A few minutes later the entry area was empty except for Kathleen who was stationed at the gates with orders to let no one enter or leave until Joe or Andy okayed it. The rest of the guards were outside. Their flashlights were on and Joe had passed out one radio to each team of three and sent them to check the walls on the east, north, and south sides of the prison. Hulbert and a half-dozen guards had already gone around to the west end of the facility. Andy was looking at the administration building. He checked the windows first; none of the glass seemed broken. The bars were all in place. And from where he stood he could see no cracks in the mortar between the brown blocks that made the walls. Everything looked good.

There was nothing that indicated structural damage to the three-story, brown limestone building that had been built over a century before.

"It looks solid enough. We might have gotten lucky," he said, knowing that until daylight came and men could walk the building and examine it up close, there was really no way of knowing for sure. Andy watched part of his crew as they hurried along side the building's exterior, their flashlights playing against the eighteen-foot, chain-link fence topped with razor wire that enclosed the compound. He turned east and looked at the wall and then toward town. There were no lights anywhere. Even the hospital lights couldn't be seen. The entire area was darker than he thought possible-so dark, he couldn't even make out the shape of the bluff the town sat on. He felt a tap on his shoulder.

He couldn't remember the woman's name, but her face was familiar. She usually worked B-house. "Yeah," he said. She pointed to the sky. He looked up and his heart leapt in his chest. The clouds were gone and the sky was filled with more stars than he could remember seeing. Then he realized the temperature had changed. It was warm. Very warm.