And amongst all these thoughts, I find myself wondering if we will at last find our way back to some kind of life when we get to Theresienstadt.

I don’t want to wish for it. I should know by now that dreams no longer come true. But I can’t stop myself. I allow myself the luxury of hope.

1942

MAX

The cold February day was here at last. It seemed to Max he’d been waiting his whole life for this day.

His fourteenth birthday and the day he progressed from the junior section of the Hitler Youth to the real thing.

His father had organized a party for him that evening. Max could barely concentrate on his schoolwork all day. Luckily, his teachers understood. Everyone knew the pride he was feeling, the hunger to give himself fully and completely to the Führer, to know that from this day onwards he was not a boy, an individual, a someone. He was part of the regime: a soldier who would take his part in spreading the message of the Aryan race and commit his life to fighting Germany’s enemies.

He would no longer have to settle for sports days and weekend camps. Now, the real training would begin. He would be learning the things that really mattered. Bayonet drill, grenade-throwing, trench-digging, map-reading, pistol-shooting, how to get under barbed wire. These things would be his life from this moment on, and nothing else mattered.

Every fibre of his being itched with the desire to take his place and give himself to Hitler.

Finally, the school day was over and he was back home waiting for the party to begin.

The doorbell rang at six on the dot. Max opened the door for his friends and stood to attention, ready to greet them.

‘Heil Hitler!’ the three boys said in unison at the top of the stairs.

Max snapped his heels together. His face solemn and composed, he raised his arm in a proud salute. ‘Heil Hitler!’ he shouted back to them.

His mother had made tea for the boys, and they crowded around the dining room table to eat. The boys looked identical with their combed and parted hair, their spotless uniforms and swastika armbands.

‘Look at you all, so handsome and so grown up,’ his mother said as they ate.

‘The boys do not care about being handsome!’ his father scoffed, wiping his mouth and folding his napkin back into a perfect square. ‘That is not why they look smart. They do it because they care about order, discipline and obedience.’ He turned to his son. ‘Am I right?’

Max nodded sharply. ‘Yes, sir,’ he said.

‘Well, I think it’s all right for a mother to think her son looks handsome,’ Mrs Fischer replied as she picked up their empty plates and took them to the sink.