Have you ever thought about what fiction is? Probably, such a question may seem surprising: and so everything is clear. Every person throughout his life has to repeatedly create the works he needs for specific purposes - statements, autobiographies, dictations - using not gypsum or clay, not musical notes, not paints, but just a word. At the same time, almost every person will be very surprised if he is told that he thereby created a work of fiction, which is very different from visual art, music and sculpture making. However, everyone understands that a student's essay or dictation is fundamentally different from novels, short stories, news that are created by professional writers. In the works of professionals there is the most important difference - excogitation. But, oddly enough, in a school literature course, you don’t realize the full power of fiction. So using our website in your free time discover fiction for yourself. The Social Cancer by José Rizal (best love story novels in english TXT) 📖
- Author: José Rizal
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In regard to young Linares, that is another matter. When arranging for the trip to Spain, Doña Victorina had thought of having a Peninsular administrator, as she did not trust the Filipinos. Her husband bethought himself of a nephew of his in Madrid who was studying law and who was considered the brightest of the family. So they wrote to him, paying his passage in advance, and when the dream disappeared he was already on his way.
Such were the three persons who had just arrived. While they were partaking of a late breakfast, Padre Salvi came in. The Espadañas were already acquainted with him, and they introduced the blushing young Linares with all his titles.
As was natural, they talked of Maria Clara, who was resting and sleeping. They talked of their journey, and Doña Victorina exhibited all her verbosity in criticising the customs of the provincials,—their nipa houses, their bamboo bridges; without forgetting to mention to the curate her intimacy with this and that high official and other persons of “quality” who were very fond of her.
“If you had come two days ago, Doña Victorina,” put in Capitan Tiago during a slight pause, “you would have met his Excellency, the Captain-General. He sat right there.”
“What! How’s that? His Excellency here! In your house? No!”
“I tell you that he sat right there. If you had only come two days ago—”
“Ah, what a pity that Clarita did not get sick sooner!” she exclaimed with real feeling. Then turning to Linares, “Do you hear, cousin? His Excellency was here! Don’t you see now that De Espadaña was right when he told you that you weren’t going to the house of a miserable Indian? Because, you know, Don Santiago, in Madrid our cousin was the friend of ministers and dukes and dined in the house of Count El Campanario.”
“The Duke of La Torte, Victorina,” corrected her husband. [121]
“It’s the same thing. If you will tell me—”
“Shall I find Padre Damaso in his town?” interrupted Linares, addressing Padre Salvi. “I’ve been told that it’s near here.”
“He’s right here and will be over in a little while,” replied the curate.
“How glad I am of that! I have a letter to him,” exclaimed the youth, “and if it were not for the happy chance that brings me here, I would have come expressly to visit him.”
In the meantime the happy chance had awakened.
“De Espadaña,” said Doña Victorina, when the meal was over, “shall we go in to see Clarita?” Then to Capitan Tiago, “Only for you, Don Santiago, only for you! My husband only attends persons of quality, and yet, and yet—! He’s not like those here. In Madrid he only visited persons of quality.”
They adjourned to the sick girl’s chamber. The windows were closed from fear of a draught, so the room was almost dark, being only dimly illuminated by two tapers which burned before an image of the Virgin of Antipolo. Her head covered with a handkerchief saturated in cologne, her body wrapped carefully in white sheets which swathed her youthful form with many folds, under curtains of jusi and piña, the girl lay on her kamagon bed. Her hair formed a frame around her oval countenance and accentuated her transparent paleness, which was enlivened only by her large, sad eyes. At her side were her two friends and Andeng with a bouquet of tuberoses.
De Espadaña felt her pulse, examined her tongue, asked a few questions, and said, as he wagged his head from side to side, “S-she’s s-sick, but s-she c-can be c-cured.” Doña Victorina looked proudly at the bystanders.
“Lichen with milk in the morning, syrup of marshmallow, two cynoglossum pills!” ordered De Espadaña.
“Cheer up, Clarita!” said Doña Victorina, going up to her. “We’ve come to cure you. I want to introduce our cousin.”
Linares was so absorbed in the contemplation of those eloquent eyes, which seemed to be searching for some one, that he did not hear Doña Victorina name him.
“Señor Linares,” said the curate, calling him out of his abstraction, “here comes Padre Damaso.”
It was indeed Padre Damaso, but pale and rather sad. On leaving his bed his first visit was for Maria Clara. Nor was it the Padre Damaso of former times, hearty and self-confident; now he moved silently and with some hesitation.
Without heeding any of the bystanders, Padre Damaso went directly to the bed of the sick girl and taking her hand said to her with ineffable tenderness, while tears sprang into his eyes, “Maria, my daughter, you mustn’t die!”
The sick girl opened her eyes and stared at him with a strange expression. No one who knew the Franciscan had suspected in him such tender feelings, no one had believed that under his rude and rough exterior there might beat a heart. Unable to go on, he withdrew from the girl’s side, weeping like a child, and went outside under the favorite vines of Maria Clara’s balcony to give free rein to his grief.
“How he loves his goddaughter!” thought all present, while Fray Salvi gazed at him motionlessly and in silence, lightly gnawing his lips the while.
When he had become somewhat calm again Doña Victorina introduced Linares, who approached him respectfully. Fray Damaso silently looked him over from head to foot, took the letter offered and read it, but apparently without understanding, for he asked, “And who are you?”
“Alfonso Linares, the godson of your brother-in-law,” stammered the young man.
Padre Damaso threw back his body and looked the youth over again carefully. Then his features lighted up and he arose. “So you are the godson of Carlicos!” he exclaimed. “Come and let me embrace you! I got your letter several days ago. So it’s you! I didn’t recognize you,—which is easily explained, for you weren’t born when I left the country,—I didn’t recognize you!” Padre Damaso squeezed his robust arms about the young man, who became very red, whether from modesty or lack of breath is not known.
After the first moments of effusion had passed and inquiries about Carlicos and his wife had been made and answered, Padre Damaso asked, “Come now, what does Carlicos want me to do for you?”
“I believe he says something about that in the letter,” Linares again stammered.
“In the letter? Let’s see! That’s right! He wants me to get you a job and a wife. Ahem! A job, a job that’s easy! Can you read and write?”
“I received my degree of law from the University.”
“Carambas! So you’re a pettifogger! You don’t show it; you look more like a shy maiden. So much the better! But to get you a wife—”
“Padre, I’m not in such a great hurry,” interrupted Linares in confusion.
But Padre Damaso was already pacing from one end of the hallway to the other, muttering, “A wife, a wife!” His countenance was no longer sad or merry but now wore an expression of great seriousness, while he seemed to be thinking deeply. Padre Salvi gazed on the scene from a distance.
“I didn’t think that the matter would trouble me so much,” murmured Padre Damaso in a tearful voice. “But of two evils, the lesser!” Then raising his voice he approached Linares and said to him, “Come, boy, let’s talk to Santiago.”
Linares turned pale and allowed himself to be dragged along by the priest, who moved thoughtfully. Then it was Padre Salvi’s turn to pace back and forth, pensive as ever.
A voice wishing him good morning drew him from his monotonous walk. He raised his head and saw Lucas, who saluted him humbly.
“What do you want?” questioned the curate’s eyes.
“Padre, I’m the brother of the man who was killed on the day of the fiesta,” began Lucas in tearful accents.
The curate recoiled and murmured in a scarcely audible voice, “Well?”
Lucas made an effort to weep and wiped his eyes with a handkerchief. “Padre,” he went on tearfully, “I’ve been to Don Crisostomo to ask for an indemnity. First he received me with kicks, saying that he wouldn’t pay anything since he himself had run the risk of getting killed through the fault of my dear, unfortunate brother. I went to talk to him yesterday, but he had gone to Manila. He left me five hundred pesos for charity’s sake and charged me not to come back again. Ah, Padre, five hundred pesos for my poor brother—five hundred pesos! Ah, Padre—”
At first the curate had listened with surprise and attention while his lips curled slightly with a smile of such disdain and sarcasm at the sight of this farce that, had Lucas noticed it, he would have run away at top speed. “Now what do you want?” he asked, turning away.
“Ah, Padre, tell me for the love of God what I ought to do. The padre has always given good advice.”
“Who told you so? You don’t belong in these parts.”
“The padre is known all over the province.”
With irritated looks Padre Salvi approached him and pointing to the street said to the now startled Lucas, “Go home and be thankful that Don Crisostomo didn’t have you sent to jail! Get out of here!”
Lucas forgot the part he was playing and murmured, “But I thought—”
“Get out of here!” cried Padre Salvi nervously.
“I would like to see Padre Damaso.”
“Padre Damaso is busy. Get out of here!” again ordered the curate imperiously.
Lucas went down the stairway muttering, “He’s another of them—as he doesn’t pay well—the one who pays best!”
At the sound of the curate’s voice all had hurried to the spot, including Padre Damaso, Capitan Tiago, and Linares.
“An insolent vagabond who came to beg and who doesn’t want to work,” explained Padre Salvi, picking up his hat and cane to return to the convento.
Long days and weary nights passed at the sick girl’s bed. After having confessed herself, Maria Clara had suffered a relapse, and in her delirium she uttered only the name of the mother whom she had never known. But her girl friends, her father, and her aunt kept watch at her side. Offerings and alms were sent to all the miraculous images, Capitan Tiago vowed a gold cane to the Virgin of Antipolo, and at length the fever began to subside slowly and regularly.
Doctor De Espadaña was astonished at the virtues of the syrup of marshmallow and the infusion of lichen, prescriptions that he had not varied. Doña Victorina was so pleased with her husband that one day when he stepped on the train of her gown she did not apply her penal code to the extent of taking his set of false teeth away from him, but contented herself with merely exclaiming, “If you weren’t lame you’d even step on my corset!”—an article of apparel she did not wear.
One afternoon while Sinang and Victoria were visiting their friend, the curate, Capitan Tiago, and Doña Victorina’s family were conversing over their lunch in the dining-room.
“Well, I feel very sorry about it,” said the doctor; “Padre Damaso also will regret it very much.”
“Where do you say they’re transferring him to?” Linares asked the curate.
“To the province of Tayabas,” replied the curate negligently.
“One who will be greatly affected by it is Maria Clara, when she learns of it,” said Capitan Tiago. “She loves him like a father.”
Fray Salvi looked at him askance.
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