something I can say about Dad anymore. Not after this business. Who kidnaps his own granddaughter . . . ?”
I had worked on parental kidnapping cases and I knew that there were plenty of people in the world who didn’t find the idea of snatching their own child, grandchild, niece, or nephew to be out of thequestion. Some did it for what they thought were altruistic reasons, like getting a child out of a bad situation when the law hadn’t. But most did it for selfish and often crazy reasons, like getting back at an ex-spouse, or believing that their methods or motives for raising the child would be better. Some of their reasons were less sane and far more terrible—which I hoped wasn’t going to be the case with Papa Purlis.
“So, what would men like that be doing here?”
“Europe’s in upheaval—at least partly thanks to Dad, but also just the circumstances he’s taking advantage of. Most of it seems fairly normal most of the time, but it’s a complex problem that’s widespread. There’ve been a lot of economic problems and those have bred a lot of social and political unrest—not just things like Ukraine, but smaller and surprisingly vicious. Guys like that always show up where the opportunity for violence or political or economic advantage is high. Right now, there are a lot of those opportunities. The Portuguese people haven’t been pleased with their government’s austerity measures—which seem to hit the taxpayers a lot harder than the politicians and government bureaucrats. They almost broke out in riots near the first of the year. That was avoided, but there’s still a lot of discomfort about the situation and that means there are people who are ready to use that turmoil and discomfort to their advantage—people who’d pay to have others make the situation worse in strategic ways. That’s what those guys are—the hired guns.”
“Do you think any of them work for your father?”
“Probably, but they don’t know who we are. At least not yet. There’s no way of knowing which of these guys, if any, are in Dad’s employ, though, so we need to avoid them if we can. Just play tourist for now. They aren’t looking for a nice couple on their way to the beach.”
I frowned, thinking as I ate my bifana . As a fanatic—and he was—James Purlis was willing to do whatever he thought necessary to achieve his goals. He hadn’t caviled at trying to trap and manipulate Quinton, nor had he been unwilling to harm—or possibly kill—his son when Quinton had refused to play along. Quinton had been monkey-wrenching his plans for a while and it sounded as if he might have managed to stop a few of Papa Purlis’s attempts at economic and social disruption. That would make Quinton a thorn in his side worth plucking out, but whatever Purlis was planning to do with Soraia was probably a lot bigger and more horrible than just using his grandchild as short-term leverage against his son.
The sandwich stuck in my throat and I felt a lump of fear harden in my chest. It weighed on me for the entire trip, making it hard to appreciate the beauty of much of our route along the riverbank and out to the edge of the sea.
The rails wove in and out of the riverside fringes of Lisbon, past developments dated by their architecture, including an area of swooping cement buildings that looked a little like leftovers from a world’s fair. We passed a stretch of churning water where the river clearly met the surging sea, creating a choppy band of waves even in the mild weather. A square tower of the same butter-colored stone as the castle above Alfama stuck out of the sea nearby. Our yellow-faced train rushed on, clacking and spitting sparks from the overhead wires.
Once we were ensconced in seats as isolated as we could manage on the train, I prompted Quinton to restart the story he’d dropped in Lisbon.
“So, tell me what happened. Your dad snatched your niece. . . .”
Quinton let out a heavy sigh, the colors
I had worked on parental kidnapping cases and I knew that there were plenty of people in the world who didn’t find the idea of snatching their own child, grandchild, niece, or nephew to be out of thequestion. Some did it for what they thought were altruistic reasons, like getting a child out of a bad situation when the law hadn’t. But most did it for selfish and often crazy reasons, like getting back at an ex-spouse, or believing that their methods or motives for raising the child would be better. Some of their reasons were less sane and far more terrible—which I hoped wasn’t going to be the case with Papa Purlis.
“So, what would men like that be doing here?”
“Europe’s in upheaval—at least partly thanks to Dad, but also just the circumstances he’s taking advantage of. Most of it seems fairly normal most of the time, but it’s a complex problem that’s widespread. There’ve been a lot of economic problems and those have bred a lot of social and political unrest—not just things like Ukraine, but smaller and surprisingly vicious. Guys like that always show up where the opportunity for violence or political or economic advantage is high. Right now, there are a lot of those opportunities. The Portuguese people haven’t been pleased with their government’s austerity measures—which seem to hit the taxpayers a lot harder than the politicians and government bureaucrats. They almost broke out in riots near the first of the year. That was avoided, but there’s still a lot of discomfort about the situation and that means there are people who are ready to use that turmoil and discomfort to their advantage—people who’d pay to have others make the situation worse in strategic ways. That’s what those guys are—the hired guns.”
“Do you think any of them work for your father?”
“Probably, but they don’t know who we are. At least not yet. There’s no way of knowing which of these guys, if any, are in Dad’s employ, though, so we need to avoid them if we can. Just play tourist for now. They aren’t looking for a nice couple on their way to the beach.”
I frowned, thinking as I ate my bifana . As a fanatic—and he was—James Purlis was willing to do whatever he thought necessary to achieve his goals. He hadn’t caviled at trying to trap and manipulate Quinton, nor had he been unwilling to harm—or possibly kill—his son when Quinton had refused to play along. Quinton had been monkey-wrenching his plans for a while and it sounded as if he might have managed to stop a few of Papa Purlis’s attempts at economic and social disruption. That would make Quinton a thorn in his side worth plucking out, but whatever Purlis was planning to do with Soraia was probably a lot bigger and more horrible than just using his grandchild as short-term leverage against his son.
The sandwich stuck in my throat and I felt a lump of fear harden in my chest. It weighed on me for the entire trip, making it hard to appreciate the beauty of much of our route along the riverbank and out to the edge of the sea.
The rails wove in and out of the riverside fringes of Lisbon, past developments dated by their architecture, including an area of swooping cement buildings that looked a little like leftovers from a world’s fair. We passed a stretch of churning water where the river clearly met the surging sea, creating a choppy band of waves even in the mild weather. A square tower of the same butter-colored stone as the castle above Alfama stuck out of the sea nearby. Our yellow-faced train rushed on, clacking and spitting sparks from the overhead wires.
Once we were ensconced in seats as isolated as we could manage on the train, I prompted Quinton to restart the story he’d dropped in Lisbon.
“So, tell me what happened. Your dad snatched your niece. . . .”
Quinton let out a heavy sigh, the colors
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