‘Shut the door!’ Beckman shouted. Claire slammed it as fast as she could, lest Beckman put a bullet through the Police Chief. It would have been easy for him to do, but then he would probably have caught one himself.
The curtains at the small windows on either side of the front door were drawn, making the entrance hall dark, but the door to the living room was open. A beam of light shone out of it illuminating the polished block-wood floor of the hall. Beckman pushed her into the sitting room. The curtains at the bay window were drawn, a precaution against a sniper’s bullet.
With the gun still aimed at her head, Beckman gave Claire another shove and she staggered into the middle of the room. She took her time regaining her balance so she could survey her surroundings. Beckman standing behind her, Nurse Bryant sitting on the sofa, and Mitch in an armchair with his back to the window. It would be Mitch who took a bullet if-- Claire shook her head to rid the image of her husband being shot in the back of the head. ‘Thank goodness those two are safe,’ Claire said, to Beckman, nodding as if to reaffirm the nurse and her husband’s safety. Beckman didn’t reply, but Mitch cleared his throat, which told Claire he understood it was his parents who were safe.
‘Silence!’ Beckman lifted his gun. Mitch leapt out of the chair, but he wasn’t fast enough. In a second Beckman had the gun pointing at him. ‘Sit down!’ Without taking his eyes off Claire, Mitch backed off and returned to his seat next to the window. ‘You too,’ he said, bringing the gun back to Claire. She held her hands up and sat on the settee next to the nurse.
‘What are you doing here, Claire?’ Mitch said, feigning an emotion between worry and anger.
She looked at Beckman, waiting for him to shout Mitch down, or order her not to speak. He did neither. Instead, he said, ‘Yes, Mrs Mitchell, what are you doing here?’
‘The same as your woman is doing,’ Claire said, ‘I am supporting the man I love.’ Beckman’s eyes flitted from Claire to Nurse Bryant. He said nothing. Claire turned her back on him and smiled at the nurse. ‘You were very kind to me on the day my husband had to stay on the ward.’ Nurse Bryant looked up at Beckman doe-eyed. Claire smiled. ‘You love your boss very much, don’t you?’
‘Yes.’
‘You’re a lucky man, professor.’
Beckman grunted.
Claire looked across at Mitch and raised her eyebrows. She needed his help. Her plan to stir up trouble between Beckman and the nurse wasn’t working.
‘So?’ Mitch said, ‘what is it you want, Beckman?’
Beckman pulled in his stomach and stood tall. ‘A new passport and two tickets to Argentina.’
‘Don’t you mean, two passports?’ Mitch said.
‘No. One passport, but two tickets - one single and one return.’ He looked at Mitch and grinned. ‘You will use your own passport.’ Mitch’s mouth fell open. ‘Oh,’ Beckman said, laughing, ‘didn’t I say? You, Captain Mitchell, are coming with me. That way I will be guaranteed a safe passage.’
‘That wasn’t part of the agreement.’
‘No?’
‘You know it wasn’t. We agreed that you’d let my parents go if I got you a passport and a ticket to a pro-Nazi country--’
Nurse Bryant looked from Mitch to Beckman. ‘What about me, Lucien?’
‘You?’ Beckman set his jaw and looked at the nurse with distaste. Then his face softened. ‘I will send for you when I am settled.’
‘But you promised to take me with you,’ Nurse Bryant said, near to tears. ‘You promised we would go to Argentina together, and when you had proved you were innocent of these-- false charges, you would take me home with you to meet your family in Switzerland.’
Beckman laughed. ‘You are deluded, woman.’
‘But-- I love you, Lucien. Haven’t I proved that to you?’
Claire glanced at Mitch. He pressed his lips together and raised his eyebrows as if to say, maybe we were wrong, perhaps the nurse did kill Beckman’s secretary. ‘He can’t afford to take you with him now you have killed for him,’ Claire said. Beckman looked at her, his eyes blazing with anger.
‘What? I haven’t killed anyone,’ Nurse Bryant cried.
‘Silence!’ he shouted to Claire. ‘And you,’ he said, pointing the gun at the nurse, ‘stop whining. No one has killed anyone.’
‘Your secretary was found on the floor of her office the morning after you left. She had been murdered.’ Claire looked at Nurse Bryant. ‘And your fob-watch was found under her body,’ Claire said. ‘How could it have got there? Perhaps Doctor Beckman’s secretary loved him and wanted to go to Argentina with him, too. Is that why you killed her?’
‘I didn’t kill your secretary, Lucien. And who is Doctor Beckman?’
‘Enough! Beckman said to the nurse, ‘keep your mouth shut. Don’t say another word.’ He turned to Claire. ‘You think you’re so smart, don’t you?’ Claire didn’t think she was smart. She was scared to death that she had gone too far and Beckman would put a bullet in her.
Suddenly Chief Jacobs voice, deep and slightly muffled, boomed into the room. ‘What is going on in there? What are your demands, Doctor Beckman?’ Claire sighed with relief. For the moment Beckman’s attention was on the police chief and not on her or the
