Chapter 23: It turned out the homeless man's family had been in a car wreck. His wife and daughter were gone; only a younger brother had vanished without a trace.

For years, he had burned through nearly everything he owned trying to find that brother. Every lead fizzled out. One failure piled onto another until even he lost faith. What little money he had left went into placing missing-person notices and paying for help. Soon he was penniless. He wound up living on the streets, getting by on petty theft. He had stolen from this supermarket before. The guards and the owner had always turned a blind eye, but today their patience had snapped, so they sent a...