‘What’s going on?’ I asked, moving away from the window to stare over the desk at her.
‘It’s a toughie, but I’l beat it.’ She sounded quite calm. ‘Leave me alone. Let me concentrate.’
‘Let’s get out of here!’
‘Oh, quiet down!’
I turned back to the window, then my heart gave a sudden bound, leaving me breathless.
Outlined against the starlit darkness I could see the head and shoulders of a man who was looking through the window.
I didn’t know if he could see me. It was dark in the office, but he seemed to be staring directly at me.
His shoulders looked immense, and on his head was a flat peaked cap that turned me cold.
‘There’s someone out there,’ I said, but the words didn’t get beyond my dry lips.
Rima said, ‘I’ve fixed it!’
‘There’s someone out there!’
‘I’ve got it open!’
‘Didn’t you hear me? Someone’s outside!’
‘Get under cover!’
I looked wildly around the dark room. Sweat, as cold as ice, was running down my face. I started across the room as the door was flung open. The light clicked on.
The impact of the hard, bright light on me was like a blow on the head.
‘Make a move and I’l blast you!’
A cop voice: tough, hard and full of confidence. I looked towards the door.
He stood in the open doorway, a .45 in his brown muscular hand, pointing at me. He was all-cop: big, broad and terrifying.
‘What are you doing in here?’
Slowly, I put up my shaking hands. I had a horrible feeling he was going to shoot me.
‘I — I — I…’
‘Keep your hands like that!’
He didn’t know Rima was crouching behind the desk. My one thought now was to cover her: to get out of the office before he found her.
Somehow I managed to get some control over my shaking nerves.
‘I lost my way,’ I said. ‘I was going to sleep here.’
‘Yeah? You’l sleep somewhere a lot safer than here. Come on. Move slowly and keep your hands up.’
I moved towards him.
‘Hold it!’ He was staring at the desk. ‘Have you been trying to bust into that?’
‘No… I tel you…’
‘Back up against the wall! Move!’
I backed up against the wall.
‘Turn around!’
I faced the wall.
There was a long moment of complete silence.
The only sound in my ears was the thud-thud-thud of my heart beats: then there came a violent, shattering crash of gunfire.
The sound, enormous in the room made me cringe. I looked over my shoulder, thinking the guard had walked right into Rima and had killed her.
He was standing by the desk, bent double. His smart cap had fallen off, showing a bald spot at the back of his head. His gauntlet gloves were pressed to his stomach, his gun lay on the floor.
From between the fingers of his gloves, blood began to leak, then there was a second bang of gunfire.
I saw the flash of the gun coming from behind the desk.
The guard gave a strangled grunt: the sound a fighter makes when his opponent has sunk in one that really cripples. Then, slowly, he tipped over and spread out on the floor.
I stood there, staring, my hands still in the air, sick enough to throw up.
Rima straightened up from behind the desk. In her hand was a smoking .38. She looked indifferently at the guard. She hadn’t even lost colour.
‘There’s no money,’ she said savagely. ‘The drawer’s empty.’
I scarcely heard what she was saying.
I stared at the guard, watching the trickle of blood move out of him in a thin thread across the polished parquet floor.
‘Let’s get out of here!’
The urgent rasp in her voice brought me to my senses.
‘You’ve kil ed him!’
‘He would have kil ed me, wouldn’t he?’ She stared coldly at me. ‘Come on, you fool! Someone will have heard the shooting!’
She started across the room, but I grabbed her arm, jerking her around.
‘Where did you get that gun?’
She wrenched free.
‘Oh, come on! They’l be here in a moment!’
Her indifferent, glittering eyes horrified me.
Then somewhere in the outer darkness I heard a siren start up. Its moaning note chilled me.
‘Come on! Come on!’
She ran out into the darkness and I went after her.
Lights were coming on all over the Studios. Men’s voices shouted.
I felt her hand on my arm as she shoved me down a dark alley. We ran blindly as the siren continued to moan into the night.
‘Here!’
She pulled me into a dark doorway. For a brief moment her flashlight made a puddle of light, then turned off. She pulled me down behind a big wooden crate.
We heard racing, heavy footsteps go by. We heard men shouting to each other. Someone began to blow a shrill whistle that set my nerves jangling.
‘Come on!’
If it hadn’t been for her, I would never have got out of the place. She was terribly cool and controlled.
She steered me through the dark alleys. She seemed to know when we were about to run into danger and when it was clear to go ahead.
As we ran past the endless buildings and the vast Studio sheds, the whistles and the voices grew fainter, and at last, panting, we stopped in the shadow of a building to listen.
There was silence now except the still moaning siren.
‘We’ve got to get out of here before the cops arrive,’ Rima said.
‘You kil ed him!’
‘Oh, shut up! We can get over the wall at the end of this alley.’
I went with her until we came to a ten-foot wall. We paused beside it and looked up at it.
‘Help me up.’
I took her foot in both my hands and heaved her up. She swung one leg over the wall, bending low and stared down into the darkness.
‘It’s okay. Can you get up?’
I walked back, ran at the wall, jumped and grabbed at the top. I got a grip, hung for a moment, then heaved myself up. We both rolled over the wall and dropped onto the dirt road that ran alongside the Studio.
We walked quickly to the main road. Along this road was parked a line of cars belonging to people in a night club across the way.
‘There should be a bus in five minutes or so,’ Rima said.
I heard the approaching sound of police sirens.
