What I am about to relate appears, at first blush, to be ordinary that we are likely to dismiss it as mere coincidence. But, ultimately, is there really such a thing as coincidence?

The story was related to me by Liberato San Jose (nicknamed Bonggo), a friend who owns a small mimeographing and printing shop in Santa Ana, Manila, near the railroad tracks. I witnessed part of the story as the incidents unfolded, and therefore, I can personally confirm their truth. 

Typewriter broke loose

“I have been typing for the past 25 years,” began Bonggo San Jose, “but this is the first time this sort of thing ever happened to me.”

What happened that night was not really extraordinary or unusual. According to him, the letter “T” of his fairly new electronic typewriter broke loose and got thrown to the ground as he was stenciling the manuscript of a book written by a friend of his.

Bonggo is not a particularly superstitious person and neither is he interested in things of a supernatural or psychic nature. He is a graduate of an exclusive private school for boys in Metro Manila and is a practical businessman.

Touchy subject matter

What scared him that night was the fact that he had never even once broken a letter of a typewriter in that manner before, although he had been typing on much older and dilapidated typewriters for so long in his former job as administrative assistant in the school he graduated from, where he also taught typing. What added to his surprise was the statement of the typewriter technician, that the letter “T” was broken in a most unusual way. In fact, he said, he had great difficulty repairing and putting the letter back in place.

Most people will dismiss the incident by explaining that newer typewriters are generally less durable than older ones. So, there was nothing unusual about the letter breaking loose, even if the equipment was relatively new.

But what made Bonggo give special significance to this seemingly ordinary incident was the fact that when it happened, he was working on a book whose subject matter has been considered taboo and forbidden for a long time, namely, the psychic powers of man. The book revealed, for the first time by a Filipino, the secret knowledge and powers taught by the ancient matters of occult wisdom. He felt he was being party to divulging hidden information meant only for the few initiates — and not for the public at large. He discussed his strange fears with the author of the book, but the latter merely laughed at the apprehensions of Bonggo and, perhaps, not to alarm him, merely said, he (Bonggo) must have been seeing too many horror movies lately.

Disturbing pattern

The succeeding events, however, acquired a disturbing pattern. When the cover illustration for the book was photoengraved, Bonggo discovered after it was delivered that the lines did not match. He usually checked this out carefully first before having things photo engraved. For the first time, he failed to do so and it caused another delay in the job.

A couple of days later, as the cover was being printed, the big bolt of the Minerva Press suddenly fell on the cemented floor with a big “clang.” This, too, had never happened in his shop, and there was no mechanical reason for the bolt to have slipped out of place at that time.

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