Читать книгу Dinosaur Patrol: The First Journey - G. A. Tupper - Страница 7

Sunday afternoon started with a phone call from Fred. He was coming right over. It wasn't long before we were gathered in front of the painting in the little room. Even April and Amy had showed up. The complete patrol was there. Every eyeball scanned over our mystery gift on the wall. I spotted a small carpet leaning in the corner and rolled it out for us to sit on.

Fred began to explain his mysterious discoveries. "From what you've told us, the painting must only be a couple of years old," April commented, looking very confident. "That's why the flea market people just gave you the painting. It simply wasn't worth anything!"

"It sure does look old," Amy added.

"Hey—I'll get a magnifying glass," I suggested. "Maybe we can find something new!"

A few minutes later, I returned and started going over the entire painted surface. I wasn't really sure what I was looking for, but it must have looked very impressive to Amy.

"—Well, it's signed—Arthur 1953," I mumbled.

"We already know that!" April blurted out. "Tell us something new!"

My face must have turned bright red as I joined the others on the carpet.

Fred started telling us how dinosaur displays in museums are being modernized. "You know, they're now using lightweight copies of the original fossilized bones. Plastics are now being used to build dinosaur skeletons today. They are exact castings of the real bones, only they weigh a lot less. They are able to construct some really great dinosaur action scenes!"

"I read that the man who discovered the Tyrannosaurus rex in 1905 wasn't able to build the skeleton he wanted," April declared.

"That's right!" Fred exclaimed. "His name was Henry Fairfield Osborn, and he was director of the American Museum of History in New York. He had the right idea about dinosaurs, but it was forgotten over time. His Tyrannosaurus rex skeleton was displayed incorrectly for many years."

"Why didn't they get it right the first time?" I asked.

"Like I was saying, the original bones were just too heavy!" Fred declared. "They aren't even bone anymore—they're now solid rock!"

"I heard that over millions of years the bone was replaced by minerals in the ground," April added.

"Exactly!" Fred exclaimed. "The proper term is fossilized bone. They tried to assemble the Tyrannosaurus bones, but because they were so heavy, the tail was put on the floor for support."

"Since the museum display was wrong, artists who did textbook illustrations of dinosaurs had it wrong also!" Fred snapped.

"So everyone thought that this dinosaur walked upright, like a person," I mentioned, raising an eyebrow.

"The modern Tyrannosaurus drawings show it walking with its head lower and its tail in the air. That's known as the new horizontal posture Tyrannosaurus," Fred said. "It's only been about twenty years since this new theory has been accepted. This brings us back to my problem with the painting. —If people were getting it wrong years ago, why didn't Arthur?"

Nobody could answer Fred's question. We sat there in complete silence staring at the painting. Time seemed to stand still, and the painted dinosaurs started to look very real! I rubbed my eyes when I thought I saw the Tyrannosaurus breathing. Suddenly, Amy began to say something. "A long, long time ago, before cars and stores, I wish we were in the land of dinosaurs."

As my eyes cleared, I noticed that the painting appeared to be very close to us.

"Whoa!" Fred gasped. "Did the painting fall on us, or what?"

"This carpet is really bumpy!" April complained. There was a burnt smell in the air, and it wasn't Mom's cooking. It wasn't even Dad's pancakes!

"Boy!" Fred said irritably. "I better go home. Something weird is going on with my eyes!"

"—I don't think we can go home right now," Amy said slowly.

I stood up and examined the landscape in front of me. It looked exactly like the dinosaur painting. Orange-colored clouds swirled above us, and I thought I caught a glimpse of a very large bird flying by. We were definitely not in my home anymore! The others stood up slowly and glared at me.

"Don't look at me!" I shrugged.

"You did it, Amy," Fred snapped. "It was those goofy words that you said."

"Wait!" I gasped. "Nobody move. Maybe this will go away in a few minutes." Distant volcanoes continued to spew dark brown trails of smoke. The rocky ground that surrounded us was covered with fine, gray volcanic ash.

"It's not changing, Bill," April said. "You better do something."

"What am I supposed to do?" I stammered. "How can I fix something I don't understand? This is weird, scary, and stupid, all at the same time. "Hey, Fred!" I called out in a shaky voice. "Help me out here. You know about this kind of stuff."

"Sorry, Bill," he said quietly. "I never read about anything like this."

Oh, boy—we were really in trouble if Fred never heard of it, I thought.

"Hey, everybody," Amy yelled. "—Look behind us!"

I spun around, and a cold chill traveled down my spine. "Bill, look!" April gasped. "It's our house. The little room is in the sky!" Sure enough, there it was, suspended in the clouds like a movie screen. It was as if we were looking from the dinosaur painting out into the room. The little room looked the same except for one thing—we were missing. The space on the floor where we were sitting was vacant. This means that we actually were in the painting!

"What did you say, Amy?" Fred asked. "You said something right before we were zapped!"

"It was just a little poem," Amy replied, lowering her head. "I didn't think it would get us in trouble."

"Bill, look at the clock on the corner desk," Fred said as he pointed at the vision. "From what I can see, the clock hasn't moved in minutes. Unless it's broken, time seems to be standing still."

"It was working earlier," I replied. "I remember checking it because we were spending so much time in the room."

"We must be in one of those time things," April said, scrunching up her nose.

"You guys," Amy said in a quivering voice. "That dark pile of rocks on our left side just began moving!"

"It's not only moving," Fred yelled. "It's a Tyrannosaurus! —Run!"

I grabbed the carpet, and we scrambled down the long hill. The river below was lined with trees, and it looked like a good place to hide. It was the only nearby shelter that we could run to.

"Hey, Bill," Fred shouted as we jumped a few small rocks. "That Tyrannosaurus was the same one in the painting. If I'm right, he'll stay busy eating that Styracosaurus and won't bother with us." That somehow made me feel better!