When at last the surgeon came to her bed, it was late in the afternoon. His voice was gentle and his manner kind, but what he had to tell her was not. He’d found evidence of a past pelvic inflammatory condition, almost certainly caused by the IUD. That, he said, would account for her infertility. The word no one had spoken.

‘Was it the abortion?’ she asked.

‘No,’ he said. ‘It was the IUD that caused the infection.’

‘How could I have something so bad and not know?’ she asked.

‘It’s common for it to be asymptomatic.’

‘But they recommended it. They put it in me.’

He was silent.

‘What does it mean?’ she asked.

‘It means there’s a residue of scar tissue. It’s wrapped tight around your fallopian tubes. There’s some on your ovaries.’

‘Did you remove it?’ The tears had stopped seeping. She was quite lucid.

‘I did what I could. That’s what took the time. Some of it went too deep to remove.’

‘Will it be enough?’ she asked. ‘Have you removed enough?’

‘I’m sorry, Rika,’ he said. ‘The scarring is extensive. There’s only the smallest chance that you can conceive.’

‘But a chance.’

‘Small. Very small. I can’t encourage you to hope.’

‘I will hope,’ she said. ‘I can’t not hope.’

‘And I shall hope with you.’ His voice was kind. ‘But you must begin to prepare yourself for there being no child.’

‘No,’ she said. ‘No.’

The tears began again, sliding down her face as if her entire being had become liquid. For a moment she was still. And then, with a juddering moan, she hauled herself up on one arm, jerking the drip in a cry of refusal, until the nurses came with a syringe. They laid her down and the moaning sounds lessened, her breathing quietening, until she was asleep.

ON THE EVENING OF PAPUA NEW GUINEA’S SELF-GOVERNMENT, THAT December of 1973, there was a reception that required dresses of a sort that were not readily purchased in Port Moresby. Rika and Martha had bought theirs in Sydney. The day before Rika had gone into hospital, they’d had lunch in a café near the park before wandering the shops. With the reception in mind, Martha bought a purple dress with a pattern of intersecting circles. Rika bought a red crepe dress with a keyhole at the breast. The young woman serving them had been to Papua with a schoolfriend whose father ran a plantation, and had some idea what it meant that self-government was coming. ‘You’re going to have to look good,’ she said, bringing hangers with more dresses. Such was Rika’s confidence that she told her she was going into hospital the next day. A small procedure, she said, touching her belly. ‘All the more reason to look good when you come out,’ the girl said, and Rika’s thumb went up in agreement. When Gloria adjusted the hem for her that evening, Rika looked beautiful.