The shop belonging to the man who made boats was just opposite, down a small side road. Kyri was getting busy now, with hopeful tourist boats arriving at the quay offering day trips to the caves and beaches. Buses stopped outside the cafe, and soon the ferry from Santorini would deposit more visitors.

Stelios replaced his beloved hat on his head and pushed open the door.

On the first floor, Moira, Penny and Dora had gone to get dressed, but Nell was glancing out, so it was she who watched Stelios’s progress across the square towards the street where the boat man, like Nikos, carved his replica boats out of driftwood. What struck Nell was the sheer physicality of the man, an energy that almost seemed to burst from his large frame. She liked the way he stopped and talked to every passer-by, even the children, and had a smile perpetually on his lips. With his abundant black curly hair and ready smile, he struck her as a large woolly bear, and she felt a tear come to her eye. What would it be like to have a man like that to laugh with and protect you?

Angrily she brushed the tear away. For more than twenty years she had lived without a man in her life, and why should she be attracted to this one just because he looked as if he could crush her in a giant embrace?

The words from a Joni Mitchell song invaded her head, about being drawn to those ones that ain’t afraid. God almighty, was she going to start living her life according to the thoughts of the great Joni? Start looking at clouds from both sides now, and wishing she’d been at Woodstock?

There he was, kissing the hand of the ancient lady who begged outside the bank. Most people walked straight past! And now chasing a football with a tiny five-year-old before sweeping him out of the path of some idiot on a scooter. And all the time, laughing.

She watched him exchange a word with the line of tourists in the bus queue, some of whom, being city-dwellers, looked at him as if he were mad, before he ducked into the boat man’s shop.

‘Yassas!’ Stelios greeted the man sitting perched behind the counter, a knife in his hand.

‘You’re in early,’ was the grudging reply.

‘I like to be up with the lark,’ Stelios replied, his voice brimming over with good humour. ‘May I look around?’

‘Help yourself. This is a shop, after all.’

Stelios walked slowly round the gallery, examining each boat in detail. From the traditional Greek caiques to the small pleasure craft, the loving detail of each was extraordinary. He had even captured the faded paintwork and worn ropes of vessels owned by fishermen who didn’t have the money to keep them pristine.