“Police!” angry voices shouted from downstairs, though I saw no one yet.

“Psst!”

I turned around. Behind me a door had opened and a man was looking at me intently, sizing me up. Then he gestured me in.

Heavy footsteps on the stairs. “Police!”

I jumped inside toward the man, and the door closed behind me.

There was heavy trampling of police boots just outside the door, shouting, running up to the top of the building, banging on the doors upstairs. I guessed they hadn’t seen me. The man who had opened the door had an intelligent, tired face and graying hair that made him look older than he probably was. We exchanged quick looks. There was also a woman, younger than him, not so far from my age, I guessed, tall and broad, with a kind face. We heard the policemen coming back down the stairs, banging on the doors of this floor. Our door. The man and woman looked at each other, and he nodded in the direction of a corridor.

“Quick, Pani Waleszka, the kitchen.”

The woman took me by the arm, and we hurried along the narrow corridor to a tiny kitchen with a view of the street. Before I could see anything going on outside, we heard more banging on the door. Then the sound of it being opened.

“Citizen,” we heard a voice boom in the other room, “a suspect is hiding in this building. Have you seen him? A young man with light hair and a brown rucksack?”

“There is no one here apart from myself and my secretary,” said the man calmly.

“Then you will let us search the space.”

Their boots crossed the threshold.

The woman and I looked at each other in the tiny kitchen. Right behind the door was another, very narrow door, painted the same color as the wall. Pani Waleszka opened it quickly, took out some brooms that were inside, and pushed me in. I fit sideways, and she closed the door. I heard her shoving the brooms up against it, and running in other parts of the office, and the sound of her heels on the wooden floor of the corridor.

“Is there anyone in that other room, citizen?”

“No, Officer,” said her voice, betraying no tension.

The kitchen door was flung open, and the door to my hiding place trembled. I could see them through a crack, a tiny slice of them. I thought my heart would burst. There were two. Flushed, angry men in uniforms, inches away. I would never see you again. Panic gripped me and pulled me into an abyss. The policemen moved quickly, looking around the kitchen and out onto the street through the window.

“Shit,” one of them whispered, banging his fist on the kitchen counter.

“All clear!” shouted the other one into the corridor.

There was a scratching on the door.