Page 13 - Microsoft Word - Belicena respaldo

order to intern Belicena Villca. In his criterion had to be considered two possibilities: the
woman went mad during the «Interrogatory», or the story proposed by the Army was real.
What had to be totally discarded was a third variant: that she knew something about the
subversion... In that case she would have been executed. They were difficult times; Argentina
military occupied in 1976, was resisting a tremendous repression that began with the
extermination of the famous «Nihilistic Partisans», such the official qualification, and ended
with a bloodbath worthy of Caligula, where fell, people of every classes. The dead and the
missing persons counted thousands and, in such dangerous atmosphere, it was not good for
the health to discuss the military directives.

–Then will come better times –said us Dr. Cortez– remember that the soldiers are reign
by the laws of the strategy.– and with his natural erudition, he quoted Machiavelli, genius of
the Strategy, where in his work «The Prince» says: «...the usurper state should make haste to
inflict what injuries he must, at a stroke, that he may not have to renew them daily, but be
enabled by their discontinuance to reassure men’s minds, and afterwards win them over by
benefits» therefore «Injuries should be inflicted all at once, that their ill savor being less lasting
may the less offend; whereas, benefits should be conferred little by little, that so they may be
more fully relished». That was, for Dr. Cortez, the philosophy of the Government.
I remember as though it were today when I accompanied Belicena Villca to the «B»
pavilion, impressed by her cult treatment and simple elegancy. Without being really tall she
seemed to be; her small body but up straight; the hair black and smooth, of soft filaments,
falling down to her waist. Her slightly torn eyes were green and the nose, a little prominent,
gave an effect of firmness to her visage, framing in an almost perfect oval. Her mouth,
proportionated, was of beefy lips; her eyebrows: thick and straight over the eyes. All in her
emanated a vital air that in no way revealed an age of 47 years and, even if the rigors of the past
left an emaciated mark, was divined that in her youth she was an extraordinary beauty woman.
The studies realized in the Hospital, confirmed that Belicena suffered some type of
schizophrenia, therefore, Dr. Cortez, not very sensitive to the esthetics considerations, decided
to maintain the diagnostic of the military physicians «irreversible senile dementia» even if such
valuation was totally unfair.
When I was walking through the corridors of the «B» pavilion, I received the first of
countless surprises that the treat with Belicena and her strange story would give me. Reading
the label of the plastic material with my name attached to the pocket of the jacket, she said:
–Dr. Arturo Siegnagel. You have a magical name: «bear of the victorious claw». Did
you know?
–Yes, I guess – I replied, while I was mentally translating: Arturo, from the Greek
Arctos, means «Bear»; Sieg means «Victory» in German; and nagel, «claw» in the same
language–. What surprises me –I added– is that you know it. Do you understand Greek and
German?
–Oh, that is not necessary Dr. I see with the Blood. I know what I always knew– said
me with a candid smile.
She is really crazy! I foolishly thought, believing that she alluded to the theory of
reincarnation as the spiritualists, permanent patients of our pavilions. In that time I could not

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