“I’ll call when I get there.”

“Good. We have all the information we need here,” Seth said. “As soon as a representative from the State Department comes through here again I’ll make sure they know who your father is, that he’s an American citizen, and they’ll make arrangements to transport him back to the States.”

“Thank you for doing that.”

“And I have your cell and home phone number. If I hear anything I’ll try to contact you. Here, take my number.” He pressed a piece of paper into my hand. “You might not be able to get through, I don’t know, but at least you can try to reach me if you need to. I just wish you weren’t alone.”

“Me too.”

“There was one other thing,” Seth said. “I was speaking to the Buddhist monks about your father. I told them that he was a good man, a good father and husband, and that he saved lives, possibly even dying while trying to save others. They asked if they could have your permission to help comfort his soul.”

“What would they do?”

“They would pray, chant, beat drums, and light incense. They would leave small gifts by his body. By doing those things, the soul is calmed and reassured. It’s a very beautiful ceremony.”

“That would be nice.”

“The monks said that they want to ease his discomfort. They believe that the dead wander, lonely and confused, until they are given calm and guidance. They said that your father accumulated a great deal of good karma in his life and they want to help him move to the next level.”

“Tell them thanks for me.”

“I’ll tell them. Now we have to get you to the camp.”

“Excuse me,” a man said.

I’d noticed him already. He and a woman, holding a young blond toddler in her arms, had been moving around the temple, talking to people.

“We were wondering if either of you knows this child.”

I shook my head.

“I don’t know her,” Seth said. “I just assumed she was yours.”

“No,” the woman said. The little girl had an arm around her neck and was clutching a little stuffed bear.

“Some locals brought her to us yesterday,” the man said. “They found her abandoned, alone, and they asked if we could help.”

“We don’t even know her name,” the woman continued. “We’ve been asking everybody, checking everywhere, looking at the boards, even posting her picture.”

“She doesn’t have many words, but the ones she has aren’t English,” the man added.

“She looks Swedish,” Seth said. She had short, white-blond hair, blue eyes, and very fair skin.

“We thought so too. We’ve had people speak to her in Swedish.”

“And Dutch and Polish and French and German. Nothing,” the woman added.

“Maybe she’s too young to speak,” I suggested.

“Or too traumatized,” Seth said. “I’ve seen some adults like that.”

“We can’t even turn her over to the authorities because we don’t know which country she belongs to.”