Thus escorted, they reached the road, and were almost obliged to force their way through a row of rubberneckers, policemen and locals: Keep back, keep back. The granddaughter and her grandmother were wrapped in a gilded foil blanket. It’s all fine, it’s all fine, an emergency doctor who looked like a young Harrison Ford had quickly pronounced, but he still insisted on them being transported to the medical centre in Ajaccio. The ambulance door was wide open, the stretchers prepared, the engine was running, the driver drew on his cigarette, ready to get going. Palma raised a weary hand: Gently, gently. Clotilde barely had time to hug her daughter and her mother before the first-aid workers separated them: Later, madam, later.

Natale was the last to climb up to the road using the rope ladder, without the aid of a winch or an escort. Cesareu Garcia helped him off the final rung, with a firm hand to hoist him up, a sound clap on the back, a physical, manly, almost silent way of saying: Well played, my boy, the kind that is enough for an exhausted man returning from heroic deeds, leaving the fiery pit or exiting the pitch victorious.

Franck had walked a short way towards the cars to fetch Valentine some dry clothes, a pullover, a pair of trousers, some trainers.

Aurélia was chatting to Harrison Ford, adopting the professional persona of a nurse who managed such situations with competence and compassion.

Clotilde, without even thinking about it, found herself face to face with Natale once more. She still found him incredibly attractive, with his blue eyes swept by his salty hair, his untroubled, heroic smile. She was filled with an irresistible desire to throw her arms around him, a spontaneous impulse, a natural and obvious need to shout Thank you, thank you, thank you into his ear, and to tell him that she had always known he would untie the moorings, that the Aryon would sail again, that they only had to go back down the rope ladder, set sail and run away. Her daughter, her mother had been saved; they had been found again. Everything had been sorted out. It was time to go.

She took one step.

She felt an animal desire to press her body against Natale’s, as if he alone had the mixture of strength and serenity that could soothe everything.

Aurélia left Harrison Ford behind and took two steps.

Franck entrusted his daughter’s dry clothes to the first ambulance man he came to, and took three steps.

Cesareu Garcia took a step back, like a wrestling referee leaving the ring to the fighters.

‘Natale!’ Aurélia cried.

He didn’t move.

‘Clo!’ Franck cried out behind her. ‘Clo!’

She didn’t move.

‘Clo. Valou wants to see you.’

She hesitated.

‘She has something important to give you.’