‘You were truly unforgettable, Monkeyface,’ Max said two hours later as they strolled companionably down the street in the direction of the small club that was his regular haunt whenever he was in the city. ‘Better not tell Hugo about the bicycling, though.’

There was laughter in his voice and she laughed with him, happy as she always was when they were together.

‘Will one of your girlfriends be joining us when we reach the club?’ she asked, knowing that if there was she would at least be someone who would be good company, unlike Claus’s girlfriends, who were all complete bores.

‘Not tonight. I’m meeting up with a friend. He’s in the SA so try not to show your aversion.’

She flashed him a sidelong look, on the verge of saying something. Thinking better of it she simply pursed her lips. What Max got up to when he was in Berlin was none of her affair. Hobnobbing with a Brownshirt was a bit unsavoury, though. Max wasn’t aware that she knew it wouldn’t be the first time he had done so, for she had seen him some months ago deep in conversation with a Brownshirt in a beer garden on the Marburgerstrasse. And what had been truly odd about that incident was that neither she, nor anyone else in the family, had known he was in Berlin at the time.

She shrugged the mystery away. It wasn’t important. All that was important was that, unlike Claus, Max wasn’t a Nazi.

‘Do you think Claus is only a party member because he’s concerned about the future of the steelworks?’ she asked as they walked past the burned-out shell of offices where communist newsletters had once been printed.

‘Well, he’d be pleased about that,’ he said, glancing towards the blackened building. ‘If the communists had gained power, it would have meant the end of the House of Remer. So the answer is yes. I can’t think of any other reason for his being a Nazi, can you?’

‘No,’ she said emphatically. ‘He isn’t a Jew-hater. He doesn’t see a lot of Hugo and Hester, but he does see them. They sometimes have dinner together at Hugo and Hester’s flat, sometimes in a little restaurant near to the flat.’

‘Do you ever join them?’

‘For dinner? Not when Claus is with them. He hasn’t quite cut me off as completely as Josef has, but he’s certainly not best pleased at having a sister who dances in revue bars.’

Max, who saw far more of Claus than Lotti realized, suppressed a grin, well aware that the expression ‘best pleased’ didn’t quite do justice to Claus’s feelings where Lotti’s choice of profession was concerned.

She slipped her arm into his. ‘Tell me the latest news from Shuttleworth Hall,’ she said, knowing that there was going to be little chance of exchanging such gossip once they were in the club and his friend was with them. ‘Do you manage to spend many weekends there, or are you always in London now? How is Paul? Is he any nearer to breeding his perfect rose? And is baby Emily Elise walking yet? She was still refusing to get off her bottom when Ilse and I were last there.’