Courage
by: Bienvenido N. Santos
Nobody noticed the new teacher as he stood among the members of the high school faculty that early Monday morning after the flag ceremony. The usual fifteen-minute program based on a theme-this morning the theme was loyalty-followed the brief ritual of raising the colors atop a tall pole in front of the high school building. It was a freshman program.
The class adviser, standing among the students lined up in front of the building, was apparently holding her breath as a boy and a girl sang "The Loyal Soldier." The song was well rendered, and thunderous applause followed as the boy and the girl bowed then disappeared behind the door of the library. Then a youth gave a brief talk on loyalty. The program was climaxed by the patriotic pledge, recited slowly and in unison.
The new teacher was impressed. He said he liked itã…¡ the song, even the speech, everything. And the our teachers smiled and talked briefly to one another as they watched the first period classes file down the corridors in orderly fashion.
The new teacher paused before the door of Room 8, looked at his class program to make sure he had gone to the right room, then walked straight to the teacher's table. A sudden quiet fell on the class as everybody stared at the new teacher.
The class was a particularly bright section, especially in English, Fred, the leader, was president of the class. He wrote perfect themes and walked with a limp. He was fond of short stories and short girls Iike Conchita.
Conchita was a candidate for valedictorian. She knew all the rules of grammar, but somehow or other she could not write as well as Fred. It was said the two exchanged love letters that were veritable masterpieces. They never looked at each other in class.
There were several other brilliant students. Maria, for example, who spoke like a debater and declaimed formulas in mathematics; Javier, who was the extemporaneous speaker in class in spite of a voice which sounded like a foghorn. He had the temper of a genius. Gloria in particular thought he was a genius. She was a young girl who believed in the power of music and the survival of democracy. And there was Sion, perpetual guardian of a perpetually empty treasury. Her ambition in life was to get rid of her shyness and her pimples. And there was Belen. When people outside the class asked, "Where's Belen? her classmates would answer, "On the honor roll. " For she was always there, a perpetual valedictorian in a class of topnotchers.
The new teacher said, "Class, you look intelligent, all of you. But that remains to be proved."
He did not smile when he said that. Then he calmly conducted the recitation. Some of the girls and even a number of the boys were visibly cowed into submission by the new teacher's unsmiling demeanor, his businesslike firmness, his detachment. And it was a quiet class, that first day. Fred did not say anything. He simply sat there biting his lips meditatively. Conchita looked at the teacher as if he were a difficult problem in mathematics. Sion was blushing, embarrassed by her thoughts. Maria fidgeted, and only Javier managed to talk cone in his foghorn voice.
At the sound of the first bell, as the class was getting ready to leave the room, the new teacher said, "Your adviser is Mr. Arsenio L. Torres That's my name. I am an Ilocano. Class dismissed."
That afternoon the class gossiped about Mr. Torres. Fred said, "Our new teacher is an international figure. Look: he teaches English; he has Chinese eyes; he speaks with an American accent, and.. . and.. "
"He's an llocano," Conchita finished.
Javier mimicked in his foghorn voice, "Class, you look intelligent, all of you. But that remains to be proved."
When the laughter died down, Belen was thoughtful.
"Look," she said, "why don't we prove it?
"Why not?" the others chorused.
It was like proving their worth with a vengeance. Mr. Torres should have been impressed, but he was not. He took it all, the perfect lessons, as quite routinary. Often questions were asked just to make him commit a blunder but he never blundered.
When he taught the shorter poems in their literature lessons, he kept his book closed. He knew them by heart. But he did no act as if he were were proud of this feat. He acted as if it were expected of anybody who taught the poems.
But he didn't seem to love poetry. That was one thing clearly wrong with him. He had no enthusiasm about anything he did.
He is cold-blooded," Maria once recommended.
When they studied a poem, Mr. Torres would tell them in his impersonal way that the author wrote other great poems. He would recite from memory lines from poetry. The class would listen without
comprehending.
So the students who have sought to impress their teacher were themselves impressed. It was evident that Mr. Torres had mastered his subject. He had a wide background. But there was something about
him and his ways that was like a barrier between him and his students. He was too impersonal, too aloof, like a proud god forced to walk among poor mortals. Maybe it was only indifference or preoccupation with something which he kept a secret, but nobody among those under him
tried or cared to find out.
"He does not smile," everybody complained.
To him laughter in a classroom was a crime. What was the student's smile but camouflage for gross ignorance? The atmosphere in his class was oppressive with learning, assignments, references. It was always a relief on the part of the students to hear the bell after 40 minutes of academic torture in the approved Torres manner.
The students asked themselves: Why can't Mr. Torres be like the other teachersã…¡ affable, pleasant, full of humor?
During the latter part of August, there were days when Mr. Torres did not report to class. His students were pleased. Such occasions called for celebrations. Some of the students even hoped Mr. Torres would stay away from class even longer than a day at a time. That was how they felt about unpopular teachers, and Mr. Torres was very unpopular.
Nobody noticed the change in Mr. Torres. Even the class failed to realize there was something wrong with their teacher. He had grown paler, and his lips were always tightly pressed as if he were enduring
some lingering pain. Everybody thought he was working hard, or was worried about his family. They heard his family had come to town. But nobody even saw his wife and children. Nobody cared.
Once he told his class, "I forgot to tell you last week that this class is scheduled to take charge of the morning program on Monday. You have about 12 days to prepare."
The class was Insulted. Everybody talked at the same time: "Why didn't you tell us about it earlier? The other sections had at least one month to prepare. What kind of program can we put up after 12 days preparation?"
"The time is sufficient, more than sufficient," Mr. Torres said, a stern finality in his tone. "All you need is a duet, a speech, and a song by a chorus, that's all."
"What's the theme, sir?" asked Fred without rising.
"Courage," answered Mr. Torres
"Where can we get a song about 'courage ?" wailed Sion.
Who are the best singers in class? Mr. Torres asked. Most of the names mentioned were those of boys and girls who could not carry a tune. They protested and blushed. Some grew angry. The
class was very noisy.
"Quiet!" Mr. Torres shouted, rapping the table impatiently. "You are forgetting yourselves. Ester and Gloria will sing a duet. I like that song
entitled, Where's the Land of Joy'?"
"That's not a song about courage!" a boy shouted.
""Quiet! I didn't ask for your opinion, gentleman. Fred, you will give a talk about courage."
"Javier can do that," Fred suggested.
"I want you to do it. Why, can't you do it?"
"Why not?" asked Fred, rising impulsively.
"All right, that's settled," Mr. Torres said, and added, as Fred sat down, "Maria, you wil take charge of the chorus. Any song you' choose will do. And on the day of the program I want everybody to wear white. I like white."
Some of the girls didn't want to wear white. The boys said they preferred khaki. In the midst of the noise, the teacher's voice rose as he gave the assignment for the next day. That was all that could be said about the program now that the recitation had begun.
For all his seeming indifference, Mr. Torres took quite an interest in the program. Daily before the recitation he would ask the students how they were getting along. They would answer that everything was all right, although, of course it wasn't. Maria could not get the class together for rehearsal. She kept on changing the song for the chorus. The class sang every song she chose without feeling. When Mr. Torres asked Ester and Gloria to report for rehearsal, the two girls said they wanted to change their song. "We don't like it. It's too common," they explained. Mr. Torres had to yield, saying they could use any song they liked.
But I like 'Where's the Land of Joy? he added in a strange voice that the two girls were to remember the rest of their lives.
For on Sunday, the news of Mr. Torres' death spread through the town, shocking everybody. Students flocked to the hospital but were not allowed to see the body. In front of the square building of the high school, children loitered and talked of Mr. Torres and his death. Fred was there with a number of his classmates looking bewildered and quiet and lost. They could not speak. Everybody knew now: Mr. Torres had been a slick man. He had managed to keep his disease a secret iron even those who knew him intimately. Nobody remembered having heard him complain. Now they knew there were many days when he attended class although the pain racked him. Only when standing on his feet was physically impossible did he absent himself from school. His death was unexpected even by the doctor who had treated him. It was sudden.
"Where are the others?" Fred asked. "Call them!"
They came, the class of Section A, and at Fred's command, went down to the creek back ol the high school building and gathered flowers, mostly white flowers and the trunks of banana and century plants, and took them to the inner court of the schoolhouse. There they worked silently till it was too dark to see. They talked only in whispers. Everybody listened to Maria when she told them what song to sing. Gloria and Ester looked away when their eyes met, both of them remembering their teacher's voice and the look on his face when he said he liked that song.
Tomorrow morning." Fred announced, "all of us will wear white. He liked white."
On Monday morning, after the usual flag ceremony, the lag at half- mast, Fred stood trembling before the students. For some time he said nothing.
"Friends," Fred began in a voice that shook with emotion, "our theme this morning is courage. This program is especially dedicated to our beloved teacher and adviser, who, as you all know, passed away yesterday. He was a stranger in our midst when he came, and a stranger when he left us. We who were under him misunderstood his firm, quiet humorless way of doing things. We did not bother to ask why he was different, why he hurried through things in a businesslike way as if there was no tomorrow. In our youthful impulsiveness, we pronounced judgment on him, thinking he was one of those mentors whom years of teaching had hardened to the lovely things of life. We looked upon him as an automation.
"But now, too late, we have learned what a martyr he was to pain. He could have smiled had we given him cause for smiling. Rather than bite his lips in agony or stay at home and suffer, he pursued the even tenor of his teaching days without a sign of the excruciating pain that daily attacked him. This is courage, my friends, the courage of a man who would rather be misunderstood than admit defeat.
I'd like to tell you the story of young guilt, of a group of conceited fools who made the remaining days of our teacher not as pleasant as they should have been, but God knows...." He paused, his eyes dimming with tears, and unable to go on, turned his back on the audience and disappeared.
There was no clapping of hands. Many were the eyes wet with tears. Only a faint murmur passed like a ripple over the listening throng.
Ester and Gloria, both in white, stood before the students.
"We shall sing this morning." Gloria said, "our beloved adviser's favorite song.
And they began softly, tremendously, their hearts in their blended voices, quivering with remorse and regret:
"Where's the land of joy?
Where's the land of lasting rapture,
Where's the land of peace replete...?"
The song was never finished. In the middle of the refrain, the two girls began to sob. They ran to the library and burst into tears.
When Maria came forward, she made a sign, and the students in white walked up the steps, and with set faces, their voices hushed as in prayer, they sang. "Farewell to Thee."
And when the song ended, it was quiet everywhere on the high school campus. Then the bell rang like a church bell tolling, and the two rows of boys and girls in white passed down the corridor, ahead of the other classes, to Room 8 where no teacher awaited them.
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