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Updated: May 26, 2025
"It's a lie!" roared Simoun, pale and beside himself. "It's false! Maria Clara lives, Maria Clara must live! It's a cowardly excuse! She's not dead, and this night I'll free her or tomorrow you die!" Basilio shrugged his shoulders. "Several days ago she was taken ill and I went to the nunnery for news of her. Look, here is Padre Salvi's letter, brought by Padre Irene.
All Manila prepared to be invited, and never did uneasiness take stronger hold of the mind than in view of the thought of not being among those bidden. Friendship with Simoun became a matter of dispute, and many husbands were forced by their wives to purchase bars of steel and sheets of galvanized iron in order to make friends with Don Timoteo Pelaez. At last the great day arrived.
Simoun smiled sadly. "Yes, yes," he said with a shake of his head, "yet to reach that condition it is necessary that there be no tyrannical and no enslaved peoples, it is necessary that man go about freely, that he know how to respect the rights of others in their own individuality, and for this there is yet much blood to be shed, the struggle forces itself forward.
"Don't pay them! Use the prisoners and convicts!" "But there aren't enough, Señor Simoun!" "Then, if there aren't enough, let all the villagers, the old men, the youths, the boys, work. Instead of the fifteen days of obligatory service, let them work three, four, five months for the State, with the additional obligation that each one provide his own food and tools."
A voice in his inner consciousness was asking if he, Simoun, were not also a part of the filth of that accursed city, perhaps its most poisonous ferment.
"What is your disposition concerning the arms for sporting purposes?" asked the secretary, taking advantage of the pause. Simoun thrust his head through the doorway. "Don't you want to take Padre Camorra's place, Señor Sindbad?" inquired Padre Irene. "You can bet diamonds instead of chips." "I don't care if I do," replied Simoun, advancing while he brushed the chalk from his hands.
Recognizing Placido, he checked himself. "I want to ask a favor of you, to say a few words to you." Simoun made a sign of impatience which Placido in his perturbation did not observe. In a few words the youth related what had happened and made known his desire to go to Hongkong. "Why?" asked Simoun, staring fixedly at Placido through his blue goggles.
He was watching the face of Simoun, who was among those that descended to receive him, and he read in that implacable countenance the sentence of death for all those men, so that fresh terror seized upon him. He felt cold, he leaned against the wall, and, with his eyes fixed on the windows and his ears cocked, tried to guess what might be happening.
Simoun himself was startled and felt pity for the wretch. Without any greeting Basilio slowly advanced into the room, and in a voice that made the jeweler shudder said to him, "Señor Simoun, I've been a wicked son and a bad brother I've overlooked the murder of one and the tortures of the other, and God has chastised me!
As was natural, all lost themselves in conjectures. Tadeo gave his particular version, which according to him came from a reliable source: Simoun had been assaulted by some unknown person in the old Plaza Vivac, the motive being revenge, in proof of which was the fact that Simoun himself refused to make the least explanation.
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