In the afternoon a man sauntered down from the floor above. His hair was cut short and he was wearing a smart gray suit. Susan, I thought, would have approved of his clothes and his bearing. When he shook my hand, I recognized him. He had studied economics and politics at the university while I was there. I had spoken to him once or twice at that time, and seen him in the library, but we were never friends and I had not seen him since. His face had become thinner; he seemed confident as he spoke to the economists. There was something about his reputation in the university which I half-remembered: he had come first in his year, or he had won a scholarship. He spoke English with a heavy Spanish accent; on the other hand, with some words he used an emphatic American accent. He discussed the ministry with the economists for a while. He appeared to understand why they wanted a detailed breakdown of the wage bill. He said with some exasperation that there were three separate offices involved in paying wages and another one for pensions and there might even be one more office which pays wages too, but it was merely a rumor; it had never actually been located. The American sat back in his chair and laughed. You’re the guy we need, he said. Tell them that we must have these figures and all the figures we asked for by tomorrow morning. Tell them we will wait here all night, he said, and we expect them to do the same.

The new arrival looked at us and smiled. I think this will be very interesting, he said. Two days later there was still a ban on lunch breaks, but the facts and figures were becoming available with the help of Francisco, the economist who had been to college with me, and the three officials who had been uncooperative. Sometimes, the two men from the IMF would huddle together with some new piece of information they had acquired. Did I know, they asked me, that the train system in Buenos Aires lost five times its annual revenue? Did I know that for each driver, ticket checker, and ticket seller, there was an administrator? Did I know that the ticket checkers and sellers earned more than the income from ticket sales so that it would be cheaper to run the service without tickets? They and Francisco were like small boys assembling a train set.

ON THE LAST night there was to be a dinner in the hotel in honor of the Finance Minister. Each group was allowed to invite officials from the various government departments; thus the two experts on transport invited Francisco and we arranged to sit at the same table. Donald and I had a drink in the bar beforehand.

“The visit has gone well,” he said. He sipped his drink. “It has been a success. And there is a great deal at stake.”