"The hospital is very important to you, isn't it, Doctor?"
"It's my life," Leitner stated simply, and I wondered where that absolute viewpoint put his wife and son.
"And it's very important for you to be head physician."
"Yes, and for the same reason. I can do the best job for the hospital. For its reputation, its status in Israel and around the world." He was livening up, getting into it. I could tell this was something he fervently believed in, his indispensable role in making that vision come true. But mostly, it was about himself, as Dr. Aboulker had told me.
"You forgot the patients," I said.
"Huh?"
"You mentioned status and reputation, but you didn't mention the patients. Aren't they the most important?"
Leitner cleared his throat, smoothed the front of his vest. "Of course they are. All I do is in order to be able to provide better care to our patients. Anything that harms the hospital harms our patients, which was why I thought it prudent to have you watched, just to be on the safe side."
"It's a nice story. Admirable if true. But it's not true, is it?"
Leitner pushed himself straight. "I'm not sure what you mean, Mr. Lapid."
"I mean that you didn't have me followed out of worry for the hospital, but for yourself. Ruslander told me I wasn't the first person you had him follow. That a few months ago, you put him on Moria Gafni."
It had been more than a minute since Leitner had last attended to his cigarette. During that time it had built up a long column of ash that now collapsed onto the desk. Leitner swore, quickly stubbed out the offending remnant, and brushed the ash off the desk into the ashtray.
In no time, he had a new cigarette burning and was sucking on it nervously. The large pile of stubs in his ashtray told me he'd been on edge even before I knocked on his door. Probably because Ruslander had told him I was back in Jerusalem, sniffing about.
"As you can see, Doctor, I know everything. So why not do me a favor and quit lying, okay?"
Leitner flashed me a baleful look. "What is it you want, Mr. Lapid?"
"I want you to tell me everything. Omit nothing."
"What for, if you already know it all?"
"I want to hear you say it. I want to understand."
"Okay. If you must."
"Why did you have Moria Gafni followed?"
"To find out what I could about her."
"What sort of thing did you hope to find?"
"Something sordid, dirty, or criminal. Something secret and shameful."
"What for?"
"So I could get her to do what I want."
"Which was?"
"Get her father to donate money to the hospital. Which she should have done herself if she cared about the place as much as I do. Her father is very rich, but when I approached him myself, he refused to give a lira. But then I discovered that Moria was his one and only child, so I asked her to change his mind. But she refused to try. She said she had no contact with her father. I explained to her how important money was for the hospital, but she persisted in her refusal."
"It made you angry, didn't it?"
"Of course it did," Leitner said, his face a contortion of old fury. He drew on his cigarette and pointed its fiery tip at me. "I was her boss. She should have done as I asked. It wasn't much. All she had to do was talk with her father, for heaven's sake."
"Do you know why Moria wouldn't talk to him?"
"I don't care why. This was about something bigger than her little feelings."
"The hospital?"
"That's right."
"And your position in it?"
"Yes." It came out almost as a shout, fire in his eyes and a forked blood vessel throbbing in his forehead. He wasn't embarrassed by his selfish admission. In his view, it was a statement of obvious and justified fact. "I'm vital to the hospital. Without me, it will fall into decay and ruin. I put my heart and soul into it. I deserve to run it."
"But you need to bring in money for that. Donations. The more the better."
"That's right," he said, tapping ash off his cigarette. "And Baruch Gafni has plenty, and his daughter works at the hospital, so he's the perfect mark."
"Mark? You sound like a con man."
Leitner sat back, brushing off my comment. "A slip of the tongue, nothing more. I value all our generous contributors."
"I'm sure you do. So you put Ruslander on Moria. What did he find?"
