Funeral for a Dog: A Novel

by Thomas Pletzinger

  Tuuli and I pack our things and leave our room 219 over the Praça de São Geraldo, she steals an ashtray, I take along the Words worth poems. The bill for the Pousada Majestic we pay in reais and dollars one to one, our American money is enough for the days and nights we spent waiting for Felix. We fell out of time and can afford it, we tip well. David throws our luggage in the back of the truck, and Lua marks the turned-off fountain of the Praça de São Geraldo of Tupanatinga with lifted hind leg. The three-legged dog jumps without help onto the back of the truck and we leave the town. Away we go, I think, on we go! David drives, Tuuli sits next to him and rolls a cigarette, I with my two thousand eight hundred eighty-three hours of peace service in my bones wonder whether all this can be true. Everything is the same as always, we buy cans of beer in various villages and stop on the roadside. We do as the padre does: Urinating is good for you, we say, and laugh. Felix and I hit each other on the shoulders and remind each other that we really exist, in the middle of Brazil, in the middle of the desert, in the middle of the jungle, on the way to the sea. We drive through the sertão and bathe in a river full of piranhas, we sleep in the monastery of the Holy Mary, we stroll in orchid gardens. We drive to Pedra, and climb up the black stone, and Felix declares with hands raised to the sky that the world belongs to us. Tuuli looks out the window for hours, we talk, she sings, we laugh. We drive past bananas and sugarcane, past green hills and herds of cattle, we dance in Caruaru and sleep on the bank of the Rio Ipojuca. Lua sings “Girl from Mars.” Felix wins a hundred reais at dice in Fortaleza, he loses a hundred reais on the international game Brazil versus the Netherlands, in a café in Macarana he bets on Oranje, everyone thinks his blond hair is Dutch. The game ends 2–2. You can’t win them all, says Felix, patting Lua’s head. Tuuli sees the ocean first, Lua sees the ocean for the first time. We sleep a few nights in the sand. Tuuli removes the bandage from Lua’s stump. In Natal we take off his chain, Lua hesitates. When he then runs along the water, you can almost no longer tell that his leg is missing. Felix borrows a surfboard, I’m Robby Naish! he cheers, and Tuuli applauds. In the morning she wears my purple Los Angeles Lakers cap and in the evening Felix’s panama hat. David leaves the Heckler & Koch in the glove compartment. I read and lie on my back, sometimes I take notes. On the white beach of Jericoacoara we collect the roundest and palest stones. Tuuli, Felix and I throw the pebbles far out into the Atlantic. No one wins, no one loses. It’s a tie, says Tuuli, and never wants to let us go. Lua asserts that this is happiness. David talks on the phone with the padre, everything is all right in the Fundação Ajuda de Nossa Senhora. The water is running. Felix and I learn capoeira, we fight and dance at the same time, we walk barefoot, we never hit each other intentionally. Lua orders chicken hearts for breakfast. On the large dune overlooking the village Tuuli kisses first me, then Felix, then me again. Peace service in deprived areas of Latin America, says Felix, crazy, aaah!

  On my last night David stops at the beach of Olinda next to the largest wooden shack. Here there are Volkswagens and Chryslers, here there are Chevrolets and Hondas. We get out, behind us a taxi is honking. Olinda, says Felix, from the Portuguese ó linda, “how beautiful!” On the horizon two tankers in full regalia, shining cranes and cabins, floodlights on the monastery on the hill too, over all this planes in descent. The sun has already disappeared, my time in Brazil has expired, tomorrow I’m flying back. I’ve finished reading Wordsworth’s Selected Poems. I’m using the return ticket for Varig Airlines as a bookmark and stick the book in my bag, Recife-São Paulo-Frankfurt. The others are heading back to Seraverde, Tuuli will stay for a while in the Fundação. She takes my hand. Your last night, she says, so let’s go! So let’s go? I think, and before my eyes I see Tuuli and Felix sitting on the water tower, her head on his chest. They’re smoking without me. So let’s go, says Felix, so let’s go, says Lua.

  OI, COMPADRE, David says to the guard at the door. The two of them know each other. He makes sure the police aren’t coming, Felix explains to us, cockfighting is prohibited. Lua has to go back on the chain, but we’re allowed in. No photos! I with my three thousand two hundred sixty-four hours of Brazil in my bones have never seen anything like this: the guests are sitting at small tables around a dance floor made of clay. We get a table in the second row. A waist-high barrier made of light blue wood stands between us and the dance floor. Old men in shirts, young men in suits, occasionally a woman with dyed blonde hair and high-laced breasts holding a bottle of Guaraná. Men and boys lean on the bar in shirts and pants of the same color, red, yellow, green, blue, black, white. At the bar there’s no drinking, at the bar the teams talk shop, says David, the cock breeders and handlers. Under strings of lights people play poker and dice and pass money back and forth. An old man is playing the berimbau, another is smoking the stub of a joint until it’s completely gone, black with oil, the lighter close to his calloused lips. To celebrate the occasion we have grilled red mullet with lemon and black beans, to celebrate the occasion David pours one beer bottle after another into Lua’s bowl. Lua is lying under the table and drinking. Tuuli asserts that I look tired. Tired or awake, Felix laughs, this is your last night, my Svensson! Now let’s have a beer! Tuuli is sitting between Felix and me, she’s laughing, she’s holding our hands. We bet! Felix indicates to the server the size of a bottle with both hands, mais uma ceveja, we raise our glasses into the light, my dear Svensson, our last night!

  Around ten the cocks are brought in. The dice and card games stop, the berimbau keeps playing, the guests turn to the dance floor on which no one is dancing. A man with a bell asks for quiet. We have to stand up to see anything. Money is pulled out of pants pockets, shirt pockets, leather wallets and embroidered purses. The cock handlers have disappeared, instead men and women in shorts and shirts crowd all around us, the air is thick with smoke. I observe Tuuli. Lua is sleeping, and when Lua is sleeping, all is well, says Felix, and kisses the nape of Tuuli’s neck. He pulls a few bills out of his pants pocket. The birds arrive, the conversations cease, the fights begin. The first handlers step into the ring through a small gate: grandfather, father and son with the same mustache and same jerseys, their hands press the cocks’ wings against their bodies. The birds’ heads jerk back and forth, their combs shake. David translates: the animals’ names, their ages, their wins and losses. The shack nods and murmurs. One after another, all the handlers present their birds. There are roosters of all colors, white and brown and black, some are one color, some speckled, they’re named Desert Storm and Senna de Vila Desterro IV and Sharkinho Noventa. I can’t remember the names, I want to take notes and I get muddled. On the animals’ legs shimmer the spurs, made of metal or horn, some look like they’re made of glass. Sharp as razor blades, says Felix, they’ll cut off your finger if they get you. In the shack there’s a soft buzz, for several roosters it rises to an excited murmur, for others it peters out with boredom. When a brown and white speckled rooster with long feathers and metal spurs is displayed, the spectators cheer. That’s the champion, David translates, 43 fights undefeated. I take note of this brown and white rooster, 43 fights and not a single loss. A moment later follows the snow-white challenger, and David explains that this bird has gone undefeated in seven duels, he hasn’t had to fight that much, he’s been well trained, he’s supposed to be the best in Pernambuco.

  What are the stakes, Svensson? asks Felix. When the first preliminary fight is announced, the spectators begin to gesticulate, they pass money through the room, there’s shouting at the bar, coins jingle. The hall goes silent, and two roosters are brought in. As in a boxing match, the handlers stand in the corners, they give their birds a light shake, they pull at their roosters’ heads and bodies as they talk relentlessly at them. The men are now wearing small bags around their bellies, in them Vaseline and bandages, needle and thread. They put the birds in the ring, they hold the scratching roosters tight for another few seconds, then comes the signal, and the audience begins to scream. The cocks flutter toward each othe
r, they assail each other, they peck and kick, they want to tear each other to shreds. The spurs cut deep wounds in their wings and bodies, their beaks peck at the eyes. After a few seconds the first cock is lying and flailing on its side, its belly is covered in blood, on its neck an open cut is gaping. The handlers take their animals out of the ring, the loser draws a knife and puts his dying rooster out of its misery with a single slash, the winner gets the executed rooster. For honor, says David, for soup. One bird after another is put in the ring, sometimes it goes fast, sometimes it takes the cocks several rounds. During the short breaks, their handlers tape up their wounds, they blow air into their lungs and pry open their encrusted eyes, sometimes they pray. If both animals are injured, the rule is: whoever moves last is the winner. A brown cock flies over the barrier, and the audience immediately jumps out of the way. Fear of the spurs splits the crowd, I think, and see Tuuli laughing as she clings to Felix. When the cock notices the absence of his adversary, he turns, and immediately his owner is there, the spectators yell and whistle. I can’t tell who here is betting against whom and how much. David bets a few reais on a speckled cock named Iguaçú and wins, Felix bets everything and loses everything to a man with a pink tie. Tuuli gives all the roosters her own names: Nightingale and Orchid of Olinda and Moby Dick. In the second-to-last fight of the evening, Tuuli says with an announcer’s voice, Don Quixote finishes off a rooster named Sancho Panza in three tragic rounds. Both birds are lying in the bloody dirt, the owners shake hands, they cut off their animals’ heads.

  The clay floor is saturated with the blood of the animals, the audience is getting nervous, at the tables in the first row the bets are increasing. Now comes the main fight, David shouts. I register the iron smell in the air, the cigarettes, the sweat of the gamblers. The owners of the champion rooster have taken their position in the left corner of the ring, the champion is fed chili seeds, the handler whispers something in his ear and makes the sign of the cross three times over his comb. Forty-three fights, I remember, not a single loss. The challenger is the whitest rooster I’ve ever seen, says David, look at the spurs! Black as hell! In the other corner the snow-white cock is being prepared for the fight. That one’s mine! shouts Felix, I’m betting on the white cock! Is that wood? I ask. Exactly, says David, jacarandá, rosewood, filed sharp a hundred times. Tuuli’s hair is fragrant as Felix and I bend down to ask her for the names of the roosters. We’ve drunk and gambled away our money, I’m the only one who still has a few reais for a last round. I say: Everything on the champion! Our former police dog is lying under the table and snoring, the heat and the squawking of the cocks can’t wake him. How Tuuli’s foot caresses Lua’s flank, I think, following every word from her mouth. Shall we bet? asks Felix, and I answer, yeah, let’s bet! Tuuli smiles. And? asks Felix. And? I ask. The names of the next combatants, says Tuuli, are William Wordsworth in the left corner and Robby Naish in the right. Your bet, please! Sodom versus Gomorrah, David laughs, Sodom versus Gomorrah. Tuuli is the top prize, says Felix.

  When the left corner puts Wordsworth on the ground and lets him feel the clay under his claws, Lua wakes up. The shack holds its breath, the berimbau player stops plucking and beating, Lua’s chain rattles softly. The bettors are staring at the cocks and their handlers, the strings of lights, the blood. They’re waiting for the timekeeper and his signal, they throw the last bills into the pot, stack the last coins. I look at Tuuli, her eyes shift between me and Felix, they shift between the animals and the people. The second the bell rings and the cocks are released, I suspect the worst. I suspect that the fun stops this instant, I suspect that Wordsworth will lose his forty-fourth fight, I suspect the winnings of the victors and the losses of the defeated, I suspect the knife for the loser, I suspect Wordsworth’s blood-spatters on Naish’s rosewood spurs, I suspect Tuuli and Felix in Seraverde and myself alone on an airplane over the Atlantic, jacarandá, I suspect, jacarandá.

  The fight lasts less than a minute. When their handlers release them, the two cocks stay where they are on the blood-soaked floor. No frantic fluttering, no squawking rage, and no flashing blades. Wordsworth opens his wings and closes them again, Naish just stands there and crows. The handlers shout their commands, vambora! Vambora! the spectators fold their hands, vambora! Vambora! they make their signs of the cross, they yell and whisper, the air in the shack is burning. And then the champion flies the first attack. Wordsworth half flies, half charges at the challenger, he slams with all his might into Naish’s side, and even though the white cock jumps up and strikes out around him, I already see the first steel-spur cut on his body. Now the audience is screaming, the roosters’ owners are screaming, the birds are screaming, the first white feathers are falling to the ground. Wordsworth is suddenly a blur of beak-pecking, spur-kicking, and wing-storm, he drives the challenger against the light blue wooden wall, he pecks at the snow-white rooster’s head, he deals him another two or three blows, then Naish manages to break free. He jumps over Wordsworth, he beats his wings wildly and almost touches the ceiling of the shack. The spectators back away, but Naish doesn’t end up over the barrier, he turns above their heads and then swoops down on Wordsworth. With both claws and both rosewood spurs, he lands on the champion and digs into his back. Now Naish is pecking insistently at the champion. I notice the first plucked spots on William Wordsworth’s neck, his first wounds, the first blood. The spectators are holding their breath, I see the red in the colored plumage, his torn and shredded feathers, his down in the air over the ring. But then Naish pushes himself off Wordsworth’s speckled back and flutters through the arena, he dances around his wounded adversary, he grazes the battlefield only rarely. Wordsworth has to stay on the ground and react, he turns in a circle and follows Naish with bloody eyes. Naish attacks Wordsworth from above, he doesn’t let up, he penetrates the colored birds’ defenses, he seems to be proceeding tactically and playing with Wordsworth, he moves with the lightness of the sure winner. Float like a butterfly, says Felix, grabbing the nape of my neck, sting like a bee! I bet on Wordsworth, and Felix’s rooster seems to be winning. Tuuli isn’t laughing anymore, she’s observing the fight with her mouth open. She just watches us, I think, as we gamble her away. When Naish flies another airstrike, Wordsworth falls to the side, and this time he manages to drive his claws into Naish and hold on to him. Naish can’t get back in the air, and they roll in each other’s embrace through the dust of the arena, a cloud of feathers and blades and blood, the noise in the shack is deafening. The cock handlers pull the birds apart, Naish’s beak is caught in Wordsworth’s eye. The roosters are again put head to head in the middle of the ring, both can neither fly nor walk, they crawl toward each other and again go directly at each other. The shack roars the real fighting names of the animals, which I don’t understand, the names of the owners, the names of their colors. Lua looks at me with drunken eyes. The pecking gets slower and ceases, the cocks lie twitching on top each other, then Wordsworth’s head flops to the side and stays there. The bird is dead. The handler in the right corner lifts Naish over his head, Felix and Tuuli are embracing. I’ve lost the bet. Without saying a word I get up, take my cap, and go outside, I lie down in the back of the pickup. On the horizon an illuminated tanker, on the shore the fishermen’s boats, over me airplanes or stars. With the return ticket in my bag I wait for Tuuli, I wait for the morning of my departure, eventually I fall asleep next to Lua.

  August 8, 2005

  (The screams of the animals)

  In the afternoon the lake is smooth like oil. Tuuli’s prescription for me was to stay. My headache has gone away, I drank Tuuli’s Chiarella with all due caution (tepid water is good for the stomach). From the window: an oddly flat tourist steamer, its foghorn can’t be heard until a few seconds after a white cloud comes out of it (time can be seen). I’m sitting in front of my notebook again, I’m observing the steamer on its way across the lake toward Lugano. Svensson is no stranger than I am (we both write ourselves). He looks to the past, Tuuli looks to the
future, I look at the ships. Everything that’s more than a hundred meters away exists in a different time (Elisabeth).

  Profiles & Strangeness

  In the autumn of 2004 I temporarily broke off my dissertation, because Elisabeth’s editorial department could use me (I wanted to be with her). In editorial meetings my wife thinks of me as Mandelkern, the freelance cultural journalist. My dissertation has been shelved, I haven’t added a word for months (the abortive ethnologist). Elisabeth and I have confused our life with our work. Participant observation is the reflexive gaze upon others and therefore upon oneself (Bronislaw Malinowski was nonetheless a ladykiller). I’m Mandelkern when I write my articles, my profiles, my reviews of strangeness. From time to time I’m paid reasonably for my work. Elisabeth is a woman with history and a future. She calls me Daniel when I don’t talk back to her. Why don’t you go ahead and do something with actual consequences sometime, she said, you need to be somewhat more decisive for this world (Elisabeth’s voice).

  Are Svensson’s stories made up?

  I put aside the notebook and pick up the binoculars (a mixture of conscience and anticipation). By the water: Tuuli and the boy are feeding the swan, Svensson is chopping wood with an ax, Lua is still breathing. Svensson keeps carrying new wood from the open shed, he stands amid logs and tinder (Svensson is building a pyre). As long as I hear the splintering, I can open Blaumeiser’s suitcase again. It takes me less than two seconds, the lock and Tuuli’s hairpin click into place. Next to all sorts of stones (flat, light, dark, angular, small, large) and a map of Brazil (little crosses at places with interesting-sounding names) lies Svensson’s stack of paper.