‘Damned Nazis. Bloody Hitler,’ Herr Bäcker says fiercely to the newspaper, shaking its pages in anger.

‘Vati!’ Erna’s voice cracks like a whip around the room. At last he looks up from the paper, open-mouthed in surprise, and sees me standing there before him, in my BDM uniform. ‘You must not talk so,’ Erna says more softly, and tips her head towards me. ‘You remember my friend, Hetty?’

‘Eh, err,’ he clears his throat and begins to fold the paper. ‘I…’ He laughs nervously and peers at me through narrowed eyes as though I’m fuzzy and out of focus. ‘You’re a friend from school, are you?’

‘Yes, Herr Bäcker,’ I reply quietly, but my heart thrashes wildly and a sweat breaks out.

Who is this man spouting such vile talk? Is this what the enemy looks like? Not a red Bolshevist pushing the cause of communist revolution. Not a rich, hook-nosed, pig-eyed Jewish conspirator. Just an ordinary, middle-class, nondescript nobody. The father of my best friend. In how many other houses, behind closed doors, are such attitudes held and whispered? How can we ever hope to overcome the treachery of ignorant fools like this?

‘Hmm. Well, apologies, Helga, my tongue runs away with me sometimes.’

‘Hetty,’ Erna corrects him. ‘Hetty Heinrich.’

‘Hetty Heinrich,’ he repeats slowly, wrinkling his brow. He clutches the newspaper more tightly. ‘Ignore me, Hetty. I’m just… I don’t mean any harm by it, do I, Erna?’

‘No, Vati.’ Her voice is low with shame.

There’s an awkward silence. Herr Bäcker smooths and folds the paper.

‘We’re going out, Vati. I’ll be back in time for lunch, before this afternoon’s BDM meeting,’ Erna says and shoos me from the room.

Out on the street, her face is pinched and pale. ‘My father doesn’t mean what he says. He’s old and silly. I don’t think he even knows what he is saying most of the time.’ The air is stiff. We walk slowly, in time. Heel, toe. Heel, toe; our rubber-soled shoes quiet on the pavement.

‘It’s okay, Erna, there is no need to explain.’

… Insanity of our leaders. Damned Nazis. Bloody Hitler. The words jolt and jar in my brain. Is this what Erna has grown up listening to? Why has she never said?

‘He’s just a stupid old man,’ she cries out. Her words stop me in my tracks. Her face is puffy, red. She’s angry. Or humiliated. Probably both, but I’ve never heard her speak in ugly terms about anyone before, let alone her own father. Poor Erna. ‘Look, Hetty,’ she turns towards me, pleading, ‘I know you, well, we, are under a duty to report such talk and all that, but…’

How can she, Erna the Enviable, the Perfect, say nothing! I think of Tomas and how brave he was to speak up about his father. Perhaps, if Erna doesn’t have the guts, I should do it myself. It wouldn’t be hard and Vati would be pleased with me. I picture him telling Karl and Mutti about how I am a true child of the Reich. But the glow is quickly extinguished by the thought of losing Erna forever as my friend. How bleak, how meaningless life would be without her.