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JON FREDERICK
1:30 P.M., SATURDAY, MARCH 29
HIGHWAY 10 HEADED NORTH TOWARD LITTLE FALLS
SATURDAY AT NOON, I RECEIVED a call for my first official case as an investigator. An eleven-year-old girl had gone missing in rural Minnesota. Unsure how long I’d be away from home, I quickly hauled all of the perishable items from my refrigerator out to the garbage, packed, and headed north. With two days in a row of temperatures hovering around forty degrees, the snow was departing fast. Late March and early April in Minnesota can be unforgiving, with cold, gloomy, overcast days. April is the purgatory ending the hell of winter, before the green of May brings everything to life once again. The trees were barren, and the color was drained from all the foliage by the bitter and exhausting winter. Patches of snow littered the burlap