Belka, Why Don't You Bark?

by Hideo Furukawa

  What, your master thought, if it were your name?

  “It’s okay,” he could tell himself then, “he’s just talking to my dog.”

  And so you became Cabron. Three months into your second year. Your master was twenty-five. He was still emotionally malleable. Day after day, as he talked to you, called you by your name—Cabron! Cabron!—he began to forget his pain. Hey, what’s the big deal? It’s a dog’s name. And though his wife had now run off with another man, he remained as tight as ever with La Familia. No, please, the Don said, call me Dad, just like before. Your master had been “bought,” as it were, as a promising young leader in the business, and his position in La Familia didn’t change. He was still free to come and go as he pleased in the orchard in Texas. He was family. And there was someone there who tried to comfort him as best she could. “I’m sorry my sister was such a bonehead,” the girl said. She was the Don’s third daughter. Thirteen years old. “Don’t let it get you down. I think you’re great.”

  Huh? Me? You do?

  Six months later, he had recovered.

  So that was your master’s story. The melodrama of your alter ego’s life until 1971. But you, Cabron, you were living your own melodrama. From the time you turned eight months old and spilled seed for the first time, you rarely had a problem getting it. Who could resist you? As long as your alter ego had his private face on, no bitch’s owner would ever refuse to let you have her. And when he wore his public face, they let you have their bitches because of the love and desire they themselves felt for the Hellhound—they were more than happy to let the Hellhound’s dog knock up their pets. And then there were the strays who knelt for you, overwhelmed. You mated with this bitch, took that one, littered all of Mexico City with your progeny. You…you betrayed your name. You were no cuckold; you were a lady-killer. But then, toward the end of 1974, everything changed. You fell in love.

  Love. Melodrama.

  Your master had gotten involved in something big. His bodyguard had brought him the lead. The bodyguard was a huge dude from American Samoa, upward of six foot two and a champion underground boxer. He had an astonishingly thick neck, fat arms, and a massive stomach. Samoans and Tongans were legendary among professional boxers. Lucha libre wasn’t real fighting, of course, but this only gave the Hellhound greater respect for true strength. He was still a fighter, he told himself, even if he wasn’t much of one. And what point was there in being protected by bodyguards weaker than he was? He had first been introduced to this guy, whose arms and torso and thighs were covered with traditional Samoan tattoos, by the nephew of the Don’s wife, a producer. The introduction alone wasn’t enough to convince him to hire the Samoan. If the bodyguard was going to be with him all the time, he had to be totally sure he was trustworthy. The Samoan had two other characteristics that made him attractive. One was that this towering giant, who spoke Spanish with a Samoan-English accent, was a twin. “You mean you’ve got a brother exactly like you?” “That’s right, man. An identical twin.” “That’s so cool! It’s like having a fucking alter ego!” It turned out, furthermore, that the older twin—the bodyguard—was also a devout Christian. “Are you kidding? The Samoan Islands are Catholic?” “Sure, man. The first missionaries came to Samoa in 1830, so what do you expect? Sometimes when I hear a hymn I get teary.” “That’s terrific!” “My brother, though, he’s Muslim.” “He’s a…but why?” “Lives in Asia. Went there to work. Does the same kind of shit I do, in Indonesia I think it is. Or maybe it’s Pakistan? He swore to obey the Koran in order to get in good with the people there.” “That’s awesome! That’s the kind of dedication I like to see in this line a work!”

  So the Hellhound hired the Samoan hulk—who was simultaneously an older twin and a championship underground boxer—as his bodyguard, and the two survived several bloodbaths together, and the Hellhound came to see that he could trust the Samoan absolutely, and then to regard him as his right-hand man. In 1974, this right-hand bodyguard was one of the main movers in a major incident: he helped lead the Hellhound to attack an officer in the Mexican Federal Police. “This dude’s bad, man,” the Samoan had muttered. “And I mean bad.” “Is he?” the Hellhound asked. “He’s building his own secret organization, Boss. Fixing it so he has access to all the confiscated drugs, building ties with the Colombians, putting all the department heads in Customs in his pocket.” “What the hell? Are you kidding? That is bad. I was thinking the paperwork guys in Customs seemed kind of unfriendly lately—so it’s this guy’s doing, huh?” “It is, Boss.” “How’d you figure this out? Who snitched? One of the little guys in the state police?” “No one snitched, Boss. More like I got him to talk. Gave him a hook to the jaw, smashed the bone. Brraahahahahah! It’s hard work getting these guys to talk, Boss.” “Hilarious. Hahahahah.” “You know that business we got going on in Cabo San Lucas, dropping drugs from the sky? I got wind someone was trying to interfere, so I had ’em tie him up and bring him to me. And let me tell you, when that guy started talking, boy did he start talking.” “So what’s this plan you got for me?”

  This officer in the Federal Police lived in a port city on the Gulf of Mexico, and that was where he had his storehouse. They attacked the storehouse. The officer had been put in charge of all the confiscated drugs, and he often went out on busts himself. He had commandeered the best drug dog in the force, a member of a true super-elite, essentially turning her into his own private dog; no one tried to stop him. He would take her to airports and up to the border and have her sniff out only the purest drugs, which he would seize. It would have been hard to find a worse instance of a man abusing the authority of his position. And once he had the drugs, he would sell them back at very steep prices to the Colombians. “You go too far,” the Hellhound told him. “You’re too bad.” He punched him, kicked him (with his torpedo St. Bernard Kick), put him in his mighty Dog-Hold. He got all the information he needed and then, just like that, had his bodyguard kill him. They cleaned out every last packet of shit in the storehouse. They’d brought a four-ton truck for that purpose. No one interfered as they carted the stuff out, but there was this dog barking its head off. A Labrador retriever. A bitch. The officer’s drug dog. “Well, look what we have here,” the Hellhound said. “Want me to shut her up, Boss?” the Samoan asked. “No, no, no. You should never kill unless you have to, not when it’s a dog. Besides, this bitch is the force’s number one drug dog, right? The one everyone talks about? She’ll come in handy. She can sniff our shit, tell us how good it is.” “Nice thinking, Boss. Very nice.”

  So they ended up taking the Labrador retriever.

  And where did they take her? To the twentieth parallel north. To the estate in Mexico City. And there you were. It was December 1974, when your master brought her in and introduced her to you, Cabron. “Hey there, boy,” he said, beaming. “Look who’s come to visit. The best perro policia in all of Mexico.” What did you feel then? Nothing, at first. You weren’t hot for her then, it wasn’t the season, and besides you had all the bitches you could want. So you just glanced at her and thought, HMM? A NEW FACE? The fact was, she was a very beautiful dog. A purebred Labrador retriever, only two years old, with an iridescent, jet black coat and a nice muscular ass. Before long, Cabron, you would be creeping around, whining up a storm, pining with desire for that ass—but for now, you barely noticed her. A NEW BLACK FACE? you thought, and that was it. You watched as your master tested her, had her sniff a bunch of drugs and pick out the heroin, cocaine, crack, marijuana, speed, and all kinds of other shit, and tell him how pure they were. WHAT KIND OF TRICK IS THAT? you wondered. Two days later, though, the situation changed. All of a sudden, things were different. The Hellhound was in a fight with a Colombian cartel. That business with the officer had deprived the cartel of one of its transport routes, and they were pissed. A gang of South American hit men turned up in Mexico. Your master realized right away what was up. He said, “This isn’t good.” “Sure i
sn’t,” replied the Samoan.

  “We’re at war.”

  In next to no time, the estate in Mexico City was transformed into a fortress. Preparations were made so that when the hit men came for the Hellhound, they’d be ready. And you, Cabron, were holed up in the fortress with your master. You held the fort together. Your master, by the way, had had to give up on his wrestling for the time being. This meant you no longer had the pleasure of traveling from one arena to the next, going from city to city, growling and glaring at your master’s trading partners. You no longer even got taken out for walks. Someone might kidnap you and use you to get at your master. You were your master’s alter ego, so if he was going to be stuck in one place for a few months, so would you. There was a difference, though, because while your master could always bring in women from outside to satisfy his sexual urges, you didn’t have that option. No matter how horny you got. And you got very horny. You were frustrated, the frustration built up, until you wanted to explode. You noticed that bitch in the fort. That drug dog, the Labrador retriever with the firm round butt. But she gave you the cold shoulder. You, Cabron, were supposed to be a lady-killer, and yet she was ignoring you. You put the moves on her, turned on the charm, to no avail. It was worse than that: she used her police-dog training to tell you to go to hell. Buzz off, mutt! She knew how to fight—in fact, she was at least as good as your master, with his surefire moves like the Top-of-the-Head-Dog-Bite. You’d yelp and retreat, instantly. But you were still horny. WHAT AM I SUPPOSED TO DO? C’MON, you pleaded. LET ME DO YOU. Again and again, you pleaded. I WON’T SPLIT AS SOON AS WE DO IT, I PROMISE, I WANT TO HAVE KIDS WITH YOU, I WANT TO MAKE YOU MY WIFE!

  Uuuuuuurrrr…wooooof! you barked sadly.

  It was love. Melodrama. What’s up, Cabron? your master asked, laughing. Can’t get her in bed? What the hell happened to you, stud? He didn’t even try to help. So what did you do? You followed her around, trying to make her like you. You groped for a solution to the problem. You tried hard to seem interested in the things that interested her. You didn’t see the point, but you tried. OKAY, I’LL LEARN TO DO THE SAME TRICKS!

  There in that closed fortress, you poured all your energy into realizing a dream. You were absolutely determined to have sex with that bitch.

  Three months later, your master was staring wide-eyed, calling his bodyguard over. “Hey! Look at that! Just look!” “What’s up, Boss?…Huh? Wait a sec, he’s…isn’t he?” “I know! It’s incredible! Cabron actually found the marijuana—just look at him, scratching the bag like that with his paws!” “Like a real police dog, huh?” “Seriously.” “He can tell the difference…that it’s not cocaine.” “Wow.” “That’s that trick magazine with the drugs in it, right? And he found them with no problem!” “Wow, he’s totally turned—” “Into a drug dog.”

  Ah, the power of love. Love had helped you memorize the scents of different drugs. You taught yourself, and you made it to the more advanced stages. You could differentiate among various levels of purity, to a limited extent. Generally speaking, in order to be employed as a professional by the police or any other organization, a dog had to have started specialized training between its fourth and seventh months. Once you got to be an adult, it was too late. So the trainers said. But you proved them wrong. You, Cabron, had pulled off the impossible. It was quite a trick. All on account of love. Finally even the Labrador retriever was moved by your attentions and stopped snubbing you.

  CAN WE DO IT NOW? you asked.

  She proffered her rear.

  In June 1975, as the siege continued, the Labrador retriever gave birth in the basement of the estate-turned-fortress. You had recognized her as your official wife, and you watched over her as she bore your puppies. It took hours, testing your powers of endurance. More than half the day, in fact. Why? Because the litter was astonishingly large. Eleven puppies, each one different from the others. Their father’s mongrel blood had shown what it could do. Your master was stunned when he saw how many pups there were. “Man, Cabron, your sperm must be like jelly, huh?” he said. “He hadn’t done it for a while, Boss,” the Samoan said. “I saw some, actually, and it was yellow, not white.” The Samoan named one of the pups. Overall his coat was brown, but he had six narrow black lines on his left side and a black spot on his haunch that made him look vaguely like a stringed instrument. His appearance made him stand out from the rest. The Samoan called him Guitar.

  MY CHILDREN, you thought.

  MY LINEAGE, MY CHILDREN.

  Right from the start, the next generation was faced with a problem. There were eleven pups. Dogs have only ten teats. Worse still, the top two don’t produce milk. The bitch could only raise seven or at most eight puppies, so inevitably there was competition for her teats. “Man, I know it’s great to have lots of kids, Cabron,” your master grumbled, “but this is ridiculous.” Still, he had a servant prepare bottles of milk, and he and the bodyguard fed the puppies that had been left at loose ends, as it were. “Shit, just look at this little cutie-pie,” said the towering Samoan as he cradled a pup in his arms. Your master went so far as to consult a veterinarian. On her advice, he mixed powdered milk with cow’s milk to thicken it so it would be better suited for puppies. The two men couldn’t look after those loose-enders twenty-four hours a day, though, and during the first two weeks of July two pups dropped out of the game. They couldn’t survive.

  Another died in the last week of July, as the bitch started weaning her puppies. The lack of adequate milk in the first days had taken its toll.

  Then it was August 3, the first Sabbath of the month. Men armed with light machine guns and howitzers forced their way into the fortress where you and your master were holed up, shattering the peace of the Catholic world. Obviously these were the hit men the Colombian cartel had hired. Expecting the situation to come to a head soon, your master had tripled the number of guards stationed around the estate since the previous year. Each guard had an automatic rifle. The shoot-out began. Sometime later, your master would describe this day to his second wife as “Bloody Sunday.” The blood was not only human. You and your wife and your children—the eight surviving puppies—were holed up in the estate as well. Ten dogs in total. Of those ten, only one shed blood. Your wife. Because your wife, Cabron, was a police dog. She had been trained to respond to gunfire—to burn with righteous anger. It was tantamount to suicide to react that way. She dashed up out of the basement, eager to find the villains, and ended up caught in the gunfire, shot through.

  Intruders stomped on two of the puppies.

  When the shooting ended, seven dogs were left. You, the father, and your kids.

  Guitar was alive. Guitar had made it through the first test—the competition for his mother’s teats—managing to live because the Samoan had kept an eye on him, encouraging the mother to let him suckle or giving him a bottle if he was pushed out of the circle. Then there was “Bloody Sunday,” which Guitar survived by staying put, not scampering this way and that through the landscape of hell which the estate had been transformed into. He didn’t lose his wits in the sudden explosion of violence—or rather he had, but he didn’t let his terror lure him into making the same mistake as his siblings, who ran around in a panic, barking their heads off. Instead, he hid in a kitchen cabinet until the noise stopped and only then ventured out in search of his mom. He found her immediately. A bullet had left two holes in her body: one at the top of her skull where it entered, the other in her neck where it exited. There she was, sprawled in the hallway that led into the living room. His mother’s corpse. Blood had pooled around her. Red blood, starting to congeal. Maybe Guitar understood something as he inhaled the smell of that blood; maybe he didn’t. He whined, nudged her stomach with his little nose.

  He felt how cold she was.

  How stiff.

  He sensed that he was losing her.

  Guitar was too old to drink his moth
er’s milk now, but he groped for her teats, nuzzling them one by one. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten. The last two had never meant anything. But now, even when he sucked the others, no milk streamed forth. There was no warmth.

  He sucked furiously.

  Twenty minutes later, Cabron, you stumbled upon the scene. There, in a corner of the hall surrounded by the tumult of an estate still in chaos, was your wife, the bitch whose ass you had pursued with such passion, stretched out in the solemnity of death, with one of your children, a puppy with stripes like a guitar, beside her—beside her body, trying to suck her teats. You stood stunned, you hung your head. Soon another of your children padded over, and a second, then three more. They all, one after the other, followed Guitar’s lead, clustering around their cold mother’s teats, to suck.

  The third trial continued through the rest of August and into September. Slowly your children began to die. The reason was simple: their mother was gone. The shock of her sudden death was more than they could bear. By the last week in September, only two puppies were alive. It wasn’t as though you weren’t trying to help—you were doing everything you could. Ever since “Bloody Sunday” you were spending all your time looking after the puppies. You were unbelievably careful. You never let them out of your sight, you kept watch over them twenty-four hours a day. You had, in fact, started raising them yourself. Even though you were a male dog, not a bitch.

  MY CHILDREN, you thought.

  MY RIGHTFUL DESCENDANTS.

  LIVE. STAY ALIVE. LIVE.

  Of course, you weren’t tending to them in the right way. You couldn’t call on your “motherly instincts” because you didn’t have any. Half of what you did was just horsing around. Though even then you were serious. The other half was education. That’s okay, you can do that, don’t do this, remember. You did all you could. And what sort of education did you pour most of your energy into? Into the very same trick you had devoted most of your energies to learning. In order to impress their mother. That, naturally, you had to teach them. You gave them an elite education. Your children, still under three months old.