The blast sent a shower of pellets into Potente’s back and shoulder, but shotgun pellets are less deadly than weapons that fire a single projectile and Potente grabbed his revolver as the old lady reloaded.

‘Our dad never served on the Manchester,’ Paul shouted, as he scrambled away from the table.

Yvette took a step closer as she pulled the trigger again. This time the pellets were spread over a tighter area and tore a huge hole in Potente’s back. As the German’s head hit the dining table, Father Doran was the first to realise that there had been two shots at the same moment.

Hugo slammed into the kitchen dresser as a bullet hit him in the armpit. The projectile kept going, passing through the soft tissue of his lung and shredding his ribcage as it exited through the front of his chest.

‘Hugo,’ Rosie screamed, as the boy collapsed in front of the cabinet.

Hugo tried to scream as Yvette dropped the shotgun and ran towards him, but blood was flooding his lungs and all he could do was heave the warm liquid into his mouth. Paul couldn’t bear to look and he grabbed the back door and stumbled outside, on to crumbled earth with chicken coops on either side of him.

Potente crashed off the dining chair as Rosie snatched the revolver from his dead fingertips.

‘Oh Hugo, I’m sorry,’ Yvette sobbed, as Father Doran stepped one way then another, unsure what to do. ‘We should have kept you out of the way, but … I’m so sorry.’

Paul peeked back around the door and watched as the old lady took Hugo’s limp body and drew him into a bloody hug. It seemed impossible that the little lad who’d been filling his cheeks with bread and pulling faces across the table two minutes earlier was dead.

CHAPTER THIRTY

Marc hardly slept because of the pain in his mouth, but Henderson had been on his feet for days. He crashed out on Miss McAfferty’s bed and slept like the dead. When it got light Marc found tinned fruit and English baked beans in a cupboard. He’d now mastered using a tin opener and once the cans were open he mashed the contents because he was too sore to chew.

He tried the radio, but the apartment hadn’t been occupied for two months and the battery was flat. It was undeniably a lady’s apartment, with flowery wallpaper and a smell like talcum powder and cats.

‘It’s almost lunchtime,’ Henderson complained, scratching his arse as he wandered into the living room. ‘Why didn’t you wake me?’

Marc sat in an armchair flicking through a bird spotters’ manual.

‘I did wonder, but I thought you’d probably shout at me.’