The compact flash shows only 15 pictures available

Guide to recover deleted photos from Nikon D70?
Connect Nikon with PC
Using a USB cable or putting SD card into an SD card reader to connect Nikon with Computer.
Scan Nikon d70- Running the Nikon Photo Recovery,you can choose Nikon media drive and click "Start Scan" for scanning
Recover deleted photos
After scanning, you will see all recoverable media photos and videos with file type. At last, click "Recover" to recovering deleted Nikon D70 photos.
This Photo Recovery also can recover all photos files from Nikon D3100 like JPEG, BMP, TIFF, GIF, etc. Support all Nikon camera.
For full details please refer to Nikon D70 Manual.- https://guideusermanual.com/product-name-d70-manual&po=4425&lang=English

did u do a hard reset?

Sometimes pins inside take strain.  Read up on how to replace the CF pin unit.  Not too difficult as long as you don't force anything and remember to retrieve the little metal strip....

The Nikon Coolpix 4300 only supports the FAT16 filesystem, so it can only support a 2GB partition. To support 4GB you need a FAT32 filesystem.
Put the card in a CF writer and attached to a PC or Mac. Partition 2x2GB partitions, then format them as FAT16. Now put it into the Coolpix 4300 and it should work.

Instead of connecting via the camera, just use a USB card reader and put the CF card in that.

4GB requires FAT32. Camera firmware only supports FAT16. 4GB won't work because FAT16 has a 2GB maximum size limitation. 1GB CF card is Nikon's "approved" maximum for this camera.

Catch: 22 1GB -and lesser capacity- CF cards are no longer manufacturered or generally available in 2010. When the current CF card dies, the still working camera also becomes throwaway unless you can source a CF card 1GB or under. 2GB may work, but with 'issues' per caution below.

CAUTION: Anecdotal evidence suggests the final release -& current- firmware for cameras of this generation is also encumbered by with a maximum picture number limitation of 999, realistic at the time of original manufacture when 256MB was a the largest capacity CF card but completely nonsensical now.

Summary: This is my first NIkon Digital camera and also my last.

Apart from the noteriety of the ubiquitous broken Nikon plastic battery latch, a major design flaw Nikon refuse to acknowledge or accept liability to rectify -since self-repaired better than OEM, Nikon policy on firmware support is complete abandonment of product within an unacceptably short service window. ie: a deliberate poilicy of enforced obsolescence.

Suggested Problem Remedy: Do buy a new camera supporting SD Cards of current capacities. Don't buy anything branded Nikon.

You would have to get an SDHC to CF adapter which could be pricey and they are hard to come by.

Dynamite,
have you tried to reformat the CF card?  If you deleted the image through your computer and not with the camera, the computer may have removed more than what was needed...

SteveK

You can connect the camera to the computer via a USB cable and use the camera as the card reader. It will show up as a mass storage device. You should then be able to copy the images to your PC and format the card once recovered.

Nikons and Fujis keep the CF slot powered, and "poll" it every now and then to see if a card has been removed or inserted. So yes, a camera may drain batteries much faster with a CF card than it does with an XD. But if it really does do this, then someone at Fuji deserves to be on the street, looking for a new job. Polling a card every few seconds does not have to be a traumatic experience to the camera. A Nikon can sleep for months, and not show appreciable battery drain. After what I've seen in the horribly slow CF write times of the S3, and the large artificial difference in write times between CF and xD on that camera, I'd say someone (or several "someones") at Fuji is doing everything in their power to make CF look bad and steer people into xD.