The Dog Fighter Read online

  The people of Canción know this story of Cantana very well. The old storyteller told us that day.

  This is one of many stories that los Cancioneros tell of the man who brought the hotels and roads to Canción. It is one they tell with some strange pride.

  Some few evenings after Eduardo visited me on the top floor of the hotel I followed him to the house of a man who did business with Cantana. Using his penknife Eduardo opened the lock after some trying. It was not yet dark and this was very bold of him. An old woman had heard Eduardo cursing the lock and looked out her door. When she noticed Eduardos nice clothes and his confident smile she ducked back inside without a word. Eduardo worked for Cantana and by following him I did also. We were privileged men.

  Inside the spacious house music played on a phonograph in a distant room. We heard the voice of a man singing. The white tiles of the floors were very clean and decorated with many colorful handmade rugs from Oaxaca. Hung on white plaster walls without smudges of soot were paintings of Zapotec women at looms. We followed the voice of the man singing. Eduardo ran his fingers along the walls. His fingernails trim and clean.

  In the kitchen we found the singing man wearing the apron of his wife. He was bent over a metal pot of tomatoes and onions and cilantro boiling in some broth with a chicken carcass. I had not smelled food so rich in a long time. In a neat pile on a wood chopping block were cut guava pieces. Alongside this was a large knife. Eduardo and I stood in the door without the singing man noticing us. Eduardo waited for the music to end before speaking.

  How does your wife feel about you wearing her apron? He said and the man dropped the wood spoon he held to the tiles.

  It is our anniversary. The man answered.

  The walls of the kitchen lined with shelves held many black earthenware pots but more for display than cooking. Few had sooty bottoms from being set directly onto fire. Wood carved cooking utensils hung on hooks on the walls. A limestone metate sat at the center of a large wood dining table for decoration. Eduardo ran his fingers over vases made by artisans in Chiapas. A copper pan from Mexicali. The man undid the apron. He was embarrassed and scared. Eduardo looked at the ends of his fingers while listening to the husband say that he did not have the money Cantana demanded. While the husband spoke he did not take his eyes from me with fear and as a young man this is a tremendous feeling. Eduardo clucked his tongue and shook his head admiring a set of dishes in a wood cabinet glazed by old men in Jalisco.

  I do not believe you. Eduardo said after the man finished. Especially after coming here to find you singing.

  The man continued pleading with Eduardo when there came the sounds of the wife entering the home. Her voice reached us pleasantly through the hallways. Eduardo put his finger to his lips as the man was going to call to her. The wifes shoes were loud on the tiles now that the music had stopped. She entered the kitchen carrying a potted bougainvillea. She had been speaking to her husband as she walked but was silent immediately when she saw me. Then she looked to her husband who only looked down.

  Señora. Eduardo bowed.

  Get out of my home. She pointed. Her finger almost touching my chest. Leave now.

  Señora your husband and I have business to discuss.

  My husband has no business with you. She hissed.

  Your husband owes Señor Cantana.

  My husband owes no one.

  Please. I would not call Señor Cantana no one señora. Eduardo clucked his tongue again. No. Your husband does owe. Otherwise I would not be here destroying your home.

  Cómo? The wife asked. But Eduardo surprised her by stepping forward and hitting the husband in the stomach. The man crumpled to the floor but was able to catch his wife by her skirt when she charged toward Eduardo. I grabbed both the wife and her husband by the arms. The husband did not struggle but the wife clenched her jaw and spit at Eduardo while I held her.

  This woman is fantastic! Eduardo said gesturing for her to come to him.

  But I knew that Eduardo did not want me to let go of the wife. He walked from the room laughing to himself quietly and wiping the spit from his chin with a handkerchief. The wife looked at her husband sitting on the floor. She cursed at him and soon music came from the farther room. Eduardo returned. Beside the stove on the wood chopping block he picked up the knife and inspected the blade. He ate a piece of the guava and licked the ends of his fingers. His tongue was enormous.

  Deliciosa. He winked at the wife. Very sweet.

  Eduardo then set down the knife and moved to the shelves. He ran his finger along them collecting dust and clucking his tongue.

  Señora why have such beautiful things if you do not take care of them?

  Eduardo then threw the row of vases to the tile floor. Shards of clay scattering under the stove. The husband covered his eyes while Eduardo destroyed the hand painted dishes and cups. He broke a chair against the stout wood table and then turned over the chopping block where the guava was but lifting this plate as he did so not to spill the fruit. Then Eduardo kicked at the legs of the table like an angry little boy. His face red. His dark hair in his eyes. Cursing. Using the large kitchen knife Eduardo cut through one of the rugs in the hallway. When he passed us the wife kicked at him. The music came loudly from the distant room. Hard off the white walls. At Eduardo and then her husband the wife made bold curses frothing at the mouth. Her husband was almost as strong as Eduardo but nothing to me. Still I did not need to hold his arms he was so weak.

  After destroying the house Eduardo ate some more of the guava and then came to stand inches from the face of the wife. He was enjoying the spit from her curses on his face. He ran his tongue over his lips moist from the guava.

  This is your warning. Eduardo said calmly to the husband.

  The wife tried to bite at the end of Eduardos nose when he came close to her but he only jumped back and laughed. Then he stepped forward and punched her in the stomach with his fist. I let her crumple to the tile floor. The husband did nothing. Catching her breath she still did not cry.

  Just so you know. Eduardo bent over some and said to her as the husband tried to put his arms around his wife. Just so you know and do not have to have this happen again. He passed the back of his hand across the kitchen. His voice just above the music. This is your warning.

  In the street Eduardo walked alongside me. We said nothing. He ran his fingers through his hair to make it neat again. Dabbed at the sweat on his forehead with his handkerchief. He was nervous some but now there was excitement in his eyes. A bounce in his step. A group of boys kicked a dried gourd back and forth down the stone street. Eduardo joined them for the moment that we passed. Laughing.

  Then some streets later he said.

  I should have said happy anniversary. That would have been better. I can never think of the perfect thing to say at moments like these.

  When I was first in Canción and working on the hotel I took money many times from Eduardo for these small jobs. I never once questioned from where the money came and most of the times I only held the arms of men while Eduardo punched them in the stomachs or necks.

  I never hit a man in the face. He told me once. I worry about breaking my fingers. Hurting my wrist.

  One time I pulled Eduardo by the hair away from a man lying on the ground that he was kicking in the face.

  Do not let me kill this one even though I want to. He said picking the lock of the door. Cantana does not always know what is best. But he is still Cantana. Be sure to stop me.

  Eduardo leaned over the man curled on the floor gurgling soft cries. He wiped the blood of the man from the toes of his expensive shoes using the mans torn shirt. Eduardos face was flush with blood making the teeth of his grin very white. He stood over the man panting.

  You are lucky I did not wear my good suit. He said. And then later he asked me. Do you think that was a good thing to say then?

  After one of these small jobs one night in the dark of a cantina Eduardo spoke of holes the teeth of the dogs leave in
the fleshy throats of men who bleed before an audience. He spoke of ragmen stinking of dog saliva and blood and mierda and of dogs whimpering and of the perfumed mistresses of the businessmen crying for the fighters. With Eduardos stories of the fighting of dogs the candles on the tables of the cantina danced beautifully in shadows along the walls of my memory.

  The money is more than you have ever known. He clucked his tongue. If you are winning the men of Canción will carry you from the ring on their shoulders singing your name. And the women. He winked. They will lick your wounds.

  The fighting of dogs in Cancíon occurred each full moon. It occurred on the rooftop of a stone depósito built by the United States to store weapons when for three months in 1847 during el Intervención de los Norteamericanos their army occupied Canción. But to escape the rains of the late summer months the first fight I witnessed was held in the sheet metal warehouse of an abandoned onyx mine tucked in the hills above the hidden city.

  On that night rain fell sharply on the corrugated metal roof. The high steel trusses of the ceiling were lost to shadows. Thick tendrils of cigarette smoke escaped through small cracked or broken windows without screens. When I walked alone into the warehouse the crowd of yelling men surrounded a source of light that did not reach beyond the last man. I lingered in the shadows before pushing forward toward the twisted wood posts and metal fencing of the ring where bloodstained ragmen on their knees wiped furiously at the concrete floor. They wore no shoes and their tattered clothes were as dirty as the rags they used to clean the blood and mierda.

  The yelling men argued and placed bets. They ignored the ragmen in the ring with their noses so close to the floor with the wiping that their tongues seemed to dart out now and then to lick the slab still warm from fighting. While the yelling men pushed one another to see the ring better the businessmen sat near this but alone and alongside their mistresses in a section of wood benches. These men controlled the fighting. They arranged the various bets and supported the fighters they favored most. Their mistresses perfume sweetened the smoky warehouse. Painted lips glistened in the light and their moist eyes shone brilliantly. I recognized some of the yelling men from the work on the hotel. These men staring at the mistresses so that it made the women uncomfortable but the businessmen did not care because above all they enjoy most the jealousy of other men.

  Within the crowd several young men carried pencil stubs and pieces of paper and handfuls of paper pesos taking the bets of the yelling men. But only one young man dressed better than the others took the bets of the businessmen. As he crouched before the businessmen scribbling their bets he had the sleeves of his shirt rolled to show that he was honest. Dabbing the pencil on the end of his tongue as they put money now and then in his shirt pocket while he wrote. Nodding to them before moving onto the next. But the businessmen gave him no money for their bets. They operated the fighting and did not want to encourage the yelling men to run at them as a mob. The yelling men knew this and accepted it as a game the businessmen played with them sitting there on the smooth wood benches with their beautiful mistresses. This balance was delicate. One they never challenged out of fear and an overwhelming feeling of impossibility. The rings on the fingers of the businessmen gleamed where they were placed on the thighs of the mistresses. Gold necklaces and pearl earrings glimmered when the women brought their long dark hair from their slender necks. But all of the faces of the men at the fighting were greasy and red. During the fighting all the eyelids of the crowd opened wide like those who choke on their tongues. But still the yelling men were separated from the businessmen. And of all the businessmen only Cantana wore sunglasses. And only rarely did Cantana stand.

  That night I did not have to be told which of the businessmen was El Tapado that the storyteller had spoken of. I knew the moment the well dressed young man knelt before him. The businessman was of medium height with broad shoulders and chest. His skin light in color but his hair shoe polish black. With a glove over his right hand he smoked a thin black cigarillo. The smoke of this white in front of the lenses of sunglasses. Silver like mirrors. While the yelling men called out their bets and waved their money Cantana leaned toward the well dressed young man and whispered his.

  When this well dressed young man finished taking Cantanas bet he stood and walked through the yelling men toward where I stood with my arms crossed. Two businessmen not far from me argued loudly. The well dressed young man walked past them and as he did I watched his hand dart into the pocket of one of the men and then quickly into his own. The well dressed young man looked then directly into my eyes after he did this and when he knew I saw what he had done he just smiled. I chose to do nothing.

  When I looked back to Cantana a man who had stood at the door of the warehouse when I entered leaned over the businessmans shoulder and whispered into his ear. Cantana nodded as the crowd began to yell and applaud. I followed the businessmans eyes to the ring where a tall handsome young man entered jumping lightly from foot to foot. In a far corner a ragman began to wrap his arm in the heavy rug stained with saliva and blood and put on his hand the glove fitted with metal claws.

  This is his first fight. Eduardo yelled then standing suddenly next to me. His name is Ramón. Put your money on the dog. The foreman smiled. He has chosen one of Mendozas.

  Light from the one large electric lamp dangling above the ring from a steel rafter reflected sharply from the claws of the glove the dog fighter wore. As the ragmen finished tying the heavy rug to Ramóns arm a dog trainer pulled back the fence for his dog to enter through at the end of a frayed leash. The leash was one rope looped over the collar of the dog that the trainer held both ends of through the fencing. One end in each hand.

  Mendoza. Eduardo yelled. He is famous for taking a file to the teeth of his dogs. You can bet on the fighter or the dog. The odds pay better if the dog wins. You can bet who bleeds first. If the fighter gives in before he dies. If the trainer stops the fight. You can bet on almost anything here. But listen to me. If you are ever to put money on a dog you always put it on one belonging to Mendoza. The old men will tell you that it is wrong for Mendoza to sharpen the teeth. But they are fools and try to hide this by acting with pride when they lose betting against his dogs. Tradición. They say. Eduardo said shaking his head. They die for tradición.

  Across the ring from Ramón a ragman teased the dog with a bloody cloth. The dog fighter leaned his head from side to side stretching the muscles of his neck.

  Mira. Eduardo pointed and laughed a short hard laugh. His knees are shaking. He is too handsome to fight dogs.

  The dog snarled and barked at the cloth the ragman held before it. Studying this Ramón suddenly collapsed in half and vomited in his corner of the ring. Two of the three ragmen fell on it immediately and a wave of new bets rustled through the crowd. Ramón stood and wiped his mouth along his forearm and when the hunchbacked ragmen stood the area where the dog fighter was sick came up clean. Across from this but outside the ring Mendoza held the leash smiling.

  He must have seen the teeth. Eduardo yelled at me. If Mendoza was not the friend of Cantana that he is the older businessmen would not allow him to sharpen the teeth. It is good to be the friend of Cantana. Remember that.

  Ramón straightened himself. His knees shook while the ragman continued to tease the dog. Then Mendoza yelled.

  Bastante!

  Pulling one end of the rope leash quickly so that it slipped free of the dogs collar and slithered from the ring through the fence. The ragmen fell back to the shadows grinning.

  The yelling men stood on the toes of their feet as Ramón fended off the sharpened teeth of the dog using the rug tied around his forearm.

  Mendoza trains his dogs to ignore the rug. Eduardo yelled. No one knows how he does this but his dogs are the most successful.

  The dog drove Ramón back stepping against the cold of the metal fence where a drunk stood laughing hot spittle into his ear. Ramón slipped and fell to the floor bringing a roar from the men that came d
own hard on my ears from the metal roof as the dog gaping went for the neck of the dog fighter. A stir of excitement fluttered through my groin. Down along my thighs and up into my abdomen.

  La lucha de los perros! Eduardo shouted. This is the fighting of dogs hombre!

  Ramón hurried to his feet. Pushing the dog from him. The eyes of the drunk behind bloodshot and mad. He rattled the fence of the ring as if he wanted to be the one on the inside. Fear twitched in the slender muscles around Ramóns mouth and eyes.

  As the yelling men cried for more Ramón swung wildly at the dog. Stopping only when he had fooled it into locking its jaws around the rug. Mendoza shook his head. But with the dog hanging from his arm Ramón shook the rug as if it were on fire. His eyes showing pain from the teeth. The dog hung limply with its eyes rolled back into its skull. Eyelids fluttering over pearls. Soon from under the rug a line of blood came to show on the back of the dog fighters hand. The sharpened teeth had gone through. When the blood lashed onto the concrete floor with each swing of Ramóns arm the ragmen stepped closer to the light from shadows wetting their lips. The dog weighed heavily from the dog fighters arm. He tried to make a fist of his gloved hand but ended up slapping the dog repeatedly on the head.

  Pendejo! Use the claws! Eduardo yelled. He fights like a woman.

  Trying feverishly to break from the dogs locked jaws Ramón stepped back and slipped on his own blood. The men cheered when he had fallen to the ground. Some of the businessmen stood in anticipation.

  Now the dog has him! Eduardo clasped my arm.

  Those businessmen who sat patiently watched the mistresses carefully from the corners of their eyes. Cantana seemed to not be watching the fighting at all. He brought his left hand from his pocket to light a fresh cigarillo. I did not understand then why he wore only the one glove. When Cantana finished lighting the cigarillo with great concentration he took his sunglasses down from his face and while keeping his eyelids closed cleaned the lenses of the glasses with a fine cloth from the inside pocket of his coat.