To be writing these words, to think of you reading them, is torture. I want you to know that, whatever we can do to help you, I will move heaven and earth to do it. I cannot bear to think of our child in an orphanage. The priority must be to get him/her out of Germany as soon as possible. It is almost unconscionable to think that anyone would do any harm to a baby, but after what I experienced in that camp, I do not doubt it. In these last six months I have seen the worst, and also the best, of what human kind is capable of.

Herr Bäcker is working hard to get passage for our baby, as well as for Josef’s three children, Lena’s boy, and several others, on one of the kindertransports leaving Berlin. We will be fostering all the cousins and Lena’s boy. It will be a strange and difficult transition for Anna and me, to go from just the two of us to suddenly being a family of seven! I have no idea how we shall manage, but with the help of Anna’s parents, we will somehow make it work. It’s quite an extraordinary programme, Hetty. English families from all walks of life are stepping forward to offer these complete strangers, these poor traumatised mites, temporary homes, until such time as they can be reunited with their families in a safe place.

I’m writing this in haste to ask if you can agree to this plan? Please think about it and reply soon.

With all my love, now and forever,

Walter.

I reach the end of the letter in a flood of tears. I wonder, if I were in Anna’s place, would I be so generous? Anna: you have my man, and soon you will have my child. I should hate you even more.

Instead, I feel only love and gratitude.

A soft knock at the door. Erna comes in with a pot of tea and apfelkuchen on a tray. She places it on the bedside table and sits on the edge of the bed, smiling.

‘Well?’ she asks softly, ‘what do you think?’

‘Oh, Erna! Yes, of course yes. A thousand times, yes.’ I try not to think of the moment I will have to part with this baby who kicks and squirms inside me. I place a hand on my belly as though to reassure it and my heart squeezes tight. I focus, instead, on the moment when we will be reunited, when somehow all this madness is resolved, when I can see Walter again, even if he is married to another. For the first time, I see things from Anna’s side.