doctor Quintanilla

Doctor Quintanilla is the surgeon who opens the hospital to Guillermo García Medina, directs his early medical work, and later insists that he remain in surgery rather than become a soldier. Though not a constant presence in the narrative, his practical authority gives shape to Guillermo’s professional identity—and to the painful conflict between preserving life and taking it.

Identity and Introduction

Guillermo first approaches doctor Quintanilla after completing the theoretical courses of his medical degree, asking to join the surgeon’s team for practical training. Quintanilla agrees immediately. The answer sends Guillermo into a rush of joy so vivid that he remembers the whole morning: as Quintanilla explains the necessary paperwork, doctor Velázquez arrives unannounced with his young daughter, Rita, to visit a friend in the digestive ward and show her the hospital. Rita says she wants to be a nurse when she grows up, a childhood ambition she will later deny.

A Mentor in Medical Work

Quintanilla’s hospital is the setting for Guillermo’s entry into clinical practice and for his first encounter with Rita’s family. Years later, when Guillermo recounts his wartime work to Rita, he links Quintanilla with doctor Bethune and the Canadian Institute of Blood Transfusion, describing the mobile units he organized and the pride Rita’s father felt when he came to see them working. In this recollection, medical service is not an abstraction: it is a shared history of people, institutions, and practical efforts to keep the wounded alive.

Authority and the Soldier’s Dilemma

Quintanilla’s guidance also sets a limit. He forbids Guillermo to enlist in any body other than the surgical service at his hospital. Guillermo remembers this prohibition when, on 29 December 1949, he kills a man in cold blood. He has never thought of himself as a soldier; his true occupation, as he understands it, is saving lives. But the real Adrián Gallardo’s continued existence threatens Manuel Arroyo, the Burnstein committee, and the people and future Guillermo loves. Quintanilla’s restriction therefore becomes a measure of the distance Guillermo has travelled: the doctor trained to preserve life has concluded that killing is necessary to protect others, even while knowing that no court would accept his claim of self-defence.

Return as a Physician and Father

Doctor Quintanilla’s later appearance is through the pediatrician who comes to examine Guillermo’s son. The pediatrician’s diagnosis agrees with Guillermo’s: the boy has an inflamed pericardium, and recovery requires bed rest, careful meals, and freedom from exertion or distress. From 22 October 1952 until mid-January 1953, Guillermo visits his son each afternoon, examines him, and gradually begins reading aloud as the child improves. The clinical episode recalls the profession Quintanilla helped Guillermo enter, now practiced within an intimate family relationship. Across these scenes, Quintanilla’s influence is less a matter of repeated instruction than of the durable standard he represents: medicine as disciplined care, even for a man whose wartime choices have carried him beyond the healer’s role.