‘The godlike Führer will be seen to have feet of clay. No more will he be able to hold himself above the common man without base needs and desires. He will be no better than the man in the Bierkeller with a stein of lager in one hand and a busty waitress in the other. He will be utterly discredited – and his henchman Martin Bormann will be seen as the filthy murderer he is.’

‘And you think that will bring peace?’

‘No, Wilde, we’re not so naive to think we can bring down the Nazi regime in one fell swoop. But we can shift the balance of power to Reichsmarschall Göring. If he can displace Hitler – and we realise it’s a big if – then we’ll have a man in power with whom we can do business. We know Göring’s a vile anti-Semite, the founder of the concentration camps and the Gestapo – a Nazi of the worst sort – but he’s never wanted this war. He believes that it will lead to the destruction of Germany and the end of European civilisation. So if we can help him into power, we will be able to treat very favourably with him. We believe he will give up the occupied territories in the west in return for a cessation of hostilities.’

‘And the east?’

‘That will no longer be our concern. Few tears will be shed where we come from if Nazism and Bolshevism destroy each other.’

Wilde met Eaton’s gaze. ‘Do Churchill or Roosevelt know about all these fanciful plans of yours?’

‘I can’t discuss that.’

‘But Göring, he knows, doesn’t he? He has been involved from the start – probably organised the whole darn thing, paid for the trawler, everything? It was a power grab – but somehow Bormann got wind of it.’

‘Hermann wants peace,’ Sunny said. ‘What you need to understand is the power that resides in the women of Germany. They are in a majority after the slaughter of so many millions of men in the Great War. They are the ones who urge men to take courage and fight to protect them.’

‘So what?’

‘The women of Germany love Hitler. He is untainted, a single man, unmarried, no children, no mistress. These are special attributes, and he knows it – which is why Eva Braun is a closely guarded secret and why Geli Raubal was hushed up. Women of all ages have adored him from the very beginning. They are a constituency he has played to all his political life – and one he daren’t lose. For if he lost the affection of Germany’s women, he would lose the country.’

Wilde had had enough.