‘Did you mind it?’ Sylvia asked, aware, as she did so, that Anna was having to relate this tale in front of Evelyne, the daughter of the people she was speaking about. But at least Anna knew that Evelyne had left too, that she understood something of what Anna had gone through.

Anna shrugged. ‘I’d done chores before, at home, although not as many. I was always tired, but that meant I slept well. And at least the work filled my day. It stopped me having too much time to think – about Mum and Cornelia mainly. I missed them so much.’

Sylvia looked at her, willing Anna to meet her eyes. ‘Did they ever hurt you at the farm?’

Evelyne glanced at her momentarily, and Sylvia wondered for a second if she was going to refuse to translate. So she was relieved when Evelyne conveyed the question, adding something else that Sylvia didn’t understand, but from the softening in Anna’s face she knew it was encouragement, not a warning.

‘Herr Buchs shouted a lot,’ Anna said. ‘He hit me sometimes. Franziska told me off all the time; I could never do anything right. But I suppose I got used to it.’

Sylvia looked at her. There was something else, she knew it. ‘And?’ she prompted.

Anna raised her head and looked Evelyne right in the eyes as she spoke. ‘It wasn’t what they did, but what they didn’t,’ she said. ‘They didn’t love me. I was never part of their family, even though I lived there for years and years. I was just a farmhand. No, worse – a dog. They were never kind to me, they never cared if I was hungry, or tired, or cold, or ill. They only took me to the doctor when I was sick because they needed me well enough to work – and then they resented me for how much it cost them and made me work even harder. They took me out of school, even though that was the only thing I liked in my life, and when I pleaded to go back, Herr Buchs hit me.’ She paused. ‘Actually, I wasn’t even a dog, I was lower than that. They liked their dogs far more than they liked me.’

As Evelyne translated, Sylvia heard her voice waver, and she knew Anna heard it too.

‘For the first year I hoped it was all a mistake, that Mum would come and get me back. But she never did.’

‘You weren’t allowed to see her?’