‘Stelios works fast, don’t you, old man?’ Karl commented.

He was answered with a loud guffaw.

‘Well, that was certainly discreet,’ pointed out Dora. ‘It probably woke Georgiades from his early evening nap!’

Stelios grinned round, undeterred. ‘Friends, I have discovered two interesting facts today.’

Karl looked delighted. ‘I told you he was a quick worker.’

‘First, your friend bought an old map of the island, a genuine one, with all the Corsair caves marked on it.’

‘We could have told you that,’ Dora replied witheringly. ‘I’m still sure he knew the caves well enough to hide the statue there and then remove it before we could prove anything. The fact that he bought a map is neither here nor there.’

‘You may be right.’ Stelios shrugged engagingly. ‘And then he bought a boat virtually identical to this.’

He produced the boat from the carrier bag. It was about a foot long, with a faded pale blue hull and wheelhouse. The mast and jib were the same colour, but peeling, as if they took the brunt of the seawater. There was an anchor line at the front and a painter for mooring.

‘She looks as if you could almost sail in her,’ Moira admired.

‘It’s just like the ones Nikos carves,’ Penny pointed out.

‘Except this one is very like the one Georgiades sailed in as a child,’ Stelios said. ‘In fact, exact in every way, except that it’s miniature. He was asking the shop owner if it could take on a heavy weight. He said he remembered them taking on a shark or porpoise, and was that possible?’

‘Or a statue,’ Karl mused.

‘Precisely my thought,’ nodded Stelios.

‘Except that Georgiades doesn’t have a boat,’ Dora replied dampeningly. ‘If he did, we’d have seen him in it.’

‘Unless he was keeping it hidden somewhere,’ suggested Stelios with a grin.

‘But they don’t have sharks round here,’ Moira threw in irrelevantly, ignoring the crushing looks from the others.

‘Now all we have to do is find out where he keeps it,’ said Karl. ‘And what better man to do it than Stelios?’

‘I also need to start putting it about that I’m interested and I have a very rich buyer. Apparently your friend likes to hang out in the bar of the White Hotel, Kyri’s only luxury establishment.’

‘Where’s that?’ Dora asked, amazed she had missed anything that smacked of luxury.

‘On the tip of the island,’ Stelios informed her. ‘Opposite Ximonos.’

‘And near the caves,’ Dora realized.

‘Time you went and rediscovered your taste for martinis, then,’ Karl suggested. ‘As long as you remember the advice from Dorothy Parker.’

‘I’m afraid that escapes me,’ Stelios replied.

Before Karl could reply, Dora whipped in first: ‘I like to have a martini, Two at the very most, After three I’m under the table, After four I’m under my host.’