Ruth was enjoying the warm desert breeze blowing through the car’s cabin as they drove along the Jaffa Road to Jerusalem. The early November weather was pleasant: the scorching heat had long gone, the days were comfortable and the nights were cool. Not that she minded the intensity of the heat; she was well accustomed to it.

Far in the distance, she could see the city. So many new buildings, she thought, although she’d known there would be. The Jewish settlement to the west had been expanding at an extraordinary rate even in 1948 when she’d last seen the city, barely a month before the State of Israel had officially come into being. Now, over six years later, the settlement appeared to have doubled in size.

Six years, she thought – had it really been that long? She lived barely a half-hour drive from Jerusalem and yet for a whole six years she’d chosen not to return. She could have done so whenever she’d wished – Moshe regularly made the trip into the city. In the early days he’d always asked her to come with him, but each time she’d said no. Occasionally she’d accompanied him into Haifa, where she’d done some shopping and visited the synagogue, more to please him than herself, but she no longer maintained the pretence of finding interest in either shopping or synagogues, preferring to remain at the orchard. Now, when Moshe went into town, he no longer asked her if she wanted to accompany him.

She glanced at him. He was deep in thought as he drove, but, sensing her look, he turned to her.

‘I told you you’d see some changes,’ he said, indicating the distant city.

‘Yes,’ she agreed. ‘It’s very beautiful.’

The two once more lapsed into silence, his eyes on the road, hers on the city.

It was extraordinarily beautiful, she thought. The new buildings already resembled the old – built, as they were, of the same local limestone, they appeared as timeless as their predecessors. In the midst of the parched, biblical landscape, the rocky oasis of Jerusalem seemed to grow out of the very stone upon which it sat, stark and pale like bleached bones.

Ruth had first arrived in Palestine in November of 1947, shortly before the United Nations’ vote for the Partition of Palestine into a Jewish and Arab state, and before the final departure of the British governing forces. Initially unaware of the depth of conflict seething around her, it had been the ancient beauty of Jerusalem that had made such an impression.

‘Yerushalayim has that effect upon everyone who comes here,’ her uncle had said in Hebrew. Walter Stein no longer spoke his German mother tongue unless it was necessary, and Ruth was fluent in Hebrew. ‘But its timelessness holds a special purpose for we who have returned to the homeland of our people, Ruth. It is here that you will find yourself.’

Walter had felt a deep responsibility, both paternal and spiritual, for his niece. She was his blood, his name. The poor child had reverted to her maiden name in a desperate bid to obliterate the memory that she had once been married with a child. She was a lost creature, and he had welcomed her into his home like a daughter. Having brought up his two children in the strict Orthodox traditions of Judaism, Walter had been convinced that the strength his niece required to rebuild her shattered life was to be found in the faith she had deserted long before.

Her uncle was kind and well-meaning, and Ruth had dutifully attended the synagogue each Shabbat and taken care to observe the rituals, but it had all been meaningless to her, mere gestures of courtesy to her uncle and his family in whose home she was living. The faith she had grown up with had died in Auschwitz. For Ruth, there was no God – there could not possibly be.

But perhaps there was some truth in her uncle’s words, she’d thought as she wandered the narrow streets of the old walled city, in awe of its history and its architecture. Perhaps here, in this ancient place, spiritual heart for Jew, Muslim and Christian alike, she might find some kind of peace within herself, something to fill the void of despair in which she’d been lost.

The miracle of liberation and her own survival had meant little to Ruth Lachmann. There had been nothing to live for, and the nightmares had haunted her …

The cattle car. Mannie supporting her, Rachel on his shoulders; the stench of vomit and faeces. The old woman on the floor unable to get up, wailing, then silenced, trampled to death.

The doors thrown open. The blinding glare of daylight. Dogs barking, jaws snapping. ‘Raus! Raus!’ Nazis screaming, cudgels flailing. The air thick with a hideous sickly smell.

The march to the head of the ramp. The SS officer in his smart, black uniform directing the traffic with a flick of his riding crop. ‘Links. Rechts.’ Mannie cudgelled and dragged from her.

The queue of old people and women with children. Clutching Rachel’s hand, trying to hide the child behind her. The SS soldier snatching at a baby in a woman’s arms, the woman fighting back, not letting go. Two shots. The woman and baby dead on the ground, the child still in its mother’s arms.

Then Rachel ripped from her and, above the chaos, the shrill scream of her child’s terror. Lunging forward, reaching for her daughter. The soldier raising his rifle. Her own scream mingling with Rachel’s …

Ruth always awoke before she heard the shot. But it didn’t save her from the image of Rachel. Her tiny, lifeless body lying next to the woman whose baby remained clutched in her arms. Ruth envied the woman.

The image returned relentlessly throughout her waking hours. Without warning, and with an accompanying click, like the shutter of a camera, it would flicker on and off in her brain. And after her liberation, when her daily focus had no longer been on the fight for survival, the image had seemed never to leave her. Her mind had been free to dwell on the image of her murdered child and the purposelessness of her own existence. Even her work as an interpreter with the American occupying forces had provided no distraction. Rachel was always there, lying beside the woman with the baby.

It had been easier in the camp, Ruth often thought. There she had learned to exist on hate. Ira Schoneberger, who had fought so desperately to encourage her will to live, had finally discovered the right avenue of persuasion, although his early attempts had met with little success.

‘Survive, Ruth!’ he’d told her at first. ‘Survive. If you die, they win. You’re young, you can have another child. Every one of us who survives is a victory. And those who go on to bear children are the greatest victors of all.’

His advice, well intentioned as it was, had meant nothing. Ruth hadn’t wished to survive and she had no desire to bear another child. But she had decided that she would live long enough to save Mannie. Through her relationship with Klaus Henkel, she could do it, she was sure. Henkel had the power over life and death. Henkel would save Mannie, and then she would be free to give up her own battle for survival. But Klaus Henkel, the Nazi who had preserved her from certain death, had not saved Manfred Brandauer.

‘Mannie is dead,’ Ira had told her bluntly. ‘They shot him yesterday, and it was Henkel who ordered it.’

She hadn’t believed him at first. ‘But Klaus promised me Mannie would be safe,’ she’d said, desperately. ‘I told him that Mannie was not a Jew, I told him that Mannie was Stefan Brandauer’s son. Klaus said that he knew Stefan. Stefan was a fine man who had served the German government well, he said. He promised to …’

‘I saw it, Ruth, I was the doctor in attendance. The wall of death beside Block 10, a firing squad of four, at three o’clock in the afternoon.’ Ira had been ruthless in his detail. ‘The soldiers told me it was Henkel who ordered the execution.’

She had known it was true, even as she’d tried to persuade herself that Ira was wrong. Ira was never wrong. Ira could always be relied upon for correct information.

Ira Schoneberger, although a Jew and an inmate, had been given the freedom of the camp. A highly qualified doctor, he’d proved useful to Josef Mengele and Klaus Henkel, and he’d ingratiated himself with the Nazis, even to the point of agreeing with Mengele that his hideous experiments were invaluable to the future of medical science.

Ira’s survival had depended upon his sycophancy and willingness to betray his own people, but Ruth had proved his weak spot. He had fallen in love with her, and would do anything to save her. The privileged position Henkel had assigned Ruth at the hospital had made it easy for Ira to meet secretly with her. She’d had no idea of his feelings for her, and he had no intention of declaring them – it was too dangerous – but he’d welcomed her as another tool in his survival kit. The anticipation of his meetings with Ruth had helped keep him alive, and he had passed to her the drugs and supplies that she then smuggled out to her fellow inmates. Ira would never have risked smuggling the drugs on his own, but giving her a further purpose to live had been to his advantage. Through Ruth, Ira Schoneberger had unwittingly been a lifeline to many of his people, all of whom detested him and considered him a traitor.

He hadn’t wanted to tell Ruth of Mannie’s death for fear she would lose her own will to live, but he’d known that she would find out eventually, and he’d needed to feed her a fresh purpose to survive.

‘You’ve tried to believe that Henkel is different, Ruth,’ he’d said after comforting her in her grief and shock. ‘But surely you must know that he’s not. Surely you must have felt the malevolence in the man.’

She had. Even when Henkel had wooed her, massaging her shoulders with caring expertise, singing along gently to ‘Barcarole’ as the music played on his gramophone, she’d had the feeling he could break her neck with equal expertise if she displeased him.

‘Klaus Henkel is different from the others in only one way,’ Ira had said. ‘He is more evil than all of them. Mengele himself fears Henkel, I can sense it. The man is so diabolical that even the Angel of Death fears him – imagine that!’

Then, as he’d planned, Ira had set out to fuel her hatred with all the reason and persuasion of which he was capable. ‘We must live to see Henkel brought to justice, Ruth – it is our duty to do so. The Germans are losing the war. I hear Mengele and Henkel talking freely about it in the Experimentation Block where there’s no-one but me to hear them. They’re worried.’

His mention of the Experimentation Block had been deliberate and he noted her reaction. She’d had no idea that Klaus Henkel was directly involved in Mengele’s experiments.

‘And when the Germans have been defeated, we must be alive to tell our stories and see Henkel and the rest of his kind hang,’ he’d urged. ‘Use him, Ruth. Use Klaus Henkel to survive. But hate him. It’s your hate that will feed you and keep you alive.’

Now as the car neared Jerusalem, Ruth could see the ancient fortifications of the Old City and the domes and spires of the mosques and churches that lay beyond, the great golden dome on Temple Mount glinting spectacularly in the afternoon sun. The Dome of the Rock, one of Islam’s most sacred sites, dominated the skyline of the old walled city from every possible viewpoint.

She recalled her hope that sacred Jerusalem might bring her some peace. How naive she’d been. Hatred and violence had abounded throughout the whole of Palestine.

The hate Ira Schoneberger had successfully fuelled in her had been rekindled in Jerusalem, and Ruth didn’t want to go back. She knew that seeing her cousin David would arouse memories she’d been trying to obliterate for the past six years, memories that rivalled even the horrors of Auschwitz. But most of all she dreaded the thought that Eli Mankowski might be at the funeral. It was quite probable he would attend, she thought. He and David were comrades in arms, after all, and Eli might well wish to pay his respects.

‘It will be hard for Sarah.’

Ruth had been so preoccupied with her thoughts that Moshe’s voice startled her.

‘Yes. Very hard. She’ll miss him.’

‘Hard for Rebekah and David too.’

‘Rebekah yes, but I don’t think David will grieve for long.’ Her tone was cold, as it so often was lately. ‘David will be too busy to bother with grief.’

She returned her attention to the old walled city, aware that she’d sounded rude and dismissive. She shouldn’t have – Moshe was only trying to make polite conversation – but she’d been brusque with him ever since he insisted she attend her uncle’s funeral.

‘You owe it to Sarah, Ruth,’ he’d said. ‘She and Walter took you into their home; David and Rebekah are your cousins, your blood. It is essential you attend as a mark of respect.’

He’d spoken to her as if she were a recalcitrant child, and she’d been annoyed. Of course she was aware of the debt she owed her aunt and uncle, but she owed no debt to her cousin David, or to his friend Eli Mankowski. Why must she be forced to suffer their company? She’d agreed to go, but was angry that Moshe appeared to have no idea what he was asking of her.

Moshe took his eyes from the road to glance at her as she gazed resolutely ahead, ignoring him. He knew what was occupying her thoughts, and it certainly wasn’t the death of her uncle. Nor was it her Aunt Sarah’s impending loneliness. She was wondering if Eli would be at the funeral. A stab of the old jealousy returned, but Moshe pushed it aside. She didn’t love Eli any more than she loved him, he thought. Ruth was incapable of love. She had told him so all those years ago, and it had been arrogant of him to presume he could change her. But Eli Mankowski had held a power over her, and Moshe had always envied the man for that. Any reaction, even the repulsion she now professed to feel for Mankowski, would be preferable, Moshe thought, to the remoteness he himself was forced to endure.

He wondered sometimes whether he still loved her. She was beautiful certainly, he thought, watching her now, the wind playing havoc with her sun-bleached hair; a tanned arm resting half out of the window; her body lean and healthy. But Ruth had a tortured mind, and little wonder. Moshe had hoped somehow that he might be her saviour. But he hadn’t been able to break through her coldness. He had the feeling she would leave him soon and, when she did, he wondered how much he would care.

Ruth felt his eyes upon her, but she continued to ignore him. His unhappiness was of his own making, she thought. She had warned him. But she couldn’t help feeling guilty. She had accepted his protection, she had even welcomed the father image he’d represented – twenty years her senior, Moshe was certainly old enough to be her father. Now that same paternal manner was a source of irritation. She would have to leave him soon, it wasn’t fair of her to stay.

Ruth’s hatred of Klaus Henkel and her obsession with Eli Mankowski had drained her of any capacity for love. And now there was Moshe. Poor Moshe who had been left with the dry husk of a woman, incapable of tenderness. She felt sorry for him.

She had known love once. Before the world had gone mad there had been Samuel; she’d been tender then. But that woman was dead. The person who had once been Ruth Lachmann had ceased to exist years ago.