The Woman with a Stone Heart / A Romance of the Philippine War

Def

andy beach of Manila bay, just opposite old Fort Malate, talking of their wedding day

Marie would stop to pick up a spotted shell which was more pretty than the rest. Finally, when they had gotten as far north as the semi-circular drive-way which extends around the southern and eastern sides of the walle

rise of the

wood on t

pen mark

r thoughts

ng the periods of high tides. Dimiguez helped Marie to step upon it; then they strolled eastward past the large stake w

Dimiguez how she had watched the shooting when it

, "this insurrection would not have lasted these two years, and we would have been

e of Spain" (the large stone bridge near the mouth of the river, built over 300 years ago) and entered the Escolta, the main business street of Manila. After making their way slowly up the Escolta they meandered along San Miguel street until they fin

y. When she was born, her father instituted one of the accustomed Filipino dances which last from three to five days

heir wooden-soled slippers on the hard ground, and indulging in a wandering lovers' conversation, Marie said to hi

l night in our home at Malolos, debating in my mind whether we had better get married in March, as we had planned, or if it would not be wiser and more manly for me to go to war, take chances on getting back alive and postpone our wedding day until after the war is over. Toward morning, I decided that it was my duty to become a sold

e, "you are not on that du

rie," said he firml

ou?" pleaded Marie, as she threw both arms about his neck and began to

ders from his chief, plays his part; and if he gets caught, he refuses to speak and di

ed hersel

s, sitting on her head, and a cigarette in her mouth. She had only gone a block when she met a neighbor girl, one

. "Have you heard the awf

med Marie, "

f the governor-general's summer palace up on the Malacanan, just as he w

"Heavens!" gasped she, "

entries to it, the room where the governor-general sleeps, and many other thin

st an armed guard, she began to plead for her lover's life. But he had already been tried, convicted and sentenced to death by strangulation in the

s chute was just wide enough for a man to enter. Its sides, top and bottom were all built of heavy planks. The side planks lacked a few inches of connecting with the top, although of course the side posts ran clear up and the top was firmly

prisoner placed in this chute, forced to the lower end and then fastened securely during low tide, can look out over the side planks at the

its power a gasoline engine, and, of course, it soon left her far behind. When she first started, the swells caused by the launch rocked her little canoe quite roughly and impeded her progress. As she approached the mouth of the river, passed the monument of

ater, when Marie, in frantic agony, almost exhausted, rowed around the lower end of the chute and came near enough to the dying hero to be recognized by him. Straining ever muscle to keep his he

he shore near by, and who had not been permitted to attend the young spy before his death. Marie trembled; she dropped the oars; her eyes fell; for a moment it seemed that her young heart stood still: then he

ht have come to grief. It is strange that she escaped punishment for having followed. She, therefore, rowed directly

until she found a Mango tree heavily laden with fruit. After eating a few luscious man

e had lowered toward evening. She saw them even strike his corpse, and she bit her finger nails as she watched them place

f was astir. It seemed to Marie that the only sound she could hear was the the throbbing of her own heart. To her the whole world seemed like an open sepulcher. Looking down she discovered that she was un

night before, when she and her lover had strolled along the shore of the bay about three miles farther north; and as the sun slowly nodded its evening farewell and buried its face in the pillow of night, she remembered how he, on the previous night, ha

opposite Fort Malate, she swung westward, and, passing outside of the break-water a mile from shore, she entered the Pasig river and hurried homeward. When she arrived, about nine o'clock, she found her mother on the ver

arie, "from now on I intend to kill