KAREN: [Speaking with great effort] No . . . it’s not necessary . . . any more.
STEVENS: Do you still claim that Bjorn Faulkner committed suicide?
KAREN: No.
[Forcefully]
Bjorn Faulkner did not commit suicide. He was murdered. I did not kill him. Please, believe me. Not for my sake — I don’t care what you do to me now — but because you cannot let his murder remain unpunished! I’ll tell you the whole truth. I’ve lied at the inquest. I’ve lied to my own attorney. I was going to lie here — but everything I told you so far has been true. I’ll tell you the rest.
STEVENS: You had started telling us about Mr. Faulkner’s way out of his difficulties, Miss Andre.
KAREN: I told you that he was going to leave the world. But he was not to kill himself. I did throw a man’s body off the penthouse. But that body was dead before I threw it. It was not Bjorn Faulkner.
STEVENS: Please explain this to us, Miss Andre.
KAREN: Bjorn wanted to be officially dead. No searches or investigations were to bother him. He was to disappear. That suicide was staged. He had had the plan in mind for a long time. He had kept ten million dollars of the Whitfield forgery for this. We needed someone to help us. Someone who could not be connected with Bjorn in any way. There was only one such person: Regan.
STEVENS: What made you believe that Mr. Regan would be willing to help in so dangerous an undertaking?
KAREN: He loved me.
STEVENS: And he agreed to help you in spite of that?
KAREN: He agreed because of that.
STEVENS: What was the plan, Miss Andre?
KAREN: Regan was to get a corpse. But he wasn’t to kill anyone for the purpose. We waited. On the night of January sixteenth, “Lefty” O’Toole, a gunman, was killed by rival gangsters. His murderers have since been arrested and have confessed, so you can be sure that Regan had nothing to do with the murder. But you may remember reading in the papers that O’Toole’s body disappeared mysteriously from his mother’s house. That was Regan’s work. O’Toole’s height, measurements and hair were the same as Bjorn’s. He was the man I threw off the penthouse.
STEVENS: Was that the extent of Mr. Regan’s help?
KAREN: No. He was to get an airplane and take Bjorn to South America. Bjorn had never learned to operate a plane. Regan used to be a — transport pilot . . . That day, January sixteenth, Bjorn transferred the ten million dollars to three banks in Buenos Aires, in the name of Ragnar Hedin. A month later, I was to meet him at the Hotel Continental in Buenos Aires. Until then — the three of us were not to communicate with each other. No matter what happened, we were not to reveal the secret.
STEVENS: Tell us what happened on January sixteenth, Miss Andre.
KAREN: Bjorn came to my house, that night. I’ll never forget his smile when he stepped out of the elevator: he loved danger. We had dinner together. At nine thirty we went to Regan’s. He had O’Toole’s body dressed in traveling clothes. We drove back to my house. Bjorn wanted to be seen entering the building. So I didn’t use my key. I rang the door bell. We were dressed formally, to make it look like a gay party. Bjorn and Regan supported the body as if he were a drunken friend. The night watchman opened the door. Then we went up in the elevator.
STEVENS: And then what happened?
KAREN: Bjorn exchanged clothes with the corpse. He wrote the letter. Then they carried the body out and left it leaning against the parapet. Then . . . then, we said goodbye.
[KAREN’s voice is not trembling; she is not playing for sympathy; only the slightest effort in her words betrays the pain of these memories]
Bjorn was to go first. He went down in the elevator. I stood and watched the needle of the indicator moving down, fifty floors down. Then it stopped. He was gone.
STEVENS: And then?
KAREN: Regan followed him a few minutes later. They were to meet ten miles out of the city where Regan had left his plane. I stayed alone for an hour. The penthouse was so silent. I didn’t want to wait out in the garden — with the corpse . . . the dead man that was supposed to be Bjorn. I lay on the bed in my bedroom. I took Bjorn’s robe and buried my face in it. I could almost feel the warmth of his body. There was a clock by the bed and it ticked in the darkness. I waited. When an hour passed, I knew that the plane had taken off. I got up. I tore my dress — to make it look like a struggle. Then, I went to the garden — to the parapet. I looked down; there were so many lights . . . the world seemed so small, so far away . . . Then, I threw the body over. I watched it fall. I thought all of Bjorn’s troubles went with it . . . I didn’t know that . . . his life went, too.
STEVENS: That is all, Miss Andre.
FLINT: I must confess, Miss Andre, that there is not much left for me to do: you’ve done all my work yourself . . . Now, tell us, didn’t Mr. Faulkner have a clear conception of the difference between right and wrong?
KAREN: Bjorn never thought of things as right or wrong. To him, it was only: you can or you can’t. He always could.
FLINT: And yourself? Didn’t you object to helping him in all those crimes?
KAREN: To me, it was only: he wants or he doesn’t.
FLINT: You said that Bjorn Faulkner loved you?
KAREN: Yes.
FLINT: Did he ever ask you to marry him?
KAREN: No. What for?
FLINT: Don’t you know that there are laws made for situations such as these?
KAREN: Laws made by whom, Mr. Flint? And for whom?
FLINT: Miss Andre, did your attorney warn you that anything you say here may be held against you?
KAREN: I am here to tell the truth.
FLINT: You loved Bjorn Faulkner?
KAREN: Yes.
FLINT: Such as he was?
KAREN: Because he was such as he was.
FLINT: Exactly, Miss Andre. Now what would you do if a woman were to take away from you the man you worshipped so insanely? If she appealed to his soul, not to his animal desires as you seem to have done so successfully? If she changed the ruthless scoundrel you loved into her own ideal of an upright man? Would you still love him?
STEVENS: Your Honor! We object!
JUDGE HEATH: Objection sustained.
KAREN: But I want to answer. I want the District Attorney to know that he is insulting Bjorn Faulkner’s memory.
FLINT: You do? But you thought nothing of insulting him while he lived, by an affair with a gangster?
REGAN: [Jumping up] You damn —
KAREN: [Calmly] Don’t, Larry.
[REGAN sits down reluctantly]
You’re mistaken, Mr. Flint. Regan loved me. I didn’t love him.
FLINT: And he didn’t demand the usual . . . price, for his help?
KAREN: He demanded nothing.
FLINT: You were the only one who knew all the details of Faulkner’s criminal activities?
KAREN: Yes.
FLINT: You had enough information to send him to jail at any time?
KAREN: I’d never do that!
FLINT: But you could, if you’d wanted to?
KAREN: I suppose so.
FLINT: Well, Miss Andre, isn’t that the explanation of Faulkner’s visits to you after his marriage? He had reformed, he wanted to avoid a crash. But you held it over his head. You could ruin his plans and expose him before he had made good for his crimes. Wasn’t it fear, not love, that held him in your hands?
KAREN: Bjorn never knew the meaning of the word fear.
FLINT: Miss Andre, who knew about that transfer of ten million dollars to Buenos Aires?
KAREN: Only Bjorn, myself and Regan.
FLINT: Regan! Now, Faulkner could have had perfectly legitimate business reasons for that transfer?
KAREN: I don’t know of any.
FLINT: You mean, you won’t tell of any. Now, Miss Andre, Bjorn Faulkner kept you in extravagant luxury for ten years. You enjoyed platinum gowns and other little things like that. You hated to change your mode of living. You hated to see him turn his fortune over to his investors — to see him poor — didn’t you?
KAREN: I was never to see him poor.
FLINT: No! Of course not! Because you and your gangster lover were going to murder him and get the ten million no one knew about!
STEVENS: Your Honor! We object!
JUDGE HEATH: Sustained.
FLINT: You’ve heard it testified that Faulkner had no reason to commit suicide. He had no more reason to escape from the first happiness he’d ever known. And you hated him for that happiness! Didn’t you?