I was dragging some files from a spotlight finder window to open in Freehand MX. The files didn't follow the cursor, so I put the cursor back over the original finder window and released. I got a system message (which I can't remember; I had pulled an all nighter working on the very files I'm writing about) but none the less, I hit cancel, then my files disappeared.
The only thing I can think of, is if the operating system was acting slow and it thought I was trying add the files back to the finder window, so it would of asked about replacing them. But hitting cancel shouldn't have caused them to disappear, it should have canceled the action no matter what the message. It was quite a number of files, and this all happend in a number of seconds. If they were going to be erased, I'm sure I would have been prompt another message, and it would have taken some time.
Now my files are gone from their original folders, and spotlight will not find them anymore. The files are not in my trash bin either. Isn't it ironic that I was openning the files to consolidate them for backup to a external hard drive. I think so. Any help?