Read Online Lost Girls by Graham Wilson - Free Book Online Page B

you are finished can you come and look at this.”
    Alan was busy
on the phone, as was Sandy. So he looked around some more, seeing
the computer in the corner. He went over to it and pressed the
keyboard. The screen came to life.
    He saw that
Internet Explorer was open with a series of web pages open in the
browser. He started reading, it was an awful story about Susan by
an internet troll, totally vile “Cut the babies out of the bitch
and watch the crocodiles jump to feast on them.”
    He felt
mortified that someone could write this about his beautiful Susan.
He looked at the web page log. The most recent page about her had
been opened at 11.45 last night. Now he knew for sure she had been
here at that time and reading this poison, completely destroying
the fragile self esteem she had begun to rebuild.
    He brought Alan
and Sandy inside to show them. Now all knew this was really
something to be frightened about. It seemed, after reading this,
she must have run off into the night to God knows where. Her
friends and the hospital had confirmed that nothing had been seen
or heard of her.
    Alan decided it
was time for a full scale missing person’s search with the police
raising the alarm through the media, seeking any sightings. He
called his boss and was told that in five minutes a squad car would
come and collect them and bring them to the police station. At the
same time a second car would come and secure the site for
subsequent investigation.
    Susan’s family
and close friends had also been contacted and asked to come to the
police station to give statements about any contact they had with
her in the last 24 hours. It was inconvenient as her parents and
David were each scheduled to leave on their midday flights for the
UK and Sydney. However all other plans were off until Susan was
found.
    Vic’s leg was
hurting and he felt woozy from yesterday’s operation. But he
resisted all entreaties to depart, to go off and have a rest. He
said he had returned to Susan once, against the odds, and was
determined not to let her go again.
    A news
conference was called for just after lunch. Thus far a series of
searches of the beaches and local parks had found nothing. At the
news conference Vic, Anne and her parents all spoke of their
concern about her absence, Vic told of discovering that she had
read the awful articles in the paper and on the internet, that her
mental state was very fragile and that he was very fearful for her
safety. He asked that anyone who had seen anything, particularly
between midnight and daylight this morning, to come forward with
this information.
    This went out
on all the TV and radio channels. Now all they could do was
hope.
    In the late
afternoon the others returned to their hotel rooms after a
fruitless day of searching. Alan and Vic stayed on at police HQ,
Alan coordinating the search while Vic sat and watched on
helplessly. He knew there was nothing further he could do, but he
refused to give up until all the efforts of the day were
finished.
    About 8:30 pm a
call came in. It was an early morning delivery driver. He told of
returning to Darwin from Palmerston after delivering stores to the
Coles Supermarket about 5 am, driving a flat-back truck. He said
the Berrimah lights had changed red just as he was coming up to
them. As he slowed down at the lights he thought he had seen a girl
who matched Susan’s description flag down a white Toyota tray-back
going in the opposite direction. While he was stopped at the lights
he had seen this person climb into the passenger side of the
vehicle which had then driven away, heading south on the Stuart
Highway. As best he could say the time was about 5.15 am.
    At the time he
had thought it was very early for a backpacker to be looking for a
lift. He also thought the girl looked fat or perhaps pregnant
though his side on view was not very clear once the Toyota had
stopped, he could only see her head. He had rung in now because he
had just seen Susan’s photo on the