Then we made our way to the Rialto Bridge and the market beside it. Aunt H. allowed me to do a little drawing, while she sat sipping a coffee at a café beside the Grand Canal. I loved sketching the market with its stalls of fruit and vegetables, women in long peasant skirts and dashing men with black moustaches. I wasn’t so entranced with the fish market. The smell was too overwhelming to want to linger. I returned to Aunt H. and was offered a gelato. Delicious Italian ice cream in flavours I had never even heard of: pistachio and stracciatella. It came with a delicate wafer.

Aunt H. was one of those formidable Victorian ladies. She showed no sign of being tired as we made our way back to the pensione. I suggested taking a vaporetto, as I was really worn out by this time. But she insisted the water buses were too crowded, and she had no wish to be pressed up against an Italian man. “They pinch bottoms, you know,” she whispered in horror. I tried not to smile.

Eventually we came back to the pensione and changed for dinner. We dined on mushroom risotto as Aunt H. wanted something that would not upset her delicate stomach. It was quite good; so was the creamy cake that followed it, and I was allowed a glass of local white wine called Pinot Grigio. We sat and chatted with other guests—or rather Aunt H. chatted and I sat, wishing I were out experiencing the sights and sounds of the city—and went to bed around ten.

Aunt H. fell asleep immediately. I lay there, listening to distant music. I had almost drifted off when I heard something rattle against the shutters. I got up. Was it the wind? But no draft came in. Then it happened again. I opened the shutter and looked around.

“Julietta. Down here,” came the whisper.

And there he was in his boat, underneath my window.

“Come,” he whispered, holding out his arms to me. “I will help you.”

“I’m in my nightdress,” I said, my heart beating rather loudly.

“I can see.” He smirked. “Hurry. Dress quickly.”

I couldn’t believe what I was doing. I stumbled into my clothes, shooting hasty glances at my snoring aunt as I fumbled with buttons. Then I arranged the bolster in my bed to look like a sleeping person and started to climb out of the window. It was a long drop and I hesitated. Instantly his arms came up again, and he lifted me down into the boat, his hands around my waist.

“Now,” he said, “we go.”

“The shutters.” I looked back at them, half open.

He stood up precariously on the rim of the boat and closed them. Then he pushed us off, moving the boat silently along the side of the canal until we were far enough away to start the motor. Off we went into the night.

When we pulled out into the Grand Canal, we looked at each other, and I gave a nervous laugh that I, good child until now, had dared to do something so naughty. He laughed, too.