‘That’s easy and not very glamorous. I simply replied to a job advertisement in a Munich newspaper in 1930 when I was just twenty-two years old. I was not a party member and knew nothing of Hitler or politics, but I was experienced in office work and had good references, and so I got the job. I think he liked me very much, for he was always kind to me and talked to me at length about his childhood, both the good parts and the less happy parts, such as his father’s vicious temper. He loved his mother dearly.’

That was too much, and Wilde laughed out loud. ‘So he was simply a jolly good fellow, not at all the type to invade other countries and order the deaths of millions of people?’

Her jaw tightened. ‘If you talk to me like that, then you will get nothing from me, sir.’

‘Forgive me, but it sounded as if you were making excuses for him – as though he must have been a good man because he loved his mother. I wonder, Frau Schroeder, perhaps you were a little in love with him?’

She considered this for a few moments. ‘No, I didn’t love him, but I admired him greatly and I think we all had a great belief in him, that he was doing his best for Germany. He gave us back our pride. He promised bread and work – and he gave us bread and work.’

And brought you all to destruction, thought Wilde, but stating the obvious would be of no benefit here. ‘Tell me about the man you knew. Was he stern with those around him?’

‘Oh, he had his moods. What man doesn’t? For much of the time he was charming and good natured, but then the devil entered his soul and he raged. His blue eyes told everything. At one moment, they were warm, the next they were ice-cold and you did your best to avoid the fury that you knew was about to erupt.’

‘Where is he now, Frau Schroeder?’

‘He is dead.’

‘Why do you say that?’

‘Because he told me he would never be taken alive, that he would shoot himself or take poison – or do both simultaneously.’

‘But saying that and doing it are two different things. You were not there in the bunker at the end. Just imagine for a moment that he is still alive, where would he be, do you think?’

‘In the mountains, of course. He loved the mountains more than anything. He was always happiest at the Berghof. He would take his morning tea on the terrace alone, looking out across the Alps, lost in his own world.’

‘Apart from the Obersalzberg, what were his other favourite places in the Alps?’

‘Well, of course, he loved the Tyrol, also Salzburgerland and Upper Austria.’

‘Any particular towns or villages?’

‘I’m afraid I couldn’t say.’

‘Did you ever meet a man named Julius Boden?’