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couldn’t face the effort of dragging herself down the stairs.
    Shortly after two in the morning she woke from a nightmare in which her mother was standing by an open grave, supported by Johannes Herzog, who was reading the inscriptions on the wreaths out to her. As the coffin was lowered, her mother asked through her tears, “Why did she never say anything?” It was a while before she realized she was lying in bed and not in her coffin.

    She had a high temperature. With difficulty she managed to stand up and stagger to the bathroom, where she soaked two towels in cold water and wrapped them round her calves. She placed a third damp towel over her head. And since the tiled floor was so lovely and cool, she spent the rest of the night wedged between the shower and the lavatory. Early in the morning she forced herself to go to the kitchen, made another cup of bronchial tea and drank it in little sips, almost coughing up her lungs as she did so.
    All was still quiet in the building, it was only just after five. Heller was presumably sleeping off the effects of the previous evening’s drink. At least at that time in the morning there was hardly any danger of him popping up and exploiting her pitiful state to abuse her in one way or the other. Really she was in no condition to bother with her post, but she had a feeling that sent her down the stairs. And, indeed, one of the familiar envelopes was in her box.
    When she got to the couch and unfolded the letter, the clear print was swimming before her eyes. “Dear Susanne,” Nadia wrote, expressing the hope that she had not used the money in the blazer pocket for experiments and reminding her of her first letter and her desire to do something for her. Then came the sentence that suddenly brought everything back into sharp focus: “I may have a job for you. It’s only as a stand-in, but we ought to discuss it.” She suggested they meet in the multi-storey car park where she’d given her the suitcase. Below were day and time: Friday, five o’clock.
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    It was Friday. But it was crazy even to think about setting off for the city centre. She’d stumbled over her own feet going down the stairs and just managed to catch onto the wall to stop herself falling. When she tried to get up off the couch to make herself another cup of bronchial tea in the kitchen, the floor and walls started to sway, forcing her to flop back onto the couch.
    It was well after midday when she managed to get to her feet again, staggering so much she knocked the little table, sending it skidding across the floor. One of the legs gave way. Something fell on the floor: a thin, elongated object, thicker at one end. Her vision blurred by fever, she assumed it was a screw. It was a self-assembly table and, not having a screwdriver, she’d put it together using a butter knife. It had always
been a bit wobbly. She left it where it was and dragged herself to the shower.
    The cold water washed the tint out of her hair but cleared her head sufficiently for the idea of taking a taxi to occur to her. She thought she could make it as far as the telephone kiosk. There was one close by, round the corner only fifty yards down Kettlerstrasse. Shortly after four she was standing at her wardrobe on shaky legs. She chose a pair of Nadia’s trousers, one of her blouses, the second pair of shoes and the second blazer.
    The next fit of coughing came while she was on the stairs. She was close to turning back. But she struggled on determinedly until she reached the street. The humid air made breathing a little easier. She made it as far as the telephone kiosk. Once there, however, she realized that all the effort had been in vain. The receiver had been torn off. It was lying on the metal holders for the phone books, the flex dangling. She leaned against the side of the kiosk and slowly slumped to the floor.
    More than half an hour must have gone when a dark-blue Mercedes drove past -