‘Oh!’ Heat rose in my cheeks. ‘And this?’ I slid my forefingers side by side.

Manno grabbed the tiller, stared at his fist, then, threw a challenging glance at Perkins, who seemed to understand more Greek than me.

‘Manno?’

‘Ah, it means – well, you saw the goats, yes?’

Horrified to realise why the old woman had blessed me. I returned my stare to Josephine who wore a sympathetic smile. ‘Don’t worry about it,’ she said.

I clasped my hands between my knees and stared at my feet.

Outside the bay, the little boat rolled and bobbed on the blue water.

‘Don’t you put the nets out?’ I asked Manno.

‘Not here, there are bombs down there. Is not safe.’

‘Bombs? My God, we’ll all be blown to bits!’

‘No worries, you’re safe with me, koukla, they’re fixed to the bottom with a long rope, but they’re for the bigger ships which are deeper in the water.’

The boat bobbed about as we chugged over the waves. Manno said something to his father who then pulled a box from under the seat. He emptied the contents into our laps, replaced the lid, and then set the top as a table. He laid fresh bread, a beautiful pink dip with a strong scent of fish, plump black olives, and lemon wedges, before us. Josephine clamped a hand over her mouth and shook her head. She shuffled to the front of the boat, a look of utter despair on her face.

The food was wonderful! ‘What was the pink dip, Mr Yianni?’ I asked. ‘It’s really delicious.’

‘Is taramasalata; is made from the raw eggs of the mullet fish and stale bread, all whipped up with lots of extra virgin olive oil.’

The information was too much for Josephine. Her face turned grey and she hung over the side. Yianni guided her to the back of the boat, which he said was a much better place for her to be, under the circumstances.

Soon, the little fishing boat approached a hilly, barren island. ‘What is this place, Syros?’ I asked.

‘No, it’s the cursed island of Giaros,’ Manno replied. ‘Nobody lives there. Giaros no have the water. They say if you step on the island, you will die a terrible death. In the old days, the Mediterranean pirates buried their treasure there, but then they all got sick and died because the well they dug was filled with seawater.’

‘Did anyone find the treasure?’ Perkins asked.

Manno lifted his chin. ‘How can we know? They would keep it secret, yes?’

‘It appears quite forebidding,’ Nurse Josephine said, staring with puffy eyes at the high cliffs. ‘A difficult place to get on or off.’

‘Are you feeling better, Nurse Josephine?’ I asked, noticing a little colour had returned to her cheeks. She nodded.