A Quiet Flame

“Yes. We’re going to the police station at Moreno,” he said. “To the Registry of Foreign Persons. All new arrivals have to report there in order to obtain a cédula de identidad. I can assure you it’s only a matter of routine, Herr Doktor Hausner. Photographs and fingerprints, that kind of thing. You’ll all need to have one to work, of course, but for appearances’ sake, it’s best you don’t all go at the same time.”

But outside the safe house Fuldner confessed that while it was true that all of us would require a cédula from the local police station, this was not, in fact, where we were now going. “Only I had to tell them something,” he said. “I could hardly tell them where we’re really going without hurting their feelings.”

“We certainly wouldn’t want that to happen, no,” I said, climbing into the car.

“And please, when we come back, don’t for Christ’s sake say where you’ve been. Thanks to Eifler, there’s already enough resentment in that house without you adding to the store of it.”

“Of course. It’ll be our little secret.”

“You’re making a joke,” he said, starting the engine and driving us away. “But I’m the one who’s going to be laughing when you find out where you’re going.”

“Don’t tell me I’m being deported already.”

“No, nothing like that. We’re going to see the president.”

“Juan Perón wants to see me?”

Fuldner laughed just like he’d said he would. I guess my face did look kind of silly at that.

“What did I do? Win an important award? Most promising Nazi newcomer to Argentina?”

“Believe it or not, Perón likes to greet a lot of German officers who arrive here in Argentina, personally. He’s very fond of Germany and the Germans.”

“It’s not everyone you can say that about.”

“He is a military man, after all.”

“I imagine that’s why they made him a general.”

“He likes to meet medical men, most of all. Perón’s grandfather was a doctor. He himself wanted to be a doctor, but instead he went to the National Military Academy.”

“It’s an easy mistake to make,” I said. “Killing people instead of healing them.”

Dropping a couple of ice cubes into my voice, I said, “Don’t think I’m not well aware of the great honor, Carlos. But you know, it’s been quite a few years since I plugged my ears with a stethoscope. I hope he’s not looking to me to come up with a cure for cancer, or to give him the gossip from the latest German medical journal. After all, I’ve been hiding out in the coal shed for the last five years.”

“Relax,” said Fuldner. “You’re not the first Nazi doctor I’ve had to introduce to the president. And I don’t suppose you’ll be the last. Your being a medical man is merely a confirmation of the fact that you are an educated man, and a gentleman.”

“When the occasion demands, I can pass for a gentleman,” I said. I buttoned my shirt collar, straightened my tie, and checked my watch. “Does he always receive visitors with his boiled eggs and his newspaper?”

“Perón is usually in his office by seven,” said Fuldner. “In there. The Casa Rosada.”

Fuldner nodded at a pink-colored building at the far side of a plaza lined with palm trees and statuary. It looked like an Indian maharajah’s palace I’d once seen in a magazine. “Pink,” I said. “My favorite color for a government building. Who knows? Maybe Hitler might still have been in power if he’d had the Reich chancellery painted a nicer color than gray.”

“There’s a story why it’s pink,” said Fuldner.

“Don’t tell me. It’ll help me to relax if I can think of Perón as the kind of president who prefers pink. Believe me, Carlos, this is all very reassuring.”

“That reminds me. You were joking about being a red, weren’t you?”

“I was in a Soviet prison camp for almost two years, Carlos. What do you think?”

He drove around to a side entrance and waved a security pass at the guard on the barrier before carrying on through to a central courtyard. In front of an ornate marble stairway stood two grenadiers. With tall hats and drawn sabers, they looked like an illustration from an old fairy tale. I glanced up at the loggia-style upper gallery that overlooked the courtyard, half expecting to see Zorro show up for a fencing lesson. Instead I caught sight of a neat little blonde eyeing us with interest. She was wearing more diamonds than seemed decent at breakfast time and an elaborate baker’s loaf of a hairstyle. I thought I might borrow a saber and cut myself a slice of it if I got a bit peckish.

“That’s her,” said Fuldner. “Evita. The president’s wife.”

“Somehow I didn’t think she was the cleaning lady. Not with all the mints she’s wearing.”