Roslyn’s Place, that’s what everyone called it. But it had no official name. Nor was it sponsored like places in other parts of the city. Those orphanages had the backing of large religious agencies or other NGOs—non-governmental organizations.

Roslyn’s Place had no backing. It was just something that had been started by a Swiss woman who had visited the country twenty years earlier and had never left. Frau Roslyn had intended it as a facility where children could come, feel safe, and perhaps even learn something during the day. But when she realized that many of the kids who came to her had nowhere else to go in the evenings, she began letting them stay. It wasn’t long before the occasional baby or toddler would be left at the front door. Roslyn could have turned them over to an official facility, but she never did. She felt the responsibility had been given to her, so she had no intention of passing it on.

Now, the first thing she did every morning was open the front door and look down.

With the help of a few locals whom Roslyn paid out of her modest savings, she did it all on her own. When Marion had stumbled upon Roslyn’s Place two months earlier, she’d made it her personal mission to do what she could to help out. Using her position within the UN, she’d been able to arrange for a shipment of school supplies, and had even convinced a European-based aid organization to send packages of nonperishable food every few weeks. But racing through the city in the middle of the night on foot was not something she had ever foreseen as part of her commitment.

Marion ducked down and passed below the darkened first-floor windows, making her way over to the dingy door on the far side. It was the back entrance into the kitchen, where most of the supplies were brought in. She put an ear to the wooden surface and listened. The room beyond was quiet. She grabbed the knob and gently turned it. As Frau Roslyn had promised on the phone, the door was unlocked. Marion had been warned that the hinges were not the quietest, so she slowly worked the door open just enough so she could squeeze inside.