‘If you kill us, you won’t be able to land the plane!’ the co-pilot gabbled.

Eddie shrugged. ‘I’ve had flying lessons.’ He opted not to mention that they had been in a helicopter, there had only been three, and on the last he had crashed into a New York skyscraper. ‘But I’m lazy, so just keep going and I won’t have to do anything drastic.’

Cheng signalled for silence. ‘He’s talking again . . . “I repeat, you must return to Cangliang immediately. Your passengers are spies who have committed espionage against the People’s Republic of China.” We’re not spies!’ he protested to the pilots.

‘No, we’re not,’ Eddie added. ‘You think we’d bring our little girl with us if we were doing some James Bond crap? Besides, we’d have had to work bloody fast. You brought us to the country in the first place, remember!’

‘Yes, we did,’ the pilot grudgingly agreed. ‘But I must still turn back.’

‘No. You mustn’t. After you’ve flown us to Uluru, you can tell ’em I had you at gunpoint the whole time. Which I will if I have to.’

He scowled, but gave Eddie a small nod. ‘We will take you there. If you promise you will not hurt us.’

‘Take us there without any trouble, and I won’t need to. Deal?’ Another nod. ‘Okay. Now, I’m not daft, despite what a lot of people say, so I’ll be keeping an eye on things.’ He indicated the control panel. ‘So long as that compass keeps pointing south, I’ll be happy. Cheng, you listen to the radio. Make sure they’re not getting any sneaky messages – or sending any.’

He returned to his seat. ‘I think everything’s under control,’ he told Nina. ‘Just got to make sure one of us is always awake so they don’t do a one-eighty while we’re having a nap.’

She nodded, then said quietly: ‘Is Cheng okay?’

‘I think so. Probably good to give him something to do to keep his mind off what’s happened, at least for now.’

‘Yeah,’ Nina replied sadly. In a way, the news Cheng had received was worse than being told his mother was dead: not only did he have the awful knowledge that she was suffering, but he would almost certainly never see her again even if she survived. She looked over to Macy. What if her daughter had to endure the same one day?

That she had already, and more than once, almost put Macy through exactly that torment because of her own obsessions was a piece of self-realisation she did not want – was afraid – to face. She turned away, looking out at the darkness beyond the window as the plane continued its journey.

Major Wu stood at the shoulder of the nervous communications officer. ‘Well?’ she snapped. ‘Have they turned around?’