A Quiet Flame by Philip Kerr Read Free Book Online Page A

began to clean their tinted lenses with the end of his woolen tie. He was trying not to smile so as not to hurt my feelings, but I could see that he really didn’t care if he did. As if he was trying only a little not to give the game away.
    I guessed what this was.
    “But you knew that already, didn’t you?”
    The colonel shrugged and went on polishing.
    “What kind of a country is this? No banking secrecy. And no medical ethics. I suppose Dr. Espejo is a friend of yours.”
    “Actually, no. Quite the reverse. Espejo is what we call a resentido. It means he has a chip on his shoulder. Espejo is a man who dislikes Perón intensely.”
    “I wondered why he seemed to be the only person I’ve met in this city who doesn’t have a picture of the president on his wall.” I shook my head. “I don’t get it. Perón recommended a doctor who hates him?”
    “Earlier on, you mentioned the oyentes. ”
    I smiled. “You have a listening device planted in his surgery.”
    “Several.”
    “I guess that’s one way of making sure you get an honest diagnosis.”
    “Did you perhaps think you didn’t?”
    “It sure didn’t feel like Espejo was keeping anything back. The man’s got quite a left hook on him. It’s been a while since anyone caught me one on the chin like that.” I paused. “Don’t tell me he was pulling his punches.”
    “Not at all,” said the colonel. “Espejo’s a good doctor. But there are better ones. If I were you, Herr Gunther, I should want to have someone treating me who’s more of an expert in these matters than Espejo. A specialist.”
    “Sounds expensive. Too expensive for my thousand dollars.”
    “All the more reason to work for me. We have a saying here in Argentina. We say, ‘I can’t trust you until I tell you a secret.’ So that’s what I’m going to do. I’m going to trust you with one of the biggest secrets in the country. Then you will have to help me and I will have to help you. It will be a sign of good faith between us.”
    “What if I prefer not to know what you know?”
    “I can’t tell you B if I don’t also tell you A. I will tell you B first, and then perhaps you will guess A. Dr. George Pack is one of the leading cancer specialists in the world. He is a consultant at Sloan-Kettering in New York. He treats patients like the Rockefellers and the Astors. But quite often he also comes here, to Buenos Aires.”
    “To treat someone equally important, no doubt,” I said. “The general?”
    The colonel shook his head.
    “The general’s wife?”
    He nodded. “But even she does not know.”
    “Is that possible?”
    “It is if the general wishes it. Evita thinks she has a woman’s problem. But it’s something else. I have already spoken to Dr. Pack. And as a favor to the general, he has agreed to treat you the next time he is in the country. At our expense, of course.” The colonel threw his hands up. “So you see, you have no choice, no excuse to refuse. There isn’t one objection you can make that hasn’t already been thought of.”
    “All right,” I said. “I can tell when I’m beaten. But you seem to have a lot of faith in my abilities, Colonel. Still, how can I resist?”
    “How, indeed? But is it so hard to accept my admiration for your forensic abilities? It would be the same for you and Ernst Gennat, would it not? Or that other great Berlin detective. Bernard Weiss. These were your mentors. Your own heroes.”
    “For a while, yes, they were,” I said. “All the same, it does seem like you’ve been to a hell of a lot of trouble to have me investigate one murder and one missing girl.”
    “It might seem that way to you, Herr Gunther. But to be brutal with you, it’s really no trouble at all. We have some old papers sent from Berlin. We give you a job. We pay you some money. We employ a doctor to treat your illness. These are easy things to fix when you’re a man in my position. What could be simpler?”
    “When you put it like that,” I