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‘Listen to me. You can’t go home; you can’t go to Unterwald at all.

Your parents have already been taken.’ She grabbed Noemi as she started to sway and held her close.

‘There was a phone call for Viktor, to tell him that the round-up had gone ahead but you were missing. I didn’t dare go to Distel’s and warn you – that could have been disastrous for us both.

But I prayed you’d take this route, not the main road, if you managed to get away. I’ve been waiting here for you.’

‘I don’t know what to do.’

Noemi’s mind had gone blank at your parents have been taken.

The fear she’d been running from finally crashed in.

Her head was filled with the impossibility of what if I never see them again?

and wouldn’t hold another thought. Luckily, Carina, for once, had found enough strength for the two of them.

‘You come to the farm.’ She tightened her hold as Noemi tried to spring away.

‘You have to trust me. I don’t know exactly what part Viktor’s played in this, but I do know he’d never suspect me of helping you or of hiding you under his nose.

There’s an unused barn where you’ll be safe, at least until we work out how to get you away from here. ’

It wasn’t until they were inside the barn on the furthest edge of the Lindiger property that Noemi thought to ask Carina the obvious question.

‘Why are you helping me? I know Viktor’s hurt you before. God knows what he’d be capable of if he catches you doing this. Why would you put yourself in such danger?’

Carina glanced down at her wrist and automatically tugged at her sleeve. But her new-found courage didn’t falter.

‘Because I don’t believe Jews are any different to anyone else, whatever Hitler or my husband says.

Because my son loves you, even if he doesn’t have the sense to see that matters more than his dreams of glory.

And because I always hoped you’d be my daughter one day.

I still do, despite all these horrible new rules. ’

She shook her head at Noemi’s exhausted, ‘How can that ever be possible?’

‘I don’t know. But I have to hope that these men will be beaten one day; anyone with an ounce of humanity has to want that.

And whatever his flaws – and I’m not blind to those, especially the way he only sees what he chooses – Pascal is not his father.

So I’m deciding to put my trust in that, and praying he eventually comes to his senses and stops believing the Führer is some kind of messiah. ’

Noemi sank down on a straw bale, wishing she had even a fraction of Carina’s faith.

‘I want to believe that too, but I don’t: he’s in far too deep.

The last time I saw him, he told me he planned to become one of the inner circle and make the Party understand that some Jews were “good” and deserved to be treated better than the “bad” ones.

I couldn’t get him to realise how wrong and deluded that was. ’

Carina sighed. ‘That hurts me to hear it. I’ve no idea how he can be that short-sighted, or naive, or why he can’t admit that all this dreadful separating is wrong.

But I can’t hate him for being a fool or for going to fight; he’s my son.

I hope you can find it in your heart not to hate him too, although I’ve no right to ask it. ’

But I don’t hate him, despite everything, and that’s the worst of it. I want to, but I can’t.

It would have been a kindness to admit that to Carina – it was what the woman’s bravery deserved. But Noemi could barely admit it to herself, so the only thing she had to offer was her silence.

‘Noemi, are you awake? It’s me. It’s safe to come down.’

The voice pulled her out of a deep sleep and plunged her into confusion.

She had no idea who me was. But it wasn’t Carina calling her, so how could it be safe?

There was no point, however, in hiding if she’d been uncovered; that could make things worse for Carina, never mind her.

She shuffled out of the sacks she’d been using for the last three nights as bedding and carefully approached the hay loft’s edge.

It was dark outside – her wristwatch said it was not quite three o’clock.

The only brightness came from a circle of pale yellow lamplight below her. And the voice belonged to Pascal.

She couldn’t stop staring at him, although she couldn’t speak.

It was the first time she’d seen him in almost three years.

The jump from seventeen to twenty suited him.

He’d grown taller; the rest of his body had filled out to match his broad shoulders.

There was a strength to his jaw which had turned his face from attractive to handsome.

He looked different but somehow the same.

Except he can’t be, not if everything Carina’s told me about his war is true.

She had to hold on to the truth of that, to stop her heart racing.

She had to see the man he’d become. The Pascal who had left Sonthofen as soon as the war started and joined the First Mountain Division.

The one who’d fought in Poland and was an officer now; who’d been on dangerous training missions in France.

Pascal had become the soldier he’d always wanted to be, which had to make him a danger to her.

Or it would, if he was wearing a uniform.

Noemi’s head began whirling as fast as her heart. He’d gone to be a soldier, but he hadn’t come looking for her dressed as one. All the longing she’d refused to let herself acknowledge since she’d walked out of the hotel came instantly flooding back.

He’s left the army like I wanted him to; he’s come home for me. He’s going to stand up to his father and help mine, and make everything right.

The hope Carina hung on to that Pascal would one day see sense surged through Noemi too, and she gasped from the joy of it.

But then he lifted the lantern a little higher and she saw the edelweiss Gebirgsj?ger pin on his lapel next to his Party badge, and that hope and that joy rushed away just as fast.

‘What do you want? Have you come to arrest me? Are you going to hand over your mother to the Gestapo as my accomplice?’

Pascal sucked in a long breath, but he didn’t rise to her goading. ‘No, I’m not going to do any of that. I’m here to help you, to take you to the station. There’s a goods train due in two hours which will get you as far as Munich.’

Her too-willing heart told her to believe him, but her head wasn’t ready to let her come down from the loft. ‘What are you doing here? Your mother said she thought you were in France; she never said you were coming home.’

‘She didn’t know.’ He hesitated for a moment, as if he wasn’t sure how much he should tell her. ‘I was in France for a while, that’s true, but now I’m being deployed to the Russian front. They need mountain fighters there. I’ve been given a few days’ leave first.’

He hadn’t stopped being a soldier then. But he hadn’t said anything about honour or glory, or how being an officer felt, and that was a welcome change.

Noemi moved a little closer to the ladder. ‘Why would Carina tell you I was here? Hasn’t that put you in a difficult position? What if your father finds out? Whose side will you take then?’

She expected him to hesitate before answering and then fall back on old ties. Her heart skipped a beat when he didn’t.

‘I don’t care about anything except helping you.

My mother understands that, and as for my father – he doesn’t suspect a thing, and he’s left for a conference in Berlin, so this is the perfect time to move you.

I can’t blame you if you don’t trust me, but please let’s not waste a chance that could be your last one. ’

Noemi knew he was telling the truth. She was also aware how quickly time was ticking and that she needed to act if she was going to catch the train, but she had one question left that Pascal needed to answer the right way before she could move.

‘Never mind about me; can you do anything to help my parents?’

Pascal looked down for a moment, and that movement – that break in their eye contact which had been drawing her in – told her the response she wanted wasn’t coming. It was all she could do not to burst into tears.

‘No, I can’t. I’m sorry. There’s been an allegation that they were using an old key to access the café and steal food.’ He spread his hands as Noemi started to argue. ‘I know that’s not true, but it’s in the law’s hands now. Hopefully there will be a resolution soon, but you can’t wait for it.’

He hasn’t changed. You have to ignore your heart. You have to hold on to that and forget everything that was and everything that might have been. You have to be as strong as you were when you walked away from him the last time.

She clung on to that certainty for dear life.

‘Why will there be a resolution? Because they’re good Jews?

’ She was glad he flinched – she wanted him to.

‘You say you’re here to help me, but then you pretend justice exists for Jewish people.

That hasn’t been true for years. If you really want me to trust you, tell me one honest thing.

Let’s see if you can do that – or go and I’ll take my chances without you. ’

The silence stretched as Pascal struggled, leaving Noemi to wonder how deeply his year at Sonthofen and his years of combat had marked him, and how deeply his already blind faith now ran. She didn’t interrupt when he finally began talking.