Frieda had an abortion.

It was illegal, and a Nazi law that threatened the death penalty was still in force. So Frieda went to an elderly ‘midwife’ who did it for five cigarettes. Frieda contracted a severe infection, and would have died but that Carla was able to steal scarce penicillin from the hospital.

Carla decided to have her baby.

Her feelings about it swung violently from one extreme to another. When suffering morning sickness she raged against the beasts who had violated her body and left her with this burden. At other times she found herself sitting with her hands on her belly staring into space and thinking dreamily about baby clothes. Then she would wonder if the baby’s face would remind her of one of the men, and cause her to hate her own child. But surely it would have some von Ulrich features too? She felt anxious and frightened.

She was eight months pregnant in January 1946. Like most Germans she was also cold, hungry and destitute. When her pregnancy became obvious she had to give up nursing and join the millions of unemployed. Food rations were issued every ten days. The daily amount, for those without special privileges, was 1,500 calories. It still had to be paid for, of course. And even for customers with cash and ration cards, sometimes there was simply no food to buy.

Carla had considered asking the Soviets for special treatment because of her wartime work as a spy. But Heinrich had tried that and suffered a frightening experience. Red Army Intelligence had expected him to continue to spy for them, and asked him to infiltrate the US military. When he said he would rather not, they became nasty and threatened to send him to a labour camp. He got out of it by saying he spoke no English, therefore was no use to them. But Carla was well warned, and decided it was safest to keep quiet.

Today Carla and Maud were happy because they had sold a chest of drawers. It was a Jugendstil piece in burled light oak that Walter’s parents had bought when they got married in 1889. Carla, Maud and Ada had loaded it on to a borrowed handcart.

There were still no men in their house. Erik and Werner were among millions of German soldiers who had disappeared. Perhaps they were dead. Colonel Beck had told Carla that almost three million Germans had died in battle on the Eastern Front, and more had died as prisoners of the Soviets – killed by hunger, cold and disease. But another two million were still alive and working in labour camps in the Soviet Union. Some had come back: they had either escaped from their guards or had been released because they were too ill to work, and they had joined the thousands of displaced persons on the tramp all over Europe, trying to find their way home. Carla and Maud had written letters and sent them care of the Red Army, but no replies had ever come.