As a Foreign Office official, his role had not been to make an open break with the Nazis, but to work against them from within. It was how he had such accurate facts and figures with regard to the Night of Broken Glass. It was how he knew that no matter what concessions Poland might make with regard to Danzig, they would never be enough, for Danzig was merely Hitler’s excuse for the war he had already decided to wage.

He said now to Zelda, ‘I think you should go home and get some rest. As you said yourself, Ilse’s condition isn’t going to change for several hours and tomorrow is going to be an exceptionally stressful day.’

Their eyes held and she knew by the expression in his that his last words hadn’t been in reference to Ilse, but to Hester. Knowing that Hugo would be in the city by morning and would probably have Vicky and Paul with him, Zelda reluctantly rose to her feet.

‘Goodnight, Nicholas,’ she said, her voice fraught with weariness and anxiety.

‘Goodnight, Schwiegermutter,’ he said respectfully.

Zelda paused. Inappropriate time or not, she was going to have to say something.

‘Zelda,’ she said. ‘I would prefer it if you would call me Zelda, Nicholas.’

And for the first time in her life, as she walked from the room she did so with the leaden tread of someone middle-aged.

None of them could remember the last time so many of their family had been gathered together in the Unter den Linden mansion. Hugo’s face was haggard, his distress and the sleepless night he had spent clear for all to see. Paul, too, was looking obviously rumpled after the night-long drive to London, the early morning ferry crossing and the long train ride to Berlin. Only Vicky showed no sign of tiredness.

Beneath make-up applied more heavily than usual, Zelda’s olive-toned skin was pale, her wine-red lipstick looking almost clownish. Josef, who hadn’t left her side since they had arrived, looked grimly austere. In contrast, Berthold looked merely bewildered.

‘Aren’t we having any refreshments?’ he kept asking plaintively. ‘I always have a cup of tea at this time of day.’

Controlling her exasperation with difficulty, Lotti said sharply, ‘We’ve more on our mind at the moment than cups of tea, Uncle Berthold.’

Max looked directly across at Claus and said, ‘I assume we can all talk freely in front of you, Claus?’

Claus, business-suited and smelling faintly of lemon-scented aftershave, his blond moustache immaculately clipped, flinched. ‘This is a family matter,’ he said savagely. ‘Of course you can talk freely in front of me. I’m as concerned about Hester’s arrest and her present whereabouts as any of you.’

‘I bloody doubt that!’ Every muscle of Hugo’s body was as tight as a coiled spring. ‘You’re still wearing your bloody personally autographed swastika pin, aren’t you? Having a Jewess in the family can’t have done your standing any good with Göring and your other Nazi chums. How do we know you weren’t party to any of this? How do we know you weren’t behind the telephone call luring her back here?’