I don't go to confession to him any more." Of all the houses one only was to be noticed without lights and with all the windows closed--that of the alferez.

Maria Clara expressed surprise at this.
"The witch! The Muse of the Civil Guard, as the old man says," exclaimed the irrepressible Sinang.

"What has she to do with our merrymakings?
I imagine she's raging! But just let the cholera come and you'd see her give a banquet." "But, Sinang!" again her cousin scolded.
"I never was able to endure her and especially since she disturbed our picnic with her civil-guards.

If I were the Archbishop I'd marry Her to Padre Salvi--then think what children! Look how she tried to arrest the poor pilot, who threw himself into the water simply to please--" She was not allowed to finish, for in the corner of the plaza where a blind man was singing to the accompaniment of a guitar, a curious spectacle was presented.

It was a man miserably dressed, wearing a broad salakot of palm leaves.