‘Good idea,’ he said.

The car juddered to a halt in front of the building, and I stepped down from the running board, stretching my back and arms. The sun was almost directly overhead and my skin felt tender from exposure to it. My mother made her way to the shade of a gum tree, fanning herself with the two wide-brimmed, floppy hats that all the women wore out here. She was still ignoring me and I suddenly couldn’t bear to be near her.

‘Maud, choose a postcard,’ my father said, mopping his forehead. ‘I need to send a telegram to the Glasgow office, and then we’ll head back.’

‘Can I stay out?’ I asked him. ‘I don’t mind walking home.’

My father looked to my mother and I felt my heart sink. Out of the corner of my eye, her expression was impossible to read. I scuffed my shoe in the dirt.

‘Don’t walk in the sunshine,’ she said eventually. ‘Here, take some money just in case.’ She held out some coins and I stepped towards her warily. ‘Remember – stay in the shade.’

‘I will,’ I mumbled.

She surprised me by kissing my forehead. ‘And be back at the hotel by four o’clock, or we’ll start to worry. We don’t want to lose you.’

My anger dissolved into gratitude at how quickly my punishment seemed to be over, and I started down the road with no clear idea of where I was going, relishing the opportunity to explore. Leaving the main streets behind me, I ended up in a more residential area, where most of the houses were bungalow mansions with tiled roofs, smallish windows and verandas supported by brick pillars. Perfectly straight paths ran between veranda and white picket fence, where flowers bloomed in pinks, purples, blues and creams, and in front of each house immaculate green lawns lay like carpets rolled out for important visitors. The road was wide, and dappled in the sun. I thought of the red tenements in Edinburgh, five storeys high and always cold inside, and felt a smile forming on my face.

These streets were mostly empty, but after a while I started to pick up a buzzing sound and, turning a corner, I stumbled on an open-air market. Stalls had been set up displaying all manner of produce: carnations, violets, tomatoes, large brown eggs, limes, courgettes, green bananas, aubergines, sacks of flour and dusty potatoes. People were thronging the aisles, squeezing and weighing the vegetables, and swatting away the flies that hovered at face-height. I hesitated, overwhelmed for a moment, but when I finally ventured in no one paid me any attention until I reached a crossroads in the market and paused, trying to decide where to go. A few shoppers knocked into me, and I felt a tap on my shoulder and smelled amber and peach. ‘You’re a lone beast, aren’t you, Theo?’