‘Then help me! You don’t wish the same fate for me, do you? This can be our secret. Vati must never know and you deserve to keep something from him. This is your grandchild, Mutti. Your grandchild fathered by the boy who saved your daughter from drowning all those years ago. Together we can do this, Mutti. Do it for me – and do it for you.’

She looks at me in silence for a long time.

At last, she opens her mouth to speak.

‘What, exactly, is it you need me to do?’ she says.

24 July 1939

Perhaps Mutti does really love me, after all. Perhaps, having lost her own dear son, in some strange way she is the only one who truly understands. And so here I am, as far as Vati and Tomas know, holed up in Berlin, awaiting the imminent arrival of the bastard brat. But instead, I’m just a few streets away, grateful beyond words to Erna and her parents for all they are doing for me. I have the small attic room next door to Erna’s room. It has just a single bed, a wardrobe and chest of drawers, but it’s comfortable enough and, through the little window under the eaves, I have wonderful views of Leipzig.

A knock at the door.

‘Yes?’ I say, instinctively closing the book and shoving it behind me.

Frau Bäcker’s head appears around the door.

‘I’m just checking you are all right,’ she says, assessing me with a look of concern.

‘I’m fine,’ I tell her with a smile.

‘Are you sure? Have the pains gone away?’

‘No, but they aren’t bad. Not yet. Truly,’ I reassure her.

She nods. ‘Well, let me know if there’s anything you need. Or if you want me to call the doctor.’ Her forehead creases. ‘Perhaps I should do that anyway, before it gets too late in the evening?’

‘Really, I’m fine. I promise I’ll let you know.’

She smiles and backs out of the room, closing the door quietly behind her. Once I’m certain she’s gone back downstairs, I continue.

The pains have been coming, on and off, for a few days. Discomfort, rather than pain. It’s hard to know what to do with myself. I’m so big now, my abdomen tight and swollen. Dr Kaufman, who retired from doctoring years ago, partly because he’s old, but mostly because he isn’t allowed to treat Germans, has been engaged by Frau Bäcker to care for me. He is a kindly man, with a grey beard and sad, watery eyes. He knows Walter’s family and has been acting as liaison between me and them, as well as helping the Bäckers communicate with the families they are trying to help in the Jewish house.