She loves looking pretty in her hat, wandering about, showing an interest in things, being enthusiastic, chatting, disagreeing, going away, changing her mind, coming back, negotiating, bargaining, buying, changing her mind again. During that week in Marrakech when I was twelve, I thought I would die of shame in the souk and not come out of our riad for a week. And this morning at breakfast, fatal mistake, I agreed to go with Maman to the market. There goes the morning! When I got fed up of being jostled by holidaymakers, and having my feet run over by buggies, I went and sat on the only bench. Blazing sun. Camouflage gear. Headphones and Manu Chao in my ears and, for a change, a newspaper on my knees, the Corse-Matin, whose banner headline had grabbed my attention.

FALLEN FROM HIS BOAT?

Someone called Drago Bianchi, a businessman from Nice, had been reported missing, according to the few lines I read on the front page. They’d found his yacht but not him, just his fishing rod which was found floating in the water with nothing on it. The guy had made his fortune in building and public works, the kind of man who could turn concrete into gold. Perhaps he’d got the formula wrong this time; perhaps all the gold in his pockets had turned back into concrete and made him fall to the bottom. The other brief news items from the island got on my nerves, so instead I chose to admire the landscape in front of me.

Shall I describe it to you? Let me try and find the words.

So in front of me there’s a fishing boat, blue and white, which looks more like a large rowing-boat than a trawler. No sails, just an engine, iron chains piled up everywhere, and nets, sea-green, forming a huge cocoon on the jetty, with a giant caterpillar of yellow buoys imprisoned inside it. Perhaps, when the net is cast, the biggest butterfly in the world will come fluttering out of it.

I’m sure this fisherman would be quite capable of that.

I’ve been staring at him for almost an hour from behind my Lolita glasses.