I was just getting to my favourite bit – the bit where my party pledges to set up a national leisure network to enable every citizen to find the activity and companions of his or her choice, where no one need ever feel alone again – when I spied through the gap between our house and the Isaacs’ a man and a boy marching down the deserted, sun-baked street. Pausing for a final peep at the upbuttoned Mrs Hardy, I hopped off the chair and, hugging the cold brick wall, scampered down the side of the house in pursuit of fresh fantasy. ‘Refugees,’ I muttered, in the know-all tone of a film detective. The man wore a battered trilby and winter overcoat, the boy a woolly jacket and short trousers that flapped comically below his knees. They could have stepped straight out of a Gaumont newsreel. The boy, beneath his arm, carried a violin case. ‘Hit the deck,’ I hissed, ‘the guy’s got a piece.’

The boy looked about my age and half my size, with sleek black hair and stick-thin legs. The father, though sweating heavily, seemed to know his business. He scanned the sultry frontages of Blenheim Terrace and headed, good heavens, determinedly up our path. Ding-dong, went the doorbell. Florrie scuffled up from the kitchen. I heard the man ask for Mr Simmonds. Florrie, impressed by the strength of purpose in his voice, showed him to the front room and asked him to wait. This had better be good, I thought. Father won’t be pleased to be woken up for nothing.

Peering through the curtains, I noted essential particulars of the strangers’ appearance in case I had to identify them in a police line-up or espionage trial. The man, heavy-jowled, wiped a receding hairline with a large purple handkerchief. He talked to the boy in a strange tongue, like German but not quite. The boy listened attentively, but not submissively. When my father entered the room the boy rose and left, as if unwilling to be party to an adult transaction. Father, bleary-eyed, sent Florrie to fetch cold drinks. I crouched beneath the window-sill, ears open for intrigue.

‘I thought I told you not to go around snooping, Master Martin,’ scolded Florrie, in her Hampshire burr, her sudsy hand tweaking my quivering ear. ‘Now, do something useful for once and look after this lad while yer father is dealing with the foreign gentleman.’ She pushed the kid at me. ‘Take him upstairs, find a game to play and I’ll bring you some leftover ice-cream from lunch.’ She winked. I liked Florrie; sometimes she mussed my hair when she tucked me into bed at night. No one else ever did.

‘What’s your name,’ I asked the boy, as we climbed the stairs to my room.

‘Dovid-Eli Rapoport,’ he replied.

‘D-dovidl?’ I misrepeated. ‘W-what kind of name is that?’