CHAPTER II
HOW THE CORPORAL WENT BACK TO SPAIN
For six months the tao of the district talked of Felizardo, the man who had slain a priest; then, as nothing more had been heard of the outlaw, and a new band of ladrones had been formed in the neighbourhood of Calocan, the centre of interest shifted, and the crime at San Polycarpio, if not forgotten, at least ceased to be discussed.
The tao knew nothing about Father Pablo’s connection with the band of the late Cinicio Dagujob—the Church had seen to that fact being suppressed—but the corporal knew, in fact he had been the first to suspect it, and he took the information across to Don José Ramirez.
“This Pablo was a mestizo,” he said. “You knew him, I suppose. No? A big scoundrel, gross and burly. I wonder why the Church will allow natives to be priests. I am sure the Holy Father cannot know. Some day, perhaps, I may have the chance of telling him, if I get back to Spain. A villain, that Pablo; but still your Felizardo was wrong to kill him. Nothing can save him now. I told you that night, even after we found how splendidly he had boloed those ladrones, that he would not come back. I was right, of course. Have I not been thirty years in these accursed Islands, and if I do not know the Filipinos, who should know them, Senor? A fine fighter, that Felizardo. Had he been in our native troops, he would have risen high. And now, because he is a savage at heart, he has become a ladrone.”
Don José sighed—there had been a romance and a tragedy in his own life, many years before, in Spain. “No, corporal. He went because he loved one woman too well to leave her to some one else.”
The corporal twisted his moustache. “Therein he was a savage, as I said before. He got one idea in his mind, and he could not forget it, not having room for two. I have loved women, Senor, and women have loved me, many of them; but as for turning highwayman, or at least outlaw, for the sake of one—pouf!” He shook his head with a great assumption of scorn.
“I see.” Don José smiled. They had been friends for many years, these two, and he knew the story of the girl in Spain whom the other had gone back to marry—and found dead; therefore, he always listened patiently to those stories of subsequent love affairs, none of which ever had the slightest foundation in fact. “I see,” he repeated. “Then you think a man should have as many wives as he can get, like a Moor or a Chino?”
“No, no”—the corporal frowned—“the Church would not allow that, only—well,” he got up rather hastily. “I was forgetting the time. I must be off. After thirty years’ service in these accursed Islands, one must not begin to neglect one’s duty, Senor.” At the door he stopped and looked back. “Think no more of your Felizardo, Don José. He will never return; and, if he did, we should have to hang him. A fine fighter, certainly—but, to kill a priest!”