39 Frances Bilinski rubbed her wrists, which were sore from the handcuffs, once she was released at the custody desk. She kept her concerns over the situation she was in carefully hidden; she had no intention of giving the cops cause to think she was beaten, in any sense. Ordinarily she would have been confident that her solicitor could deal with a charge of handling stolen property and make it disappear with the ease of a stage magician performing an everyday trick. On that occasion, however, handling stolen goods came connected to accessory to felony theft, and there was too much of the stock stolen from Hartwell Electrical at the shop for her to stand much chance of claiming ignorance regarding the illegality of their origins. Of greater concern, not that her concerns just then were

