But her scratching got a little harder.

‘She does that all the time,’ Elena whispered.

‘Let’s talk out loud,’ Martin said kindly. ‘And in English.’

If he was right, Anouk was shutting herself off inside her own world, and you only reinforced this isolation process if, in the presence of a traumatised person, you behaved as if they weren’t there. He knew this from other emotionally shattered people who he’d spent a very, very long time with.

He knew it from himself.

‘I know you want to be alone at the moment and not talk to anybody.’

Especially not to a man.

‘But I just wanted to check the equipment in this room.’

It was a crude attempt to suggest that she need have no fear of any probing questions. His experiences as an investigator had taught him never to pressurise traumatised witnesses. Victims of sex crimes, particularly children, were in a state of unbearable inner turmoil. On the one hand they wanted to be helped and see the perpetrator punished. But they also wanted the horrific event erased from their memory.

Martin looked at the ceiling, where a dark, flat screen hung from a swivel arm. He pointed up.

‘Why’s that not on?’

‘The television?’ Elena asked, confused. ‘I, well… I somehow thought it was wrong.’

Martin nodded. An understandable error of judgement.

Normally you shouldn’t leave a child alone for too long in front of the television. But this was anything other than a normal situation. Whenever he’d had to look after a child in witness or victim protection, which had happened a few times, the first thing he’d done in the safe house was to switch on the box, to take away the little one’s fear.

He got the doctor to hand him the remote control and chose, from the extensive on-board menu, a children’s channel with animated films.

‘Do you like Ice Age?’ he asked. No reply. Anouk remained as silent as the television that he’d muted.

Elena raised her eyebrows at Martin.

Later he’d explain to her that traumatised victims suffered complications for a shorter time if they were given the opportunity to take their mind off things as soon as possible after having been rescued. Studies showed that soldiers who were given Game Boys after horrendous missions were less likely to suffer from post-traumatic stress disorders than those who took part in psychotherapeutic discussions too quickly.

‘In the few pictures taken of her by the on-board photographer she was often seen holding a sketch pad. So I left paper and pencils there,’ Elena said. ‘But it didn’t go well.’

No wonder. It was far too early for gestalt therapy, even if the idea of letting Anouk draw the gruesome images out of her mind wasn’t in itself a bad one.