Her hand throbbed and burned, which was helpful as fighting it diverted her panic about the next move. Eva and the two children were having an early supper with a family friend and Petr had agreed to pick them up in the limousine at 6.30 p.m. and to bring them back.

In and out before they arrived back.

Reaching the Kobes’ apartment without incident, she went straight to the family bathroom. It was in its usual state of untidiness. Eva’s medication was stacked carelessly on a shelf. Petr’s shaving stuff beside it. The towels had not been hung up and the bath needed a clean. She did not give the mess a second thought but raided the first-aid cabinet. Aspirin to help her to think straight and the bandage, which Maria had used for a cut knee and still bore a faint bloodstain, to bind her hand.

It was ten past six, and the phone rang in the hall. She did not answer it.

In her room, she sank onto the bed.

Think.

Working clumsily, she positioned the document along the underside of her wrist and bandaged up her hand, making sure it was hidden, and safety-pinned it tight. The watery red smudge on it gave it verisimilitude.

She was light-headed. Again. Shocked. Again. She had fallen into a trap of false optimism. And all manner of things should be well. This was a city impregnated with spirits and demons and they played a tormenting game with ingenues.

How did one pray?

Pray she must – to those demons and spirits of Prague. Pray, too, that her faith was justified.

She sat on her bed and worked out the best options. First, pack the rucksack with the things she could not bear to abandon. The hand mirror. Milos’s silhouette. To these she added basic clothing and what money she still possessed. Her passport, of course.

She would leave behind the photograph taken of her by Vaclav at a rock concert in Kinsky Gardens (too incriminating if she was hauled in) and, except for what she stood up in, her clothes, including the Parisian dress.

And she would leave behind the old Laure.

Rucksack packed, she was opening the front door when the family clattered in. Dropping the rucksack onto the floor, she kicked it into the corner. ‘I heard you coming,’ she said.

‘I knew you’d be waiting,’ said Jan.

The children twined their limbs around hers, and she hugged them both with her good arm. They smelt of a cheap pop drink, the residue of which stained Maria’s mouth.

Eva had been crying but she said, ‘We had such a good time.’ The distant look was back, and she moved painfully slowly. ‘But I must go to bed now.’

‘How are you?’ said Petr. ‘Head OK?’

She told him she was fine.