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Page 121
"No need to call Mr. Ouadros. Mike? A short, wiry man walked through a door, hurrying forward to shake Mike's hand. He was middle-aged, with a receding hairline and small spectacles perched on the end of his nose. He wore trousers, a jacket and necktie much like Mike's, and shiny, decorative leather shoes. He maneuvered his spectacles up his nose by a grimace that puffed his cheeks. "So glad you're back. And Ruth will be ecstatic."
"She certainly is!" A small woman perhaps five years older than Abby rushed into Mike's arms. She looked as though she belonged in this place called Beverly Hills, with her white wool dress and flowing scarf and painted nails. Her swaying silver ear ornaments hung below the ends of her short auburn hair that had no strand out of place. When she pulled back, she examined him critically. "Your hair is so long! It looks great." Abby could see a moistness in blue eyes adorned with the face paint used so attractively by women in this time, and she looked at Mike with such emotion that Abby was certain she loved him.
Abby glanced at Mike, but he appeared oblivious of Ruth's emotion. "Great to see you all," he said. He introduced Abby, and she winced from Ruth's curious, antagonistic glare. "Feel free to call anyone you want," he told Abby.
Did he mean call on? But she knew no one in this time. "Thank you," she said politely.
He took her aside. "We could contact the L.A. police to try to find your family."
"I believe not," she said, feeling both sorrowful

 
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