James awoke in the morning in his small, bright room still wearing his clothes and covered in mosquito bites. He knew he wasn’t supposed to scratch them but he couldn’t stop himself. He tore at his skin with his fingernails, but after a brief feeling of satisfaction the itching returned worse than ever. He hurriedly found his bottle of quinine tablets in his wash bag and swallowed one. He had forgotten to take one the night before, and while it wouldn’t stop the mosquitoes from biting, it should at least help to keep malaria at bay.

He had gone to bed very late, exhausted after the day’s travelling and staying up late for the feast. He had slumped on to his iron-framed bed without undressing and forgotten to unfurl the mosquito net hanging above it.

He would not be this careless again; there were ugly raised red lumps all down his arms and round his ankles and he had even been bitten on his ears and in his hair.

He searched his room, in the vain hope that he might find one of his six-legged tormentors still here. He eventually found one – a big, fat brute, sitting on the wall near the door, too bloated and lazy to fly away. He took his shoe and hit it as hard as he could. The insect left a wide smear of blood on the plain white wall.

James noticed a painting next to the smear, not one of Poliponi’s grotesque works but a simple watercolour of a local view with the signature ‘Delacroix’. It must have been painted by Victor, but hanging nearby were two scenes of Venice that looked old and valuable.

‘They are Canalettos,’ said a voice, and James turned to see Victor in the doorway. ‘Beautiful, aren’t they?’ he said. ‘I did some work for a prince whose palazzo was sinking into the lagoon. I managed to shore it up and save the building. He could not afford to pay me, so he gave me those instead. Now, come, we need to make a start before the day is too hot.’

After a quick breakfast, still feeling miserably itchy, James started out on the climb up to Bear Rock with his cousin. The path wound steeply up between huge boulders through the familiar low scrubby Mediterranean maquis of juniper, myrtle and rosemary. Lizards sunned themselves on the rocks and scurried away as the two figures approached.

It took them 40 minutes to reach the summit, from where there was a magnificent view of the whole of this part of the island.

The rock itself was huge, and towered above them like some bizarre ancient monument. James was fascinated by the way the wind had scooped and scraped it into caves and arches. Indeed the wind up here was terrific and James felt as if he might be blown away.

‘It is the Mistral,’ shouted Victor. ‘The north wind. It is always blowing here. The sailing is some of the best in the Mediterranean. Do you like the wind, James? I love the wind. It is so clean and pure. You sense the power of nature when the wind blows; it reminds us how small we are.’