But it’s paragraph four that strikes at Elfriede’s heart. If you cannot, therefore, bring yourself to your duty, I may be forced to bring it upon you myself. Make no mistake, Elfriede. I shall not allow you to destroy the name and reputation of this family, which generations of women far worthier than you have been proud to burnish. The young Baron must return home immediately to learn his duty. He is his father’s son, after all, and the only legacy that remains to my dear brother.

Of Johann’s sisters, of course, Helga makes no mention. So far as she’s concerned, they don’t even exist.

When Elfriede returns to the living room, carrying Gertrud, the phonograph’s turned to something melancholy and Charlotte sits stiff in the armchair, drinking from a tall glass of cut crystal. Wilfred stands nearby, against the wall, arms crossed over his chest. The room smells of heat and perspiration, perfume and mildew. Elfriede holds the baby out to Charlotte. “When you’re ready,” she says.

Charlotte sighs and finishes her drink. “Yes, of course. You’ll excuse me.” Rising from the chair, she nods farewell to Wilfred and extracts the sleepy Gertrud from Elfriede’s arms. The scent of whiskey forms its own pungent atmosphere around her.

“Are you all right?” Elfriede asks, in a low voice.

But Charlotte ignores her. “Up we go, then, darling,” she croons, carrying Gertrud to the stairs, and worriedly Elfriede watches them go, watches Charlotte’s skirt whisk from sight, before she turns to face Wilfred, who has not moved an inch. His gaze asks her a question, and her nerves shatter in reply. She’s exhausted by the ordeal of bedtime, confused and consumed by guilt. Johann made her read story after story. When at last she tucked him into bed and insisted he go to sleep, he sat up and put his arms around her neck instead. You’re not going anywhere, are you? he asked, and she kissed him on both damp cheeks and assured him she wasn’t going anywhere, of course not. She left the window open, screened against the mosquitoes, and thought maybe it was time to leave, to go back to Germany. Florida’s getting so hot for small children. If this is June, imagine July.

“I thought you’d be gone by now,” she says.

He straightens from the wall and uncrosses his arms. “I gather your Charlotte is the sort who drowns her grief?”

“Gerhard’s death devastated her, I’m afraid.”

“So it seems. I’m more concerned with you, however. How you’re feeling. Are you devastated, dearest?”

“It was an awful shock, of course. I suppose we thought that if he could beat the typhoid, he was invincible. I thought we would all grow old together.”