The silvery beams of light played across the long silken strands, illuminating them with such intensity that they resembled spun gold. Nell couldn't r...sist reaching her hands through the bars and stroking the soft resilient locks. Such beauty she had never known or touched before in her life and she was momentarily lost in the wondrous delight of the moment.Her mood was sharply broken by the loud sound of glass crashing to the floor in the front part of the laboratory. Someone else was back. She needn’t have worried: Charlie was now in the shower, and the door to the bathroom was shut. Tracy hastily dried her hair, threw on her grey skirt suit, grabbed her make-up bag and her cigarettes, came downstairs again, and let herself out the front door. She lit her third cigarette of the day on the front doorstep, leapt into her car, and drove away. By the time she had reached McDonald’s she was on her fourth cigarette, which she smoked in the car through her Egg McMuffin and coffee.. “I’m going outside this time to see what is riling up the dogs. I want you to stand by the open window and keep a lookout and tell me what you can see or hear and where.”Sally held up a lit solar lantern and pleaded, “Be careful.”From the walk-in closet Clark grabbed two shotguns and loaded both with buckshot. Not knowing or seeing what was out there, the buckshot would give him a better chance of hitting the target even if his aim was less than perfect and making sure that whatever was out. The terrain was sloped up on the Eastern side rising to a fairly high elevation with rocky impassable ridges. It was possible to traverse up about 2/3 of the way because the soil and rock gave good traction. On the other side of the valley, the cliffs were sudden and high. Only a highly skilled mountain climber with the proper equipment would even consider the attempt. The pass they just came through was rough going but once you knew the route it was the best way in or out of the valley. The.