‘Obersturmführer, but I was due to be—’

‘Well there we are then – a lieutenant. Look, you’re not the only one in this position. I ended up as a Sturmbannführer, and even I’m not deemed important enough. I’m fortunate your father has asked me to look after you; that’s my chance of escape.’

‘So you owe me then?’

‘Don’t be so cocky.’

Friedrich fell silent and for a while appeared to be uncharacteristically reflective. ‘So when?’ he said eventually.

‘Hopefully soon. The most pressing thing we need is money – we’re running out of funds – but some will be arriving any day now.’

Charles Falmer was a long way from being the best qualified person for the job, but then it wasn’t as if those who’d recruited him were exactly spoilt for choice.

For a start, it had to be someone they trusted, which certainly narrowed it down, and then they needed to be able to move around Europe, particularly Allied-occupied Germany, and that narrowed it down even further, so much so that they’d drawn a blank. Then Ridgeway remembered that his nephew Charles was working for the Royal Army Pay Corps in Cologne, and there was a lively discussion about how easy it was to get from Cologne to Frankfurt.

‘It’s around a hundred miles: shouldn’t be difficult.’

‘Yes, but one’s in the American zone and the other’s in the British: you need all kind of permits to move around.’

‘But we’re on the same bloody side; it’s not as if we’re expecting him to crawl under barbed wire!’

The discussion then turned to whether nephew Charles was up to it.

‘Didn’t you mention before that he was asthmatic and a rather nervous type?’

Ridgeway said that yes, he was asthmatic and generally not someone who enjoyed the best of health – he always seemed to have a stomach problem of one kind or another – but he was sympathetic to the cause and in any case who else did they have?

There was a bit of an argument at that point until the woman, who’d remained silent until now, said to stop acting like children and obviously it would have to be Ridgeway’s nephew because there was no one else, and they’d just have to hope his stomach didn’t play up. In any case, she said, she’d discussed the matter with the Admiral and he’d approve: the priority was to get the package to Germany, and he took a dim view of how long this was taking.

At first it had gone rather well. Falmer had managed to grab a few days’ home leave, and once in London he came to collect the package and his instructions. It was larger than he’d anticipated.

‘What were you expecting, Charles – a cheque?’

‘No, but I thought maybe… an envelope?’ They were in the tiny office in the West End art gallery, and his uncle and his business partner and the woman were all smoking, which he worried was going to trigger his asthma, but he didn’t like to say anything. He stared at the package on his uncle’s desk. It was just over a foot long and possibly nine inches deep; certainly not the kind of thing you could slip into your pocket. It was wrapped in brown paper and secured with string and tape. On the front was the stamp of a pharmacy in London, and the word ‘medicine’ was written on the front and the back in English and German.