I jump off at the next stop. The street is busy and I turn to cross the road to head towards Thomaskirche. A crowd of young men pass me, heading in the opposite direction, down Gottschedstrasse. On a whim, I follow them. The air becomes heavy. My throat stings and my lungs heave.

Smoke!

I reach the corner of Gottschedstrasse and Zentralstrasse and stop. I’m facing the building Walter took me to that first time we came into the city together. I remember how I stood outside the synagogue, feeling such shame and anger as I waited for him. I see his face as it was then, proud and excited, filled with love as he presented me with the Kafka from beneath his jacket. I let out an involuntary sob. People turn and stare at me.

Heat is intense on my bare skin and I gape at the flames engulfing the synagogue, licking skywards, roaring and crackling. The fire is consuming the whole building, curling from the windows and underneath the roof. A crowd is assembled, watching the spectacle from a safe distance away. A fire engine stands in front of the building, the firemen leaning idly on their vehicle, watching the inferno.

‘Why do they do nothing?’ I ask the man standing next to me.

‘They won’t save the synagogue,’ he answers, ‘but they stand by in case the fire should spread to German property.’

‘But – what if there are people in there?’ I say, my chest tightening. What about the Rabbi? ‘Shouldn’t we do something?’

The man shrugs his shoulders. ‘Be my guest,’ he sniffs.

And what of the Kafka? The prospect of the book Walter so lovingly presented and I later rejected, being consumed by the flames, is more than I can bear.

I slip around the back of the gawkers. To one side of the burning building lies a pile of books and papers. Two men have set fire to that too. A desolate little group stand silently watching. The only one to speak is a little boy who asks, ‘Why do they burn our things? Those are our things!’

Nobody answers.

Turning, I run through the centre of old Leipzig. Here, nothing is changed. It could be any ordinary evening. People out for a stroll, visiting the bars and restaurants. How can they, the thoughtless swine? I run faster until my chest is fit to explode.

At the top of the Brühl, I slow to a walk, drawing the air in great, heaving gasps. There are clusters of men, strange sounds, shouting.

I hug the walls of the buildings as I enter the street, but soon abandon this. The safest place to walk is in the middle of the road. The air is filled with acrid smoke and mobs of boys and men smash the windows of shops, battering in doors, yelling as they loot the contents. They don’t even notice what they grab – anything, great armfuls of it. They whoop in delight. The pavements shimmer with shattered glass. Policemen stand around making no attempt to stop the madness.