Klaus would not have wanted the marriage even if Howard were a German Jew, but even so, that would be different. They would have lived in Germany and here, he reflected, we are host to the Jews who returned, as we always were. Who would try to make their host feel uncomfortable? A word not strong enough to describe how Klaus’s daughter had been made to feel by her husband’s relatives in England. He had not seen Christina smile since she came home. This time to stay.

‘Must we now eat all our meals in silence!’ he exclaimed. He quaffed some beer to wash down the food his sudden surge of anger had caused to stick in his throat. How dare those people do this to his beloved daughter!

‘Is my grandson to grow up in a house where nobody laughs?’ He unwedged his belly from where it rested against the table and went to fondle the cheek of the alien-looking child whom he nevertheless adored.

Eventually, he told himself, Christina would marry again and the man be a Bavarian, with whom she would provide her parents with a brood of happy grandchildren who looked like German children should.

‘Do not be sad, little one,’ he said to Ben. ‘All will be well.’

Christina put down the fork with which she was toying with her meal. ‘Would you please tell me how, Father? Ben is too young to understand what is wrong, but he can feel that all is not well.’

Though the child was bilingual the conversation was of course beyond his comprehension. But as Christina had said, he was sensitive to the atmosphere, and now glancing back and forth from his mother to his grandfather.

‘One day he will perhaps blame me,’ said Christina with distress when Ben dug his knuckles in his eyes and began crying.

Her father replied, ‘I do not wish to hear that word spoken in this house again. What but blame is at the root of this trouble?’

‘I want my daddy,’ Ben said in English.

‘He will forget that language when he no longer hears it spoken,’ said Klaus.

‘But he will not forget his father,’ said Christina, ‘and I would not wish for him to.’

She too began weeping, and Lisl Schmidt gave her husband a rebuking glance while cradling Ben against her ample bosom.

‘It is not good to discuss such matters in the little one’s presence,’ she said to Klaus. ‘And should you not now be on your way back to work? The Apfelkuchen you do not have time to eat I will save for you to have tonight.’

Lisl surveyed Christina, who was drying her eyes on a corner of the apron she was wearing. ‘And if our daughter does not quickly recover her appetite, Klaus, we shall soon not recognize her,’ she added as he departed.