“You’re not going!” said Santiago in amazement. “Maria Clara and her friends will be with us in a moment. What shall I say to her?”
“That I was obliged to go,” said Ibarra, “and that I’m coming early in the morning.” And he went out.
The Franciscan unburdened himself.
“You saw his arrogance,” he said to the blond provincial. “These young fellows won’t take reproof from a priest. That comes of sending them to Europe. The Government ought to prohibit it.”
That night the young provincial added to his “Colonial Studies,” this paragraph: “In the Philippines, the least important person at a feast is he who gives it. You begin by showing your host to the door, and all goes merrily.... In the present state of affairs, it would be almost a kindness to prohibit young Filipinos from leaving their country, if not even from learning to read.”
IV.
Heretic and Filibuster.
Ibarra stood outside the house of Captain Tiago. The night wind, which at this season brings a bit of freshness to Manila, seemed to blow away the cloud that had darkened his face. Carriages passed him like streaks of light, hired calashes rolled slowly by, and foot-passengers of all nationalities jostled one another. With the rambling gait of the preoccupied or the idle, he took his way toward the Plaza de Binondo. Nothing was changed. It was the same street, with the same blue and white houses, the same white walls with their slate-colored fresco, poor imitations of granite. The church tower showed the same clock with transparent face. The Chinese shop had the same soiled curtains, the same iron triangles. One day, long ago, imitating the street urchins of Manila, he had twisted one of these triangles: nobody had ever straightened it. “How little progress!” he murmured; and he followed the Calle de la Sacristia, pursued by the cry of sherbet venders.
“Marvellous!” he thought; “one would say my voyage was a dream. Santo Dios! the street is as bad as when I went away.”