Zoë spends the rest of the night on Apostoli’s sofa. He lives not far away now, since his house in Piraeus was bombed last year. His wife Andromache’s sister had died in the famine and she had inherited a little house in Psiri, near the Temple of Thession. Andromache is a warm, forthright woman who knows exactly how tight Apostoli’s reins need to be to keep them both happy. Now she bustles around in her dressing gown, making Zoë a herb tisane which Zoë doesn’t touch and making up the sofa as comfortably as she can. Zoë, though, is numb. She can’t sleep, and lies awake, listening to every creak and rodent scratch in the old house, every snore and mutter of her hosts, staring into the darkness. The next morning she is getting dressed as the sun rises. She slips out without waking the others and walks through the dingy streets of Psiri, where the walls are daubed with graffiti she hasn’t seen before: ORGANISATION X FOR THE KING! The black X, topped with a crown, is everywhere, painted over the red and white EAM slogans. The streets are empty. She supposes she must be up before the curfew but she doesn’t care. She crosses Stadiou Street, trying not to look at the man hanging from one of the lamp posts. But as she walks past she sees his face anyway: young, so young. Massalias Street, narrow and tree-lined, is tucked away behind the university. She knows she has found the right place because there is already a small, forlorn queue outside the entrance to the Athens morgue.

‘Name?’ intones the small, untidy man behind the desk. He looks as if he hasn’t left his post for days and perhaps he hasn’t.

‘Pavlo Valavani,’ Zoë says quietly. Her fingers close around the cap badge in her pocket.

‘Speak up!’ says the clerk impatiently. Zoë repeats the name and watches while the man runs his finger down a long list.

‘Not here,’ he says, and looks up at her. His face has been so deeply scrubbed by fatigue and misery that it is almost featureless. Zoë takes a deep breath, her throat tightening, but what would be the point of crying, in this place?

‘He would have come in last night from Metaxourgeiou,’ she says slowly. ‘About twenty-eight years old, black hair, tall. Light brown eyes. He was probably wearing a pinstripe suit.’