The Social Cancer, by José Rizal - Home

CHAPTER LX 278
"You are a very prudent girl," the old officer whispered to her. "You did well to give up the letter. You have
thus assured yourself an untroubled future."
With startled eyes she watched him move away from her, and bit her lip. Fortunately, Aunt Isabel came along,
and she had sufficient strength left to catch hold of the old lady's skirt.
"Aunt!" she murmured.
"What's the matter?" asked the old lady, frightened by the look on the girl's face.
"Take me to my room!" she pleaded, grasping her aunt's arm in order to rise.
"Are you sick, daughter? You look as if you'd lost your bones! What's the matter?"
"A fainting spell--the people in the room--so many lights--I need to rest. Tell father that I'm going to sleep."
"You're cold. Do you want some tea?"
Maria Clara shook her head, entered and locked the door of her chamber, and then, her strength failing her,
she fell sobbing to the floor at the feet of an image.
"Mother, mother, mother mine!" she sobbed.
Through the window and a door that opened on the azotea the moonlight entered. The musicians continued to
play merry waltzes, laughter and the hum of voices penetrated into the chamber, several times her father, Aunt
Isabel, Doña Victorina, and even Linares knocked at the door, but Maria did not move. Heavy sobs shook her
breast.
Hours passed--the pleasures of the dinner-table ended, the sound of singing and dancing was heard, the candle
burned itself out, but the maiden still remained motionless on the moonlit floor at the feet of an image of the
Mother of Jesus.
Gradually the house became quiet again, the lights were extinguished, and Aunt Isabel once more knocked at
the door.
"Well, she's gone to sleep," said the old woman, aloud. "As she's young and has no cares, she sleeps like a
corpse."
When all was silence she raised herself slowly and threw a look about her. She saw the azotea with its little
arbors bathed in the ghostly light of the moon.
"An untroubled future! She sleeps like a corpse!" she repeated in a low voice as she made her way out to the
azotea.
The city slept. Only from time to time there was heard the noise of a carriage crossing the wooden bridge over
the river, whose undisturbed waters reflected smoothly the light of the moon. The young woman raised her
eyes toward a sky as clear as sapphire. Slowly she took the rings from her fingers and from her ears and
removed the combs from her hair. Placing them on the balustrade of the azotea, she gazed toward the river.
A small banka loaded with zacate stopped at the foot of the landing such as every house on the bank of the
river has. One of two men who were in it ran up the stone stairway and jumped over the wall, and a few
seconds later his footsteps were heard on the stairs leading to the azotea.