Lloyd went on: “Last time I saw Rebecca was in 1948. She was about seventeen. By then she had been adopted by my relation Carla Franck. They lived in Berlin-Mitte, so now their house must be on the wrong side of the Wall. What’s become of her?”

Daisy answered: “She’s obviously got out of East Germany, somehow, and moved to Hamburg. Oh . . . her husband was injured escaping, and he’s in a wheelchair.”

“What prompted her to write to us?”

“She’s trying to trace Hannelore Rothmann.” Daisy looked at Jasper. “She was your grandmother. Apparently she was kind to Rebecca in the war, the day Rebecca’s real parents were killed.”

Jasper had never met his mother’s family. “We don’t know exactly what happened to my German grandparents, but Mother is sure they’re dead,” he said.

Daisy said: “I’ll show this letter to your mother. She should write to Rebecca.”

Lloyd opened the Daily Echo and said: “Bloody hell, what’s this?”

Jasper had been waiting for this moment. He clasped his hands together in his lap to stop them shaking.

Lloyd spread the newspaper on the table. On page three was a photograph of Evie coming out of a nightclub with Hank Remington, and the headline:

Kords Star Hank & Labour MP’s Nudie Daughter, 17

By Barry Pugh and Jasper Murray

“I didn’t write that!” Jasper lied. His indignation sounded forced, to him; what he really felt was elation at the sight of his own name over a report in a national newspaper. The others did not seem to notice his mixed emotions.

Lloyd read aloud: “‘Pop star Hank Remington’s latest flame is the just-seventeen daughter of Lloyd Williams, member of Parliament for Hoxton. Movie starlet Evie Williams is famous for appearing nude onstage at Lambeth Grammar, the posh school for top people’s children.’”

Daisy said: “Oh, dear, how embarrassing.”

Lloyd read on: “‘Evie said: “Hank is the most courageous and dedicated person I have ever known.” Both Evie and Hank support the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament, despite the disapproval of her father, who is Labour spokesman on military affairs.’” Lloyd looked at Evie severely. “You know a lot of courageous and dedicated people, including your mother, who drove an ambulance during the Blitz, and your great-uncle Billy Williams, who fought at the Somme. Hank must be remarkable, to overshadow them.”

“Never mind that,” said Daisy. “I thought you weren’t supposed to do interviews without asking the studio, Evie.”

“Oh, God, this is my fault,” Jasper said. They all looked at him. He had known there would be a scene like this, and he was ready for it. He had no difficulty looking distraught: he felt horribly guilty. “I interviewed Evie for the student paper. The Echo must have lifted my story—and rewritten it to make it sensational.” He had prepared this fiction in advance.

“First lesson of public life,” Lloyd said. “Journalists are treacherous.”

That’s me, Jasper thought—treacherous. But the Williams family seemed to accept that he had not intended the Echo to run the story.