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Hauke had been charged with non-payment of his suppliers and non-payment of his taxes, neither of which was true, and taken to Munich’s notorious Wittelsbacher prison.

And Pascal’s father put him there – I know it. And I’ll never forgive him for that.

Noemi slipped her arm through Frieda’s as they made their way from the railway station to the prison, trying to separate the father from the son, which was becoming increasingly impossible.

It had taken days to discover Hauke’s whereabouts and weeks for a visiting order to arrive; Noemi suspected Viktor had had a hand in both delays.

As for the charges, they were false, but they hadn’t come entirely out of the blue.

It seemed that she hadn’t been the only one in the family keeping secrets.

After almost two years of letting them feel safe, Viktor – because his fingerprints were all over the accusations, even if his name wasn’t – had used his Party connections and snatched the rug away from under her parents.

It has come to our attention that the Drachmann Café and its supporting businesses are in the ownership of a Jewish state subject, not a recognised German citizen. Please inform this office at once as to when this situation will be rectified.

‘The memo came about six weeks ago. It wasn’t an order to sell, so your father ignored it.

But then Viktor came round, asking to see the books, asking what the business is worth.

Hauke refused to tell him; he told him to get out.

We hoped that might be an end to things – which I know was foolish, but we’d been left alone for so long, we convinced ourselves this was just another bit of grandstanding.

Except then the police came for him while you were away, and I’ve had no word from him since. ’

Frieda had shown Noemi the letter from the Gauleiter’s office in Munich the day she’d come back from the mountains.

Whatever her parents had told each other to keep their spirits going – and why Viktor had suddenly felt empowered to tighten the noose he’d waved over their heads in 1935 – it was clear to Noemi that the world as they knew it had finally broken.

It was also clear that Viktor had orchestrated the whole thing, including informing the authorities about the extent of Hauke’s holdings.

His pudgy fingers were everywhere in Unterwald, pulling his friends up, pushing his enemies down.

It was impossible not to read the letter and hear, You’ll regret this .

He must have got so much pleasure watching my parents convince themselves they were safe. I bet he’s had this takeover planned since that night.

‘Goodness, this wind – it really does barrel down the streets here.’

Noemi pulled her attention back from imagining the extent of Viktor’s thirst for revenge – and what Pascal knew – as Frieda spoke and her teeth chattered.

‘You’re shivering. Here – take my scarf as well.’

Frieda stopped and let Noemi wind the soft wool round her neck.

She increasingly let Noemi take the lead in everything; she’d aged rapidly with Hauke’s arrest. The brisk February day was cold enough to turn their coats to paper, and Frieda was frail.

Noemi knew her mother needed to sit down and rest and prepare herself for the ordeal of the prison, but Munich wasn’t Unterwald.

Every restaurant and café they passed had a sign in the window saying, No Jews .

Noemi would have taken her chances, but Frieda had trembled at the suggestion, so the two women put their heads down and pressed on through the wind, trying to pretend they weren’t out of place.

‘This can’t be it – it’s far too grand.’

Frieda was right. The Wittelsbacher Palace was much too elegant to be a prison.

It was easier to imagine the princes and kings who’d once owned it sweeping past the two stone lions guarding the entrance, or gazing down from behind the perfumed splendour of its arched windows, than the Gestapo dragging frightened prisoners inside.

It wasn’t until Noemi asked a guard where to go that she was brusquely redirected.

‘The bit we need is round the back, behind the main building. Hopefully it will be as nice.’

It wasn’t. Noemi hadn’t expected it to be, but she wanted one more kind moment for her mother.

The prison’s high walls were made from granite, not soft-hued red brick; its windows were barred.

The room they were left to wait in was grey and cheerless and smelled of stale cigarettes and clothes badly in need of dry cleaning.

‘But it’s not as bad as you’d think, I promise.

My cell is warm and there’s no shortage of blankets.

The food’s not bad – cheese and sausage and stew at mealtimes and plenty of bread.

I’ve been well treated, and they’ve assured me that this is for my own good.

That I’m safer in here while things are being ironed out than I would be on the outside, where my creditors might come looking for me. ’

Noemi had to fight hard not to lose her temper at the ridiculous idea of creditors.

Or that Hauke’s imprisonment was for his own protection.

She only said nothing because she knew he was desperate for her to play along.

Hauke’s sideways glances at the guard and his dreadful appearance made a lie of his relentlessly cheerful manner.

His eyes were dull and had sunk inside bags that suggested regular sleep was a luxury.

His face was gaunt and patched in fading purple and yellow.

When he put his hand out to touch Frieda’s – before the guard barked at him not to – it shook.

‘That’s all good to hear, but do you have a trial date yet? We need to instruct a lawyer.’

His mask slipped when Noemi asked that. Noemi had to blink hard when she realised how carefully he’d been holding himself together. His body sagged. The tremor in his hand spread to his knees. He stumbled as he tried to find a positive-sounding answer.

‘Well, there’s the question. I don’t think there’ll be a trial; I’m not sure that’s their way of doing things.’

‘What do you mean, no trial?’ Noemi couldn’t stay quiet this time – she couldn’t follow what he meant.

She hadn’t yet learned that the systems she’d been brought up to believe in had been dismantled for non-citizens.

‘Where’s the justice in that? How are you meant to prove your innocence without a proper hearing? ’

Hauke glanced at the guard again before he replied.

The tremor in his hand grew worse. ‘I don’t know.

I’m not sure how the system works anymore, if I’m honest. Apparently, they can keep me here without a hearing for as long as they like.

Or they can send me to one of their other facilities if I cause problems, which naturally I’ve no intention of doing. ’

‘What other facilities ? What are you talking about?’

Noemi reached for her mother’s hand as Frieda’s voice rose. The guard who was monitoring their conversation had already looked at his watch. There wasn’t time for anything but practicalities.

‘How do we get you out if there isn’t a trial?’

Hauke’s mouth twisted in what could perhaps have been described as a smile. His eyes were begging Noemi not to correct him.

‘That’s more straightforward. We can pay the suppliers I owe money to and the taxes I’ve defaulted on.

That will obviously take a lot of money which we don’t have, but the authorities have suggested a way round the problem.

It seems Viktor Lindiger has offered to buy the shop and bar and the manufacturing businesses that go with them.

And he’s set a value on them, which I’ve been instructed to accept. ’

And there it was, the price Viktor had been waiting patiently to extract for Hauke’s attack on him in the town hall.

Noemi gripped Frieda’s hand tight and hoped her mother would understand the need not to react. She forced herself to stay calm too.

‘And the café?’

‘We keep it for now, and the house, although not the bakery.’ Hauke stopped looking at the guard; he focused entirely on his family. ‘But I imagine we won’t keep them for long, that this is simply another part of the game. You need to steel yourself for that coming.’

Where will this end?

Noemi left the prison with more understanding of the answer to that than when she’d gone in. Ruin. Humiliation. Being made to feel powerless – because that’s what they were.

Hauke had already been forced to write a letter to Viktor accepting his offer; the guard gave it to Frieda as she was trying to say goodbye to her husband.

Noemi took charge of it. She delivered it to Viktor’s office the next morning and made sure to hand it to him herself, although she did that in silence.

Then she and her mother waited for the rest of the charade to play out.

Viktor took the shop and the bar, the bakery and the bottling and distilling workshops a week later, for a sum so small it was an insult to her parents’ and grandparents’ hard work.

Noemi held her tongue; all that mattered was getting Hauke safely released.

That took another two months of delays and no explanations.

In the end, Hauke arrived home without warning, thinner and greyer, but determined to keep the café and the family afloat.

Or to act as if keeping them afloat was possible until he had the strength to contemplate the impossibility of a new start somewhere else.

A month went by and stretched into two. The days warmed and the customers trickled back.

Hauke regained a little of the weight prison had taken from him; Noemi and Frieda forced themselves to fuss over him slightly less.

Summer came and brought the tourists, the café ticked steadily on.

The Drachmanns started to look out at the world again, and to hope that the worst was done. Which was the moment Viktor pounced.