‘Don’t. Someone’s looking after him, all right. Devil or angel. Both.’ Niko turns on the radio again, but now there is nothing but static. Suddenly there is a loud crackle and a stab of feedback. Then a voice comes on, a man’s voice, familiar like all radio voices are.

‘Attention: Athens’ radio station will shortly not be Greek any more. It will be German! And it will be broadcasting lies. Greeks: do not listen to this station! Our war continues. And it will continue until the final victory! ’ Another crackle, and the national anthem starts up again.

‘God almighty …’ Niko is walking out of the kitchen with more coffee. To her shock, Zoë sees tears in the corners of his eyes. ‘They finally grew some balls, eh?’

Another burst of static, and another, different voice. Greek words, but not from a Greek throat. ‘People of Athens! Your city has been liberated from the tyrannical occupation of the British by the armies of the Third Reich. The great German people respect the great history and peoples of Greece! Together we will resist Bolshevism and British Imperialism! Heil Hitler! ’

‘For fuck’s sake.’ Niko bangs his hands down on the table. ‘I have to go out. I promised Micho …’

‘It’s all right.’ Zoë has never seen her friend so distraught. ‘I can look after the place for a bit.’

‘Thank you, Zozo. I just need … I need to see for myself. Do you understand?’

Zoë closes her eyes and nods. ‘Go. I’ve seen it already.’

She is washing dishes in a zinc tub behind the bar when the English officer walks in. It is about ten o’clock in the morning. The Cordelio is empty except for two customers, a pair of elderly men who come in every day to gossip about some village in Asia Minor, though they pretend they are discussing politics, because they belong to the KKE, the communist party, and have spent half of the past nineteen years in prison. All she has to do is make sure they have coffee when they need it.

The officer is wearing a long raincoat and stiff, new-looking army trousers and he has tucked his rumpled shirt into the high waist, which makes him look oddly boy-like. She sees, with a strange stab of recognition, the slim map case hanging across his body under the coat. He seems to be offering her a small tube of blue paper.

‘Miss Valavani?’ he asks, uncertainly.