I awoke to an empty apartment. I did not need to look at my watch; the height of the sun told me it was too late to go to my Italian class even if I had wished to. I wandered through rooms shaded and striped by the shutters, thinking about Aidan. His plan had been to get away from the beach as fast as he could, negotiating the coastline back to Castiglioncello in the hope that David would not be able to do the same. I imagined David, beside himself with rage, weaving his way up the path to the road. Had he gone back to the villa, collected his car and driven to wherever he was staying, his brain fuzzy, his body grazed from the stony beach where he had struggled with Aidan?

He definitely would not have reported the incident truthfully, if he reported it at all. Perhaps he would explain away his appearance by cursing that madman Aidan Tobias, who had turned up out of nowhere and attacked him again! Aidan had impressed upon me the importance of hiding the roll of film and, when they were printed, the photographs. “David Penn’s got contacts everywhere,” he had explained. “I wouldn’t put it past him to get us burgled.”

When I had bathed and dressed, I stepped into the white light of mid-morning and crossed the road, intending to visit the bread shop and maybe pick up a punnet of strawberries from the fruit stall.

But I had hardly reached the opposite pavement when I saw something that brought me to a halt. Aidan, who should be busy on location at this time, was standing on the corner. Hatless, with a cigarette dangling from one hand and his jacket from the other, he gave me a sheepish smile.

“Got the prints,” he said. “Got the sack, too. Again.”