He could clearly see the rib cage. He gently pinched, and the skin did not quickly resume its shape. “The arm will be fine, but the cholera is going to kick her little butt.” He made a note to admit the child as a patient and try to get her cleaned up, inside and outside. If she survived all of that, then all she would have to worry about would be measles and malaria and land mines and machine guns and mortars and a long menu of infectious diseases and the questionable privilege of growing up in a third-world country in which women were second-class citizens. Thankfully, Ledford thought, the strict Islamic religious zealots had not invaded the camp yet, or he would not have been allowed to touch or even look at the naked female baby.

“What did you tell Dr. Yao?”

“I volunteered us.”

“Humph,” Ledford grunted. Might be interesting.

* * *

The team of nine medical workers headed out the following morning, in a convoy of three United Nations trucks, carrying just enough supplies to establish a base camp that could expand rapidly to help meet the flood emergency. Fifteen hours later, after grinding through brutal, washed-out roads, they reached a camp that was run by Doctors Without Borders, where they spent the night before pushing on deeper into the wasteland in the dusty gold of the new dawn.

“My ass is completely broken,” complained David Foley by radio as the sun reached its zenith. He was in the third truck, and Ledford was riding as the only passenger in the lead vehicle.

“Take two aspirin, put it in a sling, and call me in the morning,” Ledford joked.

“Better idea would be to just stop and have some lunch. Get our bearings,” Foley replied.

Ledford thought that was a good idea, for the road had smoothed out a bit for the last few kilometers as it moved through some small hills. A side road branched off to the right and downward, and he told the driver to follow it to a spot where they could have a break. In a moment, they were on the back side of the hills and following an old road that sloped down into a valley, edging onto a flat plateau. “Here,” he said. The trucks pulled up, nose to tailgate, and the team got out and stretched.