Her father sat in her chair, his back to the garden, facing the blank wall. His head had lolled to the side, his mouth twisted, a livid tongue protruding, like some grotesque gargoyle. His grey eyes were open, as hard and empty in death as in life. She could hear herself breathing, struggling to drag the heavy air in, out, her chest rising and falling. She stood, numb, dead to herself, thoughts and feelings moiling like debris in a storm.

She felt John’s arm around her shoulder. ‘I’m so sorry, Betty,’ he said, pulling her towards him. She was limp, fell against him. ‘So sorry.’

Betty tried to speak but a lump of anger and grief blocked her throat. He had left her, abandoned her, again. There was a bang. She jumped. One of the French windows had been pulled open by the gusty wind, slammed shut. That was strange. Why were they unlocked in this weather?

‘Does your father have a telephone?’

She nodded, pointing to the hall. She watched as he walked away, listened as he dialled the emergency number.

‘Ambulance. Police.’ Called out, ‘Betty, what’s the address?’

‘Oh,’ she said. Why didn’t he know that? ‘Forty-seven…’ She listened as he repeated it, gave his name again, gave hers. ‘Yes, dead. His daughter.’ He put the receiver down.

Her father had lost his power to terrorise her. She should go over and close his eyes, shut his mouth, but she didn’t want to touch him. He repulsed her in his crude, brazen death. She had never loved him. Was that a terrible thing?

She waited for John’s steps along the hall, for his hand to pull her away, but she heard him dial another number, the soft purr of the rotary. A moment. His voice was muffled as he spoke, but she could swear he said birdcage. It made no sense.

Her eyes were fixed on her father, his purpling, flaccid flesh, his hands on the table, the fingers stiff and white. There was a small brown glass phial next to him, a tiny cork beside it. Betty stood, transfixed. Frau Weber had had one the same, looped on a cord round her neck. The Baumanns too. Handed out like chocolates at the end of the war.

John stepped behind her. ‘Come,’ he said. ‘Let me take you away.’

‘Cyanide,’ she said. ‘He took cyanide.’

‘How do you know?’

She pointed at the ampoule. ‘Why? Why now? He’d had his chance in 1945.’

‘I don’t understand,’ John said.