I need girls, Herta. Boys will fight to win the war, but girls… you will be future mothers. Mothers are to be honoured. Worshipped. Because without mothers, without girls, we cannot succeed.

Sweat beads on my forehead. I glance at Erna but she is watching Herr Metzger, transfixed as he click-clacks, back and forth, in front of our bench. The silence in the hall is unnerving. Not a rustle, nor a twitch.

Herr Metzger consults a piece of paper he pulls from his pocket. ‘Freda Federmann, Walter Keller. Join me at the front, here.’

Walter Keller.

Time slows as Freda shuffles off the bench behind me. I twist around and see Walter stepping over the knees of his classmates several rows back. Karl sits at the end of the row and catches my eye. I can’t read the expression on his face.

I watch Walter walk slowly through the middle of the grand hall, smart and upright in his dark suit and tie. Sunshine flows through the long windows and a million tiny dust particles are illuminated by beams of light. Walter passes through them and in his wake the dust shoots skywards and swirls crazily, before re-forming and slowly descending once more through the diagonal shards of light.

Herr Metzger towers over Freda with something I can’t make out in his hand.

‘A Jewess,’ he breathes, and a shudder ripples through the hall. His words, unexpected and chilling, creep down my back.

‘Observe her frizzy black hair,’ he murmurs. His voice is soft. The words seem to slither from his mouth and slide, serpent-like, around the hall. He leans over Freda as if she’s a zoo specimen. It is almost as if the teacher and the girl are alone and he has forgotten the rest of us are here.

Walter arrives level with Herr Metzger. He approaches slowly and deliberately, then stands right next to Freda. My brain is locked in confusion.

‘This is awful,’ Erna murmurs.

‘But what’s Walter doing there?’

Erna shakes her head and says nothing.

Herr Metzger barely seems to notice Walter’s arrival. He lifts the instrument in his hand and I see now it’s a pair of metal callipers. He dangles them in front of Freda’s face.

‘Her eyes are too close together,’ he announces. ‘A clear sign of a clever but untrustworthy nature.’

Nobody makes a sound. There’s a sour taste in my mouth.

‘See this oversized, lumpy nose? You will notice it’s shaped like an upside-down nine. A classic characteristic of the Jew.’

Herr Metzger slowly moves the callipers around Freda’s face. Her lips are too thin. Her ears stick out too far. Her hair is too wiry. Tears begin to flow silently down her cheeks. She is trembling. One tear, then two, fall to the floor.

Walter sidles closer to Freda. Next to her Jewish features, Walter is blond, blue-eyed and perfect. It suddenly dawns on me why he is there. Herr Metzger wants to contrast the Aryan with the Jew.