I put down my pen. This is more than discomfort now. I pace up and down the little attic room. My back aches and I rub it as I walk. I control my breathing, the way I’ve been told to. In, out. In, out. The pain grips and bites, growls around my under-belly. In my pocket is the handkerchief Walter gave me the day he told me he was getting married and leaving for England. I finger it as I pace and it comforts me. The pain eases and I sit on the bed again. I want to finish the diary entry. There’s so much I want to say, but I have just one last page to fill, and then this book will be complete.

Walter said to me once that he thinks all people – Germans, Jews, Nordics, Africans, Slavs or Americans – we all have the same capacity for good or evil. That no one race is different to any other. He said that although some individuals are worse than others, everyone is a mixture of both. But I know this is wrong. Perhaps he’s right about most of us, but not all. Some people really are better. They sacrifice so much for the good of others. Their own safety; their own lives. These are the real heroes among us. The ones who possess so much strength of mind and fortitude, not to take the easy route, no matter what personal cost is to be paid.

The Bäckers are such people. Others may think they are like them. But few would match up. They are as rare as the Lady’s Slipper Orchid, and more precious. One day I truly hope I will find a way to thank them.

I drop my pen, gripped by a wave of pain so fierce I cry out. In the few moments that it eases, I scrabble for the pen on the floor and place it, with the journal, back inside the bedside drawer, on top of the small pile of letters Tomas has written, delivered surreptitiously by Mutti to a box at the post office.

Another wave of pain, stronger than the last. I break out in a sweat. My breathing becomes ragged and I reach for the door.

‘Frau Bäcker!’

She appears at the base of the narrow stairs to the attic.

‘It’s getting worse,’ I tell her, my voice breaking as the pain grips again. I bend double on the landing.

‘It’s all right,’ she soothes. ‘I’ve already called Dr Kaufman. Hermann?’ she calls to her husband. ‘Boil water and fetch fresh towels from the linen cupboard. Quickly now. Erna, come with me.’

The pain is all-consuming. I’m enslaved to it; I walk, sit, lie, sway, bend to its demands.

Why does love end in pain?