Never an Empire Read online

  The explosion had ripped apart the forward half of the vessel which housed the crew’s quarters where the majority of the sailors were off duty: resting or asleep. All died instantly. The officers’ quarters were housed in the rear half of the ship so most survived including the captain, Charles Sigsbee, who, as soon as he was able, sent the news of the disaster to Captain James Forsythe, Commander of the Naval Station at Key West, Florida.

  Forsythe forwarded the news to Washington, to the secretary of the Navy, John Davis Long.

  Sigsbee wires, Tell Admiral Maine blown up and destroyed. Send light House Tenders. Many killed and wounded …

  The Maine was only the second battleship to be commissioned for the US Navy and had been based on the latest of European naval design; her main armament resembled that used in the Royal Navy’s ironclad, Inflexible. She had been built as part of America’s response to the increase of foreign sea power in the Atlantic, especially that of the Brazilian battleship Riachuelo. The chairman of the Naval Affairs House Committee, Hilary A. Herbert, said of said ship to Congress, ‘if the whole of this old navy of ours were drawn up in mid-ocean against the Riachuelo it is doubtful if a single vessel bearing the American flag would get back to port’. However, as navies on both sides of the Atlantic rapidly added new ships to their fleets design also rapidly evolved and the Maine proved to be obsolete as a fighting force almost as soon as she was launched. Nonetheless she had been sent to Havana to ‘protect US interests’. Quite what form this protection might take if the US considered its interests threatened was unclear. Maine carried no marines who could be sent ashore as some sort of ground force and its armaments were of a calibre that could easily pound to fragments any parts of Havana that it chose to shoot at, but she could do little else.

  Whatever its practical purpose, however, the uninvited and unwelcome arrival of the Maine in Havana harbour could easily have been be interpreted by the Spanish as a deliberate attempt to exacerbate the already strained relations with America; almost an act of deliberate aggression. However, the Spanish were given no time to formulate their official response as the Maine went down on the evening of the day it arrived.

  To the American public, when the horrific news was broken to them, the sinking of their battleship and massacre of its crew could just as easily be interpreted as a dastardly act of aggression by the Spanish military against a ship doing no more than legitimately protecting US interests, what made it worse was that this had no military action but an underhand and despicable act of cowardice. Unable or afraid to face the might of the ship, the Maine had been sunk by a mine placed secretly alongside it while its sailors slept. At least was how William Randolph Hearst and Joseph Pulitzer set about portraying the disaster. Sales of both newspapers shot up and the story, once launched, ran and ran.

  In both newspapers headline after headline deliberately tried to create an unstoppable public outcry for war with Spain. No matter to these two media moguls that their coverage was hysterical, unbalanced, and mostly inaccurate, including downright falsehoods, because neither paper cared whether the Spanish had, in truth, been responsible for the sinking or not. What they did care about was selling newspapers and a war with Spain would sell tens of thousands more of them. So the reporters, columnists, and illustrators of the Journal and the World went about their business. There could not be the slightest doubt as to who had sunk the Maine, could there? It was the cowardly Spanish. This truth, which both papers held to be self-evident, they blazoned forth to New York, across America, and to the world at large. Hearst, always able to turn a memorable phrase, put the seal on the Journal’s superior coverage when he created what was to soon become, literally, a battle-cry, ‘Remember the Maine and to hell with Spain.’ It rallied the people of America behind US armed intervention in Cuba and war with Spain. It also doomed President McKinley’s negotiations which, as it happened, were well advanced and had every chance of bringing about a satisfactory negotiated outcome. But carefully negotiated peace settlements do not, alas, sell newspapers, so Congress finally gave in to public pressure, whipped up to a frenzy by New York’s ‘yellow journalism’, and on 19 April debated a resolution supporting US armed intervention for the achievement of Cuban independence. However, Republican Senator Henry Teller proposed an important amendment: that the US would not establish a permanent control over Cuba after the war. Teller represented that rallying cry of American anti-imperialist sentiment which Senator Platt had seen as such a risk to his preferred outcome of the Cuban struggle: Never an Empire. The amendment passed, making it clear to America and the world that the United States could have no colonial ambition in any foreign military actions it undertook.

  The amended resolution, which went on to demand Spanish withdrawal from Cuba and authorized President McKinley to use whatever military force he thought necessary, passed and was sent to the White House. The President signed it into law on April 20 and an ultimatum was sent to Spain. In response, Spain severed diplomatic relations with the United States on April 21. Having anticipated such a response the US Navy, having already left their bases and been deployed at sea, now formed up and began a blockade of Cuba. Spain declared war on April 23 and on April 25 Congress announced that a state of war now existed between the US and Spain.

  William Randolph Hearst had been given his picture and had got his war.

  Chapter Three

  The town of San Juan Bautista

  Rizal Province, Philippines

  May 1906

  The man rolled off onto his side with his back to the woman. Both lay still for a short while, spent by the effort of their passion. Then she turned and slipped her hand under his arm onto his chest and drew herself close. He felt the softness of her thighs against his buttocks and her breasts as they pressed against his back. He put his hand over hers. He wanted to say something, to speak words of love or gratitude, but nothing came. Other thoughts filled his mind. He pressed her hand, a gesture, something in place of the words that should have come. Outside, a bell tolled the hour. Five o’clock. Now words came, not the ones he wanted but ones he had to say.

  ‘It is time.’

  ‘Yes, I understand. I will go. No one will see me.’

  Her hand slipped from under his and he felt her body move away. He turned, lay on his back, and looked at her. It would not be sunrise for at least another half an hour but there was enough dawn light coming through the window to see her sitting on the edge of the bed running her fingers through her long, black hair. She was so young and so beautiful, like a dark angel. He watched as she stood up and left, closing the door silently behind her.

  It was time to get up and begin the day but the man lay still for several minutes thinking. What had happened? Had it been love or lust? It could not be both. Why had it happened? Why had he let it happen? Sex was something that should only take place in marriage. Outside of marriage it was a deadly sin, an ugly stain that left a terrible disfigurement on the soul. Lust was not something beautiful like married love; it was nothing more than the feeding of animal appetite. Sex outside marriage made a man like a beast of the field and the women who gave their bodies to such men were fallen women, creatures of the devil. Dark angels.

  And here his thought came to a sudden stop. The well-known formulas he had learned and lived by now suddenly sounded false. Was the young woman who had just left his bed a fallen woman, a creature of the devil? Was he no more than a beast? The image of her naked form came back to him and he felt his passion returning. He threw off the sheet, got out of bed, and looked down at his half-risen penis. Yes, it was true, he was no better than a beast, a creature of lust and passion, an animal, a sinner.

  There was a knock at his door followed by a woman’s voice.

  ‘Father, are you awake? Are you up? It is time to get ready or you will be late for Mass.’

  The priest answered.

  ‘I am up, Maria, I will be ready soon.’

  ‘Do you want a lamp, Father?’

  ‘No, no
lamp, nothing. Thank you.’

  Thoughts of the young woman were swept away as he returned to reality. He was in a state of mortal sin but there was still a morning Mass to be said. What should he do? There was no other priest in San Juan to hear his Confession and give him absolution even if he had the time to go to Confession, and in the case of a mortal sin a good Act of Contrition was of no avail. For a moment he stood irresolute. What should he do? What could he do? Then, almost automatically he washed himself, dressed, and began to take up his daily routine.

  Not many minutes later, wearing his long white soutane and a wide-brimmed straw hat, he left the house, crossed the gravel path through the garden, and went to a small doorway in the side of the big, white church which stood next to the priest’s house and entered. Once inside his fingers found the holy water font; he blessed himself and made his way from the dark of the priest’s doorway into the dim candlelight which came from the altar. Marble altar rails ran across the front of the sanctuary. At these, communicants knelt to receive what to anyone else were small, round pieces of flat bread, but they believed were in some mystical way the body and blood of their Lord, Jesus the Christ. In the middle of these marble rails were low, wrought-iron gates which gave access to the sanctuary. At these gates the priest turned and faced the altar. A tier of three, broad steps led up to the main altar which was also was marble but draped now in heavy, coloured cloths with the Latin inscription Sanctus Sanctus Sanctus sewn into it in heavy silver and red threads and over which lay a pure white linen sheet. A Catholic altar ready for the Mass. Behind the flat surface of the altar, on its own elaborate plinth stood the domed tabernacle, draped in heavy, expensive cloth: gold embroidered brocade, a temple within a temple, the inner-sanctum of the true God.

  The priest stood for a moment gazing at the tabernacle in which was housed that most holy of holies, the bread which was the Christ. Solemnly he lowered himself onto one knee, waited for a moment with head bowed, then stood up. Big candles in heavy, brass candlesticks sat each end of the altar already lit, the heavy Mass book lay on its stand, and the Mass cards were in place on either side of the tabernacle. Everything was in readiness for the service to begin. Behind the tabernacle six more tall candles were throwing their light out into the darkness that shrouded the nave of the church, and to either side of the altar were vases of bright, fresh flowers.

  Sunrise would come just before six when Mass began and the church would fill with light as the service progressed. Dawn Masses in the weeks after the great feast of Easter had always been his favourite, like some wonderful new resurrection each day. But now it was different. He feared the coming of the light, feared that he would see himself for what he was, a creature of the night, of lust and darkness. The new light would rise to reveal a priest in mortal sin performing a blasphemous parody of the Holy Rite. None of the congregation would be able to see this new reality but God saw, and from the great crucifix that hung high above the altar Jesus, hanging, dying, suffering for sinful humanity, would see, take his terrible sin on his own holy shoulders and go on suffering, dying.

  The priest remained, standing, looking. Everything on the altar stood in readiness. To one side, from an ornate, bronze bracket on the wall, hung a small red light which was always kept burning while the tabernacle held the blessed Eucharist: the very presence of Jesus. Jesus always there, above, on the cross, hidden in the veiled tabernacle, a mystical presence, waiting, watching, knowing all, suffering but loving and waiting to forgive.

  From the darkness of the church he could hear the faint murmur of private prayers. There would be over fifty people already in the church. They would be the poorer workers who came to Mass before going on to their jobs. Those in a state of grace would have done as he had done and fasted from food and drink, even water, from midnight. These elect would come to the altar rails and kneel at the low, marble rails to receive Holy Communion from his hands, but none would know that the hands who placed the holy wafer on their tongues were those of a sinner and not only a sinner but a damned soul, utterly and eternally lost. To them, in their ignorance, he would still be their priest, the same today as he was yesterday.

  What might happen when he vested and came out onto the altar? Perhaps, in front of the actual divine presence he would be given some sign, some indication that he was forgiven, that he was once again worthy. But he knew there would be no sign because he had no sorrow for his sin, worse, he cherished it, cherished the memory of his entry into her, the rhythm of their bodies together, her cries, his strength, the awful ecstasy of the climax, and, most of all, the vision of her nakedness. No, there was no sorrow, no contrition. He was lost. He blessed himself, turned and slowly walked towards the sacristy door. To say Mass in a state of mortal sin put him beyond forgiveness, beyond the mercy of God. It was the unforgiveable sin, presumption, placing oneself above God, making a god of yourself. In the sacristy he took up the vestments already laid out for him by the old sacristan and as he put on the white robe and over it the heavy chasuble he knew that from now on he would be no more than a whited sepulchre, the same on the outside but inside full of filth and corruption, a beast, a creature of the devil.

  The old sacristan waited patiently already wearing the white cotter over the long black cassock, the uniform of an altar server, the priest’s assistant at Mass.

  The priest joined his hands and nodded to the sacristan. He was ready. The sacristan went in front of him and at the sacristy door rang a small bell. The people in the church stood for the entrance. Dawn light was already beginning to stream into the church. The pair moved out onto the altar and genuflected at the foot of the three stairs which led up to the altar proper. With his back to the people the priest spoke to opening words.

  ‘Introibo ad altare Dei.’

  I will go unto the altar of God.

  The reedy voice of the sacristan responded.

  ‘Ad Deum qui laetificat juventutem meam.’

  To God who giveth joy to my youth.

  The priest paused. He had never before thought the words absurd on the lips of the old man beside him. Now he thought them worse than absurd. They were an indictment. Youth and joy had gone in one brief act of the flesh and with them innocence and purity. To pretend otherwise and continue would be the worst kind of cowardice as well as a blasphemy. He should turn and walk away in proper shame. There was a silence as the priest and sacristan stood at the foot of the altar steps.

  The sacristan glanced at him with a look of concern. Somebody in the congregation coughed. Everyone waited, wondering.

  The priest fought with himself in an agony of guilt and indecision. A choice must be made and must be made now.

  Then a voice, his own, filled the church.

  ‘Adjutorium nostrum in nomine Domini.’

  Our help is in the name of the Lord.

  ‘Qui fecit caelum et terram.’

  Who made heaven and earth.

  The Mass had begun. Life would go on.

  Chapter Four

  Mass was over. By one wall of the church were the Confessionals: a set of three carved, dark wood cubicles with curtained entrances. In the pews adjacent to these cubicles were about twenty people, a few old men but mostly women with scarves covering their heads. They were waiting to have their sins heard and forgiveness administered. The young priest sat in darkness in the middle cubicle, his face level with the grills on the either side of him each of which had a small, sliding doors which the priest opened in turn and through them the penitents kneeling in the two outer cubicles made their confession.

  The young priest had been ordained for six years and parish priest in San Juan for only one of those years, but he had long become used to the litany of sins confessed to him: the petty misdemeanours, small transgressions, the omissions and failings. Serious sinners stayed away; there had never been any murderers, bandits, rapists, robbers. Even when the occasional adulterer, almost always a man, came to him they no longer aroused any urge to offer help, advice or suppor
t. There was a formula for dispensing forgiveness and absolution, such and such a sin equalled such and such prayers to be said. The greater the sin the longer the prayers and the more times to be said. Nowadays he hardly heard what was he was told and doled out the Latin formula of forgiveness as a routine.

  But today was different. These people were small sinners, capable of asking and receiving absolution, he was now the great sinner. He closed the grill on the last penitent and shot open the grill on the other side. Did his words and gestures still forgive? Or was it all …

  ‘Bless me, Father, for I have sinned. I have slept with a man who is not my husband.’

  And there she stopped. The priest didn’t need to look at the face, he recognised the voice only too well. Before he realised what he was saying he found himself making the habitual response.

  ‘How many times?’

  ‘Once, last night.’

  The priest fell silent and the woman waited.

  He was stunned, not because she had come to him for forgiveness, but that she was married. Suddenly it came to him that he knew nothing about her, not even her name.

  They had met the previous day, late in the afternoon. It was a quiet time for him, the siesta was over, people had gone back about their business, and the church was usually empty and pleasantly cool. Unless his paperwork was unusually heavy or urgent he came each day at this time to pray quietly by himself, to spend some personal time with Jesus.

  She was sitting in a bench at the back, weeping, with her face in her hands. He had gone to her. At first, looking down at her, he had thought she was no more than a girl.

  ‘What is it, my child? Why are you crying?’

  She took away her hands and looked up. She was not a girl but a woman, a beautiful young woman with the face of an angel or a Madonna. He sat down beside her and they had begun to talk. She had come to San Juan in desperation. She was alone, lonely, she had no work and no money. She could see no future and found herself wanting to die. She was afraid, very afraid, and there was no one she could turn to, no one. She had put her face into her hands and begun to weep once more.