It was finally before them — the life-giving artery whose delta was so fertile and wide it could swallow all the settlers with nowhere to go. They could not settle permanently in any place, however, for anytime during the year when the rains came, the waters changed course and laced the delta with rivulets, rising no higher than a woman’s ankle.
They stopped at the river’s bank. Indeed, exactly as Dalin had described it, the river was wide and swift. In the middle and close to the bank were whirlpools. The current carried trunks and branches of trees from the mountains and islands of water lilies.
They should make their crossing immediately. At the landing below, people were gathered. But there was no ferry, no raft, and there was none on the other side either.
It started to drizzle again, and in a while the drizzle turned into sheets of lashing rain. Under the canopies, almost everything inside the carts was dry. Out where he sat holding the reins, Istak was thoroughly drenched. The palm leaf helmet and cape were no protection. But just as quickly as the rain started it petered out.
Istak went down the incline to where people were gathered, farmers with goats and chickens which they wanted to transport to the other side, and women carrying baskets filled with greens.
“How do we cross?” Istak asked no one in particular. A farmer turned to him and shook his head.
“You could swim,” he said lightly.
When Istak did not speak, the farmer went on. “The ferry — it broke from its mooring in the night when the water rose. It must be far downstream now with the ferryman, who perhaps had fallen asleep.”
“Is there no other ferry?” Istak was anxious.
The other farmers who were listening shook their heads. No other ferry but this one. Maybe, if you go downriver to Alcala — but that is very far from here. And in Bayambang, there is a ferry there because they are building a bridge.
“And upriver?”
Again, a collective shaking of heads.
“There must be a shallow place where we can cross.”
“Yes, there is,” a farmer said, pointing to the line of carts up the incline of the bank. “But it will be dangerous.”
There was no time to think. As leader, he must now decide. “We are in a hurry,” he said. “God will take care.”
During the dry season, when the river was shallow, the ferrymen had built a roadway along which carts and people could pass. Where the river was shallowest, they piled the stones; they stretched across the shallow water several coconut trunks on top of which they spread cogon grass, then a layer of gravel. They did not use the ferry anymore. With this bridge, they charged a cheaper rate.
“The bridge is there.” The man pointed it out to him. “You can cross but don’t stray from the embankment because it will be deep now on both sides. And as for the coconut bridge, you must go ahead of the carts and feel for it with your feet. It should still be there.”
The carts came down the gully. The men had dismounted and were holding the animals by their reins so that they would not go down too fast.
An-no took the lead carabao. The road to the small bridge had not been washed away by the rain, though the water had risen. The stone embankment still showed through the brown water.
The uncles from Tagudin were reluctant to cross. Blas suggested that they could very well settle in this wide and fertile plain — surely there were still forests they could clear, where they would not be hounded.
“It is a distance we need,” Istak said, “distance from those chasing us. They will ask people and so many have seen us — they will know where to find us. The farther we go, the more difficult it will be for them to follow. And after we cross the river, no one would really know where we headed.”
And because he was learned, they finally agreed.
The bridge had to be tested first, and Bit-tik, who was a good swimmer, went ahead, following the embankment. It was still secure, as the men at the riverbank had assured them. He moved slowly in the brown moving waters which never got higher than his waist, feeling with his feet the boulders that had remained. The carts could go over them. Then the line of boulders ended and he was on the bridge itself. The coconut trunks had not been dislodged — they were intact all the way, but the current had become swift and Bit-tik had difficulty steadying himself.
Once across, on the embankment again, he turned to the waiting carts across the expanse of water and shouted: “The bridge is still here. You can cross.”
The carabaos were used to water; every day during the journey, they had to look for some stream or well so that the animals could be bathed. The bull might be scared, but Dalin was sure it would be all right; she led it steadily into the line. Istak went onward to the middle of the river, and realized that he was not yet all that strong and could be swept away by the current.
The carabaos were not too sure of their footing, and the carts jerked and swayed with every boulder; then the wheels tumbled across.
Istak could feel the current, at first slight and then a steady pushing against his legs. As he moved deeper toward the middle of the river, it came as a powerful force that could easily have swept away the children if they had not been in the carts, holding on to their mothers. An-no in the lead kept screaming at them to go straight for the middle and not to stray and fall into the depths and be washed away. The ten carts were now well into midstream. There was no turning back.
An-no finally hit the bridge. “I am here,” he yelled at them, his voice carrying through the rush. He was waist-deep now in the brown swirling waters.
Then Istak saw the big branches of trees, huge swatches of grass and reeds that must have been torn away upstream, and they rushed toward the carts, sometimes pushing them dangerously close to the edge of the embankment.
One of the men went toward the left to push away the branches that had gathered on the side of a cart. They moved on, swaying and jerking as they went over the coconut bridge, the water pushing steadily against the solid wooden wheels.
Within the carts, some of the children were shouting, enjoying the sight of the swirling waters, unaware of the danger they were in. The first cart was now over the bridge. An-no was going up and was shouting again, telling them to keep a straight line, that the bridge was not that long, and it was still solid underfoot. As he went up, he saw it. He shouted, fright in his voice, for in the middle of the river, hurtling toward them with the current, was a huge uprooted tree.
The men shouted and pulled at the leashes of their carabaos. The women and the children peered out of the carts, at the mountain of leaves and branches racing toward them. On its downward rush the tree had also amassed reeds and water lilies.
Istak led the last cart with Mayang and their seed rice. If he tarried, the tree might sweep away the coconut trunks underfoot. He was now in the middle of the river, directly in the path of the oncoming tree. He shouted at the animal to hurry. It was then that the cart refused to budge, its wheels stuck between the coconut trunks. No matter how he pulled at the poor beast, the cart would not move. He shouted at his mother to get out quickly, but Mayang, perhaps too tired to move, did not hear, or if she heard, she acted too late. The tree was upon them like an avenging hand.
It towered over the cart, swallowing it. Istak felt the trunks under him give way. He let go of the leash and ran to the other side, the leaves, branches, and island of reeds engulfing him. For a moment, the green mass seemed to smother him. His legs, his body, were being pushed toward the rim of the embankment. But his feet touched a boulder, solid and secure, and the mountain of branches and leaves swept by. He emerged in time to see the carabao slip into the water, the wheels of the cart bob up briefly, then disappear altogether. It was but an instant, but like a lightning flash in the darkened sky, fate passed before him. He witnessed it all and did not move, the current eddying around him, while the men who were on the shallow side of the river raced past him and, screaming at one another, dove into the river. And when they surfaced, they were already downstream. They swam back toward the shallow rim of the river, then to the embankment, and dove again and again. The carabao, which had broken free from its harness, was recovered; it was no stranger to water. Some of the men who were waiting for the ferry at the other side saw what had happened and they, too, joined in the search.