Fiesta

By Bobby Flores Villasis

Characters (in order of appearance)

MANUEL BAROY, husky and dark, about 24.
SOLING BAROY, his mother, not quite 40 but looking old beyond her age.
CORITO, about 20, with distinctive Spanish features.
INES RAGADA, in her forties, confined in a wheelchair; she wears long sleeves and a high collar to hide burn scars, some of which are visible on her cheeks.
LUCIA SOLON, about 40, dressed in black.

BAYAWAN TOWN IN THE 1960s. The play’s single scene is set in the back terrace of the Ragada house. A low balustrade breaks at right, to allow low steps to lead up from a side lawn, and breaks wider stage center where more low steps descend to the lawn. Downstage right behind a concrete bench is a group of potted palmeras, wilting. Downstage left a pathway leads off to a basement room not seen. Doors at left of terrace open into the house. Against the cyclo is a row of glass windows to show thin curtains behind it and sufficient space for two performers to enact the lovemaking scene towards end of play. About the place is a suggestion of oldness. A branch with withered leaves may be flown at left, and other potted flowers, also withered, may be placed along the balustrade to promote the impression of wilting and heat.

The play opens about mid-afternoon. Gradual light change is used to indicate passage of time so that the play ends up early evening.

MANUEL appears at doorway, bare-chested and sweating, carrying a potted palmera which he sets down among the others by the bench. He snatches a soiled-looking rag from a back pocket and mops his face with it. SOLING enters with a tray on which are a plate of pastries, a cup of coffee, a glass of iced water.

SOLING Manuel — ?

MANUEL Yes, Mama?

SOLING (Coming to edge of terrace.) Did you get the one outside her door?

MANUEL It’s here. Deader than the others. I think the plants die each time she looks at them.

SOLING It’s this heat.

MANUEL Everyone else decorates for fiesta. She makes the house bare and locks the door.

SOLING You sound surprised when that’s what happens every year. Now see that you didn’t leave dirt on the planters.

MANUEL I wiped the planters, Mama. (Shows her the rag.)

SOLING Are you sure? You know how Nyora Ines is.

MANUEL Yes. Always looking for something to get angry about.

SOLING There’s nothing we can do about that except —

MANUEL — avoid giving her a reason to be angry. (Hops up the steps and takes a bit of pastry.)

SOLING Manuel! I’m taking this to Nyora Ines!

MANUEL Ah, fiesta at the Ragadas!

SOLING Go and get your food in the kitchen.

MANUEL (Takes the glass and gulps down the water.) Ah, fiesta at the Ragadas! Go and get your food in the kitchen! Fried bananas and salted fish!

SOLING Put that glass back. I’m not even sure we have ice left.

MANUEL You can always send me back to Tio Vito.

SOLING So you can loiter by the church again? Is Corito still there?

MANUEL Yes, Mama.

SOLING I told her not to take too long, silly girl!

MANUEL Ooops! That silly girl is still going to be your daughter-in-law!

SOLING Ay, Manuel. How you can dream —

MANUEL It’s true. I can feel it.

SOLING I can also feel that although she has no Ragada blood she is the one who will inherit when Nyora Ines goes, and that Nyora Ines will never allow Corito to marry you because, as I have reminded you so many times before, we are what we are.

MANUEL Slaves.

SOLING Servants. There’s a difference.

MANUEL Not to Nyora Ines.

SOLING So stay away from that silly girl. Now put that back.

MANUEL I didn’t swallow the ice. (Puts glass back on the tray.) You can fill it with water again. She’ll never know.

SOLING She’ll know. Look at that! You left your fingerprints on the glass. (Sets tray down on the balustrade, takes a rag from her own pocket and wipes the glass.) And I was just telling you we should not give her a reason to be angry!

MANUEL Why are we so afraid of that witch?

SOLING Ssshhh. You must be crazy. You want her to send you away again?

MANUEL Let her. She’ll just have me called back the next day, like that last time. Who’s going to carry her up and down these steps, just you and Corito?

SOLING Where is that silly girl? I told her to be sure and get back before her aunt takes her bath! You two have a way of getting me into trouble!

MANUEL She’s just by the convent, helping with the carosas.

SOLING It’s all the same! Nyora Ines forbids us to go there!

MANUEL Why does she hate Father Ben so much?

SOLING She hasn’t met Father Ben at all. It’s the church. I don’t know. When Padre Paulo was parish priest she was in and out of church and convent as though she lived there. Then she went away, to Spain, and when she came back there was the fire, then she went away again and returned with Corito — I’m worried, Manuel. Maybe you should go and tell that girl to come home at once. No, Nyora Ines will think you’ve been out together and —

MANUEL Nyora Ines this! Nyora Ines that! Mama, let’s leave this house.

SOLING Have you been drinking?

MANUEL We’ll take Corito with us. Away from here.

SOLING It’s the heat. I think it has touched you in the head!

MANUEL Mama.

SOLING Don’t even think of it. (Thinks.) Where would we go?

MANUEL Our house.

SOLING That pile of charcoal beside the convent? You know we haven’t had a house of our own since that fire —

MANUEL We still have that land. We can build again —

SOLING With what?

MANUEL (Pause.) Let’s sell the land and leave Bayawan!

SOLING Ay, Manuel. Such dreams —

MANUEL We can’t stay in this town forever! We’re nothing here but servants to Nyora Ines until we die!

SOLING This has been our home for almost twenty years!

MANUEL You call this hell a home?

SOLING I call it paying a debt.

MANUEL Twenty years now and we’re still paying. What do we owe her, our lives?

SOLING Something like that. When we lost the house and your father together in that fire, it was only Nyora Ines who remembered we would be in need. Salvador’s friends were poor. I had none. Except Lucia. At least I thought she was a friend —

MANUEL I remember Lucia. She used to come down the back stairs of the convent to give me cakes and fruit. She was beautiful —

SOLING A painted woman. Used to bring Padre Paulo’s laundry down to me. Nyora Ines would get so angry about the way Lucia seemed to run the convent as though she owned it —

MANUEL She would lean over the fence and I could smell her perfume —

SOLING Just another whore. Padre Paulo’s mistress, Nyora Ines said.

MANUEL She was beautiful. I wonder where she is now?

SOLING We never knew where she was from. Lived in a rented room at the Morados. We were her family in Bayawan, she would say. Taught me to cook Spanish dishes, what Padre Paulo liked. After the fire she just left, didn’t even bother about us, huddled in the church like beggars. But Nyora Ines — even as she suffered in the hospital, her legs broken, and those terrible burns — she had money sent to us so we could bury your father, and buy food while I looked after this house —

MANUEL You worked for that money —

SOLING We have not been without food and beds since then.

MANUEL I know.

SOLING Do you know what we can repay that kindness with?

MANUEL You don’t need to ask. You know very well there’s been nothing in our pockets for almost twenty years except rags.

SOLING In our pockets, Manuel. Not on our backs.

MANUEL Mama, I don’t want to see you die a servant!

SOLING Let me worry about how I will die. Right now don’t give me any more worries. Stay away from Corito.

MANUEL Corito is alive. Everything else in this hell is burning up. Drying up. Dying.

SOLING You know, that’s what I was thinking while the convent burned and they said your father was still inside. I felt our world had become ashes. But —

(A tiny bell tinkles within. SOLING starts.)

Nyora Ines will be out of her room soon. Don’t let her catch you sitting around. Go and chop wood.

MANUEL I’ve chopped wood. Enough to last you a week.

SOLING Fetch water, then —

MANUEL The jars are full, Mama. It took hours. I think the pump is going dry.

SOLING It’s this heat.

MANUEL I’m going out to Ramon’s well for a bath. I’m joining the procession —

SOLING Nyora Ines will not let you!

MANUEL Mama, it’s fiesta! Besides, that witch doesn’t own my life.

SOLING You know, Manuel, you and Corito are just — (Bell tinkles more urgently.) I better take this in. (Exits.)

(MANUEL sits on the steps, fans himself with the rag, rises, glances around, thrusts the rag back into a pocket and crosses to palmeras just as CORITO sneaks up the steps from the side lawn. MANUEL stands behind the plants, unzips and starts to relieve himself in the same instant CORITO spots him over the balustrade. She steps back, fidgets with a handkerchief until MANUEL is through.)

CORITO (Pretends to have just seen him.) Manuel — you’ve brought out the plants.

MANUEL Y — yes, I — uh — I was just watering them.

(They break into laughter. CORITO glances at the door, comes down the steps and joins MANUEL on the bench.)

CORITO You’re all wet!

MANUEL Yes. (Takes out the rag.) It’s hot, the pots were heavy. (Starts to wipe his chest.)

CORITO (Gives him her handkerchief.) You could have waited for later. It’s cooler by sundown.

MANUEL (Wipes his chest with her handkerchief.) I didn’t want to be late for the procession. (Gives her the handkerchief, she wipes his back.) I’ll meet you behind the convent?

CORITO I haven’t told Tita Ines about the procession. I don’t know how to tell her I’m going. What do I say?

MANUEL Tell her the truth.

CORITO She’ll never let me go.

MANUEL I mean about us.

CORITO You must be mad! You know what happened last February when she caught us coming home from the dance?

MANUEL February…that time we danced so far apart no one knew we were dancing together?

CORITO Manuel —

MANUEL Look. Nyora Ines can die screaming at me. I don’t care.

CORITO Perhaps someday she’ll change her mind about you.

MANUEL After twenty years? Corito — let me take care of you. Let’s go away.

CORITO I — I don’t know —

(MANUEL gives her a quick peck on the cheek.)

Stop that! Someone will see us.

MANUEL It’s fiesta! Everyone’s entitled to some fun! (Tries to embrace her.)

CORITO (Springing away.) No! (Sits on the steps.)

MANUEL Alright, I’ll go to the procession alone. I’m sure some pretty girl will want someone like me to keep the wind from blowing out her candle, and then

CORITO And then — ?

MANUEL And then when we walk down Independencia — (Moving closer.) — there are many stones on Independencia, you see, so she will want me to hold on to her arm and see that she doesn’t stumble in her new high heels, and then —

CORITO And then — ?

MANUEL (Beside her.) And then, when we turn up Marina — you know, where there are many trees — she will be afraid, and she will want me to protect her, and then she will say, let’s rest for a while, in the dark, and then — (Gives her a quick kiss on the cheek.)

CORITO There! (Gives him a playful slap.) You maniac.

MANUEL Let’s go to my room.

CORITO No.

MANUEL Mama will still be scrubbing the old woman right now. We’ll be out before they know it.

CORITO Don’t be crude.

MANUEL I know. I’ve been sweating. After a bath then?

CORITO Is that all you think about?

MANUEL Looking at you, what else? The way Father Ben was watching you this afternoon I’m sure even he —

CORITO Now you’re being obscene!

(MANUEL sits back on the steps.)

Don’t make me angry. You’re the only friend I have.

MANUEL Friend! Ha!

CORITO I mean — you know, someone to trust, someone to talk to —

MANUEL Tio Vito’s dog has new puppies. I’ll get you one.

CORITO One of these days I think I’ll just stop talking to you.

MANUEL You can start now. After all, it’s fiesta. After all, everyone else is having fun. But you wouldn’t know what that is. Nyora Ines never taught you. I don’t think she knows either.

CORITO You really should stop talking that way about my aunt. If she hadn’t been in Barcelona at the time my parents died I wouldn’t be here at all. I wish I could see their pictures. But Tita Ines says I’ll have to wait until she dies. I guess she’s right. It wouldn’t be good for me to feel for people long dead, people I don’t really know. I wonder how Mama looked.

MANUEL As beautiful as you, of course.

CORITO I know what she might look like. I saw her in church this afternoon.

MANUEL Your mother?

CORITO No — it’s how I imagine my mother might have looked — this woman at the church this afternoon — tall and proud, skin like milk, hair like honey when the sun touches it. I didn’t see her eyes. She was wearing dark glasses. But I felt she would be kind. She was dressed in black. So glamorous. Like a movie star, the girls said. We all felt like beggars.

MANUEL Who is she?

CORITO No one knew. We never saw her before. She came out of the church, then she walked slowly past the convent, looking at it. I think she looked at me, once, and then again, as though she knew me, and then she stood by the fence, just stood there staring at the dirt and the dry grass where your house used to be…

MANUEL Where did she go?

CORITO She was still there when I left the girls. Someone’s visitor, I guess. It’s fiesta. Strange, but I felt she was — searching —

MANUEL Probably for me.

CORITO Why should she?

MANUEL Probably one of those women, you know, that kind. After all, it’s fiesta. I wonder if she’s already found a customer.

CORITO Oh, you — beast! (Chases him on the lawn, with much playfulness: this is one of their favorite games. CORITO finally lands a pinch just as INES RAGADA, waving a buri fan, wheels into the terrace. She is stunned, picks up a small bell from the seat, and flings it at the laughing pair.)

CORITO (Startled, breaks away right as MANUEL backs off left.) Tita Ines — we were just —

INES I saw what you were doing, chasing that garbage around like a pig in heat! Shameless!

MANUEL I’m not garbage and we were not doing anything wrong!

(SOLING appears at doorway.)

CORITO (To MANUEL.) Go!

INES Don’t you have anything better to do? What do I feed you for? So you can play around my lawn and service this bitch?

MANUEL Did you hear that? That is what you mean by obscene!

CORITO Just go! (Sees SOLING.) Nanay Soling — !

SOLING Manuel —

MANUEL I’m going! You think I can stay and listen to that?

INES Imbecile!

CORITO Manuel, please —

INES You don’t beg animals! You kick them away! Wait a minute — why are you all dressed up like that?

(CORITO is not sure what to answer.)

You’re not going anywhere, you hear? Look at that dress! People will think you’re a whore!

CORITO I’m going to change now. (Goes up the terrace.)

INES You’re wearing shoes!

CORITO Yes, Tita Ines.

INES Where did you come from?

CORITO I — (After a while.) The convent. We decorated the carosas for —

INES Come here.

(CORITO approaches her slowly. INES slaps her on the face. CORITO is flung to the floor.)

MANUEL Witch! (Rushes up the steps.) Don’t touch her!

(As he comes within her reach, INES slaps him, too. SOLING rushes to drag him away.)

INES Take him to his pigsty where he belongs.

SOLING Let’s go, Manuel. (They exit offstage left.)

INES I thought I warned you.

CORITO Manuel was not with me, Tita Ines. Just the girls —

INES I told you not to have anything to do with that church.

CORITO It’s fiesta, and my friends thought —

INES I had rather you did not explain because I know you will be lying.

CORITO I never lie to you.

INES When I brought you back from Barcelona I did not intend to raise you to become a woman of ill repute. It’s alright for all those so-called friends of yours to roam the streets of Bayawan like common whores. Their mothers probably were. Yours was a good woman. An orphan but a good woman. And she married a fine man. Always remember that.

CORITO Yes, Tita Ines.

INES They were so kind to me, all that time in Barcelona. I forgot I was in a strange land, among strangers. I still miss them.

(SOLING reenters, walks up to the terrace.)

I knew they had made me one of their own that day when they left you with me. They were going to a wedding. Sometimes I think it was partly my fault. Your mother said she didn’t have to go but I had seen the new dress, pinck lace it was, with shoes that matched. So I said I’d look after you until they got back. How happy they were. Soling, get me a glass of water. Try and make it colder than the one you just gave me.

(SOLING exits into the house.)

Your mother looked so beautiful in her pink dress, and your father, like a prince in his blue suit and a hat! They never got to the party. The car just — oh, and they were so young, and you were still so little, just learning to walk, a pink little walking doll. I promised on their graves I would raise you as I would my own, a dutiful daughter and a respectable woman, and I think I have tried all I can, despite what I am. So you see, Corito, if only for their sake you must help me fulfill that promise.

CORITO I’m sorry, Tita Ines. I didn’t mean to be disobedient.

INES I know you don’t mean to be. But you always are. Maybe I should have sent you to college. But I don’t see why you should need a degree and a job when all this will be yours when I go. The farm should last you many lifetimes. I’ve been thinking, when I refused to let you study in the city, did you hold it against me? Is that why you behave this way?

CORITO What way, Tita Ines? Please don’t do this to me —

INES Do what?

CORITO What you’re doing. That tone, making me feel guilty —

INES Ah, I believe it’s called conscience.

CORITO It’s — it’s almost like torture! I’m twenty years old next month. It’s too early for me to — to wither like some plant! I want to be happy. And I want you to be happy with me.

INES So you’d like me to dance on the lawn and laugh while you disgrace yourself, chasing after a man —

CORITO Manuel and I practically grew up together!

(SOLING enters with a glass of water.)

INES That doesn’t give you any reason to be so free with him, so trusting! You want to breed bastards? Go ahead! I’m sure Manuel is eager to assist you —

CORITO Tita Ines!

INES I’m doing this for your own good. What little brains you have I’m helping you keep between your ears, not between your legs!

CORITO Oh, God.

INES (Taking a deep breath.) God does not have anything to do with this. We gave up on each other a long time ago. (Looks for bell.) My bell! (As CORITO picks bell from the lawn.) Soling!

(SOLING rushes to give her the glass.)

I suppose you had to fetch this a kilometer away. (Sips as CORITO puts the bell on the seat.) And I suppose you did not know Corito was going out.

CORITO (Quickly.) I didn’t tell Nanay Soling.

INES (To SOLING.) Next time you allow her to sneak off anywhere I will slap you, too. Look at her! Look at what she’s learning from that church, and those whining, sanctimonious priests!

(SOLING backs off to doorway, listens.)

CORITO I don’t understand you at all.

INES You don’t trust me, if you have to question everything I tell you.

CORITO Not to go to church? Not to go out with my friends? Not to talk to Manuel?

INES It’s for your own good! That should be enough —

CORITO No! It’s not enough! I’m no longer that little girl you’ve slapped so many times! I’m old enough to know. Tell me. Why?

INES (Stares at the lawn for a while.) The church used to be my life. Every morning I would prepare breakfast at the convent — before I went down to hear Mass. While Padre Paulo ate breakfast I’d take his things down to Soling to be laundered. In the afternoon we would clean the convent while Padre Paulo heard confessions, then I would bring food from the house and we would have supper with his friends. We would sit afterwards in the sala, around his lamp, and talk and laugh. The hours would glitter like that lamp. He had brought it with him from Toledo. He loved that lamp. Its tiny crystal panes of many colors brilliant as gemstones. He never allowed anyone else to touch it. But he trusted me to clean it. I trusted him, too. He was like a father to me. They told me he was — carrying on with some women, like that whore Lucia Solon. But I trusted him. Even on that night when no one else came for supper. I was cleaning up in the kitchen and he had been drinking. He came after me. I was shocked. I was just another of his whores! He caught me in the dining room, tried to drag me to the table. He was slavering like a mad dog, trying to pin me down on the table! I was so shocked I couldn’t scream! A man of God! A man I had trusted! Oh, it was horrible.

(CORITO sinks to her knees, takes INES by the hand.)

I fought him off and still I couldn’t scream. It was like a nightmare!

(SOLING listens intently: she hasn’t heard this story.)

Then I thrashed out and the lamp fell and broke. I could hear the bright-colored crystals splintering, then he was on fire —

(The sound of a school band approaches from the distance.)

— he was falling around the room like a torch, setting the curtains, everything, on fire, and that was when I began to scream. As I fled to the back stairs, Salvador rushed up and I don’t know what I said, I was so frightened — Salvador ran past me and I hurried down the stairs but I slipped and fell. When I regained consciousness there was tearing pain in my legs, blood, and everything was burning. I was burning, too, as though I had fallen straight to hell! Oh, it was horrible, horrible! (Starts to weep as school band comes closer, passes and fades away.)

CORITO I — I’m sorry — I know how you feel —

INES You’ve never had my pain. You’ll never know how I feel! Everything I’ve ever done has been so I can spare you that pain. So you can put your trust in someone who will take care of you and not cause you any agony. That Manuel will never be able to give you what you deserve. He will want your body, your soul, your life, your money, everything you have. He will take it all and give you nothing in return. He’s only a man. They all think we’ve been made for them to inflict themselves upon!

SOLING That’s not true!

INES Soling — you’re still there. Did you say something?

SOLING It’s not true, what you said about Manuel. Manuel is good —

INES He can’t be better than his father. You should know. You were always so proud of Salvador. Well, what did he bring you? What did he leave you?

SOLING Salvador was good to me.

INES Good for nothing. Like your son.

SOLING We are not good for nothing. You’ve made good use of us for over twenty years!

(INES flings the water at SOLING’s face but misses.)

INES Take this glass away. (SOLING takes the glass.) If only it were not so expensive I’d break it against your face. You know, Soling, the way you and your son behave I often forget you don’t own this house. You’ve lived in it for so long perhaps you have forgotten, too. I must remind you time and again but I guess — garbage will always be garbage.

(LUCIA SOLON steps up to the terrace right, unnoticed.)

Well, what are you waiting for? (SOLING mops the floor with her rag.) You wanted my chair to slide over that puddle, didn’t you? You want me to die so you and Manuel can have Corito to yourselves, don’t you? (Laughs.) You’ll never get a chance, Soling! I will outlive all you pigs!

LUCIA Ah, my sweet Ines, still so amiable and soft-spoken as ever! And Soling — still on your hands and knees. Things have not changed much in Bayawan, have they?

SOLING (Still on the floor, is the first to recognize the visitor) Lucia!

INES L-Lucia?

LUCIA Don’t look at me like that! I haven’t died, you know. (Removes her dark glasses.) I remembered it was fiesta so I thought I’d drop by but your front door is locked.

INES I’m sorry. We don’t entertain at fiesta. Go away.

LUCIA Oh, Ines! What a sweet welcome! I feel I’m home already! (Looks CORITO over.) Your daughter?

INES (At once.) My niece.

CORITO Corito. I saw you at the church this afternoon.

LUCIA Oh, that was you on top of a carosa beside St. Peter!

CORITO We were decorating it for the procession.

LUCIA I thought some angel — but then around here few angels would look so European, wouldn’t they, Ines? So Spanish, in fact.

CORITO My parents were Spanish. Barcelona. They died in a car accident when I was small. My aunt brought me here.

LUCIA Barcelona. (Thinks.) You must have gone a second time, Ines?

(INES stares at her.)

You were gone a few months. Before the fire, remember? Padre Paulo told me you had gone to Barcelona.

INES Y-yes. A few months. I went back after the fire. To see a doctor about the burns.

LUCIA (Staring at the scars on INES’ cheeks.) He wasn’t very good, was he? (To CORITO.) Your parents must have been goodlooking.

CORITO I don’t know how they looked.

LUCIA Not even from a picture?

CORITO Tita Ines has pictures but she thinks it wouldn’t do me any good because I — it’s like I never had them, you know?

LUCIA How clever.

CORITO I think my Mama might look like you.

LUCIA How sweet, but no, your Mama would have to be really beautiful, like Ines was, before the fire. You do have the same cheekbones, and the shape of the mouth — but your nose is more aristocratic and your eyebrows are a bit bushy. Rather like Paulo’s, don’t you think so, too, Ines?

INES What are you getting at? What do you want?

LUCIA Nothing.

INES Good. Because you’re getting nothing from me.

LUCIA I don’t remember wanting anything from you that wasn’t already mine.

INES In that case you can leave now.

LUCIA Oh, Ines! I just got here! I’ve been walking in this heat and feeling so terrible about all those withering gardens and trees, and I thought of you! Now I’m here and you haven’t even asked me to sit down!

INES Not in my house. Soling, get Manuel. I want to go down to the lawn.

(SOLING hurries down to exit offstage left.)

LUCIA You know, Corito, I’ve only been in this house once before. Long ago, when Ines and I were hardly friends. When we got to know each other better I couldn’t set foot on the street outside. (Small laugh.) But the week after Padre Paulo took over the parish Ines threw a grand party for him. My landlady, Mrs. Morado, took me along. Such a lovely night it was. The curtains were lace, the food came straight out of a Spanish royal banquet. I had to wear an old dress. There was no time to have one made. But Ines, ah, like a bride she was —

INES Bitch!

LUCIA — glowing and sweet, a flower you would wish to touch and smell. Padre Paulo couldn’t take his eyes off her —

INES He was just being grateful!

LUCIA — but he kept to my side all night. You did get to dance with someone else that night, didn’t you, Ines? (To CORITO.) She wanted so much to dance with Padre Paulo but you know, he being a priest —

INES Peddle your memories elsewhere, Lucia. We have enough of our own.

LUCIA Don’t be so unpleasant, Ines. The way you are now you should be honored I have come bothering to visit at all.

(SOLING reenters with MANUEL. He has had a bath and is now wearing a shirt. He stops upon seeing LUCIA.)

Is that — Manuel?

SOLING Yes.

MANUEL Lucia — ?

LUCIA My goodness! My little boy Manuel! Look at you — what a handsome young man you’ve become! I’m sure the girls of Bayawan must be hot on your heels!

INES Still a whore, after all these years. A man appears and your tail twitches. You — (To MANUEL.) I called for you to take me down to the lawn.

(MANUEL, SOLING, and CORITO lift the wheelchair with INES in it down to the lawn.)

LUCIA It’s not the corpse that’s heavy. It’s the soul.

INES (Looking at MANUEL.) Going somewhere? Perhaps you’d like my permission. After all, you live in my house.

MANUEL I was going to join the procession.

CORITO Me, too, Tita Ines —

INES Ah, so, an arrangement, is it?

CORITO No. We just —

INES No.

MANUEL It’s fiesta.

INES I know what it is. I told you before, not any one of you is to go near that church. Not while you gorge on my food and sleep under my roof!

SOLING There’s really nothing much to do right now, Nyora Ines. I can manage in the kitchen —

INES You. Go and get me a pillow.

(SOLING exits up terrace into the house. CORITO sits sulking on the bench. MANUEL leans against balustrade downstage left.)

LUCIA (Taking a cigarette and lighting it.) So, you never forgave Paulo and me. I understand that. But even the church?

INES Corito, make sure the gate is locked after she leaves.

LUCIA You really shouldn’t blame the church for what happened. After all, you had no right to claim what was its own.

INES Did you?

LUCIA I did not claim Paulo from the church. He claimed me. Only then did I do everything I could to keep him. It hurts, doesn’t it, Ines? In spite of your beauty and your wealth, it should be me he loved and not you?

INES Maybe I should have flaunted my body, like you did? Maybe I should have waited in his bed, like you did?

LUCIA Well, didn’t you?

INES I am not dirt like you.

LUCIA Oh, Ines, how so much alike we were. You only smelled expensive.

INES Rotten to the core. I don’t know how Padre Paulo could have —

LUCIA But he did, didn’t he?

CORITO He was a priest!

LUCIA He was a man —

CORITO It wasn’t right! It was a sin!

LUCIA — a wonderful man.

(Lights go up inside the house from a dim chandelier.)

Until Ines destroyed him —

CORITO He tried to rape her!

LUCIA Ines? (Laughs.) You mean that thrilling event that resulted in the fire? Come, Ines. You know better —

INES Enough! Corito, go up to your room!

(SOLING reenters with pillows which she arranges behind INES.)

I said go up to your room! Now!

(CORITO starts for the terrace. LUCIA comes down, grabs her by the arm.)

LUCIA (To INES.) You couldn’t wait for him to die, could you? The man’s not even cold in his grave —

INES He was cold a long time ago!

LUCIA He didn’t die for a long time. Twenty years I’ve watched over him like a baby

INES B — but — all those burns — they said he had to —

LUCIA They were wrong. He couldn’t die. He said he would be condemned to hell for what he had done. He had to suffer on this earth. And he did. Twenty years of pain.

SOLING When did he — ?

LUCIA We buried him yesterday.

(SOLING crosses herself.)

CORITO And all this time you hid him? That man deserved to be punished!

LUCIA He was so badly deformed he could no longer be a priest, much less a man. That was punishment enough. Each painful day that went by I would pray that he would — rest. Are you satisfied, Ines?

INES Be quiet! If only my feet — you wouldn’t be so sure of yourself!

LUCIA Small punishment for you, Ines. You spoke of love to him. There’s nothing but spite in your heart! A little crease in Paulo’s habit and you got it smack in the face, remember, Soling?

INES I said be quiet!

LUCIA For his sake I was quiet for twenty years. Out of kindness to you. I have known no peace, knowing what I know and not being able to proclaim it from the rooftops! Poor Paulo —

CORITO He was an evil man. He tried to rape my aunt. The night of the fire. She fought him off and the lamp fell and broke — INES Corito, shut up!

CORITO — that’s why the convent burned and Manuel’s house!

(LUCIA laughs.)

An evil man, and you hid him from punishment.

LUCIA No man is ever truly good, or else he would be up there singing hymns.

CORITO Look at what he did to my aunt! And Manuel’s father —

LUCIA Salvador?

CORITO He —

SOLING He died in the fire.

LUCIA I know.

CORITO He heard Tita Ines calling for help and he rushed into the convent to help save Padre Paulo’s things —

SOLING He never came back. They say he must have been trapped when the floors fell through…

LUCIA You’ve all been fools. I was a fool as well. I should have come a long time ago but Paulo kept me.

MANUEL If he hadn’t tried to — rape Nyora Ines none of these would have happened. Papa would still have been alive and we wouldn’t be slaves until we die.

LUCIA My, how many lives must you claim before your hate is quenched, Ines? There we were, troubled by truths, and here you are, drying up, growing old and ugly in a heap of lies. I see you’ve made yourself a prison of pain, too. But you have brought many others inside with you. I’m sorry, Corito. But I didn’t want to add to Paulo’s shame. Now he is dead. Now I am free. Where is the child, Ines?

INES What child?

LUCIA You were pregnant the first time you left Bayawan. Barcelona, was it? Did you ever get to Barcelona? Did you need to go that far to hide Paulo’s child?

CORITO No…

INES How dare you — ?

LUCIA You left the child and came back for Paulo. You begged him to leave the convent and live with you.

INES That’s not true!

LUCIA You returned that night, begged him again. He wouldn’t.

INES That’s not true! How could I have his child? Priests don’t breed!

LUCIA You didn’t want the priest. You wanted the man. Most men breed.

INES Get out of here! Go away!

LUCIA He couldn’t live with you, Ines. The supreme insult, after you had given him everything he could possibly want, and a child he could not have had without your insistence! How angry you were, how furious! You threw the lamp at him. It broke against his chest. He started to run, burn, rushed around the room setting everything else on fire. Salvador must have heard him screaming. When he came the sala was burning. He did not see Paulo but Paulo heard you urging him to get the Padre from his room. Salvador never got out of that room. Did you lock the door to make sure he could never be able to say a word?

(SOLING lets out a scream and sinks to the floor, sobbing against MANUEL’s legs.)

INES She’s lying! The bitch is lying!

CORITO The lamp was on the dining table.

LUCIA That lamp was never on the dining table. It stayed on the coffee table of the sala.

CORITO It broke on the floor.

LUCIA It broke against Paulo’s chest. I was beside him in the hospital. I wept as I watched, bit by bloody bit, the shattered crystals of the lamp plucked from his chest.

CORITO (Almost a whisper.) No…

LUCIA For twenty years he was nothing but a burnt-out shell. Uglier than anything that ever came out of hell. But for twenty years I loved him, took care of him as you never could have, Ines. What bitter punishment, for both of us, having to live in a prison of ash, a prison of pain. Twenty years I’ve waited to come here. To tell you — you had killed him, long before he died.

INES You can’t believe her! She’s mad!

LUCIA How beautiful you were, Ines, a long time ago. Radiant as a sun and so good. You made us believe you were doing some kindness or another, even as you did your best to make us burn up, dry up, die. I vowed on Paulo’s grave I’d make you pay. I thought I’d come to kill you. I see now it won’t make a difference.

INES You’re mad. Mad. Go away! (Breaks down.) Please go away…

LUCIA Did you say please?

INES Please just go away…

LUCIA Yes, Ines. Now I will go.

CORITO Why — Why have you done this to my aunt?

LUCIA That’s not your aunt. That’s your mother. (Turns slowly, walks down steps right of terrace and exits.)

INES (Sobbing.) Oh God, oh God, oh God…

(Procession sounds — murmur of prayer and a band playing a slow march — approach from the distance. SOLING rises, walks slowly to INES, waits for the latter to look up, swings back a hand for a slap, drops hand slowly, walks up to the terrace looking taller than she ever was, past CORITO, and exits into the house.)

INES (Softly.) Take me to my room.

(CORITO moves down in a gaze, goes to MANUEL, takes him by the hand, leads him to the terrace and into the house. The door closes behind him.)

Corito —

(Procession sounds are closer now, just outside on the street.)

Soling! Manuel! (Looks around for her bell, tinkles it furiously.) Corito! Come back here! Take me into the house!

(On the glass windows the silhouettes of CORITO and MANUEL are seen. INES stares at it and gasps as CORITO unbuttons MANUEL’s shirt, slides it off his shoulders, throws it away. She offers her lips for a kiss. MANUEL kisses her.)

What are you doing? Corito! (Throws the bell towards windows, misses, screams.) Whore! Whore!

(At window, CORITO arches her head back. MANUEL plants a kiss on her throat. She takes off her dress, tosses it to one side, lies back. Her hand reaches out to MANUEL’s neck, draws him down to her.)

I’ll kill you! I’ll kill you, you shameless… (Wheels chair close to steps, attempts to leave it, slides to the steps, tries to crawl up, finally sprawls up on the steps helplessly, moaning and sobbing as the lights go down.)

CURTAINS