THE CADAVER (Alfredo S.

Florentino)

Characters: Torio, Marina, Carding

Time: Afternoon

Scene: The interior of a squalid dwelling located on the edge of a cemetery in

Manila. The walls and roof—made of empty fruit boxes, tarpaulin, bamboo,
and cardboard patched together threaten to collapse any minute. A door,
upstage left, leads to the outside and another, right, to the kitchen. Upstage
center is a small window. At right corner is a cot placed diagonally across the
room. Two fruit boxes, standing on their sides, serves as seats, and another,
flat on ground, serves as a table where an oil lamp gives off the only light in the
semi-darkness.

(Torio is lying on the cot, a manta blanket covering him to the waist. He is
around 28 years old, with a square jaw and well-developed body. He is sick, his
eyes being
closed as if in sleep.)

(Carding, a frail-bodied, slow-moving man, in dirty pants and T-shirt, enters.

He crosses to taps him in the shoulder.)
__________________________________________________________________

Carding: (as Torio seems to wake up) Were you asleep, Torio?

Torio: No, Carding, I was not…..sit down.

Carding: (still standing) So you’ve been sick. I didn’t know it until Marina told
me.

Torio: Where did you see her?

Carding: She passed by the house just a while ago.

Torio: Damn that woman! So she insisted on seeing you. I told her not to
bother you!

Carding: Oh….it isn’t any bother at all, Torio. I was even chiding her for not
letting me know right away. (Takes a seat at foot of cot) She was so excited
when she showed up, at first I thought you were dead or dying!

Torio: Don’t you let that woman alarm you again! There’s not a time
when she doesn’t worry about something. Sometimes, I even think she
worries about what will worry her next! tries to laugh but end up
coughing)
Carding: But she has reason to be worried. You look very sick.

Torio: I’m a just a bit feverish, that’s all.

Carding: (leans forward and feels Torio’s temperature) Your whole body is on
fire! How did you get that fever?

Torio: I don’t know. I guess it’s the tiny wound on my foot. (Exposes his right
foot, bandaged in dirty rags)

Carding: Maybe you didn’t go to the dispensary as I told you. It’s nothing
serious. (pulls his foot under the blanket)

Carding: Nothing serious! If it can put a man of your size and strength to bed, it
is something serious! But you need not worry. I sent Marina to the dispensary.

Torio: What for?

Carding: I told her to ask the doctor to come and look you over. She should
have thought that before.

Torio: Are you dreaming? Do you think the doctor will come when we have no
money to pay him?

Carding: But you don’t have to pay him anything. He’s the public doctor. He’ll
treat you for free.
Torio: Maybe if I got there. But do you think he’ll take the trouble of coming to
me? What do you think I am, a congressman?
Marina: Stop it! How horrible! I can’t stand it! (sits down) Oh…the poor sacred
dead…

Torio: What so sacred about them? They’re dead!

Marina: (almost crying) Torio…we had nowhere to go, we moved into their
place. We erected this house on their land. They did not complain, they did not
call us “squatters”, they did not drive us away. And what did you do in return,
what!

Torio: I hate them! That’s why I robbed them! I hate them!

Marina: Hate them? What did they do to you? Did they ever try to harm you?

Torio: (pointing through the window) Look at them! Doesn’t that sight
infuriate you? Look! Nothing worries them. They lie there day and night,
sleeping like babies, mocking our sufferings…

Carding: (at doorway) Marina, stop listening to him…if you want to keep sane.
He used to tell me that over and over again. Maybe that’s why he made me do
what he did.

Torio: One night, as I was coming home, A strong rain overtook me. I ran for
shelter to the nearest tomb, that one near the road, belonging to a dead
millionaire. It was so beautiful. It looks d more like a palace than a place for a
dead. It had thick marble walls and a roof and festive lights. Inside it was a dead
body in a coffin. It was dry in the rain and comfortable even in death. Why
should that dead merchant have marble walls and a roof to protect him from
the rain, while I was outside, soaked to the bone and shivering, waiting to go
home, to a dark, dank place, with a cardboard roof that leaks even in the
lightest rain! Why? He’s dead and I’m alive! I have more right to the things
wasted on him, don’t you think so? Don’t you think we need thick walls more
than the dead?
Marina: He must have seen you…

Torio: Who could’ve seen us? We used to work after midnight…when

everyone was asleep.

Marina: it was God who saw you Torio. He keeps eternal watch over
the dead.

Torio: Why should God keep watch over the dead? Why not you and me who
are still alive?

Marina: Oh…what you did is a horrible sacrilege! If you die, heaven will surely
not receive your soul…Yes, if you die, even hell would refuse your damned
soul!

Torio: (mad) Why do you always say “if you die” “if you die”? Do you really
want me to die?

Marina: No, why should I?

Torio: (vehemently) You really want to get rid of me, don’t you? (Marina,
throughout, tries to interrupt—in vain) Now I see that you two have been
waiting for me to die so you could live together! Maybe a little wound like this
can put me into bed. You’re praying—praying that I will die. But I’ll disappoint
you both! I will live on and on if only to punish you by denying you the chance
to live together! I’m still young! I have hundred years before me! Not all the
dead in the world can drag me to the grave! (His raving rises in pitch) I dare
them! Yes, I dare all the dead whom I offended to take me! (Raving mad,
shouts through the window) Take me if you can! I despise all of you!
Oh, that you were all alive now and suffering in life! (Suddenly collapses).

Marina: (rushing to him) Torio! What happened? Carding!

Carding: (at Torio’s side) Torio! (to Marina) Get some water quick! (Marina
gets water as Carding tries to revive him. Then makes him drink.)
Marina: Torio…are you all, right?

Torio: (he comes to, sees Marina and speaks between gasps) I’m all right…
They cannot take me…I’m not willing to go yet. (looks around blindly)
Where’s Carding? Has he gone?

Carding: (comes to his view) I’m still here.

Torio: I thought…. you had left… You are not mad at me…are you?

Carding: No, I’m not, Torio.

Torio: I didn’t mean it…what I said about you. I had a drunken feeling…I just
said anything„,

Carding: You don’t have to explain. I understand very well. Try not to talk…
you need rest.

Torio: Yes, I feel tired…You two talk together…I’ll take a short nap… (to
Marina) Wake me up when he’s ready to leave, Marina…

Marina: Yes, Torio. (Torio closes his eyes; suddenly his head and his arm fall
over the edge of the cot)

Marina: (screams, shaking him) Torio! Wake up, Torio! Wake up! (flings her
body on him and cries over the body for a time; later, Carding pulls her away
and covers the body as Marina, now calmed, watches.)