‘This will need careful handling. That region of Papua is controlled by Kopassus special forces who will do anything to jeopardise my career. I need to gather intelligence, starting with the Ford Mission. It is quite likely that the answers we seek are there.’

Sura nodded slowly. We. It wasn’t much – a tiny shred. But it was still an opening all the same.

Chapter 3

Chapter 3

Ford Hospital Mission, Papua, Indonesia, two months previously

Using the distinctive forked peak of Mount Mosapua as a marker, Doctor Paul Ford smoothly banked the twin-engine Beechcraft King to line up on a swathe of mown grass on the plateau below. It had been a good flight from Jayapura, without the usual roller coaster turbulence, first dropping off a heavily pregnant mother with complications, then picking up surgical supplies and a few staples like his favourite Macallan Scotch. Nothing beat an icy tumbler after a long day in clinic.

Looking down on the cluster of buildings surrounding the long white roof of the hospital, the mission appeared as an island in a sea of endless green. In a very real sense, it was. To the east lay the Papua New Guinea border and the stultifying heat and swamps of the Sepik flood plain, while to the north and west, impenetrable jungle stretched for hundreds of square kilometres. To the south, lowland rainforest ran for some fifty kilometres, before colliding with the stone feet of the Jayawijaya Mountains. The snow-capped 4000-metre peaks loomed above the horizon like some vast trompe l’œil. In these humid tropics, it was a dramatic juxtaposition he never stopped marvelling at. There were no roads or railways. The closest river was ten kilometres away. The only direct route to the mission was by air.

Paul Ford revelled in the extreme remoteness. The mission hospital was a sanctuary from the madness of the chaotic world outside. Serving the needs of the local people – delivering their babies, stitching their wounds and splinting their bones – had been his father’s vision of atonement, and it had become his, too. But it was more than that. The vocation nourished his sense of self-worth, sustained him spiritually and intellectually. It had helped him bear the loss of his wife to cancer twenty years before, and the fact they had had no children.

Dropping to 200 metres, Ford looked for the usual gaggle of kids winding their way home from school, but the paths to the village were empty. Nor was there any sign of Jackson, who was in the midst of harvesting the coffee rows alongside the runway. The sight of an unfamiliar, small olive-green plane parked next to the hangar made Ford pause. They were not expecting visitors. Then the obvious explanation struck in a rush of elation: Mia had returned early!