When the Elephants Dance (52 page)

“Yesterday afternoon, señor.” The friar stepped forward. His eyes surveyed my polished shoes, my silk trousers and matching vest.

“Yesterday!” I shouted. “And you only thought to report this transgression this morning? These people were with me yesterday, Padre. Can you explain how your money came to be in their hands? Or will you accuse me, too?”

Friar De Guzman became immediately flustered. He took out his wooden rosary beads and began to feel each sphere. I was not sure of their innocence
until that moment when the friar could not find his tongue. His eyes opened wide, emphasizing the dark rings under his bulging eyes. He struggled over his next words. “Perhaps I am mistaken. It was growing dark, you see.”

“Yes, I suspect it would be dark in the taverns. I have seen you praying there on several occasions. Possibly you lost your coins in your ale, Padre.” It was a statement, not a question. I noticed then that the toad stole glances at Divina, hungry ones that even I could feel. Divina rubbed her arms, moving away from his leering look, and edged closer to me. I stepped in front of his vision.

His attention snapped back to me. “Possibly, Señor Basa. As I said, it was growing dark.” He looked away with effort and stared at the ground, but not before he touched Divina’s breasts with his eyes.

I addressed the constable. “Captain, how do you expect my servants to do my work now that you have injured their hands?”

“Señor Basa, this is a terrible mistake.” The constable’s mustache twitched. He pulled out his own purse. “Here, señor, please take this. I feel terrible. Will that cover the cost for their time until their hands heal?”

I looked at the friar. “That and the promise that I will never come here on such a fool’s errand again.”

“Done, Señor Basa. Again my apologies.” The constable bowed.

Friar De Guzman bowed his head. “Our apologies, señor. There is no need to fear, Divina, your father and brother are safe, you see? I shall say a prayer to ask for the swift recovery of their hands.” The friar reached out quickly and brushed her hand, speaking in a whispery, sniveling voice.

He made to reach for her again, but I moved his hand away. “Say a prayer for your own soul.”

I ushered the boy and his father to our
kalesa
. I could feel the friar’s eyes boring into the back of my head as we left. Probably praying for a torturous death for me. Of course, I thought with amusement, his prayer had to stand in line behind the Jacinto-Basa curse.

The noon sky had softened to a powder blue, and the ocean was silver. The colors melded until they were one with the horizon. Divina watched me quietly on the ride back. Her father had thanked me once with deep gravity and then collapsed in exhaustion to sleep. His head bounced with every jolt of the carriage. The boy, too, had fallen asleep under his father’s arm. “The padre does not like to be challenged. This will be bad for you, Señor Basa?” she asked.

“Such concern from my best enemy?” I joked.

“I never said you were my enemy.” She looked away to the emerald-colored leaves of the banana trees that bowed and lifted as we passed. “Your countrymen, they will trouble you after this?” There was such dignity and solemnity in
her almond eyes. The sun filtered through the trees and danced shadows on her golden skin, her full lips.

“So we are friends now?” I asked.

“I never said friends.” She looked away, but I could see the traces of a smile begin at the corners of her lips.

W
HEN WE ARRIVED
at her house, her brother Virgil rushed to open the door. Her mother came out and fell to her knees, hugging my ankles. Virgil moved past his mother in irritation, his eyes counting first his father, then their younger brother, and then Divina. I watched as relief flooded his face. I braced myself for another confrontation with him, but to my surprise, he seemed almost apologetic. “
Gracias.…”
He nodded to me. Thank you.

“De nada
.” I inclined my head. It is nothing.

“This was Padre De Guzman’s doing? The joy it would give me to burn down his precious church.” His eyes were dark with revenge. I had seen that look too many times on my own brother to mistake it.

“Do not let your anger misguide you, my friend.”

“It is time you go home, amigo.” He looked straight at me and then beyond, to the cloudless sky and the birds circling in the distance.

“I still have much work to do. I will decide when it is time to leave.”

We locked eyes once again, then Virgil seemed to sigh and he walked out onto the road.

“Virgil,” his mother called out. She clutched her skirts, the green veins of her hands bloated from the effort, watching as he walked down the road, worry etched in the deep grooves of her tanned brow.

D
IVINA SAT VERY
still for me that afternoon, and every now and then I caught her watching my face. When we took a siesta, I kept my hands limber by sketching the image of the priest with his deceitful eyes. I mimicked the desperation and fear I had witnessed in her father’s face. The image haunted me, for I had never seen such a look. It was one born of hate and dwindling pride, of protectiveness toward the younger boy, and of pleading. I became so obsessed with the drawing that I did not notice when her mother stepped out into the garden. I had been so preoccupied, I was surprised to find the position of the sun was now in descent. The horizon was brilliant. It was as if someone had borrowed the soft pink of the flowers that lined the roadside and brushed it with romantic strokes across the pale blue.

She arrived with fried bananas made just for me. I took them.
“Gracias
.” I nodded.

“Salamat,”
Divina said, watching me.

“¿Qué?”
I asked. What?

“In our language you say
‘salamat’
to thank someone.”

“Salamat,”
I said to the mother, who smiled and covered her mouth. I heard as she hurried into the house to recount what I had said.

Divina studied me, and I followed the soft lines of her shoulders, the straight, delicate posture of her back. “Have you changed the sketch, señor?” She gestured to her portrait, which I had set aside on the chair.

“Just a few sketches,” I mumbled, placing a cover over the image I had drawn of her father and the friar. “I was working on an idea, a concept.”

She did not let me finish my explanation. She reached out and pulled the cover away. I watched as her eyes narrowed in fascination. “You see the padre as I do,” she said in wonder.

“I was distracted by this morning’s events.” I stood, tipping the chair backward, and pulled the cover down again. I began to pack my brushes.

W
HEN
I
STOOD
to leave, I passed the father’s room and watched as the man stared helplessly at his hands. Beside him, the boy lay asleep on a mat, his hair matted in perspiration, grinding his teeth as he dreamed.

I knocked softly against the wall. “Señor,” I said, my voice gruff.

“Sí
.” The father stood, bowing to me. I fumbled in my pockets and took out the purse the captain had given me. I had intended to donate it to another church with a more trustworthy priest, but instead I held it out to the father. “Take this.”

“Salamat,”
the father said. Then, realizing he had spoken Tagalog instead of Spanish.
“Gracias
.”

I nodded, moving past him to leave. As I reached the door, a Filipino of my age entered. He regarded me with level eyes, and we nodded to each other. I noticed the flowers in his hand and glanced in time to see Divina coming down the hallway in a fresh cotton dress. I could feel my hands tingle and an angry heat take over my face. I swung the door open harshly and heard her call out to me.

“Señor Fredrico …” Her delicate sandals skipped on the floor. She stopped, breathless, as I stood in the doorway.

“You should have worn this dress for the portrait. Why did you not tell me you had such clothes?”

“I wanted to thank you again. What you did was …” She searched my face for the right words, and I was caught in those eyes. I wanted to remain there in her sights. “What you did was honorable.”

I inclined my head. “I must go.”

“Of course,” she said, and took a step back.

Her mother was standing in the hallway, and she heard our exchange. “Señora,” I called her over.

“Yes, Señor Basa?”

“Tell Manuel when he arrives that I wish to start on foot. I wish to stretch my legs. I have been sitting too long today. I will stick to the main road; have him come find me.”

O
N MY WALK
I remembered the younger boy’s hands, both broken. I thought of the father and the expression of worry he wore, even after I had given him the money. I had never known that desperation.

You are overwrought; these things occur
, I told myself. It was as I was reasoning this that I came upon Divina’s older brother and his friends on the roadside. They carried sticks for burning. And I remembered his comment regarding the church.

Virgil was speaking to one of the loudmouths who had pestered me with his taunts the first day I was at their home.

The loudmouth laughed with amazement. “We have been blessed. Look, the bastard approaches. Come, let us show him how it feels to have his hands broken so he can no longer paint.” The man gestured the group forward. He walked with a fake confidence and with maliciousness in his eyes.

I placed my belongings on the ground, never taking my eyes from the approaching band.

Virgil spoke. “Roland, stop. He is under my protection.”

“I do not need your protection,” I spat, counting the number of men and watching that no one walked behind me without my notice. There were eight of them. I would go down fighting, and I would not forget a face.

Virgil locked eyes with the loudmouthed Roland. “He stopped the friar from hurting my family.”

A loud murmur went through the group.

“Why did you not mention this earlier?” Roland asked with accusation.

“Since when do I answer to you?” Virgil answered with equal venom. “I am the leader of this group.”

“Enough of this rambling, are we to fight or not? “I demanded.

Virgil chuckled at my audacity. “Go home. Consider us even in our debts.”

“Virgil, I know you are angry at the friar.” I looked at their sticks. “But you must not do this.”

“This is none of your concern. You see only what happened today. That this friar insulted my father, that he hurt his hands and those of my brother. You see nothing of the other injustices. The chiseling down of our souls. The taking of our land, of our women. How do you think it feels to be a beggar in your own country? Where once we were powerful chieftains and generous hosts. Do you think it is a good thing for my brother to see his father helpless to stop his beating, or the roving eye that the friar has for his sister? Each meeting he looks at Divina more boldly than the last. There is nothing to keep him from taking her.”

“But that is one man, Virgil. One friar. I have fixed the situation. He dares not lift a hand against any I have named my servants.”

Virgil shook his head in disbelief. “An enemy of one friar is an enemy of the whole. You do not know the power they have. They have poisoned the spiritual mind of the Filipinos with their teachings. My people fear to raise a hand against them. They fear that God Himself will strike them down, that He is on the side of the friars.”

“The Filipinos were in need of guidance. They needed religion.”

“We had our own religions.”

“Paganism, praying to false idols.”

“Who is to say the God we prayed to is not one and the same? Go home, Spaniard. You do not wish to know what I am telling you. We are enslaved to you.”

“I see no chains.”

“Ha, for three hundred years you have chained us spiritually with your religion. Your friars pound it into our minds. But think of this, Spaniard. Why do they teach us so much of the Bible, and nothing of the Spanish language? It is because they wish to cripple us spiritually but keep us ignorant of the laws. Because changes are made within the law.”

“Virgil, burning the church will not endear the Spanish government to hearing your pleas. Violence will only bring violence back to your family. Is this what you wish?”

“There is no other way,” he said. His eyes were deeply sad, and I felt his grief.

“There are many ways, but do not confuse what you hope to accomplish with your personal anger. It will only muddy things.” I held out my hands placatingly The air had grown cold, and I could see their fire was waning.

Roland could feel it, too, and he cut our conversation short. “Virgil, enough. So he did your family a favor. He knows nothing of our cause. Too long we have had no voice. Tonight we speak out.”

I was at the end of my patience with this man. But I knew that to dismiss him would be to dismiss myself. I pleaded once again with Virgil. “Your cause is one thing. You can find a voice, you can write to Spain if you feel there are injustices being done. But this, these plans of burning down a house of God is a personal vendetta. I will say it again. Do not mix the two.”

“And if we write to this government, we shall be heard?” Virgil asked.

“It is worth a try.”

Virgil contemplated the sun as it descended. His eyes roamed to the tree-tops, where the golden rays were fading. Behind us, the moon was full and rising. He was strongly built, with wide shoulders and muscled calves. He wore cotton pants drawn by a string that stopped just above his ankles. The color had long ago faded into a vague gray. His shirt was nothing more than a gentleman’s undershirt, a size too large, the neckline pouting outward in the back.

“Let us think on this matter.”

“But Virgil, we are here. We are ready.” Roland put a frustrated hand through his hair, then crossed them and tucked them under his armpits. “You let a Spaniard interfere with our plans.”

“The church will still be there to burn in the morning,” Virgil replied. “I will hear more of what Señor Basa has to say.”

The group dispersed, their allegiance to Virgil evident. Roland threw the stick aside, but not before he fixed me with a tremendous scowl. I was not one to take such a look, but I did. I decided that this was more important.