But the part of Sudarto’s story Mac was most interested in was the last sighting of him, in that room in the mansion, shooting at Bongo. According to Bongo, Sudarto had been in plainclothes, and so had his two henchies. A Kopassus captain suddenly working without his uniform meant one thing: Group 4, Kopassus intel – and that was a problem for Mac.

Group 4 was a secret unit of Kopassus that performed an amalgam of roles, including military and civil intelligence, SWAT-like operations and a secret police function. As East Timor headed towards their independence ballot, Mac wondered what Group 4 was doing there and why they were ambushing Canadian and Philippines nationals. It seemed like an overreaction, or perhaps a panicked reaction. Sudarto was too smart to start shooting for no reason. He was secreted during the ambush, he was doing surveillance, he obviously had Blackbird made and no one on the Australian side had been aware of it. He had the information superiority which gave him the chance to feed all sorts of rubbish back to ASIS and play Canberra for fools. But, instead, he’d broken cover and started putting holes in the players.

The last thought Mac had before he fell asleep was: why?

The four-year-old Toyota minivan needed a wash and the driver could have done with a haircut, but they were both waiting outside Dili airport terminal when Mac emerged into the sun and dust with the other passengers.

‘Turismo?’ asked Mac, bringing his black wheelie suitcase to heel as he stopped.

‘Sure, boss,’ smiled the youthful local, white shirt bleached but frayed at the collar. ‘Turismo express! Raoul do it special for you.’

Behind Mac, an American accent asked for the Resende and another voice wondered about transport for the Hotel Dili. Without hesitation, Raoul announced his credentials for those hotels too, while another local man leapt into the group of arrivals and spruiked his own brand of express travel – cheaper, faster and with air-con that worked. Though it might have looked like chaos to an outsider, this was the way people were transported around South-East Asia, and it seemed to work.

Raoul took Mac’s bag, then reached for a Malay businessman’s suitcase, covered in Malaysia Airlines tags and stickers. The man stood close to Mac in the stifling heat, his Ralph Lauren Polo wafting off him in heady waves.

A group of Indonesian police dressed in tan fatigues wandered along the terminal apron with their German shepherds, keeping a close eye on the visitors and the locals dealing with them. Their flashings were too small to readily identify names, ranks or regiment, but Mac had them as Brimob – the Brigada Mobil – a flying squad of riot and anti-insurgency police who got shifted around the Republic to intimidate troublemakers. Meanwhile, a plainclothes Javanese spook stayed in the shadows, chewing on gum and examining the visitors through a pair of dark Wayfarers.

Sitting in the seat behind the driver, Mac listened to Raoul’s running commentary on the tiny Indonesian province. There was plenty of rice, there was work and the dry season was not too bad this year – the crops had come in and there was food.

‘So what about this ballot?’ came an American voice from directly behind Mac as they moved out of the terminal area onto the notoriously dangerous road into Dili. ‘There’s a lot of soldiers around, Raoul – we expecting trouble?’

Despite the concentration required to dodge carts and motor-cyclists while trying to go down the Indonesian ‘third lane’, Raoul nodded. ‘My family has food, mister, and no crime, okay?’

‘Yeah,’ sneered the American, as only the peace-blessed Anglos of the world could sneer. ‘But you’re gonna vote for independence, right, Raoul? You look like a freedom-loving guy to me.’

Watching the driver’s shoulders slump as they slowed behind a 1950s-era truck loaded with large green leaves, Mac turned to face the American.

‘Right now it suits me that Raoul’s a life-loving guy – with me, sport?’ said Mac, smiling at the middle-aged Yank. ‘Old Indonesian proverb – driving and politics don’t mix.’

Some of the other passengers chuckled with relief and the American’s travelling companion dug his elbow into the man’s ribs. ‘You heard him, Keith. Let the guy drive.’

‘Richard Davis – sandalwood,’ said Mac, putting out his hand to the American.

‘Keith Wilson – telecoms,’ said the American, friendly but annoyed.

Turning back to face the windscreen, Mac caught Raoul’s eye in the rear-vision mirror for a split second. He’d seen that quietly thankful look in Bosnia, Iraq and Cambodia and, for the second time since the Atkins meeting, Mac longed for a firearm on his right hip.

Mac’s usual room at the Turismo was small and uncomplicated. He’d stayed in the Turismo several times and room 10 gave him a view over the Esplanada – Dili’s main thoroughfare – whereas most of the rooms either looked over the rear beer garden or had no outlook at all. The lack of in-room phone meant one less surveillance tool for unfriendlies, and the placement of the TV on top of the mini-fridge was a nice feature.

Opening a pack of Doublemint, Mac pulled a stick one centimetre out of the packet, and placed it gently in the inside pocket of his wheelie suitcase, at the same time taking a piece of chalk the size of a stock cube from the same pocket. Placing the chalk cube under the hinge end of the door, Mac let himself out and moved down to the lobby.

The manager – Mrs Soares – was friendly but couldn’t help Mac with faxing. ‘No allowed no more,’ she said with a smile and a shrug. ‘For the security.’

The Indon military commanders had removed every fax machine from Dili, leaving only one for public use at the Dili Telkom office. Given the way the Indonesian Army operated, thought Mac, word would have gone out and every fax machine in the province would have been ostentatiously sitting on top of the garbage bins the next morning.

Buying a Bintang from the woman, Mac wandered out to the famous tropical beer garden at the rear of the Turismo, nabbing a seat in the shade of a banyan. Chained to the branch of the tree was a macaque, miming something. Mac sat back, slurped on the beer and did his mental work-up for the day. He’d start with the largest of the sandalwood traders – the one owned by the generals – and make a big to-do about new orders, Australian growth markets and suggestions for new products. There were spies who thought their job was to blend into the background and not make too much noise, but business people in South-East Asia who weren’t trying to make money attracted attention. Mac wanted the Indonesian spies and soldiers talking about the Australian with the big plan for making money, not the quiet Aussie ‘businessman’ hiding out at the Turismo asking about fax machines.

‘Bad luck about fax, eh?’ came a voice from behind him, and Mac spun around slightly too quickly, coming face to face with the bloke from Raoul’s bus, the one with the Malaysia Airlines tags all over his bags.

‘But, you know, I have fax in my room. Just need to ask, okay?’ said the bloke, smiling conspiratorially and extending his hand.

‘Rahmid Ali,’ he said, the big Malay face creasing at the sides and bursting with the brightness of a lot of white teeth. ‘I saw you this morning, yes?’

‘Sure,’ smiled Mac, standing and accepting the shake. ‘Richard Davis.’

‘You tell off the American, right?’

‘You never really tell off an American, Rahmid,’ said Mac. ‘You just get ignored rather than bombed.’

Rahmid Ali laughed so heartily that Mac could see his pink tonsils. Gesturing to the spare seat beside him, Mac watched as the Malay sat with a small bottle of Perrier and a glass. He was impeccably dressed in cream linens, glowing with fresh grooming and still smelling of Polo. He was also Indonesian intelligence – BAKIN, probably, decided Mac. Since Anglo visitors had a reputation for thinking all Asians looked alike, Indonesian spooks often posed as Malaysians to get closer to their targets, hence Rahmid Ali’s display of Malaysia Air paraphernalia. In KL, the Malaysian spooks pretended to be Thai, in Manila the Filipinos masqueraded as Indonesian and in Phnom Penh the Cambodians acted Thai or Vietnamese.