‘We must go only just round our garden and a little of the lane beyond. And then back to the bed. He says your entire system will have been knocked out and you must only return to your life very slowly. But a little walk is a good thing, he says.’

Moira brushed her bird’s nest of hair out as best she could, while Eleni watched with mixed fascination and horror.

‘I know, I know,’ conceded Moira. ‘I need to do something about it.’

‘I will do it if you want,’ Eleni offered shyly. ‘I was a hairdresser before I married my husband.’

Moira pulled on her curious assortment of clothing, which was looking very much the worse for wear. ‘You weren’t a fashion buyer as well, by any chance?’ she joked with Eleni.

‘No, but I do have the clothes that belonged to my mother. I couldn’t, how do you say in English, bring myself to throw them away.’

‘OK,’ Moira replied dubiously. Being dressed like an old Greek lady didn’t seem a vast improvement on her current image.

‘She was very fashionable,’ Eleni smiled. ‘I will show you later.’

As she walked via the stone staircase to the upstairs floor, Moira suddenly realized what the doctor meant. She had better use the handrail and take it gradually.

‘Are you feeling dizzy?’ enquired Eleni anxiously.

‘Not really,’ lied Moira, calling her distant farming ancestors to mind for some inherited stoicism, but holding tightly to the banister at the same time.

Fortunately the dizziness passed, but it made her realize the doctor was right about her system being affected. This was going to take longer than she’d thought, but there was no need for the others to spoil their holiday by staying with her.

The garden was surprisingly green in the shadier areas, and Eleni insisted on showing off her one rose and a hollyhock. ‘This is my English garden!’ she announced proudly.

‘Very nice,’ replied Moira, who had zero interest in gardens or gardening – as the fellow don at her Cambridge college who’d made the mistake of asking her to join the garden committee could endorse.

At the very end of the garden there was a small gate. Moira went through, and stopped as if she’d just seen a vision. ‘What on earth are those?’ She pointed at some large pieces of stone with carved facia.

‘Oh, those are pieces of column. They are everywhere on the island.’

Despite her condition, Moira dropped reverently to her knees and began to stroke the smooth golden stone. Even though the column was in pieces, it was just as it would have been thousands of years before. ‘But they could have come from a temple to Apollo or some such thing!’ she exclaimed finally, almost overcome.

Eleni smiled tolerantly as if Moira had just praised the quality of something completely ordinary, a slice of bread or a cup of Greek coffee.