The song was quickly replaced by a voice we all recognized. Usually our stations would simply pretend Churchill didn’t exist but there was a man named Alec Mathers who had begun appearing immediately after Churchill’s broadcasts to ridicule them. Like Fellowman, he was one of a handful who had defected from their side to ours. It wasn’t satire that he broadcast – those shows poking fun at the ruling elite were long gone, leaving a hole in our cultural life – it was simply a foul sort of hatred.

The people trying to clamber over the Wall to the DUK were selfish ingrates who had been educated, clothed, fed and inoculated by the state, and now wanted to defect so they could make dirty money with the ‘small-time Fascist gangster’ Churchill, he claimed.

Even if there had been a nugget of truth in his words – albeit one twisted entirely out of shape by his hyperbole – it was completely buried under the bile. And I couldn’t fathom how you could hate a stranger simply for wanting to live somewhere else, even if you disagreed with their choice. I was going to tell Hazel to turn it off when a sudden hammering on our front door stopped me.

I found Charles on our doorstep looking furious. His voice was like low thunder. ‘I had the NatSec goons crawling all over the practice this morning. They went through the patient records,’ he growled.

‘Oh, God,’ I said, panicked. ‘Did –’

‘I told you this would happen if you started poking around. Have you any idea what they could have done?’

‘I’m sorry,’ I said meekly.

He sucked on his cigarette and angrily blew the smoke out. It made my throat sting. ‘Do you want to end up in the NatSec files? Because I’m bloody well in them now. I’ve never so much as listened to that radio station and now I’m in their records as some sort of traitor.’ I understood just how serious this was for him. Because of his parents’ support for the Royal Family he had already found it hard enough to find a job. Now things could turn far worse.

‘What did you tell them?’

‘What did I tell them? Nothing. Because I don’t know anything. I have done nothing wrong. I don’t know about your husband, but, as far as I know, he has done nothing wrong either. Whatever you are doing, it is making it worse for both of us – but you knew that already, because I warned you repeatedly.’ And, amid the anger, there was more noise as the telephone rang, the bell demanding to be answered. I ignored it. ‘All I have done is try to help you. And this is how I’ve been repaid.’

‘I, I …’ I stammered, unable to think of something to say.