The Forgotten Dark Tales of Negros

The Three Convicts and Their Theories About Hell

A long time ago, in Bacolod - the new capital of Negros after it was transferred from Himamaylan, there were three men who constantly debated about their own vision of the afterlife. Confined together at Celda Dos in Fort San Juan, the three prisoners spent most of their time talking about heaven and hell to forget about their unfortunate fates.

The first convict was Diego Rivera, 22 years old, guilty of stealing his neighbor’s goat. The son of a poor fisherman, Diego was forced to steal the goat to save some dowry for his beloved Angelina.  He was a tall man with a big scar on his forehead given to him by a carabao’s horns when he was nine years old.

The second convict was Saturnino Perez, 30 years old, guilty of killing a guardia civil. Saturnino had a very long history of grudge with the Spaniards. He grew up in Binalbagan where his parents were accidentally killed by a Spanish General who was practicing his rifle. When his sister Filomena was raped by one of the Spanish soldiers, Saturnino could no longer bear his anger. He avenged his sister the day after she was buried. 

The third convict was Edilberto Zamora, 27 years old, declared guilty of treason. Edilberto had a twin brother, Norberto Zamora. It was Norberto who was caught red handed trying to plot an assault against the Spanish troops in Talisay. When Edilberto was arrested in his house for his brother’s crime, he didn’t argue with the authorities. He loved his brother and Norberto would do the same if it was the other way around.

It all began on a rainy afternoon in the labor grounds. The prisoners were being used by the friars to build a church which would soon be called the San Sebastian Cathedral. Saturnino was confined at Celda Dos for five years already. When his two cellmates were hanged that year, the replacements were Diego and Edilberto.

“Stupid fat friars!” Diego muttered wiping the mud off his face.

“You should keep your mouth shut if you don’t want to die.” Saturnino advised his new cellmate.

“Hijo de puta! We are all going to die anyway!” Edilberto ejaculated.

“I told you to shut your mouth! Calm down, brother. I’m with you. And besides, it’s better here than in hell.”

“Are you sure about that?”

And starting that day, the three of them had been sharing their thoughts about what would happen to them after they die. They talked mostly of hell since the friars condemned them that they surely would. It would look unfair for Edilberto since he wasn’t really guilty of his supposed crime. But human as he was and maybe he was keeping it for himself, Edilberto, too, got no hopes of going to heaven.

Hell, according to Diego Rivera, is like this…

“A totality of everything that we don’t like. If you smoke 10 rolls of tobacco a day, you can never do it there. If you drink 5 glasses of tuba a day, you can never do it there. It’s place where you can’t be with your mother, your father, and in my case, with Angelina. To each his own. That’s what I believe hell is, a land where all you need is not given to you. A land of absence. An eternal suffering for our ever needing souls. I don’t believe in those fires that the friars are using to scare us during their sermons. We leave the flesh when we die. I believe that souls cannot be burned by any fire.

“And I believe that we can cheat hell. Yes! Somewhere out there, there’s someone who observes us and records what we hate the most. If we keep deep in our hearts those things we loathe, those things we fear, then that someone won’t know what our hell would look like. We can bluff.”

Edilberto: I don’t believe that that someone is not all knowing.

Saturnino: So if I pretend I don’t like seeing friars getting roasted like lechon, my hell would be a banquet of roasted friars? Sounds like heaven to me.