‘See,’ he said. ‘The problem is…’ He moved a step away from her, looked into the distance. Her stomach lurched and she felt tears threatening. Her nose was beginning to run and she sniffed.

‘You have someone,’ she said. She couldn’t help herself.

‘What?’ He looked surprised. ‘No, nothing like that. The thing is, my rooms are in a dreadful state.’

She laughed.

‘Is that all? No mummy to tidy up?’ It was a spiteful thing to say, and she wanted to swallow it back straight away. Anxiety, that’s what it was, made her say silly things.

He looked cross. ‘No,’ he said. ‘I’m very tidy. The thing is, a couple of birds flew down the chimney and made a terrible mess. I thought I’d been vandalised, to be honest. Until I realised what had happened.’

‘Are they still there?’

‘I’ve got rid of them but I haven’t had time to clean up. It looks like a battle zone.’ He looked confused, as if he shouldn’t have said that.

‘Then why don’t I help?’

‘Would you?’ he said. ‘I’m a bit squeamish about blood.’

They hopped on a bus, clambered up to the top. The two front seats were unoccupied and they scrambled forward, lurching as the bus started up.

‘I like to sit up top,’ John said. ‘Childish, I know.’

‘Me too,’ she said. ‘But it has to be the front.’

He squeezed her hand. The evening would be fine.

‘So what made you decide to come to London?’

‘Spur of the moment.’

She didn’t want to tell him she’d had an argument with her father. The row wasn’t important. Lots of people shared his views. Most of the lawyers where she worked, for a start. A deterrent, they called it. The nuclear deterrent.

It was her father’s attitude. Lieselotte. His own daughter. His anger. How many German men had disowned their women once the Russians left? Wished them dead? Her father was one of them, she saw that now. She didn’t even know if he’d voted for Hitler, supported the National Socialists. Had he been a willing member of the Party? A fellow traveller? He never spoke about it, what part he’d played in that wrecking ball of history. It was hard to live with a man who gagged his past. She’d been a child in the war. It hadn’t been her fault. She had not been responsible. But she felt it, because her father did not.

‘Spur of the moment? You’ve gone very quiet. Did something happen?’