Jacob Two-Two and the Dinosaur (7 page)

“What’s for the main course? Gimme a break, Dippy.”

“I’m still hungry.”

“You’re always hungry, Dippy.”

An hour later Dippy wasn’t feeling well. He rolled over on his back, moaning and groaning. “Ooooh,” he wailed, “ooooh, what have I done? My poor, aching stomach.”

“Well, no wonder. You weren’t supposed to eat the tin-foil plates, too, Dippy. That isn’t even civilized.”

“But I’m not civilized. I’m just a prehistoric slob. Ooooh,” he moaned again. “Ooooh, now I understand how my unhappy ancestors disappeared. It wasn’t because we were airheads or there was a meteorite shower. There must have been somebody running a prehistoric pizza parlor back in the old swamp. Oooooh me, ooooh my!”

“Stop it, Dippy. You’re giving me a pain.”

“I’m never going to find a nice girl
Diplodocus
in the Rockies of B.C. I’m going to die right here. A poor, homeless orphan dinosaur. The last of a noble line.”

“Why don’t you try to walk it off, Dippy?”

Dippy rolled onto his feet, still groaning, and began to walk about in circles, his head hanging low. But he had not yet properly digested the tin-foil plates. Each time he took a step it sounded like a hundred tin cans were being kicked downhill. Jacob Two-Two held
his ears. “Dippy, they can hear you miles away. Stop. Sit down.”

Dippy sat down. Clunk, clunk, clunk. But the next minute he was burping all over the place, his hot breath uprooting trees and sending them flying. “Oooh,” he moaned. “Poor me. Poor little me.”

“I’ll tell you what,” Jacob Two-Two said. “We’ll try a song. Maybe that will help take your mind off things.”

Together they sang:

And so on, far into the night.

CHAPTER 14

flood of fascinating information began to pour into the Dragon-Slayer’s camp, which lay only four miles away. The information came from Banff, not quite in B.C., but certainly in the Rocky Mountains. A pizza parlor owner called to say a kid who looked just like
CANADA
’
S MOST DANGEROUS DESPERADO
had been in earlier for a takeout order of fifty L’ Abbondanza pizzas. The man said he wouldn’t have served him, but the kid was carrying a machine gun and had twelve hand grenades hanging from his belt. Next, the deliveryman explained how, held at gunpoint, he had delivered the pizzas to a
remote part of the highway. “There was a big green boulder out there with red eyes,” he said.

“Get that cuckoo off the phone,” Wacko said. “Scientifically speaking, there is no such thing as a boulder with red eyes.”

Then a reporter got on the phone to Bailey to say the town had just been hit by a fierce wind filled with flying trees.

“So Banff’s been hit by another windstorm. Big deal.”

“Yeah,” Bailey said, “but this particular one stinks of garlic sausage, green peppers, olives, and cheese.”

“Just like L’ Abbondanza pizzas,” Perry Pleaser said, licking his lips. “Hey, let’s order up some.”

Yes, said the yes men, rubbing their stomachs, and yes, said the yes women, rubbing their stomachs, too.

“Wait,” Wacko said. “Let me think. Kid like Jacob Two-Two in pizza parlor. Green moving boulder with red eyes. Flying trees. Wind that stinks of garlic sausage. There has to be a connection there somewhere. Let me feed the information into my computer …”

Which was when the singing in the distance started.

Next thing they knew, the Dragon-Slayer’s camp was being bombarded by flying trees.

“Just what I’ve been waiting for,” Wacko said.

“Wh-wh-wh-what do you mean?” Pleaser asked, his knees knocking.

“I’ve tricked them into revealing their position.”

“When do we attack?” a general asked impatiently.

Wacko yanked a twenty-foot-long sheet out of his computer. “We have researched some of the most famous military decisions in history. We know the precise hour the siege of Troy began, the very moment Hannibal started across the Alps, and the exact second Caesar wet his feet in the Rubicon. As a result, we have been able to come up with the most favorable moment to begin any attack. The moment, gentlemen, that absolutely guarantees victory in the field.”

“And when is that?” the generals asked, enormously impressed.

“It is our considered opinion that we should attack somewhere between the first light of dawn and midnight. Why don’t we toss a coin?”

“We attack at the first light of dawn,” the generals insisted.

“C-c-c-couldn’t we wait for the second light?” Perry Pleaser asked.

Y-y-yes, said the yes men, and y-y-yes, said the yes women, too.

“As you wish, but then Canada expects every man to do his duty.”

“I-I-I have to go to the toilet right away,” Perry Pleaser said.

CHAPTER 15

hat night it began to rain, which did nothing to improve the spirits of either Dippy or Jacob Two-Two, both of whom were feeling frightened and irritated. So close to their destination, but not safe yet. Far from it. “At least,” Jacob Two-Two said, “we haven’t far to go. We’re almost in B.C.”

“You sound like you’ll be glad to be rid of me.”

“That’s not true, but I do miss home …”

“My home,” Dippy said, “will be in distant mountain ranges not yet ruined by man. There I’ll find my mate and raise a
Diplodocus
family. We’re caring, family-type creatures, you know.”

“Sure, Dippy. Whatever you say.”

“So why do they want to hunt me down and pulverize me?”

“Let’s face it, some people find you kind of scary.”

“Me?” he protested. “I’m a vegetarian. Well, for the most part. I do find garlic sausage yummy. But I’m a law-abiding citizen. In more than sixty-five million years I’ve never even had a ticket for jaywalking.”

“Okay, okay. You’re perfect.”

“I never said that. But people – bah! You’ve only been around for three million years or so and you’ve already made a garbage dump out of the earth. When we were lords of the planet there were no factories belching stinky fumes into the air or spilling nasty chemicals into the rivers and oceans. We kept the earth squeaky clean.”

“Yeah, sure. But there were also no airplanes or hospitals or TV or books or baseball or glee clubs. Admit it, Dippy, in all your millions of years on earth you guys didn’t even invent the wheel. Or chopped chicken liver.”

“Hey, how about another batch of pizza. I’m hungry.”

“You’re always hungry.”

“Look here, Jacob, if you think I’m so dumb or difficult, you can head home right now. I can make it the rest of the way into B.C. myself.”

“Oh, yeah,” Jacob Two-Two said, his eyes filling with tears, “I bet you’d get lost without me.”

“Like heck I would,” Dippy said, starting to cry himself.

“I don’t want to quarrel. Let’s go to sleep, Dippy.”

“You need a lot more sleep than I do. I could make better time without you.”

“Is that how you really feel?” Jacob Two-Two asked. “Yes,” Dippy said.

“All right, then,” Jacob Two-Two said, beginning to pack his things. “I’ll leave right now.”

“See if I care,” Dippy said.

But as he watched Jacob Two-Two trudge off into the dark and rainy and thundering night, Dippy was weeping buckets.
Good-bye, old friend
, he thought.
Good-bye and good luck. Maybe someday you’ll understand that I knew the enemy was approaching with their tanks and heat-seeking missiles and bombers, and that I couldn’t bear to have you around once the final battle began
.