There is nowhere to turn, no one to talk to, nothing to do. He packs up one suitcase with his books, another with his clothes, says good-bye to the porter at his hotel, jumps in his old Alfa Romeo, and knows what he must do. First, he’ll have a swim. And maybe at this point he’ll remember the words from The Last of the Mohicans that he’d read at Graziano’s funeral, because they apply to him as well: “My race has gone from the shores of the salt lake and the hills of the Delawares. But who can say that the serpent of his tribe has forgotten his wisdom.”

These are the words of Chief Chingachgook, who ends the funeral speech for his son with these three tragic words: “I am alone.” Calligarich does not quote “I am alone,” but he couldn’t be unaware of their dark and brooding presence over his own words. His protagonist too is alone. Indeed, Leo is, has always been, more than just alone.

No language has a word for being more than just alone.

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Anyway, it’s always like that. You do your best to keep to yourself and then one fine day, without knowing how, you find you’re caught up in something that sweeps you along with it to the bitter end.

Personally, I would happily have stayed out of the race. I’d known all kinds of people, some who’d reached the finishing post and others who hadn’t even gotten off the starting block, and sooner or later they all ended up equally dissatisfied, which is why I’d come to the conclusion that it was better to stay on the sidelines and just observe life. But I hadn’t reckoned with being desperately short of money one rainy day at the beginning of spring last year. All the rest followed naturally, as these things do. Let me make it clear from the start that I don’t blame anyone, I was dealt my cards and I played them. That’s all.

And this bay really is magnificent. It’s overlooked by a Saracen fortress on top of a rocky promontory that juts out into the sea for a hundred yards or so. Looking toward the coast, I can see the dazzling spread of beach and the green of the low Mediterranean vegetation. Farther on, a three-lane highway, deserted at this time of year, tunnels into a chain of rocky hills glittering in the sun. The sky is blue, the sea clear.

I couldn’t have chosen better, truth be told.