Ben shook his head. ‘If she had been, I’m sure she would have told him what I did. That you’re a Jew and you don’t tell lies.’

Would Christina have risked a confrontation with her family’s venerable elder?

‘When I told her, she said I must excuse Uncle Ernst because he’s very old.’

But still spouting the poison of his younger years and getting away with it, thought Howard.

‘It isn’t just Uncle Ernst,’ Ben went on. ‘There’s a new boy at my school who’s moved to Munich from Dusseldorf. Today he said to me and some other boys the same as Uncle Ernst said to me. About the Jews lying.’

‘Did you give him the same answer you gave the old man?’

Ben nodded. ‘And afterwards all the boys, not just him, made jokes about my nose!’

‘Is that what your mother accused you of making up?’

‘Not exactly. But she didn’t believe me when I told her the boy from Dusseldorf made himself a moustache with a pencil, raised his hand and said, “Heil Hitler! Juden araus!”’

How many budding neo-Nazis were there in West Germany’s schools? The incident Ben had described wasn’t something Christina would easily bring herself to believe possible in the eighties.

Nor did Howard want to believe it, but his son hadn’t dreamed it up and a chill had settled in the pit of his stomach. There was little doubt that Ben was suffering the effects of the computer games Howard had heard about. Lodged by their programmers in easily accessible ‘mail boxes’ which kids who had home computers could call up.

How more insidious could the implanting be? And where it would do the most damage. What were the children but the nation’s future?

The games had caused a public outcry heartening to Howard, but the authorities had failed to find out who the programmers were. As for the content – a ‘Hitler lives’ theme summed it up, with all that implied, calculated to turn the erstwhile Führer from the monster he was into a national hero and the Jews again into scapegoats.

‘Like me to have a word with your headmaster?’ he asked Ben.

‘No thanks, Daddy. That wouldn’t do me any good with the other boys.’

‘Whatever you think best. But remember that you’re not fighting your battles alone. I’m supporting you.’

‘Now I’ve told you, I feel better. Can I change my mind and have some Apfelkuchen and ice cream?’

Howard got him a large helping of both.

‘I used to like Uncle Ernst, but I don’t any more,’ Ben said while eating his dessert.

But it would be some years before he saw the old man and others of his ilk for the truth twisting self-deceivers they were. By then most would have gone to their graves and still saying, ‘Heil Hitler!’