‘If it vas your blood, I am sure he vould not mind. Herr Sleder does not care for intruders.’

‘I think I just heard someone call your name,’ I said. ‘In a moment, I shall get very angry with you. There is no one else in the building.’

He had fallen for it. Now I knew he was alone. That made life a little easier – not much but a little, and every little helped in a situation like this. I wanted to see his face and his gun. The chair I was in could swivel freely. Whoever he was, he clearly wasn’t going to pull the trigger or he would have done so by now. He was more interested in finding out who I was and what I was doing here.

I swivelled the chair round with all my force, ducked my head down, and as I came round, I grabbed his gun arm with my right hand, pulling him towards me with a violent jerk, at the same time bringing my right foot up into his crutch. He went over my left shoulder, skidded headfirst along the top of the desk, carrying most of the papers with him, and plunged off the end. Unfortunately, he was still clasping his gun, a .44 Smith and Wesson automatic, in his hand.

I heaved the massive desk up and pushed it down on top of him, and heard a winded groan as it crashed down. Either he was a lot tougher, or fitter, or both, than I had thought, for he immediately rolled clear, brought the muzzle of the gun up towards me, and fired a shot which flattened itself onto the wall. I sprang across the room and out the door, went through the fire door and up the concrete steps to the next floor. Just as I reached the top of the steps, I heard the fire door open and footsteps on the concrete. A bullet cracked up the stairwell.

I raced into the bedroom, grabbed my gun from its holster, and snapped the safety catch off. Then I dived down behind the bed, switched the gun to automatic fire, aimed at the door and waited. I heard his footsteps reach this floor, but then he continued on up; he obviously thought I had run up to the roof.