With his heart slamming against his breastbone he clumsily picked up a bunch of keys that had fallen from her bag and a pen that had rolled under one of the far seats.

‘Vielen dank,’ she said gratefully as he handed them to her.

She smiled as she spoke and he saw that there was a dimple at the side of her softly curving lips.

‘Bitte schön,’ he responded, and for the first time wished that his German was as fluent as Max’s and Hugo’s, both of whom spoke the language flawlessly, without even the slightest trace of an accent other than a Berlin accent. Like Vicky’s, his German was excellent, a result of a lifetime of spending time in Germany, but it wasn’t flawless and suddenly he very much wanted it to be.

With all her things now back in her handbag she sat down on one of the rattling wooden seats and he sat down opposite her, wondering how far she was travelling; wondering what he could say or do to ensure she remained with him.

The light coat she was wearing fell open a little and he saw she was in a nurse’s uniform. ‘You’re a nurse,’ he said, wishing he had Max’s gift of the gab or Claus’s smooth sophistication.

‘Yes.’ She smiled again. ‘And I think that though you speak German with an English accent, you are an American.’

He grinned, aware that the ice was broken. ‘I was born in New York, but I’ve lived in England—in Yorkshire—nearly all of my life. My name is Paul Gould.’

‘And mine is Eva Ketzler.’

He wanted to take hold of her hand. She had lovely hands. Well-shaped and blessedly ringless.

‘And do you live in Berlin, Fräulein Ketzler?’

She nodded and the light danced in the soft cloud of her hair. ‘Yes. In Wedding.’

Wedding was a not very smart working-class suburb north of Tiergarten, which meant she wasn’t on her way home, but was probably going to work. And if she was going to work it meant that when he plucked up the courage to ask her if she would have a tea or a coffee with him, she wouldn’t be able to—in which case he would simply wait outside her hospital until her shift was finished and then take her for a tea or a coffee.

The train pulled into Alexanderplatz station and she made no move to stand up and to leave the train.

‘Are you just going on duty?’ he asked as the train continued towards Hackescher Markt.

She shook her head and again the lights danced. ‘No. I’m going to visit an aunt who lives near Friedrichstrasse.’

‘I’m getting off at Friedrichstrasse too,’ he said truthfully, knowing he wouldn’t have been doing so if she had been travelling farther, knowing that if she had been travelling to the end of the line, he would have been doing so too.

‘Are you working in Berlin?’ she asked as the train racketed on towards Friedrichstrasse station.