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"When I was in her bedroom I saw that the walls are loaded with awards for papers, short stories, essays, all sorts of stuff that she wrote That credit card essay was one of them She must have been all of sixteen when she wrote it"

"So she’s a good writer, even a talented writer She’s still a rank amateur She’s scared She doesn’t knohat to do Everyone is after her, and we’re probably the best- of the lot, but it didn’t un in your belly"

"Don’t whine She has around three hundred dollars in cash That’s not going to take her far On the other hand, she got all the way across the country on next to noa Greyhound bus"

"You don’t keep your PIN number in your wallet, do you?"

"No"

"Good Then she can’t get out any more cash in your name"

Quinlan sat down in a swivel chair beside Dillon’s He steepled his fingers and tapped the fingertips together rhyth that nearly toreabout no one she’d been around cared about anybody but hi inside her desperately needs to be reaffir like a shrink"

"No, listen She’s scared just like you said, but she needs someone to believe her and care about what happens to her, someone to accept that she isn’t crazy, someone simply to believe her, without reservation, without hesitation

"She thought I did, and she was right, only, you know the answer to that She was locked up in that place for six months Everyone told her she was nuts She needs trust, coive her unconditional trust? Her h Sally went to see her first There’s so on with Mrs St John Sure as hell not her husband, Scott Brainerd, although I’d like to ot out her file "Let’s see about friends"

He read quietly for a very long time while Dillon put all systems in place to kick in whenever Sally used one of the credit cards

"Interesting," Quinlan said, leaning back and rubbing his eyes "She had several very good woress Then after she married Scott Brainerd, the friends seemed to fade away over the period before Daddy co resort"

"That cuts things down, but it doesn’t help us You don’t think she’d go to her husband, do you? I can’t iine it, but--"

"No way in hell"

There was a flash and a beep on the co his hands together He punched in several numbers and added two as The amount is just 2250, but it’s their policy to check all credit cards, regardless of the aton Hot daton isn’t that far from Philadelphia"

"It isn’t that far from anywhere, except randparents live on the Main Line just outside of Philadelphia Real ritzy section Street name’s Fisher’s Road"

"Fisher’s Road? Doesn’t sound ritzy"

"Don’t let the na one of those streets with big stone ood hundred feet froh It’s her mother’s parents who live there Their nalivee Harrison"

"I don’t suppose Mrs Harrison has a nauy is rich and old, that’s the way they do it I’ve wondered if sohbrow middle name for effect"

17

"I MEANT TO tell you why Sally used a credit card and not so, handling his Porsche with the same ease and skill he used with corandparents with a sht He had to look up every fewin a car My sister used to read novels all the time--in the back seat--never bothered her for an instant I’d look at a picture and want to throw up What did you say, Dillon? Oh, yeah, why Sally used the credit card While you were getting your coat, I checked the rest of the inforave on the credit card check The license plate nuht a clunker, probably used about every cent of that three hundred bucks"