When they got back to the kitchen of the Bergpension Hanneli, her adoptive family’s small bed and breakfast hotel, there was a stranger sitting at the kitchen table alongside her adoptive mother.

‘Did you have a good ski?’ asked Rosamund, the woman who Müller had believed was her natural parent until just a few years earlier.

‘It was great, Oma,’ said Jannika, before Müller herself could say anything. ‘Johannes and I both did the jump, but Mutti nearly fell over when she tried.’

Rosamund looked at Müller in apparent surprise, and the man sitting next to her laughed. Müller felt strangely defensive.

‘I’m out of practice.’

‘You certainly are if you nearly fell over on the Fallbachhang. It’s not exactly Mount Everest.’ She turned to the man next to her. He was middle-aged, with the leathery, weathered tan of a ski instructor. ‘Have you met Herr Mayer before, Karin? He’s the ski trainer for the younger children at the Internat – the sports boarding school, here in Oberhof.’

The man got up from his chair and stretched his hand towards Müller. She tried to match his firm grip and smiled. ‘Pleased to meet you.’

‘I’m delighted to meet you, too, Frau Müller.’

Frau Müller. It had an odd ring. Very few people called her that. At work, it was just ‘Karin’ or ‘boss’ from Tilsner, and ‘Comrade Hauptmann’ from Schmidt. The irony of calling his female colleague ‘head man’ always seemed to be lost on her forensic scientist in his desire to be completely formal and correct.

‘Wolfgang already knows the twins,’ said Rosamund. ‘Where are your manners, Johannes and Jannika?’

Jannika smiled sweetly at the man. ‘Good afternoon, Herr Mayer.’

Mayer returned her greeting with a bow. ‘Good afternoon, Fräulein Müller.’

Johannes, for his part, played the grown man, extending his hand.

‘Herr Mayer.’

‘Herr Müller. Lovely to see you again. Did you and your sister put into practice any of the tips I gave you?’

‘For the jumps? Yes. We did them really well. Didn’t we, Mutti?’

‘Very well,’ said Müller. She couldn’t really disagree, given her own performance had been so woeful.

The five of them sat round the table, then Rosamund got up and busied herself at the stove. ‘Will you have another coffee, Wolfgang?’

Herr Mayer and Müller both opted for coffees, while the twins whined that they wanted hot chocolate. As Rosamund Müller prepared the drinks, she began to explain the reason for Herr Mayer’s visit.

‘He thinks both the twins have potential in winter sports, so he wants to take them under his wing and train them.’

‘That’s correct,’ added the man. ‘But would it be better to have this conversation out of the hearing of the little ones?’

Rosamund nodded. ‘Jannika, Johannes. Can you go into the playroom, please? The adults need to talk.’

‘About us?’ asked Jannika.