We were just admiring the crocuses and tulips and hyacinths that had pushed their way up through the withered leaves, their blooms a blaze of colour in the bright sunshine. We did our best to stop our son picking the flowers – with varying degrees of success.

And then the Sponars emerged from the house, prayer books in hand, ready to set off for church; she looked, more than ever, every inch the dethroned queen, while he, having exchanged the velvet jacket for a black frock coat, was the eternal artist, playing the part of a graveside mourner. They marched straight up to us and halted in front of us. ‘It is our custom’, said Mrs Sponar in that deep and slightly doleful voice of hers, ‘to take Holy Communion on Holy Friday.’ (This excess of holiness was already making me feel uncomfortable.) ‘It is also our custom’, Mrs Sponar went on, ‘before we take Holy Communion, to ask forgiveness of our friends and acquaintances and relatives for any evil that we might have done them in thought or deed, either knowingly or unknowingly. And so, Mr Fallada, Mrs Fallada, we ask your forgiveness – please forgive us!’ Tears of emotion actually welled up in their eyes, while we, my wife and I, felt so angry and embarrassed that we wanted the ground to swallow us up. ‘They can keep their private religious claptrap to themselves!’ I thought, thoroughly infuriated. ‘It’s all sanctimonious humbug! The queen never regrets anything, is without fault, and cannot ask for forgiveness, and he’s just an old fool! It’s sickening – why can’t they just leave us alone!’

But what can you do? We’re brought up to hide our true feelings and just put on a good face in these situations. I’m afraid my face wasn’t up to much as I assured them we had nothing to forgive them for, and as far as we were concerned they could take communion with a clear conscience. They thanked us again very emotionally, while the tears coursed down the old hypocrites’ faces. Had I known then what I suspected twenty-four hours or so later, and what I knew with absolute certainty some twelve days after that – that these two bastards had already shopped us to the Nazis even as they begged us for forgiveness, and that in return for money they had stored up trouble, illness and mortal danger for us – I think I would have strangled them there and then with my bare hands! But as it was, I just watched them walk out of the garden in their solemn black garb, prayer books in hand, and turned to my wife: ‘What do you make of that?’

‘It makes me sick!’ she burst out. ‘We could have done without their play-acting. Or did you believe a single word they said?’

‘Not a word’, I replied, and then we walked down through the garden to the Spree, where our little boy’s delight in the rippling waves and river barges soon made us forget all about the two old hypocrites.

(25.IX.44.) The next morning came, it was the Saturday before Easter, and mother was busy with cooking and baking. So father and son went out by themselves, down to the banks of the Spree again, walking side by side with Teddy in the middle. Teddy was a wonderful and indestructible creature; I’d bought him when we were still living in ‘straitened circumstances’ for the sum of 33 marks, much to the horror of my wife. Teddy stuck out his jolly red tongue, and he seemed to take as lively a pleasure in the sunny spring sky and the bustling river traffic as my boy did. For a while we were content just to stand there and watch, and then we started to play more actively, poking about in a little patch of reeds and disturbing some birds, which flew up, chirping indignantly. We’d parked Teddy on a molehill while we played. We were still rummaging about when suddenly there were two figures standing in front of us, wearing those brown shirts that I didn’t care to see even then, and the sight of which still unsettles me to this day. Each of the figures had a pistol in his hand, which was unmistakably pointed at me. ‘Uh-oh!’ I thought to myself. ‘Are you Fallada?’ one of them asked. Except that the speaker didn’t say ‘Fállada’ with the stress on the first syllable, which I prefer, because it sounds a bit like a triumphant blast on the trumpet; instead he pronounced it ‘Falláda’, which always sounds like someone who’s about to trip over and fall flat on his face. In a way he was right, because I was about to take a tumble – out of all my dreams of a joyous Easter, at any rate: but I was not going to be floored and laid low on that account! ‘Yes, that’s me’ I said, and tightened my grip on my little boy’s hand, finding this whole show of force wildly histrionic, given my peace-loving nature. ‘You’re to come with us!’ the man barked. ‘And don’t even think of running, because we’ll shoot the moment you try it.’

‘Do you mind if I fetch our Teddy first?’ I asked amiably, and in sullen silence they allowed us to collect Teddy from his molehill. And so we marched back up through the garden, towards the villa at the top: my son and I, with Teddy in the middle, and the two brownshirts with pistols drawn. Personally I thought I completely ruined the dramatic effect for them, but they didn’t see the funny side; no-one has ever been more lacking in a sense of humour than Mr Hitler and all his hangers-on, right down to the last lackey. To them everything was deadly earnest, and in the end that’s exactly what it all turned out to be – in the most literal sense of the word.

For the rest, I wasn’t unduly concerned about this morning visitation. It was probably just another of those searches for weapons or Communist literature that they were so fond of – and they were welcome to search my place, because I was sure they wouldn’t find anything. (Sweet innocent that I was, I had no idea back then that people can bring with them what they want to find – a sure-fire method of getting rid of undesirables, come what may.