‘I’m not playing these sort of games with you.’ I turn towards the door, to make my way out. I try to turn the handle. It’s locked, of course.

‘Please sit down again, Lotti,’ says the major, using my given name for the first time. ‘We don’t want to have to use these photographs, and we don’t intend to. They’re not something we set out to catch you doing. Dr Southwick’s flat was under surveillance as part of our normal operations, simply because he is a foreigner in an influential position.’

I slump back down onto the stool. I feel like bursting into tears but don’t want to give them that satisfaction. The colonel lifts up the phone and summons someone. Then the guard is back with a colleague – wheeling in an armchair. They place it in front of the desk.

‘Come and sit here, Lotti,’ says the major. ‘It’ll be more comfortable.’

Like a robot, I get up and obey. Already I feel broken by their mind games.

‘Now, as I say,’ continues the major, still using his faux friendly voice, ‘that photograph isn’t going anywhere. In any case, you’re a single woman. You’ve done nothing illegal here.’

‘No, but he’s not single,’ I sob. ‘He’s married. I don’t want to be the one accused of ruining his marriage.’

‘He’s a big boy, Lotti,’ says the major. ‘He can make his own decisions. If he did split up with his wife, that wouldn’t be such a bad outcome for you, would it? He clearly has feelings for you.’

This time I don’t answer. Why would I want to win him that way?

‘Anyway,’ continues the major, ‘as we say, these photographs are going nowhere. And despite what you may think of us, we really do want to help – both you and Dr Southwick. That’s why we have a proposition to put to you. Would you like to hear it?’

‘Do I have a choice?’

The colonel sighed. ‘We’re trying to do this in a co-operative, comradely way, Frau Rolf. This isn’t a prison as such, but it does have remand cells, and some inmates have found themselves incarcerated here for some length of time while their actions have been investigated. Now, your many petitions about SDAG Wismut could be interpreted as trying to foment insurrection against a vital state enterprise. I’m sure that wasn’t your intention.’ The man wrings his powerful hands together. I imagine them round the neck of a chicken, or pheasant, squeezing out the last bit of life.

‘No. Of course it wasn’t.’