I didn’t truly converse with the Commander until his seventh visit to the clinic. Even the most reserved Officers need conversation I suppose. He asked me where in Scotland I was from, to which I told him Dundee, of course. His family originated from Glencoe, he ventured to tell me. We spoke on as I injected him with the penicillin. I wouldn’t have guessed how open a spy could be about his past, which I didn’t remark on.

The Commander must have intuited my confusion since he noted without prompt that a man would have to be quite sociable to find himself in my clinic so often.

“Touché” was my response.

By the time he was selected for his esteemed Section M16 had dedicated a part of the budget specifically for his venereal needs and treatment. There was a logic to it, his undercover operations could be compromised where he to infect someone he shouldn’t. Promptly, his visits became more frequent and his diagnosis more exotic.

The adventures’ toll weighed much heavier on the Commander years later. If he diminished his tempo, then the byproducts of his lifestyle would be pushed to the long term; the time had long passed for him to come out unscathed. I asked him to pause his sexual activity if he didn’t wish to worsen his condition; his efficacy as an operative would doubtfully dwindle.

But he couldn’t forsake that.

“Doctor, if I gave two damns about my health I wouldn’t be in this profession,” he told me.

In a lapse of naiveté, perhaps spurred by the strange camaraderie I had established with the Commander, I reminded him that he’d be putting others at risk too, his particular informants and foreign contacts, let’s say.

He laughed, and I noticed how much older we were now.

“The job is putting others at risk, doctor. You know I have the explicit permission and the authority to do much worse.”

My silence must have been extraordinarily long since he continued the conversation. Quite the rarity.
“It’s all part of the game, my friend. You are used until it’s your turn for using. I think you understand better than you think, ¿or do you mean to tell me that these visits have been free of charge?”

Photo by cottonbro studio: https://www.pexels.com/photo/photo-of-man-smoking-tabaco-7299582/