‘Hello, old man.’ She patted its muzzle until its owner emerged from one of the house with a hod of bricks. She thought for a moment of challenging him, but the donkey wasn’t thin or badly treated and it seemed acclimatized to its lot. She was obviously getting used to Greek ways.

‘Kalimera,’ she nodded, and flattened herself against the wall for the donkey to pass.

Another few streets deeper into Kyri town she came across the entrance to a little Orthodox church, the kind found in their thousands in every town and village in Greece, some so tiny you could hardly get inside.

There was no service on, so it was dark and pungent with the scent of incense and recently lit candles, so strong they almost choked you. But it was more than that. Penny could feel in the air such an intense wave of hope battling against the despair of everyday life that she had to stand still. She could just make out the tiny tamata, votive symbols shaped like metal hearts or limbs, pinned under an icon of the Virgin Mary, each hoping for a miracle, and the forests of candles, each lit for some unrealized hope or dream.

‘Can I help you, kyria?’ The guardian of the chapel emerged from the gloom, smiling helpfully and holding out a shawl. She looked disappointed that Penny wore neither shorts nor bare arms that would need covering up.

‘Thank you, no,’ Penny replied, backing out, unsure of what she was looking for. She headed instead for the local museum. This was also in the back streets, but housed in a rather impressive mansion that had once belonged to a corsair captain in the days when Kyri was a powerful force in the eastern Mediterranean.

She looked dutifully through the explanations outlining the difference between corsairs – privateers licensed by the French king to attack any enemies of France, England naturally included – and how they differed from the Captain Sparrows, good old fashioned pirates, who sang ‘yo-ho-ho and a bottle of rum’ and keelhauled their unfortunate victims. She wondered if it was the same treacherous king who had offered freedom to the corsair in exchange for their statue of Aphrodite and double-crossed him so that he buried the statue in revenge.

She looked carefully at all the exhibits, thinking how sad it was that Kyri, once so rich and important, was now so reduced that the locals’ children had to leave to work elsewhere. The small changes they’d helped make with the boathouses and Willow’s blogs seemed rather insignificant, and she wished there was something bigger they could achieve before they left.

On the first floor was a series of paintings – the usual icons, the portrait of an unpronounceable local saint, some scenes from the Bible. On the wall at the end was one that made her laugh out loud.