Noli Me Tángere

oña Consolacion

Why were the windows closed in the house of the alferez? Where
were the masculine features and the flannel camisa of the Medusa or
Muse of the Civil Guard while the procession was passing? Had Doña
Consolacion realized how disagreeable were her forehead seamed with
thick veins that appeared to conduct not blood but vinegar and gall,
and the thick cigar that made a fit ornament for her purple lips,
and her envious leer, and yielding to a generous impulse had she
wished not to disturb the pleasure of the populace by her sinister
appearance? Ah, for her generous impulses existed in the Golden
Age! The house, showed neither lanterns nor banners and was gloomy
precisely because the town was making merry, as Sinang said, and but
for the sentinel walking before the door appeared to be uninhabited.

A dim light shone in the disordered sala, rendering transparent
the dirty concha-panes on which the cobwebs had fastened and the
dust had become incrusted. The lady of the house, according to
her indolent custom, was dozing on a wide sofa. She was dressed as
usual, that is, badly and horribly: tied round her head a pañuelo,
from beneath which escaped thin locks of tangled hair, a camisa
of blue flannel over another which must once have been white, and
a faded skirt which showed the outlines of her thin, flat thighs,
placed one over the other and shaking feverishly. From her mouth
issued little clouds of smoke which she puffed wearily in whatever
direction she happened to be looking when she opened her eyes. If at
that moment Don Francisco de Cañamaque [107] could have seen her, he
would have taken her for a cacique of the town or the mankukúlam,
and then decorated his discovery with commentaries in the vernacular
of the markets, invented by him for her particular use.

That morning she had not attended mass, not because she had not so
desired, for on the contrary she had wished to show herself to the
multitude and to hear the sermon, but her spouse had not permitted
her to do so, his refusal being accompanied as usual by two or three
insults, oaths, and threats of kicking. The alferez knew that his
mate dressed ridiculously and had the appearance of what is known as a
"querida of the soldiers," so he did not care to expose her to the
gaze of strangers and persons from the capital. But she did not so
understand it. She knew that she was beautiful and attractive, that she
had the airs of a queen and dressed much better and with more splendor
than Maria Clara herself, who wore a tapis while she went in a flowing
skirt. It was therefore necessary for the alferez to threaten her,
"Either shut up, or I'll kick you back to your damned town!" Doña
Consolacion did not care to return to her town at the toe of a boot,
but she meditated revenge.

Never had the dark face of this lady been such as to inspire confidence
in any one, not even when she painted, but that morning it greatly
worried the servants, especially when they saw her move about the house
from one part to another, silently, as if meditating something terrible
or malign. Her glance reflected the look that springs from the eyes of
a serpent when caught and about to be crushed; it was cold, luminous,
and penetrating, with something fascinating, loathsome, and cruel in
it. The most insignificant error, the least unusual noise, drew from
her a vile insult that struck into the soul, but no one answered her,
for to excuse oneself would have been an additional fault.

So the day passed. Not encountering any obstacle that would block her
way,--her husband had been invited out,--she became saturated with
bile, the cells of her whole organism seemed to become charged with
electricity which threatened to burst in a storm of hate. Everything
about her folded up as do the flowers at the first breath of the
hurricane, so she met with no resistance nor found any point or high
place to discharge her evil humor. The soldiers and servants kept away
from her. That she might not hear the sounds of rejoicing outside she
had ordered the windows closed and charged the sentinel to let no one
enter. She tied a handkerchief around her head as if to keep it from
bursting and, in spite of the fact that the sun was still shining,
ordered the lamps to be lighted.

Sisa, as we saw, had been arrested as a disturber of the peace
and taken to the barracks. The alferez was not then present, so
the unfortunate woman had had to spend the night there seated on a
bench in an abandoned attitude. The next day the alferez saw her,
and fearing for her in those days of confusion nor caring to risk a
disagreeable scene, he had charged the soldiers to look after her,
to treat her kindly, and to give her something to eat. Thus the
madwoman spent two days.

Tonight, whether the nearness to the house of Capitan Tiago had brought
to her Maria Clara's sad song or whether other recollections awoke
in her old melodies, whatever the cause, Sisa also began to sing in a
sweet and melancholy voice the kundíman of her youth. The soldiers
heard her and fell silent; those airs awoke old memories of the days
before they had been corrupted. Doña Consolacion also heard them in her
tedium, and on learning who it was that sang, after a few moments of
meditation, ordered that Sisa be brought to her instantly. Something
like a smile wandered over her dry lips.

When Sisa was brought in she came calmly, showing neither wonder nor
fear. She seemed to see no lady or mistress, and this wounded the
vanity of the Muse, who endeavored to inspire respect and fear. She
coughed, made a sign to the soldiers to leave her, and taking down
her husband's whip, said to the crazy woman in a sinister tone,
"Come on, magcantar icau!" [108]

Naturally, Sisa did not understand such Tagalog, and this ignorance
calmed the Medusa's wrath, for one of the beautiful qualities of this
lady was to try not to know Tagalog, or at least to appear not to know
it. Speaking it the worst possible, she would thus give herself the
air of a genuine orofea, [109] as she was accustomed to say. But
she did well, for if she martyrized Tagalog, Spanish fared no better
with her, either in regard to grammar or pronunciation, in spite of
her husband, the chairs and the shoes, all of which had done what
they could to teach her.

One of the words that had cost her more effort than the hieroglyphics
cost Champollion was the name Filipinas. The story goes that on
the day after her wedding, when she was talking with her husband, who
was then a corporal, she had said Pilipinas. The corporal thought
it his duty to correct her, so he said, slapping her on the head,
"Say Felipinas, woman! Don't be stupid! Don't you know that's what
your damned country is called, from Felipe?"

The woman, dreaming through her honeymoon, wished to obey and said
Felepinas. To the corporal it seemed that she was getting nearer to
it, so he increased the slaps and reprimanded her thus: "But, woman,
can't you pronounce Felipe? Don't forget it; you know the king,
Don Felipe--the fifth--. Say Felipe, and add to it nas, which
in Latin means 'islands of Indians,' and you have the name of your
damned country!"

Consolacion, at that time a washerwoman, patted her bruises and
repeated with symptoms of losing her patience, "Fe-li-pe, Felipe--nas,
Fe-li-pe-nas, Felipinas, so?"

The corporal saw visions. How could it be Felipenas instead of
Felipinas? One of two things: either it was Felipenas or it was
necessary to say Felipi! So that day he very prudently dropped the
subject. Leaving his wife, he went to consult the books. Here his
astonishment reached a climax: he rubbed his eyes--let's see--slowly,
now! F-i-l-i-p-i-n-a-s, Filipinas! So all the well-printed books
gave it--neither he nor his wife was right!

"How's this?" he murmured. "Can history lie? Doesn't this book say that
Alonso Saavedra gave the country that name in honor of the prince,
Don Felipe? How was that name corrupted? Can it be that this Alonso
Saavedra was an Indian?" [110]

With these doubts he went to consult the sergeant Gomez, who, as
a youth, had wanted to be a curate. Without deigning to look at
the corporal the sergeant blew out a mouthful of smoke and answered
with great pompousness, "In ancient times it was pronounced Filipi
instead of Felipe. But since we moderns have become Frenchified we
can't endure two i's in succession, so cultured people, especially
in Madrid--you've never been in Madrid?--cultured people, as I say,
have begun to change the first i to e in many words. This is
called modernizing yourself."

The poor corporal had never been in Madrid--here was the cause of
his failure to understand the riddle: what things are learned in
Madrid! "So now it's proper to say--"

"In the ancient style, man! This country's not yet cultured! In the
ancient style, Filipinas!" exclaimed Gomez disdainfully.

The corporal, even if he was a bad philologist, was yet a good
husband. What he had just learned his spouse must also know, so he
proceeded with her education: "Consola, what do you call your damned
country?"

"What should I call it? Just what you taught me: Felifinas!"

"I'll throw a chair at you, you ----! Yesterday you pronounced it
even better in the modern style, but now it's proper to pronounce it
like an ancient: Feli, I mean, Filipinas!"

"Remember that I'm no ancient! What are you thinking about?"

"Never mind! Say Filipinas!"

"I don't want to. I'm no ancient baggage, scarcely thirty years
old!" she replied, rolling up her sleeves and preparing herself for
the fray.

"Say it, you ----, or I'll throw this chair at you!"

Consolacion saw the movement, reflected, then began to stammer with
heavy breaths, "Feli-, Fele-, File--"

Pum! Crack! The chair finished the word. So the lesson ended in
fisticuffs, scratchings, slaps. The corporal caught her by the hair;
she grabbed his goatee, but was unable to bite because of her loose
teeth. He let out a yell, released her and begged her pardon. Blood
began to flow, one eye got redder than the other, a camisa was torn
into shreds, many things came to light, but not Filipinas.

Similar incidents occurred every time the question of language came
up. The corporal, watching her linguistic progress, sorrowfully
calculated that in ten years his mate would have completely forgotten
how to talk, and this was about what really came to pass. When they
were married she still knew Tagalog and could make herself understood
in Spanish, but now, at the time of our story, she no longer spoke any
language. She had become so addicted to expressing herself by means
of signs--and of these she chose the loudest and most impressive--that
she could have given odds to the inventor of Volapuk.

Sisa, therefore, had the good fortune not to understand her, so
the Medusa smoothed out her eyebrows a little, while a smile of
satisfaction lighted up her face; undoubtedly she did not know Tagalog,
she was an orofea!

"Boy, tell her in Tagalog to sing! She doesn't understand me, she
doesn't understand Spanish!"

The madwoman understood the boy and began to sing the Song of
the Night. Doña Consolacion listened at first with a sneer, which
disappeared little by little from her lips. She became attentive, then
serious, and even somewhat thoughtful. The voice, the sentiment in the
lines, and the song itself affected her--that dry and withered heart
was perhaps thirsting for rain. She understood it well: "The sadness,
the cold, and the moisture that descend from the sky when wrapped in
the mantle of night," so ran the kundíman, seemed to be descending
also on her heart. "The withered and faded flower which during the
day flaunted her finery, seeking applause and full of vanity, at
eventide, repentant and disenchanted, makes an effort to raise her
drooping petals to the sky, seeking a little shade to hide herself and
die without the mocking of the light that saw her in her splendor,
without seeing the vanity of her pride, begging also that a little
dew should weep upon her. The nightbird leaves his solitary retreat,
the hollow of an ancient trunk, and disturbs the sad loneliness of
the open places--"

"No, don't sing!" she exclaimed in perfect Tagalog, as she rose with
agitation. "Don't sing! Those verses hurt me."

The crazy woman became silent. The boy ejaculated, "Abá! She talks
Tagalog!" and stood staring with admiration at his mistress, who,
realizing that she had given herself away, was ashamed of it, and as
her nature was not that of a woman, the shame took the aspect of rage
and hate; so she showed the door to the imprudent boy and closed it
behind him with a kick.

Twisting the whip in her nervous hands, she took a few turns around
the room, then stopping suddenly in front of the crazy woman, said
to her in Spanish, "Dance!" But Sisa did not move.

"Dance, dance!" she repeated in a sinister tone.

The madwoman looked at her with wandering, expressionless eyes, while
the alfereza lifted one of her arms, then the other, and shook them,
but to no purpose, for Sisa did not understand. Then she began to
jump about and shake herself, encouraging Sisa to imitate her. In
the distance was to be heard the music of the procession playing
a grave and majestic march, but Doña Consolacion danced furiously,
keeping other time to other music resounding within her. Sisa gazed at
her without moving, while her eyes expressed curiosity and something
like a weak smile hovered around her pallid lips: the lady's dancing
amused her. The latter stopped as if ashamed, raised the whip,--that
terrible whip known to thieves and soldiers, made in Ulango [111]
and perfected by the alferez with twisted wires,--and said, "Now it's
your turn to dance--dance!"

She began to strike the madwoman's bare feet gently with the
whip. Sisa's face drew up with pain and she was forced to protect
herself with her hands.

"Aha, now you're starting!" she exclaimed with savage joy, passing
from lento to allegro vivace.

The afflicted Sisa gave a cry of pain and quickly raised her foot.

"You've got to dance, you Indian--!" The whip swung and whistled.

Sisa let herself fall to the floor and placed both hands on her knees
while she gazed at her tormentor with wildly-staring eyes. Two sharp
cuts of the whip on her shoulder made her stand up, and it was not
merely a cry but a howl that the unfortunate woman uttered. Her thin
camisa was torn, her skin broken, and the blood was flowing.

The sight of blood arouses the tiger; the blood of her victim aroused
Doña Consolacion. "Dance, damn you, dance! Evil to the mother who
bore you!" she cried. "Dance, or I'll flog you to death!" She then
caught Sisa with one hand and, whipping her with the other, began to
dance about.

The crazy woman at last understood and followed the example by
swinging her arms about awkwardly. A smile of satisfaction curled
the lips of her teacher, the smile of a female Mephistopheles who
succeeds in getting a great pupil. There were in it hate, disdain,
jest, and cruelty; with a burst of demoniacal laughter she could not
have expressed more.

Thus, absorbed in the joy of the sight, she was not aware of the
arrival of her husband until he opened the door with a loud kick. The
alferez appeared pale and gloomy, and when he saw what was going on
he threw a terrible glance at his wife, who did not move from her
place but stood smiling at him cynically.

The alferez put his hand as gently as he could on the shoulder of
the strange dancer and made her stop. The crazy woman sighed and sank
slowly to the floor covered with her own blood.

The silence continued. The alferez breathed heavily, while his wife
watched him with questioning eyes. She picked up the whip and asked
in a smooth, soft voice, "What's the matter with you? You haven't
even wished me good evening."

The alferez did not answer, but instead called the boy and said to him,
"Take this woman away and tell Marta to get her some other clothes
and attend to her. You give her something to eat and a good bed. Take
care that she isn't ill-treated! Tomorrow she'll be taken to Señor
Ibarra's house."

Then he closed the door carefully, bolted it, and approached his
wife. "You're tempting me to kill you!" he exclaimed, doubling up
his fists.

"What's the matter with you?" she asked, rising and drawing away
from him.

"What's the matter with me!" he yelled in a voice of thunder, letting
out an oath and holding up before her a sheet of paper covered with
scrawls. "Didn't you write this letter to the alcalde saying that
I'm bribed to permit gambling, huh? I don't know why I don't beat
you to death."

"Let's see you! Let's see you try it if you dare!" she replied with
a jeering laugh. "The one who beats me to death has got to be more
of a man than you are!"

He heard the insult, but saw the whip. Catching up a plate from the
table, he threw it at her head, but she, accustomed to such fights,
dodged quickly and the plate was shattered against the wall. A cup
and saucer met with a similar fate.

"Coward!" she yelled; "you're afraid to come near me!" And to
exasperate him the more, she spat upon him.

The alferez went blind from rage and with a roar attempted to throw
himself upon her, but she, with astonishing quickness, hit him across
the face with the whip and ran hurriedly into an inner room, shutting
and bolting the door violently behind her. Bellowing with rage and
pain, he followed, but was only able to run against the door, which
made him vomit oaths.

"Accursed be your offspring, you sow! Open, open, or I'll break your
head!" he howled, beating the door with his hands and feet.

No answer was heard, but instead the scraping of chairs and trunks as
if she was building a barricade with the furniture. The house shook
under the kicks and curses of the alferez.

"Don't come in, don't come in!" called the sour voice inside. "If
you show yourself, I'll shoot you."

By degrees he appeared to become calm and contented himself with
walking up and down the room like a wild beast in its cage.

"Go out into the street and cool off your head!" the woman continued
to jeer at him, as she now seemed to have completed her preparations
for defense.

"I swear that if I catch you, even God won't save you, you old sow!"

"Yes, now you can say what you like. You didn't want me to go to
mass! You didn't let me attend to my religious duties!" she answered
with such sarcasm as only she knew how to use.

The alferez put on his helmet, arranged his clothing a little, and
went out with heavy steps, but returned after a few minutes without
making the least noise, having taken off his shoes. The servants,
accustomed to these brawls, were usually bored, but this novelty of the
shoes attracted their attention, so they winked to one another. The
alferez sat down quietly in a chair at the side of the Sublime Port
and had the patience to wait for more than half an hour.

"Have you really gone out or are you still there, old goat?" asked
the voice from time to time, changing the epithets and raising the
tone. At last she began to take away the furniture piece by piece. He
heard the noise and smiled.

"Boy, has your master gone out?" cried Doña Consolacion.

At a sign from the alferez the boy answered, "Yes, señora, he's
gone out."

A gleeful laugh was heard from her as she pulled back the bolt. Slowly
her husband arose, the door opened a little way--

A yell, the sound of a falling body, oaths, howls, curses, blows,
hoarse voices--who can tell what took place in the darkness of
that room?

As the boy went out into the kitchen he made a significant sign to
the cook, who said to him, "You'll pay for that."

"I? In any case the whole town will! She asked me if he had gone out,
not if he had come back!"