‘Don’t worry, it’s empty,’ the doctor said in English. ‘Now then, Lieutenant, I want to include you in this because I have no other point of contact for the woman. No next of kin, no friend. I don’t think anyone has taken any interest in her in the recent past. She’s clearly not well, but you had already deduced that. Sadly, she has the same condition as many other people in this accursed city – indeed this whole blighted continent – death of child, death of husband, despair. And no one to look after her. I would love to send her to a good sanatorium in Switzerland, but my resources are severely limited.’

‘Of course.’

‘It’s been difficult to make her talk, but I got a few things out of her. Remember, she’s not mad, she’s fragile. Crucially, she now accepts that her child is dead. I have shown her that the pram is empty and we have talked it through, and she is beginning to come to terms with it. The problem is, she just can’t bear it. The little boy was her only link to her late husband and to a better life. But I had to be blunt with her because the fact of the death can’t be altered.’

‘Is there anything you can do for her?’

‘Last night when she came in, she allowed a nurse to examine her for VD and she was in the clear, so that was something. She wouldn’t eat, kept saying we had to give milk to her baby. I thought it best to sedate her so we could get her away from the pram while she slept. This morning the pram and blankets were there but she didn’t notice the baby was gone. We gave her coffee for breakfast. It was all she would take.’

‘Is there a name for her condition?’

Dr Marsh smiled. Despite the world-weary lines, his eyes were still warm. If the war had disillusioned him, it hadn’t killed his humanity. ‘I don’t think any psychiatric term explains her condition better than the old terms: grief, bereavement. A condition as old as mankind. Apart from that I believe she is perfectly sane.’

‘So what then? We send her back out into the ruins to throw herself into the canal or hang herself from a beam?’