“This is Fidelito but you can’t use my name. My father has allowed me to talk to you only on the phone.”
Fidelito’s voice is high and sweet, and he mixes in some English with his Spanish.
“This is Bettina. I’m a writer. I will change your name and not take your picture or video.”
“Do you have the dog? I saw him two weeks ago at the clinic and he looked good.”
“I adopted him and took him to California and named him Felix. I want to write about you for my paper. I want to present you as a hero.”
“I heard God’s voice tell me to save the dog. He ran under a car in the back of Factoría Calderón. It was dark. Is that you in the zócalo, with the tall man? I can see you through a window.”
Bettina waves. “Yes, Fidelito, I’m right here.”
“If you look down Coahuila behind you, you will see the furniture factory. There is a back door and a loading dock. That was where I first saw the wounded dog running.”
“I’m going to walk over there so my assistant can shoot some video.”
“I was hiding behind a house. I heard many bullets. I saw two men run from the building, and two men who were lying in the doorway. And the dog, he climbed over the dead men and he ran. He was limping.”
They approach, Billy shooting video and stills on his phone. The factory is old and the plaster and bricks are crumbling and patched over. It’s kind of ominous, she thinks, a place where bad things could happen. Her viewers will see that. Billy shoots another police car going slowly past. The driver rests his elbow on the window frame and looks at them through his aviators, then smiles and waves. Bettina waves back.
“We need basic establishing shots for ‘Hero Without a Face,’” she tells Billy.
The pedestrians give them a wide berth and study Bettina with stoic calm. Billy Ray gets some video of the back side of the factory. Bettina notes Billy’s tight expression. Wishes he could relax some. Fidelito tells her about that night, the rain cold and some wind too.
Tells her that his father used to work in the Factoría Calderón.
They circle the building back to its entrance and go inside.
“We’re inside,” she tells him. “Excuse me while I talk to this man. Don’t hang up. This will only take a minute.”
Señor Juan Calderón greets them with a smile and a suspicious glance at the phone in Bettina’s hand. Bettina tells them who they are, and explains the story they’re doing about the dog wounded in the shoot-out back in February.
“Please to not take pictures here,” says Calderón. “It is proprietary.”
“Of course, sir,” she says. “I understand.”
The factory is well lit, with high ceilings. Tall racks of lumber and hides and cloth line the four walls, and the workbenches are fitted with power tools. Bettina sees the bedstands and the armchairs and the dining sets and the sofas, dozens of them, some apparently complete and others in progress.
She thanks him, looks at the workers at their stations, who watch her back, this gringa wearing a knit suit and white tennis shoes. Señor Calderón is clearly uncomfortable.
“We have never had any problems here before,” he says, echoing what he had told the newspaper El Sol de Tijuana. “We have been here forty years.”
Bettina surveys the big open factory and warehouse as best she can, itching for pictures and video. She looks at all the boxes of supplies and the tall walls for bullet holes. Thinks she sees some high up by the ceiling fans, but at that distance they might just be chipped paint or flies.
Back outside, she asks Fidelito if Felix came to him when he called out to the dog under the car.
“He was in the gutter near the back tire,” Fidelito says. The call breaks up, then clears. “He was licking his belly, near his hind leg. I was on my hands and knees right there, looking under the car so I could see him. He looked at me only once. That’s when I saw the blood. He whined. He looked afraid. He was patiently licking. There was still shooting from the factory. Men screamed and machine guns fired. I had a dog when I was little. He disappeared. A feeling came over me. The voice of God told me to take the dog to the clinic. Everyone knows the clinic is good and doesn’t charge money.”
“But he didn’t come to you?”
“He was afraid. I pulled him out. He yipped and closed his teeth on my arm but he didn’t bite hard. I thought he was thanking me. He let go and I ran with him all the way to Vía Rosa to get away from the guns. I didn’t know if maybe who shot him would come after us to finish killing the dog. When I was far down Vía Rosa, I was able to slow down. The dog was hard to carry because he was very heavy and wet, and I held him in both arms like a baby and he curled into me and licked himself. I knew the fastest way to the clinic. And I kept looking back to see if men were coming after us, and I saw people in the darkness. I thought maybe the bullet hit the dog by accident and nobody even knew that he had been shot. God told me to run or the dog would die. The dog whimpered as I ran. The rain got heavier and I kept running and I timed my breaths to my steps. The streets and sidewalks were slippery. When I got to the clinic, I saw there was a light on in the office. There was a bell and a man finally opened the door.”
Fidelito verbally coaches her down Coahuila Street to Vía Rosa, then sends her down two alleys that bring her to within eyeshot of Dr. Rodríguez’s clínica.
“I can see the clinic, Fidelito! It’s a harrowing story, Fidelito,” says Bettina. “But you saved his life!”
“I only carried the dog. God saved his life. God and the doctor.”
“You’re too humble. You should be aware of your unselfishness and true bravery. When people read this story and see my video, they’re going to be inspired by your courage. But I will never say your name or show your image. All because of what you did. You will be a hero without a face.”
“Gracias, Señorita Blazak.”
Bettina and Billy set off down Vía Rosa to retrace their steps to the Factoría Calderón. At the corner of Avenida Revolución, a rough-looking young man in a ratty silk sport coat right out of Miami Vice, wearing a belt with an enormous silver-and-turquoise buckle, offers to show them his cocaine, pure from the Sierra Madre, or his highest quality “super-ice” meth — both containing a safe amount of fentanyl, both on sale today.
Billy Ray badges him. “Can I help you?”
The young man backs away, then wheels and runs into the busy Avenida Revolución sidewalk.
Bettina and Billy continue on Vía Rosa, but two blocks later, the drug peddler and two beefy associates are coming up the sidewalk from behind them. Billy with his cop antennae spots them first. He gently ushers Bettina into a narrow curio stall filled with hanging blankets, serapes, hoodies, guitars, dresses, and chino pants. Steers her deep into the garments.
“I know you don’t like being told what to do, Bettina, but stay here. I mean it.”
He’s gone before she can answer.
Through the hoodies and blankets and hanging guitars, she can see him in the open doorway of the shop, his back to her, feet spread, arms crossed.
Sees the three men confronting him, Billy shaking his head, hands at his sides now. Leaning into them, leading with his big open face. From Bettina’s perspective, all four men seem to be talking at once. Billy steps through them toward the street, one hand waving high as if hailing a cab.
Which is exactly what he does.
Then he turns and waves Bettina out to the sidewalk, where he shepherds her into a clean white-and-orange Taxi Libre while the original drug seller curses them in loud foul language that Bettina understands.
The driver U-turns and barely misses the drug men, who follow the taxi down the street. He berates them through his open window, shaking a fist and calling them names and also trying to apologize to his fares in English.