‘We’ll be just outside, don’t worry,’ he smiled.

Dora detected the tenderness and concern in Stelios’s tone, and glanced at him in surprise. She hadn’t realized things had progressed so far.

‘Dora,’ he said, suddenly firm and decisive once they were in the corridor outside Nell’s room, ‘I don’t think Nell should be involved tonight. It’s too risky for her. The man is ruthless and he has seen her now.’

Dora remembered the frisson of fear she had felt when Georgiades stared at her with those cold aristocrat’s eyes not so long ago.

‘The trouble is,’ he continued, ‘will she listen? Please try and convince her. She has already been through a lot with her granddaughter – and now she has the chance of happiness at last.’

It was on the tip of Dora’s tongue to say that happiness might also lie in having someone who cared about you as much as Stelios clearly did, especially when you’d been alone as long as Nell. She wondered if Nell had any idea, and how she would react if she did.

How exciting. This holiday was certainly turning out to be full of surprises.

Nineteen

‘Right,’ demanded Dora in her best Boadicea tones, ‘what are we going to do? I think Stelios should go and look at this boathouse because he knows where it is. And Karl can go with him to make sure it’s the right bloody statue!’

‘Stelios says he’s scared,’ pointed out Moira.

‘So am I,’ seconded Karl. ‘I may be old, but I still enjoy life.’

‘Well, you’ll have to get over it,’ Dora continued mercilessly. ‘I don’t like heights but I’ve made myself go up the Eiffel Tower.’ Before Karl had time to argue that he didn’t think that was at all the same thing, she continued, ‘Now, if it is the statue, how are we going to transport it?’

There was a silence.

‘I know!’ Nell offered enthusiastically. ‘Demetria. She can get the old fishermen involved.’

Karl shook his head. ‘Considering our age, this is beginning to sound like the Hatton Garden jewel heist.’

‘Didn’t they get caught?’ Moira asked tactlessly.

Nell ignored her. ‘If we had the fishermen standing by with the van we used for picking up furniture, they could carry the Venus between them and we could cover it in blankets. Kyri was big in the Greek resistance, almost as famous as Crete, so Cassandra told me. I’m sure they’d be up for it. The honour of the island.’

‘And what will we do with it, once we’ve got it?’ Karl enquired stoically.

‘Take it to the main square,’ Dora commanded. ‘Unload it next to the hotel, where it’s busiest. He can’t get it back from there – too many witnesses. And Kyri can have her Venus back.’