Recovering lost email in outlook express after compacting

I have outlook express 6 for a email client. I was getting reminded to compact my email messages every one in a while so I said yes and let it compact my messages ... now I don't see any email other than new email that has come in since I compacted the mail. But I did find some .bak files in the recycle bin ... How do I recover them? Does anyone know how to get my messages back? ... Please, help!
 
I have no idea, but I just copied & pasted your message subject into Google and many relevant-looking articles were displayed.
 
Thank you guys for your feedback and help. Sorry, that long time did not respond. This is because the issue was solved and I forgot to tell.) Thank you!
 
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