THE MONEY ARRIVED on the fifth of November, the day before Barbara was due to meet Luis again. She was despairing of it ever coming and had prepared herself to plead with Luis to wait. As she grew more worried, Barbara knew she was becoming nervy and withdrawn. Sandy was clearly starting to wonder what was wrong with her. That morning she had pretended to be asleep while he dressed, though her eyes were open, staring down at the pillow, remembering it was Guy Fawkes Day. There would be no fireworks in England this year; they had enough real explosions every night. The BBC said there had been no more raids on the Midlands, but London was being bombed most nights. The Madrid papers said much of the city was reduced to rubble but she told herself that was propaganda.

After Sandy left she went down for the mail. There was one typed envelope on the mat with the King’s head on the stamp instead of Franco and his cold stare. She tore it open. In coldly formal tones, the bank told her they had transferred her savings to the account she had opened in Madrid: over 5000 pesetas. She could sense their disapproval of her taking money abroad in wartime.

She went back to the bedroom and put the letter in her bureau. There were a couple of guides to Cuenca in there now, which she had bought and studied carefully. She locked it.

She dressed hurriedly; she was due at the orphanage at nine. It was her second morning there. Yesterday she had worn her usual clothes but Sister Inmaculada had said she should not dirty a good dress. Barbara found it a relief to revert to an old skirt and baggy jumper. She glanced at her watch. It was time she was off.

BARBARA HAD ARRANGED to come to the orphanage twice a week but already she was unsure if she could continue. She had been a nurse before but never in conditions like this.

She thought of the scrubbed, clinical corridors of the Birmingham Municipal Hospital with nostalgia as she approached the orphanage. A gasogene passed, the foul-smelling smoke belching from its little chimney making her cough. She knocked at the door and a nun let her in.

The grey nineteenth-century building was a former monastery, built round a central square with pillared cloisters. The cloister walls were covered with anti-communist posters: a snarling ogre wearing a cap with a red star looming over a young mother and her children; a hammer and sickle in a montage with a skull and the legend, ‘This is Communism’. Yesterday she had asked Sister Inmaculada whether the posters might frighten the children. The tall nun had shaken her head sadly.

‘Nearly all these children come from Red families. They have to be reminded they lived in the devil’s shadow. Otherwise how can their little souls be saved?’

Sister Inmaculada was finishing roll-call in the central cloister as Barbara arrived, her clear high voice ringing round the yard, a cane tucked into the belt of her habit. Fifty boys and girls between six and twelve stood in lines on the concrete. She lowered her clipboard. ‘Dismiss,’ she called, then raised an arm in the Fascist salute. ‘¡Viva Franco!’ The children replied in a ragged chorus, arms waving vaguely up and down. Barbara remembered the concert, Franco suppressing his yawn. She walked to the infirmary; ‘Spain Reconquered for Christ!’ was painted over the door.

Her first job of the day was to check the health of newly admitted children to see if any needed referring to the doctor. Inside the cold infirmary with its iron beds and steel instruments hanging from the walls her helper, Señora Blanco, was waiting. She was an elderly retired cook, a beata, a religious woman whose life revolved around the church. She had tight grey curls and wore a brown apron; her plump face was wrinkled and at first sight kindly.

‘Buenas tardes, Señora Forsyth. I have hot water ready.’

‘Thank you, señora. How many have we got today?’

‘Only two. Brought by the civiles. A boy caught burgling a house and a little girl living wild.’ She shook her head piously.

Barbara washed her hands. The children who came to the orphanage were mostly feral, living by begging and stealing. Their begging was a nuisance and when the police picked them up they handed them over to the nuns.

Señora Blanco rang a little bell and a nun led in a red-haired boy of about eight wearing a greasy brown coat too big for him. Sister Teresa was young, with a square peasant face. ‘Caught stealing, the little beast,’ she said admonishingly.

‘What a bad child,’ Señora Blanco said sorrowfully. ‘Take off your clothes, child, let the nurse see you.’ The boy disrobed sullenly and stood naked: ribs poking out, arms like matchsticks. He lowered his head as Barbara examined him. He smelled of stale sweat and urine; his skin as cold as a plucked chicken.

‘He’s very thin,’ she said quietly. ‘Nits, of course.’ The boy had a long cut on his wrist, red and weeping. ‘That’s a nasty cut, niño,’ she said gently. ‘How did you get that?’

The boy looked up with big frightened eyes. ‘A cat,’ he muttered. ‘It came into my cellar. I tried to pick it up and it scratched me.’

Barbara smiled. ‘Bad cat. We’ll put some ointment on it. Then we’ll get you something to eat, would you like that?’ He nodded. ‘What’s your name?’

‘Ivan, señora.’

Señora Blanco compressed her lips. ‘Who gave you that name?’

‘My parents.’

‘Where are your parents now?’

‘The civiles took them.’

‘Ivan is a bad name, a Russian name, do you not know that? The nuns will find you a better one.’ The boy hung his head.

‘I think that’s all,’ Barbara said. She wrote on a card and handed it to Señora Blanco, who led the boy away. Sister Teresa left by the other door to fetch the next child. The beata returned a few moments later, wiping her hands on her dark apron. ‘Dear Lord, how he smelt.’

There was a commotion outside. Barbara heard high thin screams and the door was flung open. Sister Teresa dragged in a scrawny dark-haired girl of about eleven, struggling frantically. The nun was red-faced and her coif had been knocked askew, giving her a drunken look.

‘Madre de Dios, she struggles worse than a pig.’ Sister Teresa gripped the child’s arms hard, forcing her to stand still. ‘Stop that or you’ll get the cane! The devil is in this one. She was living in an empty house in Carabanchel – the civiles had to chase her round the streets.’

Barbara bent down in front of the girl. She was breathing heavily, lips drawn back over bad teeth, eyes wide with terror. She wore a filthy blue dress and clutched a little woolly donkey, so dirty and torn it was hardly recognizable.

‘What’s your name?’ Barbara asked gently.

The girl swallowed. ‘Are you a nun?’

‘No, I’m a nurse. I just want to examine you, see whether you need a doctor.’

The girl looked at her beseechingly. ‘Please let me go. I don’t want to be made into soup.’

‘What?’

‘The nuns make children into soup, feed it to Franco’s soldiers. Please, please, make them let me go.’

Sister Teresa laughed. ‘You can see who’s brought this one up.’

Señora Blanco frowned at the girl. ‘Those are wicked lies the Reds told. You’re a bad child to say such things. Now get undressed for the nurse. And give me that!’ She reached for the woolly donkey but the girl clutched it tighter. Señora Blanco’s face flushed with anger.

‘Give that to me. Don’t defy me, you little Red!’ She grabbed the toy and pulled sharply. It tore in two, white stuffing flying out. The beata was caught off balance and the girl jumped away, screaming. She ran under a bed and crouched there, holding the donkey’s head, all that was left, to her face and howling. Señora Blanco threw the rest to the floor. ‘Little bitch—’