‘Shut up, unless you fancy spending the night as our guest in Prinz Albrecht Strasse. I can assure you it’s not nearly as comfortable as the Excelsior.’

The Gestapo man fired questions at him. ‘What brings you to Berlin? Who have you met with? Where exactly have you been tonight? Did you visit any restaurant on Donhoff Strasse?’

But Prince smiled apologetically, shaking his head. ‘Ich spreche nicht Deutsch… Dansk… Dänisch…’

The man who’d followed them to the Tiergarten strolled over, speaking to the other man as if Prince wasn’t there.

‘I tell you, it’s a waste of time. They’re just two fucking Danish businessmen. The other one is well known to us: his company supplies the Reich. He’s never been any trouble. We’re wasting our time, come on.’

‘But they were coming from that direction, weren’t they? Donhoff Strasse is just up there. Weren’t we supposed to be looking for more than one person?’

‘Maybe, but it’s obviously not one of these bastards, is it?’

Prince’s sense of relief was short-lived. In the distance, there was the sound of shouting, loud voices, one of them possibly that of the young Luftwaffe officer. It was too far away to make out the words, but they were followed by pistol shots, four or five in very quick succession, fast enough to have come from a semi-automatic. Almost immediately there was a retort of gunfire. It sounded like a machine gun, and was followed by a brief scream, then more shouting and dogs barking.

‘Quick, we need to get up there. I told you we were wasting our time here. You two: go straight back to your hotel – now, move!’

Otto and Prince walked as fast as they felt they could get away with. Just before they crossed Wilhelm Strasse, Otto turned into a shop doorway and threw up.

‘You need to pull yourself together, Otto. We can’t afford to draw attention to ourselves. You look like a bag of nerves.’

‘Not without good reason! We were stopped by the Gestapo, for Christ’s sake!’

‘That happens all the time in Berlin, I imagine. We must regard it as routine. The important point is they don’t suspect us.’

‘How the hell do you know that?’

‘Because they were talking freely in front of me, remember? They assumed I didn’t understand. The one we spotted in the Tiergarten yesterday described us as two fucking Danish businessmen and said they were wasting their time on us. If they’d suspected us of anything, they wouldn’t have let us go, would they?’

‘But what if they’ve caught Kurt or Bruno and they’ve confessed? And that shooting – what was that about?’