The Social Cancer, by José Rizal - Home

CHAPTER XVI 81
the only three fishes that were left: each would have one and a half. "They'll have good appetites," she mused,
"the way is long and hungry stomachs have no heart."
So she sat, he ear strained to catch every sound, listening to the lightest footfalls: strong and clear, Basilio;
light and irregular, Crispin--thus she mused. The kalao called in the woods several times after the rain had
ceased, but still her sons did not come. She put the fishes inside the pot to keep them warm and went to the
threshold of the hut to look toward the road. To keep herself company, she began to sing in a low voice, a
voice usually so sweet and tender that when her sons listened to her singing the kundíman they wept without
knowing why, but tonight it trembled and the notes were halting. She stopped singing and gazed earnestly into
the darkness, but no one was coming from the town--that noise was only the wind shaking the raindrops from
the wide banana leaves.
Suddenly a black dog appeared before her dragging something along the path. Sisa was frightened but caught
up a stone and threw it at the dog, which ran away howling mournfully. She was not superstitious, but she had
heard so much about presentiments and black dogs that terror seized her. She shut the door hastily and sat
down by the light. Night favors credulity and the imagination peoples the air with specters. She tried to pray,
to call upon the Virgin and upon God to watch over her sons, especially her little Crispin. Then she forgot her
prayers as her thoughts wandered to think about them, to recall the features of each, those features that always
wore a smile for her both asleep and awake. Suddenly she felt her hair rise on her head and her eyes stared
wildly; illusion or reality, she saw Crispin standing by the fireplace, there where he was wont to sit and prattle
to her, but now he said nothing as he gazed at her with those large, thoughtful eyes, and smiled.
"Mother, open the door! Open, mother!" cried the voice of Basilio from without.
Sisa shuddered violently and the vision disappeared.