‘Something should be done about what?’ I ask. She’s sitting at the table, her feet up on a chair, a cup in her hand. Bertha’s at the sink, scrubbing potatoes.

‘Sorry.’ She swings her legs down from the chair, slowly, as though trying to make a point. ‘I didn’t mean to offend.’

‘What was it you were saying,’ I probe. ‘Don’t let me stop you.’

Her cheeks flush and she looks to Bertha for help. Bertha shrugs and goes back to her scrubbing.

‘It was just some silly gossip in the fishmongers this morning, Fräulein. People talk these days, you know. Everyone watching everyone else, you never know who’s going to report on who. Anyone with a grudge. How do you prove it, if you didn’t do anything wrong?’

I burn hot and walk across the room, taking Kuschi’s leash from the hook, bending down to hide my face. I fix the leash to his collar with trembling fingers.

‘No one will have anything to worry about if they abide by the law. Only those with something to hide have a reason to fear,’ I say at last, looking her straight in the eye. ‘I’m going for a walk with the dog. Not sure when I’ll be back.’

‘What, in the dark?’ Ingrid reacts.

‘Oh, Fräulein Herta, I’m not sure your father would like that,’ Bertha cautions.

‘I’m just walking around the lamplit roads of Gohlis,’ I tell her firmly. ‘What harm can come to me in a respectable neighbourhood like this?’

I shouldn’t need permission from a cook or a maid to leave my own house.

I walk quickly. Like an invisible magnet, I can’t resist the pull of him. I have no real plan except to go to the place he lives, walk the pavements he walks, breathe the air he breathes, aching with the knowledge of what I must do. Kuschi’s paws click on the pavement at my side.

We cross the little stone bridge, the river flowing smooth beneath my feet. I stop for a moment and lean over the wall. I can smell its dank wetness as it gushes and churns around the ancient arches of the bridge. My head swims – and for a second I think I might pitch forward into its depths. I spring away and walk fast down the dark lane, anxious to be back on the main roads with their bustle and streetlights.

The northern end of Hindenburgstrasse is a wide, busy, tree-lined avenue; large and imposing buildings line each side. I walk slowly past a row of shops. A haberdasher’s, a grocer’s, a café and butcher’s. All are shut except the café and a florist at the end of the row, where a man and a boy wearing aprons are dismantling displays of flowers and taking them into the shop.