Page 65 of The Watchmaker of Dachau

Greta slowly walked towards him, her face showing the same pain Isaac’s had when he had moved his leg.

Friedrich waited until Greta had shuffled from the room and asked again, ‘Can you dance, Anna?’

‘I used to be able to.’

‘Like the dancing with a man, when he spins you around a room? Like that sort of dancing?’

Anna laughed. ‘Yes. I suppose so. Why do you ask?’

‘No reason!’ Friedrich ran out of the kitchen and bounded up the stairs to his parents’ bathroom – he had to act quickly.

When he returned, Greta was talking to Anna and he stood at the kitchen door whilst they spoke.

‘To Munich, tonight?’ Anna asked.

‘That’s what he said. Him and the wife. Back tomorrow.’

‘What about Friedrich?’

‘Schmidt will be staying over to mind him.’

‘He makes me feel really strange. He’s always looking at me and things in the house as if he is weighing up whether he wants them or not,’ Anna said.

‘Oh, Friedrich.’ Greta caught a glimpse of him. ‘What do you want?’

‘I’m hungry,’ he said. ‘Can I please have one of those cakes you made yesterday?’

‘Now?’ Greta glanced at the clock. ‘It’ll be time for tea soon enough.’

‘But if Mother and Father are going out, maybe they won’t take tea, so maybe I could have my cake now?’

Greta shook her head and Friedrich held his breath – he needed that cake. ‘Fine, here.’ She cut a slice of stodgy fruit cake and handed it to him on a small plate.

He scurried from the kitchen and sat waiting in the living room. He would pounce as soon as his parents left.

By four, his parents stood at the doorway of the living room, explaining that they would be back tomorrow.

‘Don’t misbehave for Schmidt,’ his father said.

His mother barely glanced at him, her eyes on the front door, waiting to make her escape. She had managed to dress herself properly, Friedrich noted, her dress perfectly fitted, though it was at odds with her wild hair and pained expression.

‘Yes. Yes, be good. Come now, Peter, let’s go.’

He watched their chauffeured car disappear down the drive and turn onto the road. Then he jumped up.

He knew where Schmidt was, where he always was, in his father’s study. He knocked on the door, but this time did not wait for Schmidt and simply left the cake outside the door, hoping that he would think Greta or Anna had left it for him, just in case he had connected his previous tiredness with the unexpected gift from Friedrich.

He waited in the living room once more, hearing the study door open then close. He tiptoed back – the plate was gone.

Greta brought him a sandwich which he ate at the dining room table, as though he were king of the house.

‘Greta,’ Friedrich said to her retreating back, ‘Father said to tell you that you can go home because you have been poorly; he said Anna could give me my supper and Schmidt will take her back to the camp.’

‘He did, did he?’ She raised her eyebrow at him. ‘Are you sure that’s what he said?’

‘Completely sure. He said to tell you just before he left. He said he didn’t have time to be giving orders about me, so I was to tell you instead.’

Greta seemed to believe him, nodding her head and returning to the kitchen. Soon, he saw her walking past the dining room window, her coat buttoned up, her hat placed firmly on her head.