We stood up at once. ‘Oh yes – we know her all right.’ We ran outside.

There was the little thing.

She looked as if she’d been dragged through a hedge backwards, she had been crying, her hair was all over her face, perhaps she had been running. She wasn’t herself. When she saw Lydia, she ran quickly to her and buried her face in her dress.

‘What is it? What’s the matter?’ The Princess bent down, and was transformed from the sportswoman of this morning to a mother; no, she was both. The lady of the castle stood there, brimming with curiosity – soaking it all up. Well?

The red-haired woman had beaten the child and smacked her and shouted at her so loudly, that the child had run away. She just hadn’t been able to bear it any longer. The child was trembling violently and looking towards the door. Was she coming–? Frau Adriani was coming to get her! Frau Adriani was coming to get her! It was only piece by piece that we could find out from her what had happened. At last we had the whole story.

We stood around.

‘I won’t let her go back,’ I said.

‘No . . . of course not,’ said the Princess.

‘Will you not send the child back?’ asked the lady of the castle.

The little thing started crying loudly: ‘I don’t want to go back! I want my Mummy!’

‘Another black coffee,’ I said to the Princess, ‘and then we’ll be off.’

We took the child back inside with us and piled biscuits up in front of her. She wouldn’t take a single one. We drank our coffee quietly: when things are hectic, it helps to count up to a hundred or drink a cup of coffee.

‘There, Lydia – now will you calm the child down and clean her up a bit while I telephone the old treasure. Would you please connect me with the children’s home?’ The castle-lady asked a lot of questions, I gave her some cursory answers, she said something Swedish over the telephone; I sat and waited.

Someone answered, in Swedish. I spoke German, on the off chance.

‘Can I speak to Frau Adriani?’ Long pause. Then a hard, yellow voice spoke,

‘This is Frau Direktor Adriani!’

I introduced myself. And then she erupted.

‘The child is with you then? Yes?’

‘Yes.’

‘You’ll return her . . . You’ll send her back to me immediately! I’ll have her collected – no, you send her to me . . . You bring her back to me at once! I’ll take you to court! For abduction! You put her up to it! You! What? If that child’s not here in half an hour . . . in half an hour . . . Do you understand me?’

Inside me, a regulator snapped into operation, restraining the spring-action. I had myself fully under control. ‘We’ll be with you in half an hour!’

A click – she had hung up.