When Othello first arrived, my grandmother declared that he should be called Prince, but she soon changed her mind and named him after the Moor who killed his wife Desdemona because he was sure that she had betrayed him. When I asked her why she had changed the dog’s name to Othello, she responded that it was an appropriate name because his hair was black as vicuñas wool and because he was fiercely jealous.

I suppose she said Othello was jealous because of the way he bullied poor Pierre. Pierre was a German Shepherd but for some reason his growth had stunted, and he was much smaller than most dogs of his breed. Othello, by contrast, was a mutt with wooly ears, a bit tinier than Pierre, but what Othello lacked for in size he more than made up for in vigor. And from the first day in our house Othello tyrannized Pierre. When I put food on a tray in the backyard, Othello snarled at Pierre to let him understand that the black mutt would eat first. Only when Othello had finished would Pierre have the opportunity to eat. When I tried to caress Pierre, Othello showed his avid teeth threateningly to the German shepherd. More than once, the black mutt pounced upon Pierre and bit him in the snout to make him leave me. Of course, caressing Pierre was always fraught with peril, for the very simple reason that he lived his life in terror. All a person needed to do was gently touch his back and Pierre would immediately pee in fear of being hit. My sister Carla had found him on the streets, a stray dog, shivering and dirty, and we imagined his prior owner had resorted to beating him. There was no better explanation of the extent of his fear. And when Othello routinely attacked him, Pierre did nothing to defend himself and took Othello’s bites without a whimper. More than once, I found Pierre with blood all over his snout after an encounter with the dominant Othello. Although Pierre had his own set of sharp teeth, he never did anything to protect himself from the much smaller dog. I concluded that he was a coward and for the first time in my life realized that dogs shared the traits of men.

I don’t want to give the impression that Othello was a ruffian and nothing more. In fact, he was fiercely loyal and loved me to no end. I remember a time we were walking over the Shakespeare Bridge, close to Saint Casimir School, and I decided to go down to see what was below. It was a school for adolescent girls, and as soon as we were spotted, four armed security guards approached me and asked in a menacing voice what I was doing. Pierre innocently sniffed the men and did nothing to defend me. Othello, on the other hand, growled fiercely and flashed his teeth, ready to attack the men he perceived to be a threat to me. Had I not held Othello tightly by his leash, I’m sure he would have jumped upon the men and bitten them until he was shot. I suppose Pierre’s was the better reaction, but at the time I felt greatly disappointed. It’s not that I wanted Pierre to attack the guards, but I would have been pleased if at least Pierre had made some effort to frighten them. From that moment forward, I felt a certain partiality for Othello for I equated his bravery with fidelity.

At all events, there is no denying that Othello was a scoundrel and a rogue. But like a father who secretly laughs at the antics of his child, I could not bring myself to punish the little mutt for his behavior since I thought it was hilarious. Like most Peruvians, my grandmother did not allow pets into the home, but that did not stop Othello from entering the dining room and stealing food, particularly on the rare occasions when my grandmother made steaks. He would sneak into the house and somehow climb onto the dinner table and scramble away with the desired meat. When my grandmother caught him in the act, he would quickly scurry away into the backyard, not without taking his prize with him and ignoring my grandmother’s vociferous complaints. I’m sure if dogs could laugh, he would have done so loudly.

Othello was also something of a Lothario who had girlfriends all over the neighborhood. Such conduct made me nervous, for I thought that he was putting himself at risk of being hit by a car when he ventured outside the home and braved the streets to find his lovers. One day a furious woman appeared at the front door of my home with Othello on a leash. She explained that her Ninny was in heat and that Othello had made it a habit to visit her. When I asked her why she didn’t spay her female dog, she responded that her dog was a pedigreed cocker spaniel and that it was her business to sell her cubs, but she couldn’t do so if her Ninny was impregnated by a mutt. Then, she demanded that I neuter my Othello. I had thought about it in the past, but I couldn’t bring myself to castrate my own dog as I thought removing his testicles would take his vitality away. I feared castration would make him as weak-kneed as the meek Pierre who never manifested any sexual desire whatsoever. At any event, it wasn’t even an issue in my home.  My grandmother had grown up in a large hacienda in Peru, and the dogs were never neutered. Without apologizing for Othello’s forays into her home, I simply told Ninny’s owner to keep her cocker spaniel inside the house at all times and not to blame Othello for her Ninny’s lust. If she wasn’t in heat, I told her owner, my Othello would never visit.

Not long thereafter, I took my two dogs to the veterinarian. He repeated the advice given me by Ninny’s owner and suggested that Othello should be castrated. When I asked why Othello should be neutered and not Pierre as well, he advised me that the German shepherd’s testicles had already been removed. That confirmed my decision not to neuter Othello. Perhaps the reason Pierre was such a wimp was the fact that he literally had no balls. In retrospect, I realize that neutering a dog does not necessarily affect his vitality or vigor, but I was a twelve-year-old at the time. I feared that Othello’s mischievous personality would forever change if he went under the surgeon’s knife. I didn’t want him urinating in fear when he was touched as Pierre was wont to do.

***

At some point, when I was still in grammar school, Pierre started developing strange symptoms. At first, he started walking in circles in the backyard, which I thought was odd but not alarming. Then I noticed his gait was wobbly, as if his legs could not support his body. Suddenly he started vomiting on a frequent basis. Finally, he was subject to constant seizures, which frightened me to no end. He started shaking without control and violently convulsing for half an hour at a time. Eventually, I learned that he was suffering from Grand Mal seizures, which cause a dog’s entire body to shiver as if he was in the freezing rain. I don’t know if there is empathy in dogs, but during this period Othello never attacked Pierre or bit him with jealousy, as if he somehow knew that Pierre was in a great deal of trouble and should be left alone.

I soon carried Pierre to the veterinarian’s clinic. He couldn’t walk for long distances given how weak his legs were, so I had to lift him. After I explained the situation to Doctor Grossman, he took Pierre to a back room and left me alone in the lobby. I said a silent prayer to the Virgin of Guadalupe, asking for her intercession and wondering whether dogs had souls. Three hours passed and the doctor did not reappear. When he came back, sans Pierre, he advised me that the dog was suffering from meningioma – a large brain tumor – and told me he would euthanize Pierre. I asked him what it meant to “euthanize,” and he responded that he intended to put the dog to sleep.

I violently protested.

“I brought Pierre here so that you could cure him, not for you to kill him.”

“Your dog is in pain,” responded the veterinarian, “and it will only get worse. The most humane thing to do is to put him out of his misery.”

“You say he has a tumor,” I implored. “Couldn’t you remove it in an operation?”

“Surgery is a possibility, but I don’t recommend it in this case. Your dog’s tumor has been growing for months and is very large. Even if I excise the tumor – assuming he survives the intervention – there is no guarantee that he will be well. I would imagine that the cancer has already metastasized and is affecting other parts of his frail body. We could try chemotherapy too, but it will cost you a great deal of money.  And dogs who undergo surgery along with chemo are granted median survival times of no more than a year. I think what’s best is for you to say goodbye to your friend. He will suffer no pain if we put him to sleep. Believe me. It’s for the best.”

“Well, I won’t have it. I want you to do whatever you can to save him. How much does chemotherapy cost?”

“It all depends. I suspect you don’t have pet insurance. The standard costs for chemo are three thousand to five thousand dollars. And surgery for neurological conditions can cost three to five thousand dollars. We’re talking of a total cost exceeding eight thousand dollars. And that doesn’t even guarantee the dog will be cured after the intervention. In most cases, the dog dies less than a year later.”

“I need to consult this with my family,” I told the doctor.

“Fine,” he responded. “That’s probably a good idea.”

As soon as I arrived home with the luckless Pierre, I convened a meeting of the family. I insisted that everyone be present – my grandmother, my mother, two spinster aunts who lived with us and my two siblings. My father had left the home years earlier.

“Pierre is very ill,” I announced. “We have to come up with the money for an operation of his head. And also, for a treatment the doctor calls chemo. The vet says he has a brain tumor and will soon die unless we do something about it.”

“Oh, dear,” said my mother. “Is that the cause of all the seizures?”

“It is,” I responded. “But we can still do something about it. It’s not too late to save the life of poor Pierre through an operation.”

“Well, that’s good,” my grandmother intervened. “But we need to know the cost of the operation and the chemo.  I know chemotherapy is very expensive for humans who have cancer.”

“A couple of thousand dollars,” I confessed, looking intently at the faces of all around me to gauge their reaction. “No more than buying a used car.”

“Two thousand dollars?” echoed my aunt Rita. Other than me, she was the member of the family who loved the dogs the most. “I suppose we can come up with that amount.”

“Let’s say a little more,” I responded. “It will cost about three thousand dollars for the surgery and another three for the chemotherapy.”

“That’s an exorbitant sum,” opined my grandmother. “And chemo doesn’t even guarantee a cure. I’ve lost more than one friend to cancer even after undergoing chemotherapy. Did the doctor guarantee that Pierre will be cured?”

“Let’s say he gave Pierre a fifty-fifty chance,” I lied.

“Under the circumstances,” my grandmother said with a grim look, “I think we should just put Pierre to sleep. We can’t spend six thousand dollars on the off chance that he might be saved. And he’s living in pain. Don’t you hear his constant moaning? Haven’t you seen his frequent seizures?”

“That’s why he needs the treatment,” I insisted. “You can take out a loan from a bank. I think it’s called a mortgage. Then you can just repay the money over time.”

“The house is already mortgaged,” said my mother. “And we can’t spend six thousand dollars on a dog for a treatment that may or may not succeed. I promise I will buy you another puppy of any breed you want.”

“He’s not just a dog,” I replied. “He’s Pierre, a member of the family. If you lost a child, would your grief end just because you had another?”

“I’m sorry, Javier. We just don’t have the money.”

***

I immediately went out to the backyard and sat on the ground where Pierre was lying. Othello was on one of his frequent escapades, roaming the streets in search for a brief encounter with his Juliet du jour. When I began to caress Pierre’s head gently, he did not urinate as usual. Instead, he gently placed his face against my chest and began to softly moan, as if he was seeking that I rid him of his pain. But the truth is that I couldn’t, and I was gradually accepting the possibility that Pierre would soon be euthanized.

I racked my brain trying to figure out a way to get the required six to eight thousand dollars and nothing came to mind. I thought of asking Father Colosimo at Saint Casimir Church to consider asking the parishioners to contribute to a special collection to pay for Pierre’s medical care but figured it would take many Masses to come up with the massive sum required. I thought of calling my father to ask him for the money but soon concluded he would not be of any help. After all, he hadn’t sent any money to my mother since the day he left the home. Then wilder thoughts came to my mind. What if I burglarized some rich man’s home? What if I worked as a mule bringing hidden drugs from Tijuana to the United States? For every potential solution, there was an obstacle. How could I know where a rich man kept his jewels or his money? How could I transport drugs stateside if I was twelve years old and couldn’t drive? Then an unruly thought came to my head.

What if I stole the money from my grandmother?

I knew that before she left Peru, approximately when I was nine, she had sold her home in Lima and brought some fifty thousand dollars with her. Of that sum, she had spent thirty thousand for the down payment on our house in Los Angeles, but she had some twenty thousand dollars left over which she kept in an unlocked trunk. She was keeping the money for her two unmarried daughters who were to inherit the money upon her death as well as her interest in our home. I knew that if I took the money, she would not realize that it had been taken – at least not soon. I could pay for Pierre’s surgery and even his chemo before she ever figured out that the money had been stolen. At some point, she would conclude that I was the culprit, but how could she punish me? She certainly wouldn’t turn me into the authorities, and she didn’t need the money anyway. The theft would soon be forgotten, and I would have saved the life of my cherished Pierre.

So, one Sunday afternoon, while my grandmother was at Mass, I stealthily went into her bedroom and opened her large black trunk, where she spent all sorts of items – photographs, old newspaper clippings, Spanish fans, bottles of perfume which she had not opened for years, little statuettes of Saint Martin de Porres and Saint Rose of Lima as well as an image of Pope John XXIII. I had to be as careful as possible to leave everything as I found it, lest she discover her money was gone, so I slowly placed the items on the floor until I found the little pouch full of twenty thousand dollars – about three times the amount needed for Pierre’s treatment. After I took eight thousand bucks, I put the rest of the money back in its pouch and arranged the other items as I had found them. I said a silent prayer to Saint Martin de Porres asking forgiveness for the theft, but I knew that he would understand. After all, the black friar was always depicted with a dog, a cat and a mouse at his feet and was known for his love of animals.

The next Monday, at the end of the school day, I carried Pierre to the vet’s office on Hyperion Avenue, only two blocks from my home. I think that when I arrived with the frail Pierre in my arms, Doctor Grossman thought that I had come to euthanize the dog, since the first thing he told me was, “It’s for the best.”

But I took the envelope where I had put the money and placed it in his hands.

“Take all the money you need,” I told him in a defiant voice, as if I had somehow vanquished him in battle. “This should be more than enough for the surgery as well as the chemotherapy for Pierre. How soon can you perform the operation?”

“You’re wasting your money,” he admonished me. “But far be it from me to tell you how to use it. The operation will be performed tomorrow morning at your request.”

When I handed the leash to the vet, Pierre didn’t want to follow him, instead pulling towards me with all his might. Then he urinated on the carpet and whimpered as if he were in pain. A nurse suddenly appeared and took him to a room beyond the lobby. I would not see him again until after the operation. But I left with a grin on my face. Against all odds, I had achieved my purpose. Surgery was no longer a possibility. It was a certainty. Pierre’s life could yet be saved!”

***

I appeared the next day at the veterinarian’s clinic and was ushered to a room where Pierre was lying on a bed with white bandages all about his head. Upon seeing me, he wagged his tail in delight and put his left paw on my chest, as if asking me to carry him in my arms and take him home. The nurse then told me that Doctor Grossman would soon join me.

“Under the circumstances,” she reassured me, “he couldn’t be in a better condition.”

“Does that mean Pierre’s been cured of his cancer?”

“I think you should wait for Doctor Grossman. I’m only the nurse.”

The veterinarian soon appeared with a surgical mask about his neck.

“I think we managed to excise the entire tumor,” he began. “And surprisingly the cancer does not appear to have metastasized. But let me warn you –”

“You’ve used that word before. What does ‘metastasized’ mean?”

“I mean that the cancer does not appear to have spread to any other part of his body. I looked at his chest X-rays, as well as an abdominal ultrasound and a CT scan. It’s rather uncommon given how large the tumor was but it appears that the cancer was confined to his brain and hasn’t affected other vital organs.”

“So, he’s saved then, right? Is that what you’re telling me?”

“I wish that I could say that, but there’s still a great risk that his cancer cells have already multiplied and could travel to other parts of his body. We’re still going to need to subject Pierre to intravenous chemotherapy. I mean that we shall attach a catheter to his chest and inject him with certain chemicals that hopefully will kill all cancer cells or at least prevent them from multiplying. But there’s no guarantee. The survival rate for dogs with malignant brain tumors is very low.”

“So, Pierre could still die?”

“I’m afraid so. But at least for a while he should be feeling better.”

“How often do you have to give him the injection to kill the bad cells? Is it just one time or will it take many weeks?”

“It all depends on how he responds to therapy, but my estimate is that we shall have to administer the chemo to him every two weeks for a period of about seven to eight months. At some point I may decide to change the cycle, but it all depends on how Pierre responds to the treatment.”

“So at least you no longer think that we should kill him?”

“I think you’ve bought yourself some time, Javier. The surgery also has a palliative effect. What I mean by that is that at least for a little while – and hopefully longer – Pierre’s quality of life should be substantially better. I don’t think he’ll experience any more seizures for the time being. And the pain will immediately subside.”

“Will he be able to walk?”

“He should stay in the clinic for the whole month so that I can monitor him and see how he’s doing. But after that – assuming no unexpected reversal – Pierre should be able to walk with ease, perhaps stumbling a little.”

“How long will the chemo sessions last? Will Pierre have to stay in the clinic overnight or will I be able to take him home after it’s done?”

“It should take one to three hours. There won’t be any need for you to keep him in the clinic.”

***

I got through the first gauntlet without being discovered because I was good at lying. When the rest of the family realized that Pierre was missing, they immediately asked me to disclose his whereabouts. I responded nonchalantly that he was at the veterinarian clinic after having undergone an operation. I told them his brain tumor had been successfully removed. Then they asked me a series of questions which could not be easily answered, but I muddled through them anyway.

“How did you pay for the operation?” demanded my mother.

“Is he completely healed?” asked my aunt Rita.

“What about the need for chemotherapy?” queried my grandmother.

I told them that the veterinarian had agreed for me to make periodic payments of what I owed for the surgery, twenty-five hundred dollars over a period of five years, which would be equal to about forty dollars a month. I told them I intended to get a job immediately as a newspaper delivery boy, and I could earn a hundred dollars a month. As far as the chemotherapy, I once again lied and told them that it wasn’t necessary. I intended to keep it as a secret from them. On the appointed days, I would take both dogs and tell everyone we were going for a long walk. There was nothing as ordinary as a two-hour walk in the hills with your dogs. Everyone was satisfied with my report. Pierre’s legs were still somewhat wobbly, but we managed to make it to the vet twice a month without raising anyone’s suspicions. And then Othello’s actions messed up everything approximately halfway into poor Pierre’s chemotherapy.

Othello wasn’t a biting dog – other than his frequent attacks against Pierre – so the lawsuit for personal injury was a complete surprise to all. The bite itself had not initially been serious – a small cut through the left hand – but the wound had become infected, and the plaintiff’s two fingers had been amputated. To make things worse, the plaintiff moonlighted as a guitarist in a rock band. Under the circumstances, a personal injury attorney told my mother on a free consultation that damages would easily exceed fifty thousand dollars, although he added he might be able to settle the case for twenty-five as long as it was paid in a lump sum. My mother – the dog’s legal owner – could provide documentation showing that she could not satisfy any judgment exceeding that sum since her only asset (the home) was underwater, which would prompt the plaintiff to settle. The personal injury lawyer advised her that it would be folly to take the case to trial as the jury might grant the plaintiff an outrageous amount of money and keep her in debt for years.

The whole family got together to discuss what course of action to take. My aunt Rita, who worked as a filing clerk, reported that she had no more than five hundred dollars in a savings account. My aunt Ethel could contribute nothing as she couldn’t work due to a longstanding disability. My mother stated that she had no money at all and actually owed money to various friends who had loaned her small sums to help her out. Then my grandmother smiled broadly. She thought she had the solution to the problem.

“Many years ago,” she stated, “I sold my house in Lima and still have some of that money left. You may have forgotten about it but not me. I have twenty thousand dollars in cash which I can immediately contribute. Maybe the plaintiff will accept the twenty thousand as there is no way to pay him more. If he doesn’t, maybe we can find something to sell to make up the difference.”

At that moment, everyone breathed a sigh of relief – everyone but me – and everyone cheered my grandmother. I felt I had to say something to let them know her proposal wouldn’t work. I was going to be discovered at some point, so I thought it was best to bite the bullet now. Then maybe they could come up with an alternative solution.

“That money isn’t there anymore,” I said as I began to sob. “I borrowed it to pay for Pierre’s operation and therapy. I’m sorry, but he was dying.”

“You spent twenty thousand dollars on the dog?” my mother asked incredulously.

“Not the whole amount,” I responded. “Maybe about eight thousand dollars.”

“Oh, that’s great!” exploded my grandmother in a fierce voice. “Is that what you learn at Catholic school? Do they teach you how to steal? You took money I have saved up for years to pay for the treatment of a dog which is doomed to fail in any case. And you’re a liar. You said the doctor would allow you to pay him over time.”

“I’m sorry,” I replied. “But the vet says Pierre is making progress. I didn’t want them to put my dog to sleep.”

“Do you realize what you’ve done?” cried my mother. “They’re going to garnish my wages. I can barely make ends meet now. And I won’t be able to make the mortgage payments on the house. We’ll be thrown out into the street. You should have castrated Othello a long time ago, and this would never have happened. And you should have put Pierre to sleep.”

“How much has already been spent on the therapy?” intervened my aunt Ethel. “If we stop it now, will there be any money left over?”

The last thing I wanted was for Pierre’s chemotherapy sessions to be interrupted. I had the sense that the German shepherd was getting better and better.

“He needs the help,” I said, regaining my composure. “And most of the money has already been spent anyway.”

“We’re going to have to talk to the veterinarian,” said my mother. “He can’t make a deal for such a great amount of money with a twelve-year-old kid. I’ll have to check with an attorney, but I don’t think minors have the ability to make contracts with other people. I suspect we may be able to void the deal and have the money returned to us.”

“Just don’t interfere with his chemotherapy,” I pleaded. “Pierre is doing so much better.”

“We have to save the house,” my mother responded.

***

My mother consulted with three attorneys in free consultations, and all of their advice was ambiguous and tentative. The consensus seemed to be that the contract for the care of Pierre could be voided as I was a minor, but a judge would probably not do so once the contract was complete. Once a minor had received the benefit of the bargain, it would be unfair to the other party to force him to return the money paid for a completed contract. In other words, I couldn’t enter a contract for Pierre’s surgery and then, once it had happened to my satisfaction, avoid paying it on the grounds that I was a minor. Of course, all three attorneys agreed that the outcome would be altogether different if Pierre actually died despite the surgery and the chemotherapy. Then it could be argued that the veterinarian had taken advantage of an unwitting minor by convincing him to pay for a costly operation with no chance of success. In such a case, all three attorneys agreed that the doctor would have to reimburse me for the full amount. One of the lawyers opined that not only would the contract be voided, but there was even a possibility the veterinarian would be found liable for fraud.

After hearing the lawyers’ advice regarding the difficulties of a lawsuit, my mother decided to set up a meeting with Doctor Grossman anyway. We met with him that very afternoon.

“I understand,” said my mother when Doctor Grossman appeared in the lobby of the clinic, “that you received eight thousand dollars for a brain operation on Javier’s dog Pierre.”

“Yes,” said the doctor. “I was paid for the surgery as well as the chemotherapy.”

“Do you think such a decision could be made by a twelve-year-old? Would a distraught young boy have the presence of mind to evaluate the need for such an expensive operation when the life of his dearest dog was at stake? Shouldn’t you have consulted with me first?”

“In retrospect, I admit you’re right. But the boy seemed so desperate I didn’t think twice about it.”

“You’re damn sure I’m right,” my mother responded. “Then I could have calmly made a cost-benefit analysis of the situation. I probably would have decided to put the dog to sleep.”

The doctor was suddenly defensive.

“You knew about the operation immediately after it happened. After all, Pierre arrived at your house with bandages all over his head. Why did you wait until the chemo sessions were almost complete before you contacted me if you thought Javier wasn’t using his money wisely? I find it curious that you challenge the payment only now that Pierre’s treatment is near completion. Do you think it’s fair for the dog to be saved and then for you to pay me nothing for it?”

“Can you guarantee that the cancer is forever gone, Doctor Grossman? Isn’t it true that even after the surgery and the chemo Pierre might yet succumb to the disease? My mother had a friend who suffered from metastatic cancer. Even after the tumor was removed, she still died. Can you assure us that Pierre’s cancer won’t spread to other parts of his body? Has all our money only bought Pierre a couple of months of life?”

“I explained all the risks to Javier before the operation, and even as a child he has the right to use his money in any way he sees fit. At all events, the tumor was completely excised, and Pierre is responding very well to chemotherapy. So far, the cancer hasn’t metastasized.”

“Can you guarantee that the dog is cured? You should know that Javier didn’t use his own money to pay you. They were funds stolen from my mother.”

“Nothing is certain with a cancer diagnosis. But Pierre is doing a lot better than I anticipated. As far as the source of the money, I had no way of knowing Javier had taken it from anyone.”

“Well, now you know. I’m hereby demanding that you return the money. If Pierre gets healed, then we can get together and arrive at a payment schedule consistent with my financial condition. I can assure you that we’re not a family of means.”

“So, you expect me to continue Pierre’s chemo sessions for free? Well, I won’t countenance it. If you want to sue me for the money, so be it. But do realize that if Pierre dies now, I shall argue it happened because the chemotherapy was incomplete.”

“No, doctor,” I suddenly intervened. “Don’t let Pierre die now that we’re so close to saving him.”

“Hush!” commanded my mother. Then she looked at Doctor Grossman with a furious expression on her face. “If you cease the chemo now and the dog dies, I shall report you to California’s veterinary licensing board. I don’t think they’ll be pleased by the way you’ve exploited a twelve-year-old boy. You can even have your license revoked. So, let’s be clear. No matter what, the chemo doesn’t stop.”

***

Soon after everyone learned about the man bitten by Othello, my grandmother declared that we needed to build a taller fence separating the backyard from the driveway leading into the street. We had a white picket fence there for years, but Othello had easily established that he could jump over it whenever he smelled a female dog that was in heat. So, one Sunday afternoon, my grandmother, my mother and I went to a local Home Depot to buy the necessary wooden planks and to hire two Salvadoran journeymen to do the job.

At that time, my mother also told me that she was taking Othello to a veterinarian (not Doctor Grossman) to castrate the poor mutt as soon as she had a weekday off from work. She had learned that neutered dogs were less likely to bite people, and that way we could avoid another lawsuit. And if he were neutered, he wouldn’t even escape from the home as he would have no desire for female company. She told me quite bluntly that the alternative was euthanasia. We couldn’t risk another dog bite given the family’s limited resources.

We soon built the fence, but animal lust – like adolescent love – cannot so easily be thwarted. About a week after the fence was built, Othello disappeared again. We couldn’t figure out how he could have breached the six-foot wooden fence, but somehow, he had done it. He came back safe and sound after a few hours, but my grizzled grandmother considered whipping him with one of my belts so that he would learn a lesson. In the end, she could not bring herself to do it. My grandmother had belatedly concluded that she was no longer living in her father’s hacienda in Peru where dogs could roam free and were in no danger of being hit by cars. In the United States, a dog bite could result in a fifty-thousand dollar judgment and crossing a street full of vehicles could result in death.

It didn’t take too long for us to figure out what Othello had done. There was a tool shed at the northernmost edge of the backyard next to which there were some old chairs and tables. We deduced he had jumped onto the pile of wood and from there to the top of the shed, which allowed him to go into our neighbor’s driveway and from there to freedom. That selfsame afternoon I removed all the rotting wood next to the tool shed to make it impossible for Othello to escape, but not long thereafter he disappeared again, this time by digging a hole under some fencing between our house and that of the neighbor.

“If the neutering doesn’t work,” my mother announced, “we’ll have to put him to sleep. God knows that in his present condition Othello will pounce at the opportunity to escape as soon as anyone forgets to shut the fence door. And if he escapes, there’s no telling what he might do. I’m sorry, Javier, but we simply cannot afford another lawsuit.”

Then it happened. My older sister Carla, a little drunk, decided to sneak into the house through the backyard around midnight. As she was doing so, she forgot to latch the gate, giving Othello the opportunity to escape into the streets. About three hours later, I found Othello pawing at my feet as I lay in bed. Not only had he gone past the wooden fence to the backyard but he had also entered the house and found my bedroom upon returning. When I lifted him onto my bed, I realized that he was gently moaning, and in the darkness soon discovered his body was covered in blood.

“No! No!” I cried out, “No, no and then again no!”

It didn’t take me long to figure out he had been hit by a car as he crossed the street trying to return to our house. He seemed groggy but his eyes were still wide open. I put him on my bed and told him, “Wait a moment, I’ll return. Please don’t die on me, Othello please!”

I rushed to my mother’s room and roused her. I informed her what had happened and begged her to look for an emergency animal hospital open round the clock in the Yellow Pages. Then I returned to my room, turned on the light, and found my black dog seeped in red. He had a long gash in the stomach area and his right leg was nearly amputated, attached to his body only by a thread of flesh. And yet in such a condition he had managed to make it all the way to my bedroom from the street where he had been run over. I managed to say a prayer to Saint Francis of Assisi, patron saint of animals, and began to use a blanket in an attempt to staunch the bleeding.

“Hold on!” I cried. “Hold on! We should have you at the hospital within twenty minutes!”

Then my mother entered the room, accompanied by my grandmother, who loved Othello too.

“There’s an emergency pet hospital on Virgil Avenue, which is open all night,” my mother exclaimed in a frantic voice. “I’ll move the car in front of the house,  and you bring Othello down. Is he bleeding much?”

“He is,” I replied. “He’s bleeding to death!”

I wanted to weep but I was so full of adrenalin I could not shed a tear. The thing was to rush Othello to the vet hospital as soon as possible while he was still breathing, albeit somewhat slowly. I kept telling him to hold on as we entered my mother’s white Impala, as we traversed Sunset Boulevard going south, as we saw the neon sights saying Animal Specialty Group in the distance.

“Hold on!” I cried. “Hold on a little more! We’re almost there.”

As soon as we arrived, an Asian man in light green scrubs immediately ushered us into what I supposed was an operation room.

“How long has he been like this?” asked the nurse.

“We don’t know,” I responded. “He arrived at my door about thirty minutes ago. I suspect he was struck by a car trying to cross the street in front of our house.”

“Oh, Lord, in all this time you haven’t been able to staunch the bleeding!”

Then the nurse disappeared from the room for about fifteen minutes which seemed like an eternity to me. He returned with a balding man in white surgical attire whom he introduced to us as Doctor Fernandez.

“Well, let’s see,” the doctor said as he was putting on his latex gloves. “The wound seems deep. And he’s lost a lot of blood. We’ll definitely have to inject him with intravenous fluids. I hope he hasn’t suffered any damage to internal organs. And that leg will certainly have to be amputated.”

As soon as a female nurse came into the room bringing the doctor’s utensils, he told us that it was time to leave the room.

“Couldn’t I stay?” I asked him. “I just want to hold on to Othello’s paw as he’s going through this.”

“I know you love your dog. And we’re going to do our best to save him. But you would just be getting in the way. An operation isn’t a pretty sight.”

“It’s just that I think I can give him strength.”

“We’ll do our best. Just let us begin the surgery. You can wait in the lobby outside. We’ll let you come back in as soon as we know the outcome of the operation.”

“How does it look?” I asked.

“Just pray,” he responded. “It’s not great, but I’ve seen worse.”

***

Two years later, as I was walking around the Silver Lake reservoir with Pierre, I took stock of everything that had happened with my two dogs. Pierre had survived. Othello had not. I remember wanting to bury my black mutt in a pet cemetery, but my mother stated peremptorily that he would be cremated, which cost only a hundred dollars. Pet cemeteries were for rich old ladies with pampered poodles, not for a dead dog owned by a poor family run by women whose first language was Spanish. The problem with Pierre’s vet had been resolved. After it was clear that the dog was entirely cured of his cancer, the doctor asked for a payment of five thousand dollars, which my mother agreed to pay overtime in monthly increments of two hundred dollars. The lawsuit brought against us by the guitarist had been successfully settled for twenty thousand dollars, the exact amount my grandmother had kept hidden in her trunk.

At the end of the reservoir, there was a huge yard which served as a place for people to bring their dogs. There must have been a hundred canines in the camp that summer day. Free classes were given to dogs so that they could learn the basics. Sit. Heel. Roll over. At first, I hoped the classes might help me solve Pierre’s problem with submissive urination, but it was not to be. At a minimum, Pierre didn’t pee when I touched him anymore, but he continued to do so when anyone else did. I had long since concluded that he lived in constant fear.

Most dog owners at the park kept their dogs on a leash at all times, but some did not, thinking their pets were harmless. That is always a mistake. Although dogs may exhibit many human traits – love, anger, joy, excitement, loyalty and honor – they’re first and foremost animals whose acts of aggression can be triggered by the most unlikely stimuli. And so it was that day in the park. A woman was throwing a Frisbee to her splendid Boxer, strong and well-muscled, obviously pedigreed. The dog would then return it to her. That’s where I made a calamitous mistake. The Frisbee landed close to my feet, and I picked it up with the intention of sending it back to the woman. Then the Boxer suddenly attacked me, biting my arms first since I put them in front of my body in a defensive action. Then he jumped on me, and I fell to the ground, and he bit my face with violence. The woman kept exclaiming, “Benjy! Benjy!” but he paid small heed to her. Then I felt the Boxer attack my head, immersing my whole face in crimson red. That is when something remarkable happened. Pierre decided to act. Apparently, he wasn’t willing to fight to defend himself, but he would do so to protect his human companion.

At first, Pierre gave as good as he got although I’m sure that he was terrified. But on that day my dog taught me that true courage is not a lack of fear but finding the strength to overcome it. He immediately bit the Boxer hard on the neck and face, forcing him to cease attacking me. Then they both wrestled on the ground as the two dogs exchanged furious bites. The Boxer began bleeding from the space beneath his ear and from his rump while Pierre bled from his left eye. Then the Boxer got up on two hind legs to make manifest his might. That is when he violently grabbed Pierre by the scruff of the neck and began to shake it with all his might until Pierre’s neck was snapped. The woman who owned the Boxer apologized profusely once she managed to control her dog.

I felt a pang of shame because I hadn’t had the courage to attempt to separate the fighting dogs when I had the opportunity to do so.

And Pierre, too, was dead.