Then she turned up the radio, picked a good sharp knife and started chopping.

Sally navigated through rather choppy waters, squinting at all the motor yachts anchored in the bay. She hadn’t realised how many had clever-clever long names. She had thought that the particular name she was headed for would be easy to spot due to its length, but not when you had others called Three Sheets to the Wind, Stocks and Blondes and Eat, Drink and Remarry. She sensed a fair amount of bitterness in boat naming.

Sally was also amazed at the number of British ensigns dangling from the stern staffs. Many of these boats seemed to be registered in every conceivable tax haven, from Jersey, Guernsey and Bermuda to the Cayman Islands.

So many loaded people.

And if the Picasso had sold as intended, she might have been one of them. Sally gathered control of herself. Even if the mosaic had made what she considered to be mega-bucks, she still wouldn’t have arrived at anywhere near the level of wealth of these people. And presumably they had something more up their sleeves than just striking it lucky. If they had worked for their money, there must be some feeling of fulfilment, something which in her own mind she lacked.

As she left the waters of Bellevue-sur-Mer and pulled out into the open sea, she turned the wheel of the helm and pushed the throttle forward.

Where was this ruddy boat?

Her phone rang.

Carol.

‘You were right. They’re not at Bellevue-sur-Mer. They’re actually at the end of the Rade at Villefranche.’

Sally sighed.

Carol continued: ‘To be fair, they admitted to me that they didn’t actually know where they were but described their surroundings, saying it was a big bay, with hills either side and that they could see “a kind of polygon-shaped white lighthouse” nearby at the end of the land . . .’

‘Cap-Ferrat,’ snapped Sally. ‘I’m on my way.’

‘Good.’ Carol hung up.

Sally slipped her phone back into her pocket. Carol didn’t need to be quite so brusque. Sally felt utterly disgruntled.

Why had she got involved in the stupid restaurant in the first place? It really wasn’t her thing at all. She must have been having a mental fit that day. Her friendships with the others had been so much easier before. Now practically everything made her feel guilty.

Sally steered the boat towards the lighthouse, all the while thinking of the fuel she was getting through. This Shore-to-Ship idea was going to cost them so much more in gas than they could ever make in profit from a few sandwiches. She couldn’t see how they could make it work if she had to race miles and miles around the Med …

As the boat hurtled through a wave, spray drenched the windscreen. Sally laughed. Really, she was relieved to be out at sea in the boat rather than hovering around the restaurant surrounded by all that disappointment, tension and fear.