As the sun set over a glass-smooth bay, four CV members made their way separately to the committee meeting at Safety Beach North clinic. Situated at the Mt Martha end of the suburb, Luke Patterson’s medical practice fronted the old coast road and comprised a large brick house, plus several sheds dotted around the rear garden. The road continued north for another three hundred metres, ending abruptly at a concrete barrier built to channel storm surges and king tides away from the residential areas to the south and east.
Although Emma attended a different clinic, she often passed Luke’s surgery during her walks by the bay and eleven years earlier had observed with interest its transformation from abandoned holiday house to welcoming medical centre. She had expected the house to be demolish
