Lykiard was beside me, warning the children away with the lizard, which he threw into the sea. I lifted Miriam onto her side, trying to feel the broken bone. Still stunned, she held on to my shoulder and sat up, her face small and pale, inhaling shallow breaths.

“My, that was a knock.” She spoke flatly. “Silly fool, where was I going?”

“Love, are you all right? Your leg…”

“Hurts like hell. Don’t worry, Lucy. Mummy was silly and fell over. God, my head—I shouldn’t have laid all those steps…”

Sally and I helped her back to the patio and settled her in the wicker chair. Miriam was shivering with the shock, her hair matted to her scalp, as she held Henry’s hand. I tried to calm her trembling shoulders while Sally cleaned the ankle wound with a tampon soaked in mineral water. She turned to kiss Henry, and I saw the swollen bruise above her right ear, pushing against the unbroken skin.

Lykiard had put on his jeans and sandals. He spoke quickly to the Jouberts and brought out a bottle of fundador, but Miriam waved it away. She was reassuring the children, her face as small as theirs, her eyes staring at the staircase as if she had mislaid part of herself on the damp steps.

“I’d take her back to your flat,” Lykiard suggested. “We’ll drive the kids in the car. She’ll be more comfortable in the dinghy.”

Sally and the Jouberts helped me to lift Miriam into the inflatable. We pushed off, leaving our hamper and beach equipment on the sand, where the waves were already soaking the towels. Miriam waved to the children climbing into the back of the Citroen, her hands awkwardly gripping the sides of the inflatable. During the short journey the sea air seemed to revive her, and she smiled at me confidently, raising her damp eyebrows to apologise. But she collapsed when I pulled the dinghy onto the beach and had to lie down among the lines of parasols and the watching sunbathers until she recovered her breath.

She was strong enough to walk to the lift, but when I opened the door to the flat I sensed that only half her mind recognised it. I called the bureau for the telephone number of a local doctor, and Miriam wandered onto the balcony, blinking at the crowded beach.

An hour later, when the Spanish doctor arrived, she was lying on our bed, smiling wanly at the sound of the children on the Nordlunds’ balcony. The doctor examined her in a slow but scrupulous way. Afterwards he patted me encouragingly and spoke in Spanish to Lykiard. The practicante, a visiting male nurse, would keep Miriam under observation until the doctor called again that evening.