‘Don’t worry. Haddock is more plentiful than cod at this time of the year.’

Prince felt relieved. Niels looked at him expectantly, his eyebrows raised: Carry on…

‘Oh, yes… and no plaice either.’

‘Good,’ said Niels, ‘but you mustn’t hesitate like that. Your safety – and ours – depends on it. You need to be more fluent. Anyway, welcome to Denmark. I’m Niels.’

‘Were some Germans here before?’

‘They were, yes. A routine search apparently.’

‘Do they search every trawler coming in?’

‘Sometimes. Still, they found nothing. We’ll take you to your safe house soon. Let me see your identity documents, please.’

Prince passed over his Jesper Holm identity card and the other papers. Niels studied them carefully.

‘This is the only identity you have?’

Prince nodded. Niels shook his head.

‘I’m not happy with this. They really should have given you more than one identity: one for your journey, one for when you reach your destination. I’ve told London this so many times, but as usual they ignore what I say. Stay here while I sort out a new identity card for you. I’ll come back soon to take your photograph and we’ll have the card ready by lunchtime. That will be a better time anyway to take you to the safe house – it’s always busy then.

‘This card,’ he handed the legitimationskort back to Prince, ‘keep it safe. We’ll sort out somewhere to conceal it soon – and don’t use it until you arrive in Copenhagen.’

Chapter 5

Denmark, November 1942

Days later, on the train from Odense to Nyborg, Prince had fallen into a deep sleep when he was woken up by a loud voice shouting for tickets a few rows behind him. For a moment he had trouble remembering quite where he was, the rocking effect of the train creating a hypnotic sense of confusion. And then he spotted Henry in a seat diagonally opposite, smiling and staring straight at him.

The sense that his son was opposite him was so intense, Prince leaned forward to speak to the boy. The words were half formed, but just as he opened his mouth, the ticket inspector appeared in the aisle and the spell was broken. By the time he’d checked the tickets, the boy had turned round. He no longer looked like Henry.

At that moment, Prince would have happily betrayed the whole world just to spend five minutes with his son.

In Richard Prince’s first year at grammar school, morning lessons were spent in a classroom overlooking the main entrance, where from his window desk he’d watch the almost ceremonial arrival each day of Mr Marquis, one of the classics masters.