"But the preaching? You can't tell me that it's not work. Just look how the fat curate was sweating this morning," objected the rustic, who felt himself being beaten into retreat.
"Preaching! Work to preach! Where's your judgment? I'd just like to be talking half a day from the pulpit, scolding and quarreling with everybody, without any one daring to reply, and be getting paid for it besides. I'd just like to be the curate for one morning when those who are in debt to me are attending mass! Look there now, how Padre Damaso gets fat with so much scolding and beating."
Padre Damaso was, indeed, approaching with the gait of a heavy man. He was half smiling, but in such a malignant way that Ibarra, upon seeing him, lost the thread of his talk. The padre was greeted with some surprise but with signs of pleasure on the part of all except Ibarra. They were then at the dessert and the champagne was foaming in the glasses.
Padre Damaso's smile became nervous when he saw Maria Clara seated at Crisostomo's right. He took a seat beside the alcalde and said in the midst of a significant silence, "Were you discussing something, gentlemen? Go ahead!"
"We were at the toasts," answered the alcalde. "Señor Ibarra was mentioning all who have helped him in his philanthropic enterprise and was speaking of the architect when your Reverence--"
"Well, I don't know anything about architecture," interrupted Padre Damaso, "but I laugh at architects and the fools who employ them. Here you have it--I drew the plan of this church and it's perfectly constructed, so an English jeweler who stopped in the convento one day assured me. To draw a plan one needs only to have two fingers' breadth of forehead."
"Nevertheless," answered the alcalde, seeing that Ibarra was silent, "when we consider certain buildings, as, for example, this schoolhouse, we need an expert."
"Get out with your experts!" exclaimed the priest with a sneer. "Only a fool needs experts! One must be more of a brute than the Indians, who build their own houses, not to know how to construct four walls and put a roof on top of them. That's all a schoolhouse is!"
The guests gazed at Ibarra, who had turned pale, but he continued as if in conversation with Maria Clara.