“Why should she be easy? Is her life easy?” Cressa’s voice is quavering, and Amara is afraid she might cry.

“I know,” she says, her tone apologetic. The last thing she wants is to upset her already anxious friend. “I know. I’ll try and make more effort, I promise.”

They carry on at their painfully slow pace, until Cressa stops altogether. Amara realizes she is gazing at a small child, perhaps aged three or four. The child’s piping chatter carries, and his mother smiles, indulgent, before noticing the strange, bedraggled woman fixated on her treasure. She puts an arm around her son, nervously steering him out of sight.

“Cressa,” Amara says, trying to usher her along. But Cressa is crying.

“Don’t,” Cressa says, shaking Amara off when she tries to comfort her.

Amara sighs. She almost regrets asking her to come out.

They walk under the marine gate, passing Vibo’s baths where none of them have worked for some months since Felix decided the tips weren’t worth it. Further down the hill, the sea sparkles into view. The air is fresh, the salt sharp. Cressa seems a little calmer now they have reached the harbor. At the docks, several boats are unloading. Men scurry and shout, busy as ants moving crumbs to their nest. Amara offers her arm, nervous after the last rejection, but this time, Cressa accepts. “Shall we have a walk, before fishing?”

Cressa nods, and they head to the colonnade that circles the port. Amara feels her spirits rise. Sunlight, reflected from the sea, ripples over the pillars and painted statues, and the call of the gulls, the sing-song shouts of the sailors sound almost musical. She helps Cressa sit down in a patch of sun by the water’s edge. Below their swinging feet, she can see gray fish darting in the clear water.

“Felix never told me where he sold Cosmus,” Cressa says. The mention of her son is so unexpected Amara does not know what to say. She looks at Cressa but cannot read her expression as her face is turned to the sea. “Fabia tried to find out for me, but we never managed it.”

“Fabia?” Amara asks in surprise. She cannot imagine Paris’s mother having the necessary bravery, or cunning, to make such an attempt.

“Why not Fabia? She sees more than you think. And everyone overlooks her. That’s what happens when you get old.” There is no mistaking the bitterness in Cressa’s voice.

“Even though it was so hard for you,” Amara says, desperate to try and make Cressa feel better. “Do you think maybe it might have been for the best? So that Cosmus wasn’t trapped at the brothel?”