Read Online Dusk: A Novel (Modern Library Paperbacks) by F. Sionil Jose - Free Book Online
Authors: F. Sionil Jose
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Istak wanted to do, too, what his father and mother had hoped would happen—that he would be a priest, not just so he could flee the drudgery of the village, but because he was the eldest, he could help his brothers and all his relatives who were mired in Po-on.
But the priestly life was not one of ease; even in his old age, Padre Jose worked hard, tending to the people, reaching those
sitios
where the Ilokanos seldom went, across Tirad to the land of the Bagos where they could be killed, their heads chopped off to decorate some heathen’s house. Padre Jose had prided himself on his order. “We are builders, Eustaquio; above all else, not just of buildings and churches, but of men. We will go wherever there are souls to rescue.” He would tell them then of Saint Augustine, of the first Augustinian in the country, Padre Rada. Padre Jose, without any family, had taken on a bigger one, notjust the order to which he belonged, but the Ilokanos, whom he had grown to love.
Can one really love a people? And why not a village? A family—or even a woman? It had all become so remote, Istak’s discovery of his manhood and the desires that had shamed him once and at the same time warmed him to the pleasure that he would surely forgo if he became a priest. She was the eldest of Capitán Berong’s daughters—Carmencita, sixteen and already full-breasted, with flesh aching to be caressed beneath her long skirt. Just looking at her made him feel that all the beauty there was to behold in the world was in those red lips, the pert nose, and the cheeks that shone. Her two younger sisters—Filomena, fifteen, and Angela, fourteen—they were beautiful, too, but not as Carmencita was. They were not bright but they were all clever, and it was not difficult teaching them what he knew, a bit of history, arithmetic—and none of the homemaking arts that all women of high birth such as they would learn in the school in Vigan. It would all be wasted, of course, for Carmencita was just waiting for the right suitor to come to her father’s door so she could be married off to settle in some Ilokano town as mistress of a big stone house.
The sisters came to the convent in the afternoon, and stayed till the Angelus, when they went down the wide churchyard and the street, bringing with them their nubile laughter, and with Carmencita a presence that often was a challenge and a tease, for at sixteen, she knew she was desirable and if she wanted to, she could command men to do her bidding. He would have done so if only he had not been just a farm boy from Po-on. He believed then—as the old priest had taught him to believe—that with knowledge, righteousness, and faith in the Almighty, hewould open the gates of Heaven to his countrymen, benighted as they were. But probing his thoughts, his own being, he had felt so small and worthless, for he reached the conclusion that, above all, with the priesthood, he would be able to rise from Po-on, and, perhaps, bring up with him his parents and brothers as well.
“You will not have a woman then,” Carmencita had told him pointedly. They were in the room behind the sacristy, a wide room with walls of thick coral stone and a floor of earthen tile. Outside, in the shaded patio, her younger sisters were playing
patintero
, while upstairs, Padre Jose was fast asleep, one of the younger acolytes—his arms perhaps already aching—pulling at the huge cloth fan that dangled from the ceiling to ward off the strangling heat of a March afternoon.
What would it matter if he would never know a woman? “If I become a priest, señorita,” he said diffidently, “but that is not for me to say.”
She pouted.
He started the lesson again: “There are really only so many elements on earth. Some are metals—”
“I don’t want to know about elements,” Carmencita said, bending down again to examine her right foot, visible below the hem of her white cotton skirt. Again, he could see the white mounds of her breasts
But the priestly life was not one of ease; even in his old age, Padre Jose worked hard, tending to the people, reaching those
sitios
where the Ilokanos seldom went, across Tirad to the land of the Bagos where they could be killed, their heads chopped off to decorate some heathen’s house. Padre Jose had prided himself on his order. “We are builders, Eustaquio; above all else, not just of buildings and churches, but of men. We will go wherever there are souls to rescue.” He would tell them then of Saint Augustine, of the first Augustinian in the country, Padre Rada. Padre Jose, without any family, had taken on a bigger one, notjust the order to which he belonged, but the Ilokanos, whom he had grown to love.
Can one really love a people? And why not a village? A family—or even a woman? It had all become so remote, Istak’s discovery of his manhood and the desires that had shamed him once and at the same time warmed him to the pleasure that he would surely forgo if he became a priest. She was the eldest of Capitán Berong’s daughters—Carmencita, sixteen and already full-breasted, with flesh aching to be caressed beneath her long skirt. Just looking at her made him feel that all the beauty there was to behold in the world was in those red lips, the pert nose, and the cheeks that shone. Her two younger sisters—Filomena, fifteen, and Angela, fourteen—they were beautiful, too, but not as Carmencita was. They were not bright but they were all clever, and it was not difficult teaching them what he knew, a bit of history, arithmetic—and none of the homemaking arts that all women of high birth such as they would learn in the school in Vigan. It would all be wasted, of course, for Carmencita was just waiting for the right suitor to come to her father’s door so she could be married off to settle in some Ilokano town as mistress of a big stone house.
The sisters came to the convent in the afternoon, and stayed till the Angelus, when they went down the wide churchyard and the street, bringing with them their nubile laughter, and with Carmencita a presence that often was a challenge and a tease, for at sixteen, she knew she was desirable and if she wanted to, she could command men to do her bidding. He would have done so if only he had not been just a farm boy from Po-on. He believed then—as the old priest had taught him to believe—that with knowledge, righteousness, and faith in the Almighty, hewould open the gates of Heaven to his countrymen, benighted as they were. But probing his thoughts, his own being, he had felt so small and worthless, for he reached the conclusion that, above all, with the priesthood, he would be able to rise from Po-on, and, perhaps, bring up with him his parents and brothers as well.
“You will not have a woman then,” Carmencita had told him pointedly. They were in the room behind the sacristy, a wide room with walls of thick coral stone and a floor of earthen tile. Outside, in the shaded patio, her younger sisters were playing
patintero
, while upstairs, Padre Jose was fast asleep, one of the younger acolytes—his arms perhaps already aching—pulling at the huge cloth fan that dangled from the ceiling to ward off the strangling heat of a March afternoon.
What would it matter if he would never know a woman? “If I become a priest, señorita,” he said diffidently, “but that is not for me to say.”
She pouted.
He started the lesson again: “There are really only so many elements on earth. Some are metals—”
“I don’t want to know about elements,” Carmencita said, bending down again to examine her right foot, visible below the hem of her white cotton skirt. Again, he could see the white mounds of her breasts
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