***
Instead of little sleep, Hanley had no sleep this night. Now, it was time to get ready and leave for the mission’s landing strip and the flight to Kosti. He was anxious, but no longer afraid. If all went well, they would be back by 9:00 a.m. Allowing for two hours’ flight time each way and one half hour on the ground, nine o’clock was a reasonable expectation. Going to the foot locker, Hanley opened the lid, slid his hand down along the right inner wall of the metal box and under some shirts, folded and resting on the bottom. There, he felt the hard metal case of a pocket watch Rocky had given him. Surrounding it with his fingers, he pulled the watch from the locker, examined it for a moment and put it into his pants pocket. Not interested in its marking of time, Hanley took it to have a part of Rocky with him on the flight. He considered taking her photo, but thought the watch to be more meaningful; he had not asked for the watch, it was a gift.
Jumma would be waiting with the Land Cruiser near the edge of the mission, where, at three-fifteen, Hanley would meet the boy and the nun. The plane was ready, what supplies they assembled stowed onboard two days earlier. The weather would not pose a problem.
For the hundredth time in the past week, he reassured himself this was a simple task. Fly the plane, land, load twelve children and depart. He figured the window for problems to develop was approximately twenty minutes at the most. It would be maybe five minutes before landing for anyone on the ground that might hear the plane’s approach to get to the landing strip by the time it touched down. Assuming there was no one at the strip to begin with. Five minutes out, ten minutes on the ground from touchdown to taxing, turning and to a full stop; fifteen minutes at most to load the children; another five to secure the plane and depart-maybe twenty to twenty-five minutes on the ground. Okay, twenty-five to thirty minutes total time, from hearing the plane approach to rotation and departure; a simple plan. Nothing was ever simple, not even in the best of circumstances. Sudan was not the best of circumstances and he knew it.
Hanley sat on the edge of his cot, staring at the floor and his bare feet. He wished he’d slept, but knew that adrenaline would take over once he was flying. Bending over, he reached underneath the stand beside his cot and pulled a shallow white porcelain bowl to sit on the floor near his feet. In the bowl sat a damp cloth, white and rough, resting in a half inch of water. Squeezing the water from the cloth, he used it to wipe his face and neck, then his arms. This will have to do, he reminded himself again. Bathing was never a regular practice in Sudan as water had more essential uses. He should shave, but that was not possible either. When he returned to Kokomo, he would take a shower twice a day for the first week, he promised himself.
Hanley passed through the door of his room into the dark hallway. His eyes had adjusted to the darkness, allowing him to find the doorknob and slip outside with just a few squeaking floor boards to announce his movements.
The night was very still and cool, the buzz of insects the only noise he could hear. Smoke from the evening fires drifted away while the light from the still smoldering coals dotted the landscape, marking the spots where people were sleeping on the mission’s grounds. Taking a moment to orient himself, Hanley noted the location of the fires and the direction he needed to go to reach the Land Rover. Hoping to avoid stepping on someone and waking the whole complex, he headed toward his meeting with the nun and Jumma.
***
Jumma knelt beside the vehicle and shivered as he waited. He was cold. Even though the morning was unusually chilly, he had worn khaki shorts and a white shirt, his usual uniform when he worked at the mission.
The last two months had been the most stressful he had known for some time. His life at the mission settled into a routine and flow that suited him. He was working and being useful, caring for those less fortunate and assisting both the nun and the pilot. He liked both, though he would prefer they not argue as much as they did. For the past eight weeks or so, he had been working to contact the families of the children they hoped to rescue, telling them only that their child or relative had been located and he would provide additional information as it became available. Hoping to avoid any undue attention and contact from the relatives, he explained that he worked for a private organization that specialized in finding missing children from the Darfur and southern Sudanese regions. He provided no contact information only saying he would be in touch when he had more to tell them. Most of the families were so glad to have any information, they did not ask questions, but only thanked him for his efforts. Some did ask who he was and the name of his organization but he immediately asked them for the specifics of when and where the child had been taken. This always deflected their curiosity. The work had been difficult and exhausting at times. He shivered again and waited.
***
Hanley was the first to arrive. He saw the form of the truck and steered toward it in the darkness.
