Danger Dinosaurs! полностью

“Brother!” Masterson said. “That’s the strangest darned bird I’ve ever seen!”

“It’s one of the strangest flying creatures that ever existed,” Chuck said. “But it’s not a bird.”

“Well, it certainly looked like a bird,” Masterson insisted.

“We may see some birds before we leave the Jurassic period,” Owen said. “As a matter of fact, the first feathered creatures make their appearance in these times. I don’t think you’ll recognize them as birds, though.”

“Well,” Masterson said, still dubious, “whatever that was, I’d have liked to take it back as a trophy.” He turned and started walking back toward the truck. “Hey, Brock!” he called. “Did you see that?”

The rain came at noon.

The clouds had been piling up on the horizon since about ten o’clock, darkening the sky, casting a deep pall over the land. Lightning streaks suddenly slashed through the gray overhang, illuminating the cycads and ferns with electric fury. The thunder rolled out of the mountains, shook its noisy fist at the land, and then the rain came.

It spilled out of the sky in a wet sheet that ran across the vegetation in lashing torrents. The leaves flapped in protest, raising their frantic plea to the shrieking wind and the flailing water. Roots tore at the earth, wrenched free. Evergreens turned over, rolled beneath the force of the gale. The waters began running down out of the mountains, filling the lakes, flooding the land and turning the ground into a mucky, rain-drenched quagmire. The entire party sat in the truck, listening to the wind rip at the canvas top and watching the rain sweep by outside.

And then, almost as suddenly as it had started, the rainstorm ended. The clouds pulled their tattered gray robes across the sky, trailing smokelike wisps away from the sudden rays of the sun. The earth smelled clean and fresh. The plants glistened with a million, sparkling, watery jewels.

The mighty beasts lifted their heads to sniff the air, raised their dull, flat eyes to the sun and came forth to soak up the warmth.

The storm had ended.

Masterson surveyed the mud with a disgruntled eye.

“Quite a mess,” he said. “Quite an unholy mess.”

“We’ll feel better when we’ve had something to eat, Mr. Masterson,” Pete said. He had set up a stone fireplace and started a fire with the newspapers from the truck. When the blaze was strong, he fed it from a bag of charcoal.

Owen had walked several yards from the group surrounding the fire. He returned with a worried expression on his face.

“I think we’d better find another spot for lunch,” he said.

Gardel, squatting by the fire, looked up suddenly. “Why?”

“We’re near a small lake, and there are sauropods in it. I don’t like it.”

“What the deuce are sauropods?” Gardel asked. “Some kind of fish?”

“Fish?” Owen was plainly surprised. “Maybe I’d better explain the life setup here a little more fully.”

Masterson nodded. “Maybe you’d better.”

“To begin with, the word ‘dinosaur’ covers a large group of reptiles-most of them of gigantic size. Within that group, there are further groupings, groupings that distinguish the different types of dinosaurs. For example, a stegosaur is any armored dinosaur. Sauropods are the largest of all Mesozoic reptiles. Theropods are carnivorous dinosaurs. Ceratopsians are the horned dinosaurs-none of which exist until later in geologic time.”

“I don’t get it,” Gardel said.