‘My sister is having a lie-down right now,’ he explained. ‘But I will ask her if she wishes to speak with you, Herr Gunther.’ He closed the door behind us, and tried to fix a more welcoming expression to his face. Broad and thick-lipped, the mouth was almost negroid. It smiled broadly now, but quite independently of the two cold blue eyes that flicked between Inge and myself as if they had been following a table-tennis ball.

‘Please wait here a moment.’

When he left us alone in the hall, Inge pointed above the sideboard where there hung not one, but three pictures of the Führer. She smiled.

‘Doesn’t look like they’re taking any chances as far as their loyalty is concerned.’

‘Didn’t you know?’ I said. ‘They’re on special offer at Woolworth’s. Buy two dictators, and you get one free.’

Sahm returned, accompanied by his sister Marlene, a big, handsome blonde with a drooping, melancholic nose and an underhung jaw that lent her features a certain modesty. But her neck was so muscular and well-defined as to appear almost inflexible; and her bronzed forearm was that of an archer or a keen tennis player. As she strode into the hallway I caught a glimpse of a well-muscled calf that was the shape of an electric lightbulb. She was built like a rococo fireplace.

They showed us into the modest little sitting room, and, with the exception of the brother, who stood leaning against the doorway and looking generally suspicious of myself and Inge, we all sat down on a cheap brown-leather suite. Behind the glass doors of a tall walnut cabinet were enough trophies for a couple of school prize-givings.

‘That’s quite an impressive collection you have there,’ I said awkwardly, to no one in particular. Sometimes I think my small-talk falls a couple of centimetres short.

‘Yes, it is,’ said Marlene, with a disingenuous look that might have passed for modesty. Her brother had no such reserve, if that’s what it was.

‘My sister is an athlete. But for an unfortunate injury she would be running for Germany in the Olympiad.’ Inge and I made sympathetic noises. Then Marlene held up my card and read it again.

‘How can I help you, Herr Gunther?’ she said.

I sat back on the sofa and crossed my legs before launching into my patter. ‘I’ve been retained by the Germania Life Assurance Company to make some investigations concerning the death of Paul Pfarr and his wife. Anyone who knew them might help us to find out just what did happen and enable my client to make a speedy settlement.’

‘Yes,’ said Marlene with a long sigh. ‘Yes, of course.’

I waited for her to say something before eventually I prompted her. ‘I believe you were Herr Pfarr’s secretary at the Ministry of the Interior.’

‘Yes, that’s right I was.’ She was giving no more away than a card-player’s eyeshade.