MARIA FERRER, IN HER OWN BEHALF AND AS ADMINISTRATRIX OF THE INTESTATE ESTATE OF MARIANO TRIAS, PLAINTIFF AND APPELLANT, VS. MARIA IGNACIO ET AL., DEFENDANTS AND APPELLEES.

On December 21, 1908 or 1910, the Court of First Instance of Cavite rendered
two judgments in favor of the spouses Mariano Trias and Maria Ferrer, and
against the brothers Buenaventura Dimaguila and Perfecto Dimaguila, in the total
sum of P13,500.

To satisfy these judgments, the sheriff attached the five parcels of land
described with the letters (a), (b), (c), (d), and (e) in paragraph 4 of the
complaint. At a public auction, the said parcels were sold to different persons,
and the total price of P2,750 was realized from the sale of the parcels (a),
(b), (c), and (d).

In another case instituted in the Court of First Instance of Laguna between
Emilio Buenaventura as plaintiff and the same brothers, Perfecto Dimaguila and
Buenaventura Dimaguila, as defendants, a judgment was rendered in favor of the
former. To satisfy this judgment, four parcels of land described with the
numbers (1), (2), (3), and (4) in paragraph 6 of the complaint were sold at
public auction. At the instance of Mariano Trias, the right to repurchase, which
the Dimaguila brothers had over these parcels of land, was likewise sold at
public auction, adjudicating it to the same Mariano Trias for the sum of P150.
Mariano Trias redeemed these lands from the purchasers at the public sale, and
later sold them for P3,700.

Subsequently, Maria Ignacio, the mother of Perfecto Dimaguila and
Buenaventura Dimaguila, claiming to be the owner of the lands sold by the
sheriff at public auction, as lands belonging to Perfecto Dimaguila and
Buenaventura Dimaguila, brought an action to recover said lands against the
spouses Mariano Trias and Maria Ferrer, and the sheriff who sold the lands.
Pending this litigations, the spouses Mariano Trias and Maria Ferrer, parties of
the first part, and Maria Ignacio, Perfecto Dimaguila, and Buenaventura
Dimaguila, as principal obligors, and Pedro Guevara as surety, parties of the
second part, executed a compromise agreement (Exhibit A), on February 6, 1912,
whereby said litigation was terminated.

In this compromise agreement, Maria Ignacio, Perfecto Dimaguila, and
Buenaventura Dimaguila bound themselves to pay jointly and severally to Mariano
Trias the amount of P13,500; to redeem the parcels of land described with the
letters (a), (b), (c), and (d) in paragraph 4 and all the parcels described in
paragraph 6 of the complaint, retaining and deducting from the amount of P13,500
the amount of P6,450, which is the total amount that should be paid to the
purchasers in redeeming from them the said lands. Because the amount of P2,000
was formerly paid to Mariano Trias, this amount should likewise be deducted from
the amount of P13,500, thereby leaving a total balance of P5,050. Maria Ignacio,
Buenaventura Dimaguila, Perfecto Dimaguila, and Pedro Guevara jointly and
severally :bound themselves, the first three as principal obligors and the
latter as solidary surety, to pay to the spouses Mariano Trias and Maria Ferrer
this balance of P5,050, within a period of one year and a half, to be counted
from the date of the agreement, that is, from July 6, 1913.

Mariano Trias and Maria Ferrer, after recognizing Maria Ignacio’s title to
the parcels of land referred to in the agreement, bound themselves, in turn, to
cooperate, with all the means in their power, in redeeming the said lands.

About the 29th day of December, 1913, Buenaventura Dimaguila paid to Mariano
Trias the amount of P500 on account of the balance of P5,050. Mariano Trias died
in February, 1914. Up to this time, the parcels of land had not been redeemed,
and the period within which to exercise the right of redemption over the lands
described in paragraph 4 of the complaint appears to have already lapsed since
the date of the agreement, and the parcels described in paragraph 6 of the
complaint had been sold in an absolute sale by Mariano Trias. The purchasers of
all these parcels refused to allow their redemption.

The plaintiff, for herself and as administratrix of the estate of Mariano
Trias, now brings this action against the defendants, Maria Ignacio,
Buenaventura Dimaguila, Perfecto Dimaguila, and Pedro Guevara to recover from
the said defendants the amount of a P5,050 with interest thereon. The
defendants, in their cross complaint, claim from the plaintiff the payment of
the amount of P13,250 as damages, for the reason that the plaintiff failed to
redeem the lands. The court absolved the defendants Maria Ignacio and Pedro
Guevara from the complaint; condemned the defendants Perfecto Dimaguila and
Buenaventura Dimaguila, to pay to the plaintiff, within the period of ten days
immediately following the date of the rendition of the judgment, the amount of
P3,530 with legal interest thereon from December 15, 1914; ordered that proofs
be taken to determine the value of the lands in question at the time of their
sale, and that the plaintiff pay to Maria Ignacio, by way of damages, the value
of said lands; ordered that after the plaintiff shall have made this payment,
the defendants Dimaguila should in turn pay to the plaintiff the amount of
P4,770. From this judgment the plaintiff appealed.

The plaintiff’s action as well as the defendants’ cross complaint depend
entirely as to whether or not the spouses Mariano Trias and Maria Ferrer have
complied with their obligation with regard to the redemption of the lands
referred to in the compromise agreement. To decide this question, it is
necessary to determine the nature and scope of this obligation. The compromise
agreement contains the following clause:

“* * * the parties of the first part (Maria Ignacio, Buenaventura Dimaguila,
and Perfecto Dimaguila) promising to accomplish the redemption of all the
parcels of land sold from the respective purchasers mentioned in this paragraph,
with the cooperation of Mr. Mariano Trias who will use all the means within his
power to effect the redemption.”

The defendants claim, and the lower court agrees with them, that this clause
imposes upon the plaintiff (by plaintiff we refer to the spouses Mariano Trias
and Maria Ferrer) the obligation to effect in fact the redemption of the lands,
and unless this redemption is effected and the lands are delivered to Maria
Ignacio, it can not be said that the plaintiff has complied with her obligation.
And, as the redemption of these lands is now legally impossible, because some
parcels were sold in an absolute sale, and as regards the other parcels the
right to redeem them had already been extinguished, the defendants allege that
it should be considered that the plaintiff has already violated her obligation.
We believe that this interpretation of the contract is ab solutely unfounded. We
can readily say that the literal wording of the contract itself rejects this
interpretation, as the contract shows that the defendants are the ones who bound
themselves to make the redemption and that the plaintiff only promised to
cooperate with the defendants towards this purpose. It is sufficient for the
plaintiff that she use all the means within her power, and it is not required
that this cooperation on her part will result precisely in the redemption of the
said lands. And, if the wording of the contract is clear in this sense, the
intention of the contracting parties which can be deduced from the other clauses
is no less clear.

We accept the fact as true that the defendants, upon entering into the
agreement, knew that the period within which the repurchase of the lands
described in paragraph 4 of the complaint and sold by the sheriff could be
effected had already expired, and that the lands described in paragraph 6 of the
complaint and sold by the plaintiff had been sold in an absolute sale. As may
readily be seen, in the contract the plaintiff does not make any statement which
expressly or impliedly may induce the defendants to believe otherwise.  It
should be presumed, on the other hand, that he who contracts and assumes an
obligation knows the real circumstances under which such an obligation is to be
complied with. Consequently, it must be supposed that the defendants in assuming
the obligation to redeem these lands should have known the conditions under
which this redemption could be made. The contrary view would imply, on the part
of the defendants, the incredible improvidence of having entered into a
compromise agreement regarding the redemption of certain lands without
acquainting themselves with the conditions under which this redemption could be
effected. Moreover, with regard to the lands described in paragraph 4 of the
complaint, which have been sold by the sheriff as property of the Dimaguila
brothers to satisfy the judgment rendered against them and in favor of the
plaintiff, the latter was not the one who had the right to redeem but the
defendants Dimaguila. The latter should have known better than the plaintiff as
to whether this right of repurchase had already been forfeited. With regard to
the other lands described in paragraph 6 of the complaint, and sold by the
plaintiff, the defendants should have known also that such lands had been sold
in an absolute sale. If the idea of the defendants was that these lands had been
sold with pacto de retro and this pacto was then in force, it is not explained
that they were obliged to effect the redemption, they not being the ones
entitled to redeem. Instead, they only required the plaintiff’s cooperation in
effecting the redemption, when as the plaintiff was the one who had the right to
repurchase, this cooperation was not sufficient, but it was necessary, in order
to effect the redemption of these lands, that the plaintiff should exercise in
fact this right.

It is to be inferred from the foregoing that the redemption of which the
contract speaks should not be, in the contemplation of the parties, the legal
redemption but a redemption purely voluntary on the part of the purchasers. And
if this interpretation is the one that should be given to the contract, as we
believe it is, it seems clear that the plaintiff in binding herself to cooperate
with the defendants did not understand that she was obliged to effect in fact
the redemption, inasmuch as she could not reasonably oblige herself to do so, as
the redemption did not depend upon her own will but upon of the purchasers.
Aside from the fact that the word “cooperate,” in itself, does not have this
scope, the circumstances which we have explained show, moreover, that the
contracting parties should not have given to this word such a scope.

But, even supposing that the defendants, in entering into this agreement,
believed that the lands could be legally redeemed, another reasoning brings us
to the same conclusion.

After declaring in the contract that they bound themselves to pay to the
plaintiff the amount of P13,500, the defendants make it appear that from this
amount they withheld P6,450, which is precisely the total price of the lands
that had to be redeemed with a view to using the said amount in the redemption
thereof. The fact that the defendants have placed in their own hands the means
by which they could effect the redemption indicates clearly that they believed
that they were the ones that had to make the redemption. Likewise, the fact that
the defendants took from the plaintiff these means shows that they understood
that it was not the plaintiff who should effect the redemption.

Referring to the lands described in paragraph 4 of the complaint, this
conclusion is more evident. As we have said, with regard to these lands the
plaintiff was not the one entitled to effect the redemption but the defendants,
the Dimaguila brothers. If, in addition to the fact that the plaintiff was not
the one entitled to make the redemption but the defendants, the Dimaguila
brothers, the latter retained the amount with which the redemption should be
made, the claim of the defendants that, according to the contract, it is the
plaintiff who should make the redemption, appears without a foundation. Any
interpretation of the contract which leads to an absurdity should be rejected,
and that interpretation which is reasonable and just should be preferred. It
seems to us absurd that the plaintiff has bound herself to do what she did not have the right to do and after she had
parted with the means with which to accomplish the act. But, it seems reasonable
and just that the defendants who were the ones entitled to effect the redemption
and who had the money to do so were the ones who bound themselves to
redeem.

Although this reasoning is not entirely applicable to the lands
described in paragraph 6 of the complaint, in which the same circumstances do
not concur, nevertheless, we can infer that, as the redemption refers to all the
lands, we should interpret it in the same manner with respect to all the
lands.

This conclusion is strengthened by the fact that the defendants,
through Buenaventura Dimaguila, complied in part with their obligation, paying
to the plaintiff P500 on account of the amount of P5,050, almost two years after
the execution of the contract, a sufficient time, at all events, to create with
good foundation the supposition that the defendants, in making this partial
payment, should have already known that the lands were not yet redeemed; that
they could not yet be legally redeemed; and that the purchasers did not permit
the redemption. Notwithstanding this, according to a witness who was present at
the time this payment was made, Buenaventura Dimaguila then made no protest
whatever against the plaintiff’s failure to comply with the contract. This
proves that the defendants did not claim up to that date that the plaintiff, by
virtue of the contract, was obliged to actually redeem the lands.

We have reached this conclusion, taking into account the fact that the case
treats of a compromise agreement whereby the plaintiff and the defendants have
put an end to a litigation, and that this class of contracts is to be strictly
interpreted, and must be understood as including only matters specifically
determined therein or which by necessary inference from its wording must be
deemed included. (Art. 1815, Civil Code.)

At all events, supposing that the -defendants executed the contract under the
impression that the right to redeem the parcels of land was still subsisting, as
it does not appear that the plaintiff has induced them into this belief, this
fact, at most, constitutes an error of fact which the defendants can not set up
in this action, it having been the object and result of the compromise to
withdraw the parties from a suit already commenced. (Art. 1817, Civ. Code.)

It is argued that if the contract is to be interpreted in the manner we have
indicated, the contract would be lacking consideration on the part of Maria
Ignacio. We believe that this contention is also unfounded. In their answer, the
defendants say:

“These last three named persons, namely, Mariano Trias, Perfecto Dimaguila,
and Buenaventura Dimaguila, recognizing the right of said Maria Ignacio over the
said lands, on the one hand, and on the other, in consideration of the fact that
Maria Ignacio is the mother of the said Buenaventura and Perfecto Dimaguila, and
for this reason, desired to free the lands from .the effects of the judgment
rendered against them in the suit instituted by Mariano Trias in the Court of
First Instance of Cavite, all realized the necessity of a compromise which would
entirely end all of said litigations and the misunderstandings existing between
the same, without injury to the rights of the parties, if possible.”

This does not only give the reason or personnal motive which led Maria
Ignacio to make the compromise, but also demonstrates that as to her the
contract contains a consideration. If she had desired to assume voluntarily the
obligation of her sons, jointly with them, in order to free them from the
effects of the judgment rendered against them, then her obligation is the
obligation of her sons, and the consideration of the contract as regards the
sons should be considered as the consideration of the contract as to her. And it
can not be claimed, nor can it be successfully claimed, that the obligation of
the defendants Dimaguila to pay to the plaintiff the amount of ^13,500, ratified
by a final judgment, is without a consideration.

Moreover, the contract shows other considerations on the part of Maria
Ignacio, which are sufficient to constitute a consideration for the obligation.
By this compromise agreement, the plaintiff and the defendant have, by mutual
concessions, given an end to a litigation. These concessions are the cause of
this class of contracts. The plaintiff had the right, by virtue of a judgment,
to demand at any time the balance of P5,050 of her credit against the Dimaguila
brothers and to proceed to the. execution of the property of the latter in order
to recover this amount. By virtue of the compromise, the plaintiff renounced
this right and granted a period of one and a half years within which to pay this
amount. This was a concession whereby the Dimaguila brothers were, for one year
and a half, freed from the effects of a judgment, thereby giving said brothers
an opportunity to satisfy said judgment before their property could be proceeded
against. According to the admission made by the defendants, this fact was
precisely the principal consideration for which Maria Ignacio entered into the
compromise. And then the plaintiff’s cooperation in effecting the redemption of
the’ lands is another consideration. If it did not give result, it could have
given. The defendants could have required not only the obligation to cooperate
but also the obligation to effect the redemption itself, but they only demanded
the first. At all events, one or the other, although in different proportion, is
a consideration.

The lower court holds in its decision, and it appears to be the principal
ground for absolving Maria Ignacio from the complaint and awarding to her the
damages prayed for in her cross complaint, that the obligation of the plaintiff
by virtue of the contract is to return the things to the condition in which they
were before the sale of the lands, because, the decision states, that the same
state of things could have been reached anyway, if, instead of the compromise,
the compromised litigation would have been continued and decided with the
natural result of indemnification for damages. This reasoning takes for granted
that Maria Ignacio is the owner of these lands and has proofs sufficient to
justify her ownership. However, there is absolutely no foundation in this case
for accepting this supposition, excepting the acknowledgment in the instrument
of compromise, made by the plaintiff in favor of the ownership of Maria Ignacio.
But, if it be supposed that there was no compromise, neither had there been this
acknowledgment. We do not understand why, in omitting this compromise and this
acknowledgment, it can be affirmed in this case that, had the compromised
litigation been continued, it would surely have resulted in a finding in favor
of the ownership of Maria Ignacio. The acknowledgment by the plaintiff in favor
of this ownership of Maria Ignacio did not precede the compromise; it is the
effect of the compromise. If it had existed before, there would have been no
disputed right, neither, therefore, would there have been any compromise. This
presupposes essentially a doubtful right, which is its object as a contract.

Another allegation of the defendants is that the plaintiff, subsequent to the
compromise, still sold, in an absolute sale, one of the parcels. We have
examined the proofs and found that this sale covered the parcel (e) which was
not included’in the compromise. (Par. IX, Exhibit A.)

According to the same proofs of the defendants, Mariano Trias interviewed
personally the purchasers of some of the parcels in order to negotiate their
repurchase, and, as regards the other parcels, whose purchasers were in Manila,
he (Mariano Trias) sent his lawyer, Mr. Joya, for the same object, because he
could not leave the Province of Cavite, for his duties as provincial governor,
as he then was, did not permit him to do so. We believe that this was
substantially a compliance with his obligation.

For all the foregoing, we hold that the contract, Exhibit A, between the
plaintiff and the defendants is valid; that the obligation imposed upon the
plaintiff by this contract was duly complied with; that the obligation imposed
by the same contract upon the defendants Buenaventura Dimaguila, Perfecto
Dimaguila, and Maria Ignacio, as principals, and Pedro Guevara, as surety, to
pay jointly to the plaintiff the amount of P5,050 has not been complied with, as
to the amount of P4,550.

Therefore, the judgment appealed from is reversed, and the defendants
Buenaventura Dimaguila, Perfecto Dimaguila, Maria Ignacio, as principal
obligors, and Pedro Guevara, as surety, are hereby condemned to pay jointly and
solidarily to the plaintiff the amount of P4,550, with legal interest thereon at
the rate of 6 per cent per annum, beginning December 15, 1914. The plaintiff is
hereby absolved from the cross complaint. There is no special finding as to
costs. So ordered.

Arellano, C. J., Torres, Street, and Malcolm, JJ.,
concur.

Johnson, J., did not sit in the case.

Carson, J., reserves his vote.