The nave was very dark. There was no light anywhere, save that of her candle and the dull, leaden light of the late winter sun as it filtered weakly through the stained-glass windows.

Trembling slightly, she knelt down and began to pray. ‘Dear God,’ she said aloud and in an unsteady voice, ‘if there is a God, please don’t let Josef die.’ She thought of the millions who, over the last few years, must have made similar prayers for their loved ones, only for their prayers to go unanswered. She clasped her hands even tighter, resting her forehead against them. ‘Dear Heavenly Father,’ she began again, aware she hadn’t made the most polite of beginnings. ‘Grant me forgiveness for all my many sins, and please don’t let Josef die.’

Once again she couldn’t get beyond that sentence. Please don’t let Josef die. It was like a mantra running ceaselessly through her head. The doctor had said that Josef, struck down with pneumonia like so many other Berliners, had gone past the point when he might be expected to recover.

‘I can do nothing more for him,’ he had said tersely. ‘You must come to terms with the fact that you will soon be a widow, Frau Remer.’

‘I’ve been a widow once,’ she had snapped back, hating him for his lack of determination to keep Josef alive, ‘and I’ve no intention of becoming one again!’

Remer money ensured that even in these difficult days, Josef was receiving twenty-four-hour nursing care. The real nursing, though, the nursing that mattered the most to him, was done by herself.

‘Don’t die, my darling,’ she pleaded ceaselessly, holding his near-lifeless hand close against her cheek as he slipped in and out of consciousness. ‘Please don’t die, Josef. Please stay with me. Please.’

It was a plea she took up again with her Maker. ‘I promise I’ll become a nicer person if only you let Josef live,’ she said as her candle flickered and threatened to go out.

It was the prayer of a child, not of a sophisticated adult, and she knew it. The problem was she had never previously approached God for anything and she simply didn’t have the language to do so. It occurred to her that perhaps she should have come when a service was in progress.

‘Please, God,’ she said yet again, tears rolling silently down her face. ‘Please, God. Please…’

‘Herr Remer is conscious,’ the nurse on duty said brightly when she returned to their apartment. ‘He is improving, I think.’

Zelda whipped off her headscarf and hurried towards Josef’s bedroom without even taking off her coat. The instant she entered the room, all her hopes came crashing down.

Josef’s eyes were open, but she knew immediately that he had reached crisis point; that they were open only because of his fierce determination to say a last goodbye to her.

She flew to his side, kneeling down beside the bed, taking his hands between hers.

‘Z…elda,’ he said with difficulty, his breathing so laboured it hammered in her ears. ‘Liebchen.’