She put her knitting under the chair, and said she was going to bed. The cat lay on the threadbare carpet in front of the low, open fire. The radio played Beethoven softly, a concert performed by an orchestra from Prague. He heard her go up the creaking stairs. Where he came from, south of Leipzig and east of Erfurt, a bishop had said that it was more important to obey God than human beings. Simple for a man of his status to make such a statement, hard for a humble pastor. The quiet was around him. He had been thirty-six years a pastor in the Evangelist Church and censorship came easy to him: he had nothing bold to say, he lived within the walls of the system, and it was his delight every November to come with his wife from the small industrial town between Leipzig and Erfurt to the wild winds and storms of the Baltic coast. He came for three weeks to free the resident pastor for conferences and seminars, and he intended to move here when he reached the retirement age, to live his last years beside the seashore, if permission was given. He made the notes for his Sunday address. He would do nothing, in his preaching and in his conduct, to threaten the granting of that permission. He knew exactly when his retirement was due: in three days he would have twenty more months to serve.

That night of the week, whatever the weather conditions, the aircraft came low and thundering over the base and then over the pastor’s house, but he had never before heard shots at night. He listened for more shooting and heard nothing. He switched off the radio, crouched in front of the fire and stroked the cat fondly. He drained the last of the coffee from the cup and took it to the kitchen at the back of the house. He stood at the sink and rinsed the cup, the water icy on his hands. He heard the clatter of a machine gun, then the siren again, and more single shots.

Slowly the pastor climbed the stairs. His wife grunted in her sleep. The bedroom was in darkness. He went to the bathroom to wash his face and under his armpits, and to brush his teeth. The tap water ran and he undid the buttons of his shirt.