The Dog Fighter

by Marc Bojanowski

  In the company of Guillermo I looked at my friend the poet much differently. He had never spoken to me of his involvement in the Revolution. Of his time in the cave. I sat like a boy among these two men learning much.

  By dark Guillermo was already very drunk. Without saying anything he stood and hobbled down the street to his shop leaning heavily on his cane.

  He sleeps in the back room. The poet told me. Walk with me over toward the hotel to see if they have taken down the young mans body.

  They will not leave it hanging through the night?

  Cantana knows to take it down before dark. He wants to threaten los Cancioneros. Not anger us.

  We walked along the malecón watching the water of the bay unfold onto the beach in tiny waves. The tide was out and the hotel loomed to the north. Between the end of the malecón and the hotel there was a rock outcropping where feral cats with scarred noses lived in the shadows and crags. The starving cats came salivating to the cathedral bells that rang at sunset. They hissed and meowed rolling over one another when the old men and women of Canción approached with food. Without this food the cats ate fish that washed ashore. When I was in Canción there was a story of one old man who came after dark and left beans mixed with poison. Dozens of bloated cats floating on the foamy waves. Floating with paper and tin cans and corks.

  On this evening a small group of men and women gathered at the edge of these rocks. Beyond them at the hotel I could see two men untying the knots that suspended the skinny shadow of the young mans body. The poet was correct about Cantanas decision to take the body down. As we approached the crowd came undone with loud cries. Seven cats had cornered a baby rattlesnake in the rocks.

  The poet cursed the hotel. Shook his head. Since the first months of the construction on the hotel the malecón had begun to slither at night with snakes. They came to warm their bellies on the stones now that their favorite rocks had been moved. Mice scurried in the moonlight past barefoot lovers and those like myself who slept on the beach.

  Surrounding the baby rattlesnake the hissing cats tested the air between themselves and the snake with their claws. The rattlesnake coiled into a small crack in the rocks. Striking out at the cats but then recoiling as instantly as it had shot out. Some of those in the crowd laughed nervously. Five or six of the men brought out money to place bets. One young boy wiggled free of his mothers hands cupped over his eyes.

  They will wait. The poet said about the cats. Look at the marks on their noses. The missing fur. These cats know that the baby rattlesnake cannot control its venom. They know that after it has killed one of their own they can easily tear through its scales with their claws without being harmed. The baby rattlesnake is too eager. Look.

  I do not want to watch this. I told him and turned away.

  When the poet came back alongside me farther down the malecón he said.

  Some dog fighter you are.

  We had not taken many steps when the loud cries sounded again. From the crowd a young man fell back hunched over and holding his stomach with both hands. His face in pain. He fell to the stone sidewalk laughing.

  I am afraid to die fighting the dogs. I said then. I am afraid I will go to hell for the things I have done.

  There is no hell. The poet said confidently.

  For me maybe there is.

  And what makes you so special?

  There are many things I have not told you.

  And many things you do not know about me.

  I have killed a man. I said.

  Did you not hear the story Guillermo told you today? We laugh about it now. Two old men. But on that day. And on others like it. I shot at many men and I do not know how many I killed.

  But that was in war.

  Each day is war.

  It was quiet then. Uncomfortable with the silence I felt compelled to speak. I told him about my father and the death of my mother. Of sleeping alongside the creek in Northern California after having killed the husband. I spoke with fever almost.

  Who am I to judge you my friend? The poet asked after I had finished.

  That is not why I told you.

  Then why?

  I do not know. I do not want there to be any lies between us as friends. You have done much for me.

  What have I done?

  The English. The talking. The time in the market. Many things.

  You buy me expensive cigarettes.

  I just want to thank you.

  When did you become such a woman? He laughed. I looked away. No. I am joking. The poet continued. No hay de qué. We are friends. But I have to tell you dog fighter. The poet studied the end of his cigarette grinning to himself. I think I enjoyed your company more when you did not talk so much.

  We laughed together at this. I was comfortable with the poet. But still I was not ready to tell him of her. I had lied to him. She was my only weakness. And this I was not willing to share with anyone yet.

  On the night of my third fight my hand was not healed completely but the money I had was not much. Jorge offered to wait some before I paid him but my pride would not allow this.

  You can return to work on the hotel. He said.

  I would not be able to make a fist around the hemp ropes of the crane I told him. And if I returned to construct the hotel I would not be able to face the poet. I did not want to admit how anxious I was to encounter her. I would have fought dogs to be near to her even if I had no hands.

  From the small room on the rooftop I heard squealing children chasing one another down the narrow street below the storehouse. The light around the door darkened slowly with the moon full but clouds gathered some and the men earlier in the day had spoken of rain. Ramón and Vargas sat drinking coffee to sober themselves. They had been drinking until late in the night before.

  We went with Cantana and the other businessmen to church. Ramón said. You should have been there. One of the mistresses punched Vargas in the mouth.

  It was nothing. Vargas smiled. One of the front teeth missing from his mouth.

  What happened? I asked. Only Ramón and I were stretching before the fight. Vargas sat in a new wood chair with a small bruise at the corner of his mouth.

  I asked her to dance. Vargas said. His voice a bit sad even maybe. I asked if she would like to dance with me. We had been making eyes at each other during the night.

  She was looking over your shoulder at me. Ramón smiled at the fugitive.

  Then she hit you? I asked Vargas.

  No no. She said. You say another word to me and I will hit you in the face. So I said. Another word.

  It was a good punch also. Ramón gestured.

  She was standing too close. Vargas argued.

  Close enough to knock out your tooth.

  That one was loose before she hit me.

  I do not understand. I said to them both.

  Neither do I. Said Vargas. Rubbing the bruise. His tongue inspecting the dark space between his teeth. His brow wrinkled.

  Ramón and Vargas went on about the night before. Discussing which mistresses lips were the fullest and most beautiful. Who had the roundest eyes. Ramón made jokes about hitting the fugitive in the head with the leg of the chair again when Vargas mentioned an ugly mistress Ramón had danced with.

  Cantana. I asked carefully. Did he dance?

  No. He sat smoking. Vargas said. Watching us all. Smiling. You wonder if he even likes the women sometimes.

  Ask him? Ramón joked. But before you do be sure to leave behind some nice words about yourself so I will have something to say at your funeral.

  Later Ramón told me that after they left the cantina Vargas was still upset about losing his tooth to a woman. When they were leaving the abandoned church the sun had barely risen. Vargas stopped a young man in a suit walking to the cantina. The young man had two women on his arms. Vargas asked him for a cigarette. Ramón spoke with the women smiling. When the young man lit the cigarette for Vargas he accidentally brought the flame from the match too close to the f
ugitives hand. Vargas beat the young man down to the stones. Ramón helped by keeping the young man pinned with the toe of his shoe placed on the young mans shoulder. The women cried for the dog fighters to stop but Ramón only continued to talk at them in his smiling voice.

  I was drunk. He shook his head when telling me this. It was a blur.

  Later when I would look on the dead body of Vargas I would see that even in death his face showed that he thought nothing of his decision to beat this young man. It was nothing to him. All the men he had beaten occurred in the blur Ramón spoke of. The dogs the same for all of us I think. I can remember how it was to be this way as a young man of great strength. You think nothing of it at all. It does not bother you like a sliver beneath your fingernail or a mosquito you hear in the dark. It has nothing to do with your body or mind. This is when men are the most dangerous I think.

  My fight was difficult that night because of my hand. I told the ragmen to wrap the rug on my right arm and the claws this time on my left. This felt much different. As if my body were not my own. I swung wildly. Weak swings. To better use my left hand with the claws I positioned my body in a stance I was unused to. My fight went longer than it should have. I was angry with myself for this because it was time away from her. But when the dog sat back to snarl I broke its jaw with a kick to its muzzle and then sank the claws awkwardly into the soft skin of its belly. I did this stabbing until the dog its jaw hanging limp from its face was dead.

  After the fight I sat on the benches with the businessmen. I sat off to the side and behind her several rows. I stared at the gentle curve of her neck beneath her hair. I memorized the three tiny black moles along the straps of her dress on her dark shoulders. I followed the blue veins beneath her skin like words of a poem. I read her hair down to the small of her back where Cantanas palm rested. With his gloved hand he smoked watching the fight. His other hand on her. From where I sat behind him I tried to look into his eyes in the reflection of the inside of his sunglasses. But I only saw through the dark lenses. The world before him easier on the eyes.

  When I witnessed his hand move in an intimate caress I refused to believe he had known her. I considered standing and placing my hands on his warm ears and breaking his neck. But I was not ready to die without knowing her. It was easier to think that he had never known her. I convinced myself of this to prevent myself from attacking Cantana and being killed after I did. The poet had taught me if anything to be smarter. To be patient for my time. So when he touched her like this she sat erect under his touch and it thrilled me to see that she was uncomfortable. She was beneath his hand but away from him also. She could feel my eyes on her and this was a game she played sliding from him to let me know that she loved me. And when his fingers would move to adjust to the pressure of her moving from him he would follow her. Knowing I think why she moved from him. The fighting happened in the ring in front of us but I only watched his hand placed in the small of her back and her moving from him. And in all this all my hatred for Cantana and all my love for her lived.

  It was during the fugitives fight that the yelling men turned their backs on the ring. Over the rooftops of Canción black smoke rose from the direction of the hotel. There were several fires. The yelling men pushed toward the edge of the rooftop but careful not to cut their hands on the shards of glass along the tops of the walls hidden some by the bougainvillea vines. The black smoke of the fires captivated us all. Fighting his dog while no one was watching Vargas looked strange in the ring when I turned to him. He was alone. I realized then that the fighting of dogs does not exist without an audience. The fire at the hotel the same.

  Many of the businessmen clenched their teeth in anger when they saw the smoke. Pointed in the direction of the fire and waved their hands. The businessmen took the mistresses by the arm roughly as if they were threatened but responsible for the fire somehow also. One of the women refused to be pulled in this way and she slapped at one of the businessmen. I wondered if this was the one who had punched Vargas. The businessman hit this woman in the face then. His hand closed. She went to the ground holding her eye. Several of the yelling men stepped toward this but Elías was there between the yelling men and the businessman with his revolver.

  My eyes went to find her. Also to see the reaction of Cantana. But they were gone from the rooftop. Ramón gone with them. Vargas was alone in the ring and only the ragmen witnessed him kill the dog and they now were bent over the blood on the floor with their backs to us all mopping hungrily.

  After I dressed quickly I went to the hotel to see what the fires were from. The throats of two guards had been slit and their rifles stolen. The tractors used for moving the earth to make the swimming pool and terraces for sunbathers had been set on fire. A woman came down from her window across the way and was speaking quietly to a man next to me of what she had witnessed.

  They climbed onto the backs of the machines and attacked the wires to the engines with the claws of hammers. She said. Then they poured something on machines and threw matches onto this. They ran laughing.

  You should tell the businessmen what you saw. The man said to her.

  Why? She asked. So they can torture me when I tell them the truth. That I do not know who the young men were? That I saw only shadows in this moonlight.

  Down the crowded street the men and women had come carrying buckets of water. Some men encouraged them to stop and set the buckets down. The reflection of flames danced in our eyes. The buckets made it no farther. Children used the water to splash the dogs snarling and barking at the machines. The light of the fire from the burning tractors cast the shadows of the boys watching from their canoes tall and lean across the black bay. I looked for the poet and Guillermo.

  Businessmen who came from the fight were ordering a group of workingmen to throw the water on the machines. One of the businessmen put his hands on the neck of one man who was not running. While choking this workingman the businessmans suit jacket tore. A crease of narrow lightning down his spine.

  Throw the water! He cursed.

  But the man could not stand. Police wrestled back men crowding the businessman with his hands around the one mans neck. Other businessmen watched this. Their hands empty. The hands of the one businessman with the torn jacket grew from the neck of the man whose body was trying to stand from his knees where he was choked down to.

  Off to the side of this commotion the bodies of the guards were covered by a woman with canvas sacks I once used to carry sand for the cinder blocks. The dead mens skin had paled some in the moonlight. But more from the dark slits in their throats. Like when a fish is brought from water. Not far from this painted on a concrete column at the corner of the hotel in red paint were the dripping words.

  Viva Canción!

  Words that burn slowly around the wood of a door up its walls and into the roof before the building collapses into itself and as the last flames exhaust themselves slowly. Looking at the words in the light of the burning tractors I remembered seeing them painted on the body of the young man to mock him more already naked hanging from the scaffolding. I had been blind to so much of Canción then I was so taken with images in my mind only of myself and her. For all of its peace and beauty Canción was at war. The businessmen constructing their dreams in the daylight they shared with los Cancioneros also dreaming but different dreams.

  First it will overshadow the cathedral. The poet had said. Soon enough the city itself.

  That night on more and more walls the dripping words appeared. On many of these walls those who owned them or lived behind them refused to paint over them. Stories of young men striking from shadows only to disappear.

  These young men they speak of are stronger than us all. The poet would say to me. We are blind to think we have no place in this war. Foolish to believe that we are an audience.

  Lightning cracked above. Thunder collapsing over the bay. The man next to me looked to the sky and said to the woman who spoke quietly.

  If it rains then God do
es prefer Cantana.

  But it did not rain then. The tractors burned until late in the night. Smoldering until late in the morning of the next day.

  I was eager to hear what Guillermo and the poet had to say about the newest attack on the hotel. But Guillermo was busy at the back of the salon talking in whispers with the crying mother of the young man that had been hanged from the hotel scaffolding. The poet took my arm and we walked in silence to the knoll across from the cathedral. There I asked the poet if this was the mother but he answered no. I did not believe him but I did not think the poet lied to me and so I did not ask him.

  The plaza was empty and in our silence I listened for the voices of those singing inside.

  I am going in there one day. I said finally to the poet.

  Good for you. He answered.

  You have never been in there?

  A long time ago. When Guillermo and I first came to Canción we slept in the pews at night until the priest found us. He told us to leave. Told us to sleep on the beach. We were lucky he only found us sleeping.

  What do you mean?

  We stole coins from the feet of the statues. Or from the box where people pay to buy candles. We had nothing. The poet took a long drag from his cigarette. His eyes far off. Then he laughed remembering something. You should have seen how fat this priest was. He barely fit in the pews.

  My father said to me once that if he was to go to church with my mother he would go only to a church where the priest was skinny.

  Your father was a wise man.

  You two would have had much to talk about I think.

  Maybe.

  The voices in the church came to us then from across the sunny plaza. Soft and beautiful. The words indistinct.

  My father used to tell me that Jesus was the greatest daydreamer. I told the poet then. That what He taught was beautiful but difficult also. He said Jesus deep in His heart wanted to be the most famous man that will ever live. That He sat on the bank of some river thinking to Himself how He could put His name not in the voices of many but in the voices of all. God. He thought. My father said to me. Tell them you are the son of God. Who is more known than God?