“Careful!” She springs back, looking at my paint-stained fingers, though they’ve pretty much dried now. “Why is it,” she asks, arching an expressive eyebrow above her sunglasses, “that you are always running about covered in paint?”

“Technically, this is only the second time,” I say. I’m still rattled from the strange moment with Ben, and the adrenaline has faded, replaced by a curious, bone-deep tiredness. I’m not sure I’m up to verbal sparring with Ursula. Her moods are mercurial; one moment she’s withdrawn and the next she’s full of life and enthusiasm.

She watches me for a moment. Then she turns.

“Come with me,” she says, heading further down the path we’re on, before disappearing along a small rough track that forks off to the right. She doesn’t check to see if I follow but of course I do, surprised by the brisk pace she sets and finding myself stumbling through the trees towards a building I haven’t seen before.

It’s a small, squat and rather ramshackle affair made of light timber. A veranda wraps around the outside and a set of rickety wicker furniture with faded cushions is clustered at the front beside a table full of bottles and dirty glasses.

“Come, come,” Ursula calls over her shoulder and I follow her towards this intriguing building. I thought I had found all the villa’s secrets, but this just goes to show that there are still hidden corners waiting to be discovered.

“Where are we?” I ask, looking around at the dappled space, hemmed in by ilex trees. This is obviously a man-made clearing but it feels a little like the woodcutter’s cottage from the fairy tales.

“Leo calls it the summer house,” Ursula says, coming to a halt on the veranda. “Rather grand, I know. It’s a sort of folly he had built a few years ago and then promptly forgot about. It was almost falling down when we arrived. He and Filomena have been letting me use it while I’m here.”

As we get closer I see that the building does look a bit unloved. The roof has been patched up, and the timber veranda is missing several floorboards. From where I’m standing, I can just see through the window to a large, square room with an unmade bed and a small desk pushed to one side. There are hundreds of sheets of paper scattered across the floor.

“There is water around here,” Ursula says, gesturing with her hand and, following her, I see that to the side of the house is an old-fashioned water pump. “You can wash.”