‘Well, perhaps I’ll call them myself.’ There was something about Maria Dienstag that seemed to sum up the whole bloody horror of the past six years. Heck couldn’t quite get her out of his mind.

‘There was something else,’ the sergeant said. ‘My private told me the woman said something to him as he drove her to the clinic. She said, “I know where she is”. He thought she was talking about the baby, but he had a strange feeling. I thought I should tell you, sir.’

I know where she is.

She wasn’t talking about her baby, because the dead child was a boy.

‘Did she say anything else?’

‘Not that he mentioned, Lieutenant.’

Now Heck was here at the Military Hospital, an outfit set up at great speed in the two months that the British had been in Berlin. A nurse had told him that a psychiatrist, Dr Marsh, had worked on Maria Dienstag’s case the previous evening and again this morning. In fact, he was with her now. The nurse placed a call through to the doctor and then directed Heck to his office and asked him to wait outside until summoned.

The door opened and Dr Marsh emerged. ‘Ah, Lieutenant Heck, it’s good of you to come. Will you join us? I’d like a few words with you in the presence of the patient. You and I will speak English, which she doesn’t understand. Are you all right with that?’ He was.

‘You will notice that she looks a little different. Beneath her headscarf, her hair was alive with lice and we had to shave it off and disinfect her. We have given her another scarf to make her look presentable, but I’m just telling you this so you don’t stare too obviously or look startled.’

‘I understand.’

‘How old do you think she is?’

She obviously couldn’t be as old as she looked, but he really had no idea. ‘Thirty-five?’ he suggested.

‘Twenty-three,’ the psychiatrist said. ‘She’s worn out, mentally and physically.’ Dr Marsh was a kindly man in his late thirties, but he too looked exhausted, as though the war and its aftermath had taken a great toll. Heck followed him into the office.

‘Do sit down, Lieutenant.’

Heck smiled at Maria Dienstag and sat beside her on the doctor’s couch. He reached out and took her bony hand. ‘Are you OK, Frau Dienstag?’ he said in German.

She nodded stiffly. Her hand was limp in his but she didn’t try to pull it away.

The pram stood at her side.