'We have a very simple rule: it's a rouble to get in, but two to get out. That meants that it's difficult to join the organization, but alot more difficult to get out. Theoretically there's only one way out for any member of the organization - through the chimney of the crematorium. For some it is an honorable exit, but for others it is a shameful and terrible way to go, but there's only the one chimney for all of us.

'That's it over there...' Grey-haired points to a fat square chimney, no more than ten meters high, built on top of a flat asphalt roof. A thin transparent smoke is rising from the chimney.
'Is that someone leaving the organization?'
'No' Grey haired laughs. 'The chimney is not only our way out; it is also a source of energy for us and the guardian of our secrets. At the moment they are simply burning secret papers. It's better you know, to burn them than to keep them. When someone leaves the organization the smoke is not like that; it is dense and oily. If you join the organization you too will wone day rise into the sky through that chimney. But that's not what were here for now. The organization is giving you a last chance to change your mind, a final opportunity to consider your choice. And to give you something to think about, I'll show you a film. Sit down.'

With a faint scraping noise, heavy brown shutters vocer the huge windows and immediately a picture appears on the screen without any title or other explanation. It is a black and white film, obviously old and rather scratched. It has no sound, and the regular clicking noise of the projector can be clearly heard.

On the screen appears a high, gloomy room without windows, something between a factory workshop and a boiler house. In the foreground, there is a furnace with fire-doors looking like the gates of a small castle, with grooves running into the furnace like rails into a tunnel. People in grey protective gowns are standing near the furnace. Boilermen. Then they showed a coffin. So this is a crematorium too. Probably the same one I have just been looking at out of the window. The men in gowns lift the coffin and place it on the guide rails. The fire doors open smoothly to each side, the coffin is given a gentle push and it bears its unknown occupant into the roaring flames. Then the camera gives a close-up of a living person. A face swimming in perspiration. It is probably very hot near the furnace. A face is displayed from all sides of what seems an eternity. At least the camera pulls back to show the person full lengh. He is not in a gown. He is dressed in an expensive black suit, terribly crumbled. His tie is tightly screwed round his neck. The man himself is bound faast with steel wire to a strecher, and the strecher has been propelled up against the wall so that the man can see the furnace.

Next all the attendants suddenly turn their attention to the bound man. Their attention obviously gives him no pleasure. He lets out a scream. A terrible scream. There is no sound, but I can tell it is a scream that would make the windows rattle. Four of the attendants carefully lower the strecher to the floor and raise it again. The bound man makes an incredible effort to prevent this. The titanic strain is apparent in the expression on his face. A vein on his forehead stands out as though it is about to burst. But his effort to bite the hand of an attendant is in vein. His teeth only bite into his own lip, and a black tickle of blood begins to run down his chin. He certainly has sharp teeth. His body is firmly tied down, but it is wriggling about like that of a captured lizard. Submitting to an animal instinct, he begins to beat his head against the wooden handle of the strecher and so assist his body. He is not fighting for his life, but for an easy death. His calculation is clear: to rock the strecher over so as to fall with it off the guide rails and onto the concrete floor. This will mean either an easy death or loss of consciousness. You don't fear even the flames if you are unconscious. But the attendants know their job. They simply hold onto the handles of the strecher to stop it rocking. And the prisoner cannot get at their hands with his teeth even if he breaks his neck.

They say that at the last moment of his life a man can perform miracles. Prompted by the instinct of self-preservation, all his muscles, all his mental and psychological resources, all his determination to live are suddenly concentrated into one supreme physical effort to survive. The man is making that last effort. He strains his whole body to try and get free. He sits like a fox which, caught in a trap, bites and tears off its own bloody paw. Even the metal guide rails begin to shake. He strains to the point of breaking his own bones, and tearing his own tendons and muscles. It is a superhuman effort. But the wire does not give. And the strecher slides smoothly along the rails. The furnace doors move aside again and the fire casts a white light on the soles of the man's dirty patent leather shoes. He tries to bent his knees in an effort to increase the distance between his feet and the roaring fire. But he can't. The cameraman then shows the man's fingers in close-up. The wire has bitten deaply into them. But the tips of his fingers are free, and with them too he is trying to slow down the movement toward the fire. If they could only come up against something the man would certainly hold on.

The two attendants at the front jump away to the side, while the two at the end give the strecher a good push into the depths of the furnace. The furnace doors close and the sound of the projector dies out. Who was he? I don't really know why I ask such a question. 'He was a colonel, a former colonel. He worked in our organization in important posts. But he deceived us. So he was turned out fo the organization. And he left. That's the law here.'