Two more Mau Mau appeared by the foot of the stairs. Others joined them, carrying pangas rather than guns. They looked down the tight, hemmed-in space between them and the three white men and saw what Gerhard had: anyone who went down there would be shot before they had gone a single step.

‘Don’t shoot,’ Gerhard said to the two men beside him. ‘They have more men, but we don’t have many more rounds. Save them for Mau Mau with guns.’

Mpishi and a couple of the women reappeared and assembled a ramshackle pile of junk across the hall for Gerhard and the others to crouch behind. There was a pause in the assault, with neither side able to make an attacking move.

Gerhard saw one of the Mau Mau speak to another, who dashed away through the front door and into the open.

He was giving him a message, Gerhard thought, his chest heaving as he caught his breath. My God, there are more of them out there!

In the brief moment of stillness he heard shooting down in the basement. All Gerhard could think was, No . . . please, God . . . not the children!

‘Be very quiet, children, and stand behind me,’ Harriet whispered as she got to her feet.

She stood a foot away from the wall, with Zander clinging to one of her legs and Kika to the other. She cocked the revolver and held it out in front of her in both hands. Leon had let her fire it occasionally in the past and she knew that the recoil was too powerful for her to manage in one hand.

The footsteps were getting closer.

‘I’m scared,’ Kika whimpered.

‘Hush . . .’ whispered her brother. ‘Don’t let them know we’re here.’

Suddenly a deafening fusillade of shots pounded their ears. The bullets passed through the flimsy door and smashed the bottles in the racks beyond.

A single kick smashed the door in. Two men entered the room, both tall, strapping Kikuyu. One of them carried the gun that had peppered the door. The other was armed with a panga.

The men saw Harriet and the children and grinned, knowing that they had stumbled upon a great prize.

Harriet was holding the gun. The men were so close she could not possibly miss. And yet she froze, unable to pull the trigger, paralysed by fear and a fundamental inability to take the life of another human being, even when her own was in danger.

Mwangi knew that this woman did not have it in her to kill. He reached forward and took the gun from her hand.

‘Like candy from a baby, eh?’ he said to her, speaking in English so that she would know that he was as good as her.

Roosevelt asked Mwangi a question in Gikuyu.