakling, but while the
other youths practiced the arts of war and exercised for the great leap that would transform them
into men, he played with his kutibeng and took pleasure in composing new songs. When the great
feast came, he was not even anxious. They had lighted the wide pit and the hay and the logs there
were a roaring flame. They lined up the young men who would now be warriors, and one by one, they
leaped across the chasm of fire. They had practiced and he had not and when it was his turn, he

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started to panic for he now realized that the pit was wider than he thought it would be. He ran and
leaped just the same and barely made it to the other side; he had burned his foot - the stigma that his
father would bear - but he thought nothing of it. The final test, after all, was when the warrior crossed
the river. He had done that, been in Laud for three nights, and what did he learn? Were the warriors
of Laud all that skilled and ferocious? Were they out to destroy Daya and everything his father and
his people had built? This was what his father had told him and all Tag-Daya; he had heard this when
he was small, and again when he trained and he still heard it now that the Ulo had begun to age and
a few strands of white laced his mane. Still, he was the Ulo, the repository of wisdom and strength
until that time when someone braver, stronger and wiser would lead them to battle. The community
house came into view- a magnificent structure as tall as a bamboo, with a high-pitched roof that was
almost an arm’s length in thickness, so thick that it could last a hundred years! The flooring was solid
parunapin, taken from the forest and drawn across the gullies by water buffaloes. The bamboo on the
walls had been tempered in brine so that all the insects would not be able to attack it. The posts-
almost as fat as a man’s thigh, were the best sagat there was. And above the walls, just below the
eaves were the skulls of their enemies, impaled on rattan staves. He waited until everyone had gone,
then the Ulo beckoned to him. His dark, handsome face was shrouded in gloom.
“Do you know that had you not returned today, tomorrow we would have dispatched men to Laud to
look for you?”
“Forgive me, Father,” Dayaw said contritely.
“Well, how far did you go?”
“I crossed the river, Father.” He wanted to say more but he held back.
“And what else did you do?”
“I wanted to know the enemy. . . “
“That is a foolish thing to do, going there alone, with no one behind you. And this girl. . .”
Dayaw smiled. “She is wildcat but I can tame her. I will know more about Laud from her. But this I
already know – the Taga Laud – they are like us and I think they want peace.”
“So do we,” the Ulo said.
“But time has a momentum and we must be ready for war. Always. And you don’t prepare for war by
reciting poetry and going on an adventure by yourself. . .” Again, the sarcasm.
The Ulo did not hide it anymore, his frustration that his older son, bright with tunes and
words and wise in his own way – did not have any Feeling for combat, for politics, for the craft of
ruling. He was getting on in years and to whom would he pass this accumulated wisdom and
experience? Dayaw, his son, his blood, but he had been claimed by the talisman of forest and sea when
it was all before him, the opportunity to rule, to unite, conquer not just land but also the many regions
beyond Daya, the lands of Abagatan and Amianan.
When Dayaw was still young he had looked upon the Ulo with awe; it had pleased him to
know that his father was a leader, respected and loved, that it was he who led the warriors and had
given the taga Daya a sense of unity their best defense against their enemies which had eluded them
for years. With the years, however, he had also seen the panoply of power and of ceremony that had
consumed the Ulo, that for all his avowals of justice, he was not beyond the reach of fawning relatives
and panderers. He could not understand how in a year of drought his mother could still go down the
far reach of Amianan bringing with her a retinue of friends, honey and rice in two boatloads, and
return with nothing but beads and gushing talk about lavish feasts given by the rich and powerful
whom she had met. He could not understand how his mother’s brother continue in blessed idleness
while everyone worked, how his father could hand over grain from the communal granary to his
favorite warriors who had not even fought in Laud. There were times when the people grumbled and

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had less to eat but the Ulo had brought them peace, the right to work and live without the Taga Laud
descending from the mountain to badges their lives.
“The war must stop, Father,” he said quietly.
“And you took slave,” the Ulo hissed at him, “This means that they will seek revenge.”
His father was right and again, he was clobbered not by superior intelligence but by his own
impulsiveness. If he had only carefully thought out the consequences of the deed. And thinking about
it later, he recognized this magic compulsion about Waywaya that he could not exorcise. Again, it
came to him not as a flash of lightning but just as scaring, the knowledge that his perdition was in
himself. He went down the wooden stairs into the wide grassy yard once more; the urge to leave Daya
came. How often had he thought about it, but always he seemed rooted in the land. When the ships
of the Narrow Eyes docked at the stone pier which they had built from coral, he had often wondered
if they could take him so that the niggling doubts, the nagging sentiments would be banished forever.
However, after the Narrow Eye had loaded the tobacco and the rice in exchange for knives, plates and
beads, they would leave and he would not even tarry to ask that they take him.
It was dusk when he reached his house and from the distance he saw Parbangon idling at the
foot of the stairs strumming the kutibeng. His younger brother would probably be with him the whole
night, asking a host of questions, listening to his new songs. Waywaya kept house. Liwliwa sneered
at her and envied her for she was doing what she, herself, would have wanted to do had Dayaw but
asked her. She said Waywaya would not be able to last; her ways, her attitudes were different and all
because she was from Laud. The older women made the same remarks – she was alien to the ways of
Daya. But in time, all the pots in the kitchen were clean of soot, the firewood rack below the house
was neatly slacked and there was always husked grain in the bin. The grass roof was patched where
it had thinned and where the rattan twines on the floor had loosened, she had tightened it so that the
split bamboo was once more taut and secure. Waywaya asked if she could weave and Dayaw
retrieved one of the old looms his grandmother had left, and there was enough cotton too and
vegetable dye which she mixed in a way different from the women of Daya. She did not use the
patterns from where she came; she fashioned new ones, using the primary reds and blacks of the
Taga Daya and in time, she made trousers for Dayaw, for Parbangon and last of all, a dress for herself.
There were many nights that Dayaw did not sleep in his house, he loitered often in the communal
house for the unmarried, and when the weather was good, he would go to the beach or the fields with
Liwliwa. And when he returned in the morning, there was the usual plate of steaming rice, the bowl
of ginger broth which she had brewed, the perfunctory questions about how the night had been, if he
slept well, and inevitably, how Liwliwa was.
Once, he woke up in the night with a parched throat and he went to the water jar for a drink.
She was awake and sat up. In the dark, he went to her and for a moment he wanted to touch her.
There was no stopping him; she was his property, but he remembered the past impulsiveness that
had been his damnation and he withdrew, hissing to himself.
Lightning! Lightning! It was a good year; the rice grew tall. Apo Langit had been kind and the
harvest had been abundant. By the time the easterly winds began to blow, the fields had all been
gleaned, the bat wing ships of the Narrow Eyes were rounding the point again; they brought more
jars and plates, more bells and gongs. The slaves were even given new clothes, some were set free,
but they selected to remain to partake of Daya’s peace and prosperity. A good year, but not for
Waywaya. She had her first horrible bout with fever before the harvest and though Parbangon came
and prepared marunggay broth for her, the fever worsened. Dayaw made an offering to Apo Daga;
apprehensive and frightened, he placed the bowl of glutinous rice with hard boiled eggs in the corner

9. AMCM [9]
where she slept. The fever did not leave till a few days afterwards and she was still weak when she
got up to do her work. She was friendly; she smiled at all whom she met and to Dayaw’s people and
friends, she showed obeisance and respect. He was convinced, though she never admitted it, that her
bearing was noble, but why, why did she go tothe river? She told him afterwards that she was curious,
that she would have crossed the river, too, if only she was made to run swiftly like a deer, that she
had gone up the mountain often and looked at creation spread before her, the forest and the plain
and beyond, the river emptying into the sea.
He finally took her there on a night when the surf was rough, a night without stars. At first,
she was scared but he held her hand. Together they breasted the surf as it collapsed on them until
they got to where it was calm and the water was up to their shoulders when it heaved. He thought he
could soften her loneliness if he explained, although he did not have to. “It is what you remind my
people of, not what you are . . . .” he told her. In the soft dark, her eyes shone, the grateful smile. She
chose to be elusive “Don’t worry,” she said. “I can belong anywhere, I can even be across the sea
although I don’t know what is there . . . .” “But the greatest unknown, one that we can never get into,
is the mind of other people,” Dayaw said.
She was not meant to do all that work, to bear all those insults. She had become very thin and
one afternoon, in the month when the rains were to come again, Dayaw came upon her at her
weaving, the shuttle unmoving in her hands. Tears were rolling down her cheeks. Dayaw was
engulfed by the pity and compassion he had felt for her from the very start. In the morning, he
prepared long provisions for the long walk: dried meat, rice cooked in coconut milk, salt and sugar,
and the tubes of water. He told her to gather her things, nothing really but her old dress, the buffalo
skinned sandals that were almost frayed and the length of fabric that she had woven. They left Daya
before light broke upon the land and late the following day, they finally reached the river. All through
the night, he had been quiet and now, looking at her moving quietly, a great sadness filled him. He
was taking her back and he wanted to go as far as it was possible, to cross the river with her, so he
waited for darkness, until the stars swarmed out of the sky. Once, she slipped over a mossy boulder
and he reached out to steady her and her grasp firm and warm.
They reached the curve at the other side, and as he had planned, headed for the cove where
he had found her. After they had eaten the cold rice and the dried meet and drank from the pool, she
laid on the sand the piece of cloth she had woven and they lay down. He slept easily, and at the first
sliver of light, he woke up to find that she was still beside him. He watched her, the slow rise of her
breast, her parted lips, and her closed eyes. Then she stirred. “I had expected you to leave in the
night,” he said. “Well, you know why we are here. I have caused you harm and sorrow. Also, I did not
do right from the beginning, I know that now.” He rose, unsheathed the knife at his side and handed
it to her without ceremony. “You can have your revenge now,” he said simply. Her eyes widened in
amazement, in wonder. She fell on her knees, hugged his legs then kissed his feet, “Dayaw, I belong
to you,” she murmured. That was how it really began.
Back in Daya, in the mornings when dew was still glistening on the grass and cooking fires
still sent grey smoke trailing, above the houses, he would rise to find that she already had food for
him. She would hover silently around, waiting for his every whim to express itself. The first time was
a revelation; she had gone with him to gather firewood in the communal forest beyond the fields; it
was to be their fuel for many rainy season and she had balanced a heavy load on her head and his
own load was a pole slung over his shoulder. The day was warm and beads of sweat were on her nape
like pearls. They were about to break through into the clearing and he was tired so he brought his
load down and helped her to bring her bundle down, too. She was close to him and could smell her
warm body, her hair. He drew her to the shadow of agreat tree; she met his gaze without fear, without

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pretense. It was as if she had expected this moment, too, and with one deft pull at the knot on her
shoulder, she let her dress drop so that she stood before him as he had seen her for the first time,
only now there was no anxiety, no fear in her eyes. She was not as experienced as Liwliwa and there
was this unspoken demand that he teach her, but for the moment he knew only his need, the fire that
must be quenched and when it was, he lay on his back, his breathing quiet and slow. The sun filtered
through the leaves above them. She lay beside him, unmoving, while his hand stroked her smooth,
flat belly. “I hope I did not hurt you,” he said afterwards. “I will be better next time,” she said “I am
sorry I don’t know too well how to please you. And no one but you will teach me.”
She still slept in the kitchen except on those nights when he called her in, but after two
months, when she was finally sure, Dayaw forbade her to sleep there for always. That morning, before
the men went to the fields or put out to sea, he put on the robe that she had woven and she slipped
into her old Laud dress, and on her head a garland of kalachuchi that Parbangon had made. Then they
went down the steps, bright with happiness. Parbangon walked ahead of them, blowing on the buffalo
horn, the shrill blasts echoing in the morning quiet. They walked hand in hand, first, to the farthest
end of town, close to the sea, and the people peered out of their windows or paused in their yards to
watch them. The young men smiled, but none of the girls greeted them. Liwliwa had done her words
more than that, she had cursed them. Their march around the town ended in his father’s house beside
the community hall. They passed at the bottom of the flight while Parbangon blew at the horn again
and again. The Ulo came out, his face glum and with a wave of his hand, he forbade his younger son
to continue the bleating.
To Dayaw, he said with a slow shake of his venerable head: “Now” more in sadness than in
anger “Dayaw, you will never be Ulo” “But I will be happy, Father,” Dayaw said, looking straight at his
father. Within the house, his mother was waiting; she shared her husband’s sorrow and she must
have wondered what terrible deed of hers had displeased Apo Langit. And that evening when
Waywaya came with her offering of rice and coconut milk, Pintas accepted both, but in the presence
of her daughter-in-law, she emptied the pots into the pit where her pigs were. Hate --- this was the
strongest and rawest of feelings that bound people together and it was hate, Dayaw knew, that made
the Taga Daya regard Waywaya and now, himself, with derision. And how did this feeling start? How
did it take root? It was in the fears and insecurities of his own people and it was the Ulo – his father
who knew how to use hate. It was he, his family and his family’s relatives and friends who benefited
from the largesse that hatred created. Indeed, without hate and fear, the Ulo would not have been
able to shape Dayaw into the fortress that it had become. But at what cost? Knowing this, Dayaw often
wondered how it would be if he fled to the deeper forest. Such a flight was a wish that he sometimes
played in his mind, imagined himself starting out, clearing the land with his bare hands, planting the
crops on a patch that the wilderness would constantly encroach upon. The labor would be severe and
the vigil constant. How to watch over the field, protect it from wild pigs, marauding deer and rats --
and no fence would really keep away the wild buffaloes and when the grain was ripe, there would be
the birds. How much simple it would be if he just stayed and moved with the daily rhythm that his
father had decreed. Here, there was a community, order, certitude the finality that would assure him
and everyone not only of their place but of their destiny. How was it in other lands? Hate and injustice
were everywhere and he himself had contributed to the inequity of things. Look at what you have
done to Waywaya: you do not love her, you merely possess her. You are as guilty as your father, as
your warriors who have ambushed and maimed that Taga Laud. And in the evenings, when he
strummed his kutibeng and sang, the words were sad. Waywaya understood. “Why are you
unhappy?” she asked. “Because you are.” “With you I am always happy.” “And when I am no longer
here?” “I’ll stand by myself,” she said. He shook his head. He had made up his mind; he would speak
to the Ulo again, find out how they could clear the dust that had suffocated them. He formed clearly
and sharply the thoughts that he would express.

11. AMCM [11]
Our tools are lined with the skulls of our enemies and they do not evoke their ghosts to
rampage in our midst they don't disturbed our sleep for the skulls of our loved ones and they are
there without honor. What has war has brought us? Women wailing when they should be singing.
How much blood has been spilled? It was not used to water the crops, quench our thirst, or wash the
dirt from our bodies. And the flesh of our enemies we did not fill our stomachs with it, or make the
fields fertile with it. Who knows what they who fell before our lances could have achieved, what
offspring they would have sired, what clearings they would have made? All this is for the mind to
guess, for the death that we bestowed unto them is final.
They walk slowly on the beach, the waves to their right dappled with moon silver. It was a
quiet night interrupted by the sounds of children playing in the moonlight, the howling of dogs; the
planting season would soon set in, still no avenging warriors from Laud, still no tear in the fine fabric
of peace.
“They are afraid,” the Ulo said, “They cannot penetrate the wall of our determination. And if they
come, will they be fast enough to flee to their sanctuary, to escape our hound dogs? Then you ask,
why are we strong?”
Dayaw stared at the waves breaking on the surf with a murmur. “Nature has been on our side Father,”
he said.
“Not just nature,” the Ulo was exuberant “We know our past, we don't repeat its mistakes. That, too,
is tradition.”
“The past could also be a prison, Father,” Dayaw said. “You always look back, not ahead. Do you know
that across the river, they are cooking not with earthen pots but with copper? They have kilus better
than our, not for making pots but for melting metals. And they have beeswax and mountain dyes.
Hardwood. And their spears...”
“Our bamboo spears are lighter, easier to throw.”
“Their spearheads are better.”
“We fight in groups, we eat rice – not camotes.”
“They have lowland rice, too, and they use water from the spring...”
The Ulo was silent.
Dayaw continued eventually. “We have to change, Father. To be where we are, we have to change...”
“That is the law of life,” the Ulo said. “You are not telling me anything.”
“Change not war.”
“War that is part of change. And however you may detest it, with war we have become prosperous.
And I have worked very hard...”
“We have worked very hard.”
“And now, our seed is the best in the land. Our water buffaloes are the strongest. We used our
knowledge to breed, not just plants, but animals...”
“And people?”
“Don't speak like that to me.”
“You wanted Liwliwa for my wife.”
“Her father is powerful and...”
“The way Mother's father was powerful...”
“Yes, and everything we do should contribute to Daya, to our unity, our progress...Even our leisure.
Our weaving, our pottery...”
“The Taga Laud have better...”
“That is not the test. A people survives not because of its pots. It survives, endures because it has a
will...”
“And who provides the will, Father? The leaders?”
“Yes!” The Ulo ignored the remark.

12. AMCM [12]
“She has also helped the weavers, sold what they made, improved their designs. And the carvers. Has
there been any time that out crafts have been so encouraged? We don’t rely any more on the bowls
and plates that the Narrow Eyes bring from across the sea. Soon we will be firing our kilns and making
plates just as beautiful......”
He had heard it all before and he would hear it again. But what is truth? Dayaw had asked himself
many times but could not find the answer except that he believed what he felt and saw, the sunrise
that glad denied him, the wind in the bamboo, the smell of new rice, of meat crackling in the open
fire. And now Waywaya the scent of her hair, the warmth and softness of her being – he would not be
leader now, with her as his wife.
“Parbangon is growing like bamboo shoot, Father,” Dayaw said, divining his father’s thoughts.
“And he is already taking after you”
“He must know poetry, and music, too. He will be a complete man.” Then Dayaw said it. “So he will be
the leader. Father. What I cannot be. But Waywaya at least, you can be kind to her.”
“She is Taga Laud,” the Ulo said sadly.
“She is my wife. And her baby…” he said this slowly “our baby, he will have your blood, Father!”
He marvelled at the miracle of life in her belly, felt its first stirring. With eyes shining, she had
told him of her deepest wish that the child become truly happy and not given to gloom because of
her. Dayaw watched her go through the phases, the first three months during which she hankered
for oranges, for chicken as only the Taga Laud could cook, but when it was cooked its blood
coagulated with its flesh – she would have none of it. She became emaciated and he worried about
her health; he gathered water buffalo milk, lots of fish. But why did she have to die? O Apo Langit, O
Apo Daga – all of you who shape the course of time and the destiny of men, what wrong has she done?
He had watched her bleed; he could not staunch the flow and there was no healer who would come.
“Waywaya – you have son!” he cried and she looked at him and smiled, then slowly, ever so slowly,
she closed her eyes. He took his son and hastened to his father’s house.
“You have a grandson, Mother,” he told Pintas who met him at the stairs. “And the slave whom all of
you loathed don’t regard your feelings to her anymore. She is no longer among us.”
The traces of beauty were still on her face. “It is not my fault, child of mine. It’s fate,” Pintas
remonstrated.
“I am not blaming anyone.” Dayaw said. “Not even fate. But promise me, Mother, raise my son to love
his mother as I have always loved you.”
“And why do you say this?”
“I have a duty to do, Mother. I’ll not be there to watch him grow…”
It was then that the immensity of what he was saying struck her. She shrieked an animal cry
of surprise and grief that brought the Ulo to the house. To him, Pintas fled, her face contorted with
fright. “Stop him, my husband. He does not have to do it. She was not one of us!”
“What foolishness is this” his father asked. “Must you spite me? Whatever it is that I have done, I did
because you are my blood and I want you honored…”
“I do not seek honor, Father.”
“You have already shown that. But now, I want you alive, whatever your faults, whatever your
weaknesses.”
“Tradition, Father. We have to live up to it. You said that.”
“Don’t throw it back to me like spoiled meat…”
“But I believe in tradition, too, Father. This you never understood. There are traditions we must
uphold because they are not just for us they are for all people…” The Ulo was silent.
“How many seasons passed that she was without honor among my people? But I can honor her now.”

13. AMCM [13]
“Then live with dishonor!” the Ulo screamed at him. “For me! Now!”
He went forward and embraced his father, tears scalding his eyes, “My son, my son,” the Ulo
whispered.
Dayaw felt his father’s arms tighten around him. It was the last time that they would embrace.
Parbangon had already been circumcised and had already started to build his own house.
“She is light,” Dayaw told him remembering how he had carried Waywaya across the river.
“I will carry her upright, strapped to my back.”
“But that is not how it is done, Manong,” Parbangon insisted. And of course, his brother was right.
“You are not that strong…” Parbangon shook his head.
“No, that is not the reason. You fear for me.” Dayaw did not speak: he was condemning his brother to
a life travail but Parbangon knew all that.
“She was sister to me. She cooked for me, wove for me. I have not done anything for her. Let me honor
her too.”
Dayaw wrapped Waywaya in the blanket she had woven, the bright red with blas of her
people, the designs of moon, mountain and tree coming through the slats of bamboo. On both ends of
the pole to which the bier was attached were the wreaths of kalachuchi that Parbangon had made.
They reached the river easily following afternoon for they rested and ate but little and Dayaw
marveled at the boy’s strength. They untied the thongs of their sandals ad waded across the shallows,
stepping over mossy boulders, taking care that their precious burden did not tilt into the water.
There was still plenty of light when they reached the other side and he followed the bend to
the small cove where he first saw her. How peaceful it was and briefly, in his mind’s eye, he saw her
again as he saw her then, poised before the pool, serene as nightfall, and a sharp, almost physical pain
coursed through him. By dusk, they reached the town of Laud; they had been watched even before
they had approached the fringes and now, the enemy appeared from everywhere, women, children
and men who looked at them more with curiosity than hate.
He knew where to go; he had studied the town only too well and to his knowledge, Waywaya
had contributed her share. A clutch of women met them before they reached the clearing in front of
their community hall and they started wailing, their voices high-pitched and nasal, listening to what
they said- the sister, the friend who was no more- again tears dimmed his eyes. Through the blur, he
could see the structure before him, the high posts with finely carved filigrees, the beams jutting out
and around the rafters- just below the grass roof- a line of skulls of his people. The huge door of the
community hall swung open and down the massive stairs he came, the leader of Laud, and as Dayaw
by the shoulder as Dayaw lowered Waywaya onto the wooden platform where offerings were made,
and spoke in a voice that quavered.
“It has been two harvest seasons. We missed her…” Then he beckoned to one of the older women
who had met them, and to her he said “Look at your jewel, woman!”
Darkness came quickly and with it, bird calls and the cool breezes of the mountain. He sat
with the old chief in the place of honor, and they filed up to him. The warriors of Laud with their
wooden shields and shiny battle axes, and raised their arms in salute. Then the gongs started beating,
sonorous and loud- his knell. Death would be welcome, for with Waywaya’s passing no longer would
the sky hold its dominion over him, nor would the earth that he had cultivated; whose fruits he would
offer to her. How will it feel? There would be pain but he could bear that. He had been wounded
before, had seen blood ooze from the wound, had felt his head grow light and his strength slowly ebb.
It was not this pain which he learned for the warrior was prepared for it. It was this deeper anguish
that no herb, no sorcery could staunch.

14. AMCM [14]
All around them the huge pine splinter torches had been ignited and they cast a red glow over
the crowd; it was time to do the final ceremony and they rose- just him and her family, and they
formed a small procession to the side of the mountain where a hole had already been dug. They let
him shove her coffin within the; they pushed a boulder at the entrance to the burial place and covered
it with earth. Waywaya’s mother planted before it a few strands of ramos- they would grow, tall and
purple. He was a Taga Daya, he must show them that he could dam his feelings but as tears streamed
down his cheeks, he shuddered violently and cried. The chief laid an arm around Dayaw’s shoulder
and took him back. The gongs were louder now and above their rhythm rose the squealing of pigs
being butchered. They went up the hall, its floor of hewn wood, and from the roof dangled lamps of
iron, ablaze with light. “I have asked my father.” Dayaw said, “that they do not cross the river
anymore, that if they do, they bear gifts of life. I pray that you do the same. This is what Waywaya
would have wanted. . .”
The old chief, squatting on his deerskin rug, did not reply; his gaze went beyond the bonfire
outside the wide open door, leaping now, lighting the sombrous sky. In the yellow embroidery of
flames, it seemed that his eyes were glazed and when he finally spoke, his words were slow and they
bore great feeling. “There something about an old tree, “he said, “it grows no more. At the same time,
it is difficult to cut it down. Its roots are deep although it can draw no more sustenance from the earth.
Maybe, it is right that the new trees should grow.”
He ate little when the food finally came. Parbangon ate nothing for he had falllen asleep. They
brought Dayaw wine – sweet slightly bitter and he wondered if it would be in the wine. But it was
not. It was late and he must rest so they left him while the feasting and dancing continued outside.
He slept fitfully until dawn- that deep and tranquil quiet when just a tint of purple appeared in the
east and stars still studded the sky like gems. Now, thoughts crowded his mind like drones and he
was filled once more with regret that he had not been kinder to her. He could see her now in this time
of day , her hair glossy and black, her precious face, the luminous eyes, the moist lips- the image of
her alive and breathing and touching, pottering in the kitchen, preparing his meal. And the baby yes,
their son, how would it be when he finally b became a man? And Parbangon, would they enslave him
order him return as he had hoped they would so that he could tell Taga Daya? And how would it end
for him? He had been trained not to fear death and though he had considered fighting, there was no
sense to it as there was really no logic for his being here, just as the lo said. No logic, but since when
did love have any?
Morning and it was time to leave the old chief was at the door and as he approached, Dayaw
glanced at Parbngon who was still asleep. “Don’t wake him up,” the chief said softly. “He needs rest;
we will take him back to the river.” A wave of joy engulfed him. They went down the broad steps, into
a brilliant morning, where some of the warriors had already gathered. The old chief put an arm
around his shoulder, murmuring, “Husband of my daughter- my son.” “Father of my wife- my father,”
he returned the farewell. In the clear, everything stood out now – the bamboo houses with their grass
roofs, the corrals for the pigs, the chicken houses, the vegetable patches, the orange trees. He knew
almost everything around him just as Waywaya had described it; why, he was almost home at home!
They walked him to the edge of the village. He must utter now the important word.
“Waywaya,” he said in reverential prayer. “I loved her. The fruit of our union- a boy. Your blood is in
him, he is across the river. Will you let him grow in peace ignorant of a time like this? “Will you?” The
chief did not answer and if he spoke. Dayaw did not hear. The gongs started again and then, from the
women in the distance came a sound of wailing. Was it for him? In his heart, though he was afraid, he
was glad. The forest awaited him… as sunset, he knew that he would not reach the river. ###

15. AMCM [15]
Author: Amador T. Daguio was a poet, novelist and teacher during the pre-war. He was best known for
his fictions and poems. He had published two volumes of poetry, "Bataan Harvest" and "The Flaming
Lyre". He served as chief editor for the Philippine House of Representatives before he died in 1966.
------------------------0--------------------------
wiyao reached for the upper horizontal log which served as the edge of the head high threshold.
Clinging to the log, he lifted himself with one bound that carried him across to the narrow door.
He slid back the cover, stepped inside, and then pushed the cover back in place. After some moments
during which he seemed to wait, he talked to the listening darkness.
"I'm sorry this had to be done. I am really sorry. But neither of us can help it."
The sound of the gangsas beat through the walls of the dark house like muffled roars of falling waters.
The woman who had moved with a start when the sliding door opened had been hearing the gangsas
for she did not know how long. There was a sudden rush of fire in her. She gave no sign that she heard
Awiyao, but continued to sit unmoving in the darkness. But Awiyao knew that she heard him and his
heart pitied her. He crawled on all fours to the middle of the room; he knew exactly where the stove
was. With bare fingers he stirred the covered smoldering embers, and blew into the stove. When the
coals began to glow, Awiyao put pieces of pine on them, then full round logs as his arms. The room
brightened.
"Why don't you go out," he said, "and join the dancing women?" He felt a pang inside him, because
what he said was really not the right thing to say and because the woman did not stir. "You should
join the dancers," he said, "as if--as if nothing had happened." He looked at the woman huddled in a
corner of the room, leaning against the wall. The stove fire played with strange moving shadows and
lights upon her face. She was partly sullen, but her sullenness was not because of anger or hate.
"Go out--go out and dance. If you really don't hate me for this separation, go out and dance. One of
the men will see you dance well; he will like your dancing, he will marry you. Who knows but that,
with him, you will be luckier than you were with me."
"I don't want any man," she said sharply. "I don't want any other man."
He felt relieved that at least she talked: "You know very well that I won't want any other woman
either. You know that, don't you? Lumnay, you know it, don't you?" She did not answer him.
"You know it Lumnay, don't you?" he repeated.
"Yes, I know," she said weakly.
"It is not my fault," he said, feeling relieved. "You cannot blame me; I have been a good husband to
you."
"Neither can you blame me," she said. She seemed about to cry.
"No, you have been very good to me. You have been a good wife. I have nothing to say against you."
He set some of the burning wood in place. "It's only that a man must have a child. Seven harvests is
A

16. AMCM [16]
just too long to wait. Yes, we have waited too long. We should have another chance before it is too
late for both of us."
This time the woman stirred, stretched her right leg out and bent her left leg in. She wound the
blanket more snugly around herself.
"You know that I have done my best," she said. "I have prayed to Kabunyan much. I have sacrificed
many chickens in my prayers."
"Yes, I know."
"You remember how angry you were once when you came home from your work in the terrace
because I butchered one of our pigs without your permission? I did it to appease Kabunyan, because,
like you, I wanted to have a child. But what could I do?"
"Kabunyan does not see fit for us to have a child," he said. He stirred the fire. The spark rose through
the crackles of the flames. The smoke and soot went up the ceiling.
Lumnay looked down and unconsciously started to pull at the rattan that kept the split bamboo
flooring in place. She tugged at the rattan flooring. Each time she did this the split bamboo went up
and came down with a slight rattle. The gong of the dancers clamorously called in her care through
the walls.
Awiyao went to the corner where Lumnay sat, paused before her, looked at her bronzed and sturdy
face, and then turned to where the jars of water stood piled one over the other. Awiyao took a coconut
cup and dipped it in the top jar and drank. Lumnay had filled the jars from the mountain creek early
that evening.
"I came home," he said. "Because I did not find you among the dancers. Of course, I am not forcing
you to come, if you don't want to join my wedding ceremony. I came to tell you that Madulimay,
although I am marrying her, can never become as good as you are. She is not as strong in planting
beans, not as fast in cleaning water jars, not as good keeping a house clean. You are one of the best
wives in the whole village."
"That has not done me any good, has it?" She said. She looked at him lovingly. She almost seemed to
smile.
He put the coconut cup aside on the floor and came closer to her. He held her face between his hands
and looked longingly at her beauty. But her eyes looked away. Never again would he hold her face.
The next day she would not be his anymore. She would go back to her parents. He let go of her face,
and she bent to the floor again and looked at her fingers as they tugged softly at the split bamboo
floor.
"This house is yours," he said. "I built it for you. Make it your own, live in it as long as you wish. I will
build another house for Madulimay."
"I have no need for a house," she said slowly. "I'll go to my own house. My parents are old. They will
need help in the planting of the beans, in the pounding of the rice."

17. AMCM [17]
"I will give you the field that I dug out of the mountains during the first year of our marriage," he said.
"You know I did it for you. You helped me to make it for the two of us."
"I have no use for any field," she said.
He looked at her, then turned away, and became silent. They were silent for a time.
"Go back to the dance," she said finally. "It is not right for you to be here. They will wonder where you
are, and Madulimay will not feel good. Go back to the dance."
"I would feel better if you could come, and dance---for the last time. The gangsas are playing."
"You know that I cannot."
"Lumnay," he said tenderly. "Lumnay, if I did this it is because of my need for a child. You know that
life is not worth living without a child. The man have mocked me behind my back. You know that."
"I know it," he said. "I will pray that Kabunyan will bless you and Madulimay."
She bit her lips now, then shook her head wildly, and sobbed.
She thought of the seven harvests that had passed, the high hopes they had in the beginning of their
new life, the day he took her away from her parents across the roaring river, on the other side of the
mountain, the trip up the trail which they had to climb, the steep canyon which they had to cross. The
waters boiled in her mind in forms of white and jade and roaring silver; the waters tolled and
growled, resounded in thunderous echoes through the walls of the stiff cliffs; they were far away now
from somewhere on the tops of the other ranges, and they had looked carefully at the buttresses of
rocks they had to step on---a slip would have meant death.
They both drank of the water then rested on the other bank before they made the final climb to the
other side of the mountain.
She looked at his face with the fire playing upon his features---hard and strong, and kind. He had a
sense of lightness in his way of saying things which often made her and the village people laugh. How
proud she had been of his humor. The muscles where taut and firm, bronze and compact in their hold
upon his skull---how frank his bright eyes were. She looked at his body the carved out of the
mountains five fields for her; his wide and supple torso heaved as if a slab of shining lumber were
heaving; his arms and legs flowed down in fluent muscles--he was strong and for that she had lost
him.
She flung herself upon his knees and clung to them. "Awiyao, Awiyao, my husband," she cried. "I did
everything to have a child," she said passionately in a hoarse whisper. "Look at me," she cried. "Look
at my body. Then it was full of promise. It could dance; it could work fast in the fields; it could climb
the mountains fast. Even now it is firm, full. But, Awiyao, I am useless. I must die."
"It will not be right to die," he said, gathering her in his arms. Her whole warm naked naked breast
quivered against his own; she clung now to his neck, and her hand lay upon his right shoulder; her
hair flowed down in cascades of gleaming darkness.

18. AMCM [18]
"I don't care about the fields," she said. "I don't care about the house. I don't care for anything but
you. I'll have no other man."
"Then you'll always be fruitless."
"I'll go back to my father, I'll die."
"Then you hate me," he said. "If you die it means you hate me. You do not want me to have a child.
You do not want my name to live on in our tribe."
She was silent.
"If I do not try a second time," he explained, "it means I'll die. Nobody will get the fields I have carved
out of the mountains; nobody will come after me."
"If you fail--if you fail this second time--" she said thoughtfully. The voice was a shudder. "No--no, I
don't want you to fail."
"If I fail," he said, "I'll come back to you. Then both of us will die together. Both of us will vanish from
the life of our tribe."
The gongs thundered through the walls of their house, sonorous and faraway.
"I'll keep my beads," she said. "Awiyao, let me keep my beads," she half-whispered.
"You will keep the beads. They come from far-off times. My grandmother said they come from up
North, from the slant-eyed people across the sea. You keep them, Lumnay. They are worth twenty
fields."
"I'll keep them because they stand for the love you have for me," she said. "I love you. I love you and
have nothing to give."
She took herself away from him, for a voice was calling out to him from outside. "Awiyao! Awiyao! O
Awiyao! They are looking for you at the dance!"
"I am not in hurry."
"The elders will scold you. You had better go."
"Not until you tell me that it is all right with you."
"It is all right with me."
He clasped her hands. "I do this for the sake of the tribe," he said.
"I know," she said.
He went to the door.
"Awiyao!"

19. AMCM [19]
He stopped as if suddenly hit by a spear. In pain he turned to her. Her face was in agony. It pained
him to leave. She had been wonderful to him. What was it that made a man wish for a child? What
was it in life, in the work in the field, in the planting and harvest, in the silence of the night, in the
communing with husband and wife, in the whole life of the tribe itself that made man wish for the
laughter and speech of a child? Suppose he changed his mind? Why did the unwritten law demand,
anyway, that a man, to be a man, must have a child to come after him? And if he was fruitless--but he
loved Lumnay. It was like taking away of his life to leave her like this.
"Awiyao," she said, and her eyes seemed to smile in the light. "The beads!" He turned back and walked
to the farthest corner of their room, to the trunk where they kept their worldly possession---his
battle-ax and his spear points, her betel nut box and her beads. He dug out from the darkness the
beads which had been given to him by his grandmother to give to Lumnay on the beads on, and tied
them in place. The white and jade and deep orange obsidians shone in the firelight. She suddenly
clung to him, clung to his neck as if she would never let him go.
"Awiyao! Awiyao, it is hard!" She gasped, and she closed her eyes and hurried her face in his neck.
The call for him from the outside repeated; her grip loosened, and he buried out into the night.
Lumnay sat for some time in the darkness. Then she went to the door and opened it. The moonlight
struck her face; the moonlight spilled itself on the whole village.
She could hear the throbbing of the gangsas coming to her through the caverns of the other houses.
She knew that all the houses were empty that the whole tribe was at the dance. Only she was absent.
And yet was she not the best dancer of the village? Did she not have the most lightness and grace?
Could she not, alone among all women, dance like a bird tripping for grains on the ground, beautifully
timed to the beat of the gangsas? Did not the men praise her supple body, and the women envy the
way she stretched her hands like the wings of the mountain eagle now and then as she danced? How
long ago did she dance at her own wedding? Tonight, all the women who counted, who once danced
in her honor, were dancing now in honor of another whose only claim was that perhaps she could
give her husband a child.
"It is not right. It is not right!" she cried. "How does she know? How can anybody know? It is not
right," she said.
Suddenly she found courage. She would go to the dance. She would go to the chief of the village, to
the elders, to tell them it was not right. Awiyao was hers; nobody could take him away from her. Let
her be the first woman to complain, to denounce the unwritten rule that a man may take another
woman. She would tell Awiyao to come back to her. He surely would relent. Was not their love as
strong as the river?
She made for the other side of the village where the dancing was. There was a flaming glow over the
whole place; a great bonfire was burning. The gangsas clamored more loudly now, and it seemed they
were calling to her. She was near at last. She could see the dancers clearly now. The man leaped lightly
with their gangsas as they circled the dancing women decked in feast garments and beads, tripping
on the ground like graceful birds, following their men. Her heart warmed to the flaming call of the
dance; strange heat in her blood welled up, and she started to run. But the gleaming brightness of the
bonfire commanded her to stop. Did anybody see her approach?

20. AMCM [20]
She stopped. What if somebody had seen her coming? The flames of the bonfire leaped in countless
sparks which spread and rose like yellow points and died out in the night. The blaze reached out to
her like a spreading radiance. She did not have the courage to break into the wedding feast.
Lumnay walked away from the dancing ground, away from the village. She thought of the new
clearing of beans which Awiyao and she had started to make only four moons before. She followed
the trail above the village.
When she came to the mountain stream she crossed it carefully. Nobody held her hand, and the
stream water was very cold. The trail went up again, and she was in the moonlight shadows among
the trees and shrubs. Slowly she climbed the mountain.
When Lumnay reached the clearing, she could see from where she stood the blazing bonfire at the
edge of the village, where the wedding was. She could hear the far-off clamor of the gongs, still rich
in their sonorousness, echoing from mountain to mountain. The sound did not mock her; they seemed
to call far to her, to speak to her in the language of unspeaking love. She felt the pull of their gratitude
for her sacrifice. Her heartbeat began to sound to her like many gangsas.
Lumnay thought of Awiyao as the Awiyao she had known long ago-- a strong, muscular boy carrying
his heavy loads of fuel logs down the mountains to his home. She had met him one day as she was on
her way to fill her clay jars with water. He had stopped at the spring to drink and rest; and she had
made him drink the cool mountain water from her coconut shell. After that it did not take him long
to decide to throw his spear on the stairs of her father's house in token on his desire to marry her.
The mountain clearing was cold in the freezing moonlight. The wind began to stir the leaves of the
bean plants. Lumnay looked for a big rock on which to sit down. The bean plants now surrounded
her, and she was lost among them.
A few more weeks, a few more months, a few more harvests---what did it matter? She would be
holding the bean flowers, soft in the texture, silken almost, but moist where the dew got into them,
silver to look at, silver on the light blue, blooming whiteness, when the morning comes. The stretching
of the bean pods full length from the hearts of the wilting petals would go on.
Lumnay's fingers moved a long, long time among the growing bean pods. ###

21. AMCM [21]
Author: Paz Marquez – Benitez was born in 1894 in Lucena City, Quezon. Marquez - Benítez authored
the first Filipino modern English language short story, Dead Stars, published in the Philippine Herald in
1925. Born into the prominent Marquez family of Quezon province, she was among the first generation
of Filipino people trained in the American education system which used English as the medium of
instruction.
------------------------0--------------------------
hrough the open window the air-steeped outdoors passed into his room, quietly enveloping him,
stealing into his very thought. Esperanza, Julia, the sorry mess he had made of life, the years to
come even now beginning to weigh down, to crush--they lost concreteness, diffused into formless
melancholy. The tranquil murmur of conversation issued from the brick-tiled azotea where Don
Julian and Carmen were busy puttering away among the rose pots.
"Papa, and when will the 'long table' be set?"
"I don't know yet. Alfredo is not very specific, but I understand Esperanza wants it to be next month."
Carmen sighed impatiently. "Why is he not a bit more decided, I wonder. He is over thirty, is he not?
And still a bachelor! Esperanza must be tired waiting."
"She does not seem to be in much of a hurry either," Don Julian nasally commented, while his rose
scissors busily snipped away.
"How can a woman be in a hurry when the man does not hurry her?" Carmen returned, pinching off
a worm with a careful, somewhat absent air. "Papa, do you remember how much in love he was?"
"In love? With whom?"
"With Esperanza, of course. He has not had another love affair that I know of," she said with good-
natured contempt. "What I mean is that at the beginning he was enthusiastic--flowers, serenades,
notes, and things like that--"
Alfredo remembered that period with a wonder not unmixed with shame. That was less than four
years ago. He could not understand those months of a great hunger that was not of the body nor yet
of the mind, a craving that had seized on him one quiet night when the moon was abroad and under
the dappled shadow of the trees in the plaza, man wooed maid. Was he being cheated by life? Love--
he seemed to have missed it. Or was the love that others told about a mere fabrication of perfervid
imagination, an exaggeration of the commonplace, a glorification of insipid monotonies such as made
up his love life? Was love a combination of circumstances, or sheer native capacity of soul? In those
days love was, for him, still the eternal puzzle; for love, as he knew it, was a stranger to love as he
divined it might be.
Sitting quietly in his room now, he could almost revive the restlessness of those days, the feeling of
tumultuous haste, such as he knew so well in his boyhood when something beautiful was going on
somewhere and he was trying to get there in time to see. "Hurry, hurry, or you will miss it," someone
had seemed to urge in his ears. So he had avidly seized on the shadow of Love and deluded himself
T

22. AMCM [22]
for a long while in the way of humanity from time immemorial. In the meantime, he became very
much engaged to Esperanza.
Why would men so mismanage their lives? Greed, he thought, was what ruined so many. Greed--the
desire to crowd into a moment all the enjoyment it will hold, to squeeze from the hour all the emotion
it will yield. Men commit themselves when but half-meaning to do so, sacrificing possible future
fullness of ecstasy to the craving for immediate excitement. Greed--mortgaging the future--forcing
the hand of Time, or of Fate.
"What do you think happened?" asked Carmen, pursuing her thought.
"I supposed long-engaged people are like that; warm now, cool tomorrow. I think they are oftener
cool than warm. The very fact that an engagement has been allowed to prolong itself argues a certain
placidity of temperament--or of affection--on the part of either, or both." Don Julian loved to
philosophize. He was talking now with an evident relish in words, his resonant, very nasal voice toned
down to monologue pitch. "That phase you were speaking of is natural enough for a beginning.
Besides, that, as I see it, was Alfredo's last race with escaping youth--"
Carmen laughed aloud at the thought of her brother's perfect physical repose--almost indolence--
disturbed in the role suggested by her father's figurative language.
"A last spurt of hot blood," finished the old man.
Few certainly would credit Alfredo Salazar with hot blood. Even his friends had amusedly diagnosed
his blood as cool and thin, citing incontrovertible evidence. Tall and slender, he moved with an
indolent ease that verged on grace. Under straight recalcitrant hair, a thin face with a satisfying
breadth of forehead, slow, dreamer's eyes, and astonishing freshness of lips--indeed Alfredo Salazar's
appearance betokened little of exuberant masculinity; rather a poet with wayward humor, a
fastidious artist with keen, clear brain.
He rose and quietly went out of the house. He lingered a moment on the stone steps; then went down
the path shaded by immature acacias, through the little tarred gate which he left swinging back and
forth, now opening, now closing, on the gravel road bordered along the farther side by madre cacao
hedge in tardy lavender bloom.
The gravel road narrowed as it slanted up to the house on the hill, whose wide, open porches he could
glimpse through the heat-shrivelled tamarinds in the Martinez yard.
Six weeks ago that house meant nothing to him save that it was the Martinez house, rented and
occupied by Judge del Valle and his family. Six weeks ago Julia Salas meant nothing to him; he did not
even know her name; but now--
One evening he had gone "neighboring" with Don Julian; a rare enough occurrence, since he made it
a point to avoid all appearance of currying favor with the Judge. This particular evening however, he
had allowed himself to be persuaded. "A little mental relaxation now and then is beneficial," the old
man had said. "Besides, a judge's good will, you know;" the rest of the thought--"is worth a rising
young lawyer's trouble"--Don Julian conveyed through a shrug and a smile that derided his own
worldly wisdom.

23. AMCM [23]
A young woman had met them at the door. It was evident from the excitement of the Judge's children
that she was a recent and very welcome arrival. In the characteristic Filipino way formal
introductions had been omitted--the judge limiting himself to a casual "Ah, ya se conocen?"--with the
consequence that Alfredo called her Miss del Valle throughout the evening.
He was puzzled that she should smile with evident delight every time he addressed her thus. Later
Don Julian informed him that she was not the Judge's sister, as he had supposed, but his sister-in-law,
and that her name was Julia Salas. A very dignified rather austere name, he thought. Still, the young
lady should have corrected him. As it was, he was greatly embarrassed, and felt that he should
explain.
To his apology, she replied, "That is nothing, each time I was about to correct you, but I remembered
a similar experience I had once before."
"Oh," he drawled out, vastly relieved.
"A man named Manalang--I kept calling him Manalo. After the tenth time or so, the young man rose
from his seat and said suddenly, 'Pardon me, but my name is Manalang, Manalang.' You know, I never
forgave him!"
He laughed with her.
"The best thing to do under the circumstances, I have found out," she pursued, "is to pretend not to
hear, and to let the other person find out his mistake without help."
"As you did this time. Still, you looked amused every time I--"
"I was thinking of Mr. Manalang."
Don Julian and his uncommunicative friend, the Judge, were absorbed in a game of chess. The young
man had tired of playing appreciative spectator and desultory conversationalist, so he and Julia Salas
had gone off to chat in the vine-covered porch. The lone piano in the neighborhood alternately tinkled
and banged away as the player's moods altered. He listened, and wondered irrelevantly if Miss Salas
could sing; she had such a charming speaking voice.
He was mildly surprised to note from her appearance that she was unmistakably a sister of the
Judge's wife, although Doña Adela was of a different type altogether. She was small and plump, with
wide brown eyes, clearly defined eyebrows, and delicately modeled hips--a pretty woman with the
complexion of a baby and the expression of a likable cow. Julia was taller, not so obviously pretty. She
had the same eyebrows and lips, but she was much darker, of a smooth rich brown with underlying
tones of crimson which heightened the impression she gave of abounding vitality.
On Sunday mornings after mass, father and son would go crunching up the gravel road to the house
on the hill. The Judge's wife invariably offered them beer, which Don Julian enjoyed and Alfredo did
not. After a half hour or so, the chessboard would be brought out; then Alfredo and Julia Salas would
go out to the porch to chat. She sat in the low hammock and he in a rocking chair and the hours--
warm, quiet March hours--sped by. He enjoyed talking with her and it was evident that she liked his
company; yet what feeling there was between them was so undisturbed that it seemed a matter of
course. Only when Esperanza chanced to ask him indirectly about those visits did some uneasiness
creep into his thoughts of the girl next door.

24. AMCM [24]
Esperanza had wanted to know if he went straight home after mass. Alfredo suddenly realized that
for several Sundays now he had not waited for Esperanza to come out of the church as he had been
wont to do. He had been eager to go "neighboring."
He answered that he went home to work. And, because he was not habitually untruthful, added,
"Sometimes I go with Papa to Judge del Valle's."
She dropped the topic. Esperanza was not prone to indulge in unprovoked jealousies. She was a
believer in the regenerative virtue of institutions, in their power to regulate feeling as well as conduct.
If a man were married, why, of course, he loved his wife; if he were engaged, he could not possibly
love another woman.
That half-lie told him what he had not admitted openly to himself, that he was giving Julia Salas
something which he was not free to give. He realized that; yet something that would not be denied
beckoned imperiously, and he followed on.
It was so easy to forget up there, away from the prying eyes of the world, so easy and so poignantly
sweet. The beloved woman, he standing close to her, the shadows around, enfolding.
"Up here I find--something--"
He and Julia Salas stood looking out into the she quiet night. Sensing unwanted intensity, laughed,
woman-like, asking, "Amusement?"
"No; youth--its spirit--"
"Are you so old?"
"And heart's desire."
Was he becoming a poet, or is there a poet lurking in the heart of every man?
"Down there," he had continued, his voice somewhat indistinct, "the road is too broad, too trodden
by feet, too barren of mystery."
"Down there" beyond the ancient tamarinds lay the road, upturned to the stars. In the darkness the
fireflies glimmered, while an errant breeze strayed in from somewhere, bringing elusive, faraway
sounds as of voices in a dream.
"Mystery--" she answered lightly, "that is so brief--"
"Not in some," quickly. "Not in you."
"You have known me a few weeks; so the mystery."
"I could study you all my life and still not find it."
"So long?"

25. AMCM [25]
"I should like to."
Those six weeks were now so swift--seeming in the memory, yet had they been so deep in the living,
so charged with compelling power and sweetness. Because neither the past nor the future had
relevance or meaning, he lived only the present, day by day, lived it intensely, with such a willful
shutting out of fact as astounded him in his calmer moments.
Just before Holy Week, Don Julian invited the judge and his family to spend Sunday afternoon at
Tanda where he had a coconut plantation and a house on the beach. Carmen also came with her four
energetic children. She and Doña Adela spent most of the time indoors directing the preparation of
the merienda and discussing the likeable absurdities of their husbands--how Carmen's Vicente was
so absorbed in his farms that he would not even take time off to accompany her on this visit to her
father; how Doña Adela's Dionisio was the most absentminded of men, sometimes going out without
his collar, or with unmatched socks.
After the merienda, Don Julian sauntered off with the judge to show him what a thriving young
coconut looked like--"plenty of leaves, close set, rich green"--while the children, convoyed by Julia
Salas, found unending entertainment in the rippling sand left by the ebbing tide. They were far down,
walking at the edge of the water, indistinctly outlined against the gray of the out-curving beach.
Alfredo left his perch on the bamboo ladder of the house and followed. Here were her footsteps,
narrow, arched. He laughed at himself for his black canvas footwear which he removed forthwith and
tossed high up on dry sand.
When he came up, she flushed, then smiled with frank pleasure.
"I hope you are enjoying this," he said with a questioning inflection.
"Very much. It looks like home to me, except that we do not have such a lovely beach."
There was a breeze from the water. It blew the hair away from her forehead, and whipped the tucked-
up skirt around her straight,slender figure.In thepicturewas something of eager freedom as of wings
poised in flight. The girl had grace, distinction. Her face was not notably pretty; yet she had a
tantalizing charm, all the more compelling because it was an inner quality, an achievement of the
spirit. The lure was there, of naturalness, of an alert vitality of mind and body, of a thoughtful, sunny
temper, and of a piquant perverseness which is sauce to charm.
"The afternoon has seemed very short, hasn't it?" Then, "This, I think, is the last time--we can visit."
"The last? Why?"
"Oh, you will be too busy perhaps."
He noted an evasive quality in the answer.
"Do I seem especially industrious to you?"
"If you are, you never look it."
"Not perspiring or breathless, as a busy man ought to be."

26. AMCM [26]
"But--"
"Always unhurried, too unhurried, and calm." She smiled to herself.
"I wish that were true," he said after a meditative pause.
She waited.
"A man is happier if he is, as you say, calm and placid."
"Like a carabao in a mud pool," she retorted perversely
"Who? I?"
"Oh, no!"
"You said I am calm and placid."
"That is what I think."
"I used to think so too. Shows how little we know ourselves."
It was strange to him that he could be wooing thus: with tone and look and covert phrase.
"I should like to see your home town."
"There is nothing to see--little crooked streets, bunut roofs with ferns growing on them, and
sometimes squashes."
That was the background. It made her seem less detached, less unrelated, yet withal more distant, as
if that background claimed her and excluded him.
"Nothing? There is you."
"Oh, me? But I am here."
"I will not go, of course, until you are there."
"Will you come? You will find it dull. There isn't even one American there!"
"Well--Americans are rather essential to my entertainment."
She laughed.
"We live on Calle Luz, a little street with trees."
"Could I find that?"
"If you don't ask for Miss del Valle," she smiled teasingly.

27. AMCM [27]
"I'll inquire about--"
"What?"
"The house of the prettiest girl in the town."
"There is where you will lose your way." Then she turned serious. "Now, that is not quite sincere."
"It is," he averred slowly, but emphatically.
"I thought you, at least, would not say such things."
"Pretty--pretty--a foolish word! But there is none other more handy I did not mean that quite--"
"Are you withdrawing the compliment?"
"Re-enforcing it, maybe. Something is pretty when it pleases the eye--it is more than that when--"
"If it saddens?" she interrupted hastily.
"Exactly."
"It must be ugly."
"Always?"
Toward the west, the sunlight lay on the dimming waters in a broad, glinting streamer of crimsoned
gold.
"No, of course you are right."
"Why did you say this is the last time?" he asked quietly as they turned back.
"I am going home."
The end of an impossible dream!
"When?" after a long silence.
"Tomorrow. I received a letter from Father and Mother yesterday. They want me to spend Holy Week
at home."
She seemed to be waiting for him to speak. "That is why I said this is the last time."
"Can't I come to say good-bye?"
"Oh, you don't need to!"
"No, but I want to."

28. AMCM [28]
"There is no time."
The golden streamer was withdrawing, shortening, until it looked no more than a pool far away at
the rim of the world. Stillness, a vibrant quiet that affects the senses as does solemn harmony; a peace
that is not contentment but a cessation of tumult when all violence of feeling tones down to the
wistful serenity of regret. She turned and looked into his face, in her dark eyes a ghost of sunset
sadness.
"Home seems so far from here. This is almost like another life."
"I know. This is Elsewhere, and yet strange enough, I cannot get rid of the old things."
"Old things?"
"Oh, old things, mistakes, encumbrances, old baggage." He said it lightly, unwilling to mar the hour.
He walked close, his hand sometimes touching hers for one whirling second.
Don Julian's nasal summons came to them on the wind.
Alfredo gripped the soft hand so near his own. At his touch, the girl turned her face away, but he
heard her voice say very low, "Good-bye."
---II---
lfredo Salazar turned to the right where, farther on, the road broadened and entered the heart of
the town--heart of Chinese stores sheltered under low-hung roofs, of indolent drug stores and
tailor shops, of dingy shoe-repairing establishments, and a cluttered goldsmith's cubbyhole where a
consumptive bent over a magnifying lens; heart of old brick-roofed houses with quaint hand-and-ball
knockers on the door; heart of grass-grown plaza reposeful with trees, of ancient church and
convento, now circled by swallows gliding in flight as smooth and soft as the afternoon itself. Into the
quickly deepening twilight, the voice of the biggest of the church bells kept ringing its insistent
summons. Flocking came the devout with their long wax candles, young women in vivid apparel (for
this was Holy Thursday and the Lord was still alive), older women in sober black skirts. Came too the
young men in droves, elbowing each other under the talisay tree near the church door. The gaily
decked rice-paper lanterns were again on display while from the windows of the older houses hung
colored glass globes, heirlooms from a day when grasspith wicks floating in coconut oil were the chief
lighting device.
Soon a double row of lights emerged from the church and uncoiled down the length of the street like
a huge jewelled band studded with glittering clusters where the saints' platforms were. Above the
measured music rose the untutored voices of the choir, steeped in incense and the acrid fumes of
burning wax.
The sight of Esperanza and her mother sedately pacing behind Our Lady of Sorrows suddenly
destroyed the illusion of continuity and broke up those lines of light into component individuals.
Esperanza stiffened self-consciously, tried to look unaware, and could not.
The line moved on.
A

29. AMCM [29]
Suddenly, Alfredo's slow blood began to beat violently, irregularly. A girl was coming down the line-
-a girl that was striking, and vividly alive, the woman that could cause violent commotion in his heart,
yet had no place in the completed ordering of his life.
Her glance of abstracted devotion fell on him and came to a brief stop.
The line kept moving on, wending its circuitous route away from the church and then back again,
where, according to the old proverb, all processions end.
At last Our Lady of Sorrows entered the church, and with her the priest and the choir, whose voices
now echoed from the arched ceiling. The bells rang the close of the procession.
A round orange moon, "huge as a winnowing basket," rose lazily into a clear sky, whitening the iron
roofs and dimming the lanterns at the windows. Along the still densely shadowed streets the young
women with their rear guard of males loitered and, maybe, took the longest way home.
Toward the end of the row of Chinese stores, he caught up with Julia Salas. The crowd had dispersed
into the side streets, leaving Calle Real to those who lived farther out. It was past eight, and Esperanza
would be expecting him in a little while: yet the thought did not hurry him as he said "Good evening"
and fell into step with the girl.
"I had been thinking all this time that you had gone," he said in a voice that was both excited and
troubled.
"No, my sister asked me to stay until they are ready to go."
"Oh, is the Judge going?"
"Yes."
The provincial docket had been cleared, and Judge del Valle had been assigned elsewhere. As lawyer-
-and as lover--Alfredo had found that out long before.
"Mr. Salazar," she broke into his silence, "I wish to congratulate you."
Her tone told him that she had learned, at last. That was inevitable.
"For what?"
"For your approaching wedding."
Some explanation was due her, surely. Yet what could he say that would not offend?
"I should have offered congratulations long before, but you know mere visitors are slow about getting
the news," she continued.
He listened not so much to what she said as to the nuances in her voice. He heard nothing to enlighten
him, except that she had reverted to the formal tones of early acquaintance. No revelation there;
simply the old voice--cool, almost detached from personality, flexible and vibrant, suggesting
potentialities of song.

30. AMCM [30]
"Are weddings interesting to you?" he finally brought out quietly
"When they are of friends, yes."
"Would you come if I asked you?"
"When is it going to be?"
"May," he replied briefly, after a long pause.
"May is the month of happiness they say," she said, with what seemed to him a shade of irony.
"They say," slowly, indifferently. "Would you come?"
"Why not?"
"No reason. I am just asking. Then you will?"
"If you will ask me," she said with disdain.
"Then I ask you."
"Then I will be there."
The gravel road lay before them; at the road's end the lighted windows of the house on the hill. There
swept over the spirit of Alfredo Salazar a longing so keen that it was pain, a wish that, that house
were his, that all the bewilderments of the present were not, and that this woman by his side were
his long wedded wife, returning with him to the peace of home.
"Julita," he said in his slow, thoughtful manner, "did you ever have to choose between something you
wanted to do and something you had to do?"
"No!"
"I thought maybe you had had that experience; then you could understand a man who was in such a
situation."
"You are fortunate," he pursued when she did not answer.
"Is--is this man sure of what he should do?"
"I don't know, Julita. Perhaps not. But there is a point where a thing escapes us and rushes downward
of its own weight, dragging us along. Then it is foolish to ask whether one will or will not, because it
no longer depends on him."
"But then why--why--" her muffled voice came. "Oh, what do I know? That is his problem after all."
"Doesn't it--interest you?"

31. AMCM [31]
"Why must it? I--I have to say good-bye, Mr. Salazar; we are at the house."
Without lifting her eyes she quickly turned and walked away.
Had the final word been said? He wondered. It had. Yet a feeble flutter of hope trembled in his mind
though set against that hope were three years of engagement, a very near wedding, perfect
understanding between the parents, his own conscience, and Esperanza herself--Esperanza waiting,
Esperanza no longer young, Esperanza the efficient, the literal-minded, the intensely acquisitive.
He looked attentively at her where she sat on the sofa, appraisingly, and with a kind of aversion which
he tried to control.
She was one of those fortunate women who have the gift of uniformly acceptable appearance. She
never surprised one with unexpected homeliness nor with startling reserves of beauty. At home, in
church, on the street, she was always herself, a woman past first bloom, light and clear of complexion,
spare of arms and of breast, with a slight convexity to thin throat; a woman dressed with self-
conscious care, even elegance; a woman distinctly not average.
She was pursuing an indignant relation about something or other, something about Calixta, their
note-carrier, Alfredo perceived, so he merely half-listened, understanding imperfectly. At a pause he
drawled out to fill in the gap: "Well, what of it?" The remark sounded ruder than he had intended.
"She is not married to him," Esperanza insisted in her thin, nervously pitched voice. "Besides, she
should have thought of us. Nanay practically brought her up. We never thought she would turn out
bad."
What had Calixta done? Homely, middle-aged Calixta?
"You are very positive about her badness," he commented dryly. Esperanza was always positive.
"But do you approve?"
"Of what?"
"What she did."
"No," indifferently.
"Well?"
He was suddenly impelled by a desire to disturb the unvexed orthodoxy of her mind. "All I say is that
it is not necessarily wicked."
"Why shouldn't it be? You talked like an--immoral man. I did not know that your ideas were like that."
"My ideas?" he retorted, goaded by a deep, accumulated exasperation. "The only test I wish to apply
to conduct is the test of fairness. Am I injuring anybody? No? Then I am justified in my conscience. I
am right. Living with a man to whom she is not married--is that it? It may be wrong, and again it may
not."

32. AMCM [32]
"She has injured us. She was ungrateful." Her voice was tight with resentment.
"The trouble with you, Esperanza, is that you are--" he stopped, appalled by the passion in his voice.
"Why do you get angry? I do not understand you at all! I think I know why you have been indifferent
to me lately. I am not blind, or deaf; I see and hear what perhaps some are trying to keep from me."
The blood surged into his very eyes and his hearing sharpened to points of acute pain. What would
she say next?
"Why don't you speak out frankly before it is too late? You need not think of me and of what people
will say." Her voice trembled.
Alfredo was suffering as he could not remember ever having suffered before. What people will say--
what will they not say? What don't they say when long engagements are broken almost on the eve of
the wedding?
"Yes," he said hesitatingly, diffidently, as if merely thinking aloud, "one tries to be fair--according to
his lights--but it is hard. One would like to be fair to one's self first. But that is too easy, one does not
dare--"
"What do you mean?" she asked with repressed violence. "Whatever my shortcomings, and no doubt
they are many in your eyes, I have never gone out of my way, of my place, to find a man."
Did she mean by this irrelevant remark that he it was who had sought her; or was that a covert attack
on Julia Salas?
"Esperanza--" a desperate plea lay in his stumbling words. "If you--suppose I--" Yet how could a mere
man word such a plea?
"If you mean you want to take back your word, if you are tired of--why don't you tell me you are tired
of me?" she burst out in a storm of weeping that left him completely shamed and unnerved.
The last word had been said.
---III---
s Alfredo Salazar leaned against the boat rail to watch the evening settling over the lake, he
wondered if Esperanza would attribute any significance to this trip of his. He was supposed to
be in Sta. Cruz whither the case of the People of the Philippine Islands vs. Belina et al had kept him,
and there he would have been if Brigida Samuy had not been so important to the defense. He had to
find that elusive old woman. That the search was leading him to that particular lake town which was
Julia Salas' home should not disturb him unduly. Yet he was disturbed to a degree utterly out of
proportion to the prosaicness of his errand. That inner tumult was no surprise to him; in the last eight
years he had become used to such occasional storms. He had long realized that he could not forget
Julia Salas. Still, he had tried to be content and not to remember too much. The climber of mountains
who has known the back-break, the lonesomeness, and the chill, finds a certain restfulness in level
paths made easy to his feet. He looks up sometimes from the valley where settles the dusk of evening,
but he knows he must not heed the radiant beckoning. Maybe, in time, he would cease even to look
up.
A