Like Maureen said, ‘What do we have to lose’?” Allen agreed.“Who all wants to go?” Jill asked and everyone raised a hand. “We need to chan...e clothes then,” Jill told them, and all of the Hardtricks left to change clothes.“This will give me a chance to talk to the cats. They have been waiting very patiently,” I told Allen. We collected some scraps for the cats before going out to the barn to visit them until the Hardtricks were ready to leave. The cats wanted to hear about everything that we had. ’ Monique turned scarlet. ‘Mr White I know after suffering the loss of your wife I did rather rashly make an offer to you but you rejected me. I’m not in the habit of making repeat offers and anyway, you are far too old for me.’ ‘Well thank you Monique. You handled that rather well. I really do feel how a repulsive bug must feel when being squashed.’ ‘Mr White… I mean Jerry… I wasn’t attempting to make a cruel rejection.’ ‘Hush, it’s okay. I was out of line. I can’t find a good woman who wants. I got through the day at college okay; I was still surprisingly tired and not at my best, but at least I didn’t fall asleep in the lecture theatre, as some of our fellow students were wont to do after sleepless weekends. After tea, Julie and I walked down to the phone box and talked briefly to the twins to thank them again for their hospitality and to check on Sheila – a full night’s sleep and a hot shower had worked wonders, although she did say that her Twin wouldn’t be getting his leg over. It was estimated to be a 7.7 on the seismic scale. Later it was downgraded to a 7.5. There was vast damage as oil wells swayed for a moment then collapsed ripping drills out of the ground. Hundreds of thousands of barrels were lost as the crude shot up and out drenching the area with black rain.Little Fox and General Emerson studied the aftermath of the quake. The general was pointing out the very spot where the laser had hit the fault and the widespread damage had occurred. The Jungle some.