Helen, realizing the importance of time, suggested that we proceed with the strike. Fired with a new impetus, José worked night and day. The strike spread to Solvang and Las Cruces, where the Lompoc farmers controlled the agricultural products. The strikers organized reconnaissance squads and guarded the highway and other exits from the valley.
It was exactly what Helen wanted. The trucks that carried the lettuce were driven by Japanese and white men to Las Cruces, where they were inspected by government officials before proceeding to Los Angeles. Helen wanted the hauling stopped. It was a dangerous move, because the job of taking out the crates from the fields was done by Japanese and Mexican workers under the surveillance of highway patrolmen.
I tried to argue with Helen against the use of firearms and violence in general, but gave up when some of the strikers became hysterical. The leaders of the squads wanted to install me as the new secretary of the local. I accepted it, not because I wanted it, but because the strike called for quick decision. Besides, I was beginning to understand the organized conspiracy against the agricultural workers in California.
The strike taught me that I was definitely a part of the labor movement. On the third day, the reconnaissance squads rushed to the main highway where the loaded trucks would pass. The men spread out and waited on both sides of the road, becoming tense when the trucks appeared in the distance. But the drivers were guarded by motorcycle patrolmen, three on either side, releasing their sirens whenever they approached the strikers.
When the first truck appeared in the bend of the road, the strikers came out and signaled to the driver to stop. The patrolmen rushed forward, clubbing the men who tried to climb into the trucks. About a dozen men turned over a truck, fighting their way out when the patrolmen turned around to beat them. The drivers leaped out and stayed away from the fight.
In a few minutes, finding resistance impossible, the strikers rushed to their cars and drove madly to the office. Three strikers were arrested on the spot, brought to town, and thrown in jail. In the afternoon a newspaper reporter from Santa Barbara came to our headquarters and reported that the strike was inspired by Communists. The next day, believing the newspaper story, some of the townspeople joined the Mexican and Japanese laborers in the fields.
The strike was completely broken. Great damage was done to organized Filipino labor. I was reluctant to believe that Helen had betrayed us, but when she disappeared at the termination of the strike, I suspected that she might be a professional strikebreaker.
Helen had shown me a subtle way of winning the rank and file. But she had also shown me a way of winning the leaders. In fact, she had shown me another way of abusing the trust and confidence of honest working men.
When the strike was broken in Lompoc, José followed Helen to Salinas, where she had gone to spread calamity. I knew that they were living together as husband and wife, in the Mexican section, and I intimated to José my suspicion. But he ignored my warning. Because he was the ablest organizer among Filipinos in California, Helen got her man. She was paid to curtail the trend of agricultural workers toward the labor movement.
Then I heard that the Salinas strike had been defeated, or betrayed, and again Helen disappeared. A ranch house was burned by unidentified persons, and the blame was put on the strikers. It was the same old tactic, but still workable. José was arrested; but Helen, who was also arrested, was released immediately. It was evident that she was paid to create disunity among the strikers and to turn public opinion against them. When José was released by the International Labor Defense, which handled such cases, he went to San Francisco where he attended a workers’ conference.
I went to Los Angeles hoping to persuade my brother Macario to go to Santa Maria with me, where the two of us could work together, because he was proficient in languages and was a forceful speaker. But he already had a job. He was more interested in the theoretical approach. I discovered with disappointment that his desire to go to college was fading. He was, however, reading extensively and acquiring books about world politics.
I wanted Macario to complete his education because, at that time, I still believed that it was the only course for him. I remembered how our family had sacrificed everything for him, and when I saw him losing interest, I thought of the years when I had been with my father on the farm in Mangusmana. I recalled that my most wonderful days were those centered around Macario—when he was away from Binalonan, when he was studying in Lingayen, and when he came back one vacation time to cut my hair.
I wrote to my brother Amado, in Phoenix, but when he received my letter he was already in San Francisco. He was living at the St. Francis Hotel with the man for whom he was working—a big-time racketeer lawyer from Los Angeles. I went to San Diego, where the Filipino pea pickers were on strike. When I returned to Los Angeles a letter from Amado was waiting for me. He was in Hollywood.
I went to see him immediately. He was staying in a luxurious room. But it was actually rented by the lawyer; they always lived together when they were traveling.
“In fact,” Amado said proudly, “we sometimes sleep with the same woman.”
I did not believe him. How was it that a successful lawyer would share a room with his servant? But Amado disappointed me: he was in a position to help Macario go to college but would not. It was the beginning of a long estrangement between Amado and me.
“I’m going into a new world, Carlos,” Amado said. “Away from our people. I’m sorry it’s this way.”
I knew that he had deserted us—even his speech was rapidly becoming Americanized.
“I’m sorry, too,” I said.
“Good-bye.”
I walked out of his room and his life forever.
I lived with Macario in his little room on Flower Street, hoping to read some of his books and magazines. I went to the public library, fumbling for knowledge in the enormous building. One day Macario took a civil service examination, although he knew that he could not get the job.
“Why?” I asked.
“California doesn’t employ Filipinos in civil service jobs,” he said.
“Is there a law about it?”
“None. But it is a matter of personal interpretation of our status in the United States.”
“Citizenship, then, is the basis of all this misunderstanding?”
“You can put it that way.”
I was discovering things. Where should I begin? It was then that Helen came to Los Angeles. She saw me at a meeting of the Labor Relations Board and the workers’ representatives at the post office. She grabbed me, pretending excitement and joy. I played my part, wanting to know what she was doing.
We went outside and walked in the autumn shower: the sky was dark and there was a cold wind. I took Helen with me to my brother’s room; there was no other place for us to go. Because my brother was beginning to integrate his beliefs, I warned him against Helen. But it was useless. She had found her next victim, but her method was more subtle. She was dealing with an intellectual, and used a different strategy.
She succeeded, living with Macario and despising me. I was dejected and lost. I could not believe it: the gods of yesterday were falling to pieces. They were made of clay. I had to make my own gods, create my own symbols, and worship in my own fashion. Yes, this is what I would do, now that all of yesterday was dying.
I was about to leave Los Angeles when José arrived. He had heard that Helen was in town. He wanted to stop her doing any more damage to the Filipinos. She was not only involved with powerful agricultural groups, but was also connected with certain self-styled patriotic organizations that considered it their duty to terrify the lives of minorities in the state.
Helen’s suspicion that Macario was what she called a “professional agitator” revealed her stupidity. There was nothing in my brother’s activities that would indicate his political connections; he was simply a man who had been awakened by a dynamic social idea. How to realize it was beyond him. Although he wanted a course of action, he was incapable of working it out to the end. He was by inclination an intellectual, a visionary, a dreamer. The turmoil in the agricultural areas of California were but reverberations of a greater social catastrophe.
When José, infuriated by Helen’s lack of integrity, accused her of being an agent of anti-union interests, she retorted savagely:
“I hate the Filipinos as deeply as I hate unions! You are all savages and you have no right to stay in this country!”
I struck her in the face with a telephone receiver. Something fell from her mouth. Now let her speak arrogantly about the Filipinos! When José saw that I was going to hit her again, he charged suddenly and knocked me down. When I scrambled to my feet Helen was already running down the alley toward the street.
It was the end of Helen among Filipinos. But she had done enough damage. I had often wondered what became of her. I later heard unconfirmed reports that she had been beaten to death in Visalia.