I'll Walk Alone Read online

  The Anastasia Syndrome

  I took a course years ago in which the instructor hypnotized people and brought them back to previous lifetimes. I took it out of curiosity, not because I believe in reincarnation. When I heard startlingly vivid descriptions of former lifetimes from people under hypnosis, it didn’t make me a believer, but it did make me realize that I was going to write a book on that subject. Since I’m a history buff, I loved setting the back story in the time of Charles the First and Charles the Second of England.

  Let Me Call You Sweetheart

  I love jewelry and have a few pieces that once belonged to my mother-in-law. One pin especially is unique. I thought it would be interesting if that pin could get someone on a path to murder. As a secondary theme, the idea of a plastic surgeon giving a number of women the same face, I thought offered a meaty plot because why would any doctor do that? A third plot element was the idea of a young man in prison for a murder he didn’t commit. I threw these together — the jewelry, the plastic surgeon, and the innocent prisoner. Let Me Call You Sweetheart was the result.

  Silent Night

  A friend of mine was nineteen years old when he was in the Battle of the Bulge. A bullet hit the Saint Christopher Medal he was wearing, and the medal saved his life. I always knew that there was a story within that story, and when I was asked to write a Christmas novel, I knew the Saint Christopher Medal had to be part of it. The other plot element involved a young woman who had been in prison, sees a wallet, picks it up and may be accused of having stolen it. I thought that is the kind of predicament that people can sometimes get into. Afraid to tell and afraid not to tell is a desperate situation for a lone young woman with a dependent child. That situation tied to the Saint Christopher Medal produced Silent Night.

  Moonlight Becomes You

  My mother-in-law had a recurring nightmare perhaps twice a year. It was that she was in a funeral home in a casket. She was alive, and all the other people in the other caskets were dead. It is easy to trace the origin of that dream. Her mother was a young girl in England when the flu epidemic killed thousands of people. People were buried immediately, and later it was found that some of them were still alive. The coffins had scratch marks as they frantically tried to lift the lid and escape. In those days the rich people would have a string around the supposedly dead person’s finger and would have a bell on the ground at the end of the string. They paid watchers to sit by the grave for a week just in case the person was not yet dead and tried to signal them. I thought that is a darn good basis for a suspense novel.

  Pretend You Don’t See Her

  So often an article I have read triggers a book. For this one I read a long article about a family in the Federal Witness Protection Plan and the excruciating loneliness that they were experiencing living in a strange place, unable to discuss their backgrounds and only contacting the rest of the family through a Federal Marshal. I ask myself why a young woman would be forced into that position and what it would be like if an assassin breaks through the code of secrecy and learns where she is.

  All titles by Mary Higgins Clark are also available as ebooks.

  Table of Contents

  Cover

  Front Flap

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Dedication

  Acknowledgments

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

  Chapter 51

  Chapter 52

  Chapter 53

  Chapter 54

  Chapter 55

  Chapter 56

  Chapter 57

  Chapter 58

  Chapter 59

  Chapter 60

  Chapter 61

  Chapter 62

  Chapter 63

  Chapter 64

  Chapter 65

  Chapter 66

  Chapter 67

  Chapter 68

  Chapter 69

  Chapter 70

  Chapter 71

  Chapter 72

  Chapter 73

  Chapter 74

  Chapter 75

  Chapter 76

  Chapter 77

  Chapter 78

  Chapter 79

  Chapter 80

  Chapter 81

  Chapter 82

  Chapter 83

  Chapter 84

  Chapter 85

  Chapter 86

  Chapter 87

  Chapter 88

  Chapter 89

  Chapter 90

  Epilogue

  Back Flap

  Back Cover