Abbie sighed. “I wish we could get out of this mud. Look at me! I’m dirty from head to foot.”
Wash piped up, saying, “I don’t mind being dirty so much as I mind being hungry.” He glanced about the swamp and then looked ahead. “That looks like a dry spot up there, Dave. Let’s see if we can get out of this water.”
The seven struggled on, their feet making sucking sounds as they pulled them free of the muck. But at last they found themselves up on dry and stony ground.
Wiping the mud off his boots as well as he could, Josh looked up at Dave. “What now? The river’s getting smaller all the time.”
“That’s the way rivers do,” Dave said nastily. “They’re small where they start. I’m surprised you didn’t know that, Josh.” His tone was sharp.
Sarah thought Dave probably was unsure of himself and to cover this he asserted his authority. Seeing that Josh was about to answer back, she said quickly, “Let’s go on. According to the map, we aren’t too far away from the village.” She stooped and washed her hands in the river, which was now more of a creek.
“All right,” Dave said grudgingly. “I’d like to get where we’re going. I’m tired of this trip. It’s too much ‘adventure’ for me.”
The land, Sarah saw, was broken up now by stony outcroppings. Here and there huge rocks began to appear, but the walking was much easier.
They had kept at it for more than an hour when Dave called a halt. “Let’s stop here and rest. We’ll spread out and see if we can find some game or something else to eat—maybe berries.”
Sarah saw huge ferns and tall trees everywhere but nothing that looked like a berry bush.
“All right,” Josh said doubtfully, “but it doesn’t look very promising.”
“I’ll go with you, Josh,” Sarah said, and the two of them walked off to the right.
As soon as they were out of hearing, Josh said angrily “I don’t see why Dave has to take everything out on me! He’s just getting a swelled head. Besides, I don’t think he knows what to do.”
“Well, you know how that is, Josh. When we first got here and you were the leader, you were uncertain at times too. It’s hard on Dave. Just be patient with him.”
Josh grinned at her. “Always the peacemaker, aren’t you? Well, I expect you’re right. Come on, let’s see if we can find something to eat.”
But search as they might, they found nothing and finally returned to learn that the others, except for Wash, all had the same bad luck.
“Well,” Dave said, “we can eat a little of this dried meat. Not much of it left, but it’s—”
“Hey! Hey! Come and see what I’ve found!” Wash was standing on top of a large rock, waving wildly.
Dave motioned everyone to come. “Maybe he’s found something to eat.”
The Sleepers scrambled to their feet and ran to where the small black boy was almost jumping up and down with excitement. “Right over there! In that little crater!” Then Wash did jump up and down with excitement. “You—you’re not going to believe this!”
He led them to a certain spot and pointed down. “How about that for lunch!”
The other Sleepers clustered around him.
Abigail gasped. “I never saw anything like that! What is it?”
“Why, it’s eggs!” Wash said proudly. Leaning over, he touched one of six large, gray objects. “I don’t know what kind of bird laid these things, but they’re something, aren’t they?”
Josh picked up one. It was larger than a bowling ball. He hefted it, his brow furrowing. “No bird laid these,” he said. “There’s never been a bird that big that I know of.”
Dave said, “It has to be a bird. That’s all that lays eggs.”
“No,” Josh said, “other things lay eggs. Big sea turtles, for example. But these aren’t turtle eggs either. That only happens in the ocean.”
“Well, what do you think it is?” Sarah asked.
Josh shook his head. “Don’t know,” he admitted. “Never saw anything like it.” He looked down at the other eggs, neatly piled in a small pyramid. “And I don’t know whether we’d want to eat them or not.”
“Let’s try one,” Wash suggested. “Build up a fire, and we’ll have the biggest omelet you ever saw in your whole life. I’m tired of stringy old rabbit meat!”
Quickly they built a fire, but when the girls had gotten out the skillets, Abigail said, “Dave, I don’t know how to break one of those things. It’s not like a hen’s egg.”
“Let me try,” Jake offered and pulled out his pocket-knife. Using the butt end, he cracked one of the eggs at the top. “It’s tough.” Then he examined the rough, wrinkled shell. “I don’t think we ought to eat this thing. We don’t know what it is.”
“Let me see,” Dave said. He took the cracked egg and peered at the contents. Finally he too said, “No, we better not try this. We just don’t know what it is.” He straightened up and looked around. “I don’t like this. I keep thinking about those stories the sailors told about this place—or didn’t tell. They were too scared to talk about it. Let’s get on our way.”
The country changed again as they traveled that afternoon. They passed several hot springs that sent up spray and vapor. The massive boulders became as big as houses. The area now was a mixture of swampy places and rocky, arid land. At times they passed through huge forests of trees that none of them recognized.
At dusk they made camp again beside the river and ate most of their remaining provisions.
“We better find that village tomorrow,” Reb said. “I don’t fancy starving to death out here. Maybe we could catch a fish though.” His brow furrowed. “Yeah, we can run us a trot line across the river.”
“What’s a trot line?” Abigail asked curiously.
“You don’t know what a trot line is?” Reb was astounded. “You ain’t been well brought up, Abbie. What you do is, you stretch a line across a creek about like this one here—or even a big river. Then you tie little lines with hooks about every five feet across it. You bait them up, and then you see what you get. You catch fish.”
“We don’t have a boat,” Jake protested. “We don’t have hooks.”
“Shucks,” Reb said, shrugging. “That river ain’t very deep. Get some of that twine out. I’ll put the line out while the rest of you make up some short lines. Make hooks out of that little bit of wire we bought.”
They worked quickly, and within an hour they were ready. Reb waded across the stream—the water came up only to his chest. He tied one end of the line to a tree, then came back and said, “Now, give me them short lines.”
“What you going to use for bait?” Josh inquired.
“Well, if there’s any catfish in here, they’ll eat just about anything. Use some of that dried meat—that’ll do for a starter.” When Abbie brought the remains of the meat, Reb started out again. He stopped at each hook and baited it.
When he returned, he said, “That’s it! We ought to catch something. Now we’ll wait about an hour, and then we’ll run that line.”
“Why do they call it a trot line?” Sarah asked.
“Because you put the line out in the river, build a fire up back a piece, and then every hour you trot down to the line and take the fish off,” Reb explained.
They sat around the fire, waiting, hungry and uncomfortable. Mosquitoes began to hum in their ears, and finally when it was almost dark, Reb said, “I reckon I’ll go see if we got us a fish.”
The rest, curious, followed to watch him.
Stepping into the stream, Reb walked out, lifting the line, and pulled up the first hook. “Nothing here! Hope we got better luck on them other hooks.” He lifted up two more that were empty, then yelled, “We got one!”
The others watched excitedly as he lifted the line and they saw a fish flopping in the water. “Don’t know what it is,” he shouted, “but it’s a good’n!” He started struggling to get the fish off the hook. “This thing’s swallowed the hook. I don’t know if I can get i
t off or not.”
As Josh watched Reb tussle with the fish, a sudden movement across the stream caught his eye. He thought he saw something at the base of the trees. The others were so busy watching Reb that no one else seemed to notice anything.
Josh decided at first that his eyes were deceiving him. It was almost dark, and the trees cast long shadows. I guess that was just a big boulder I saw, but—he froze, for the “boulder” had moved! He squinted, and all of a sudden what he had thought was a boulder came into focus. Josh could not believe what he was seeing. A monstrous form was emerging from the forest and was headed for the river. It was so big he doubted his eyes, but he didn’t doubt the long, sharp teeth.
A dinosaur!
“Reb, get out of there! Fast!”
Reb had just extracted the hook, and he straightened up, holding the fish. “What did you say?”
Josh screamed again, “Reb, look out!”
Reb looked behind him to where Josh was pointing, saw the beast, and he too froze.
Sarah and the others, after the first shock, now were yelling, “Run, Reb! Run! Come on!”
Reb dropped the fish and began splashing wildly back toward shore.
The dinosaur spotted him and plunged into the water.
To Josh, watching terrified, the creature looked at least twenty feet tall.
Splattering desperately, Reb reached the bank, then glanced back. The dinosaur was halfway across and wading swiftly.
“It’s a Tyrannosaurus rex!” Jake yelled. “Let’s get out of here!”
Reb stumbled up the bank and, running with all his might, caught up with the others.
Abigail tripped and fell, and Josh pulled her to her feet. He looked back, and the dinosaur was still coming, lifting its enormous feet in long strides. It had a mouthful of sharp teeth and front legs that seemed tiny compared to the rest of its massive body.
“Get in among the trees,” Josh shouted. “We can hide there!” He motioned wildly, and the Sleepers raced to a grove of great trees packed so tightly together that they had to dodge around the trunks.
“This way!” Josh led them deeper into the forest. “Stay together. Don’t get scattered.” He held onto Abigail’s arm.
She was weeping with fear.
He whispered, “Don’t worry—we’ll get out of this.”
They ran until they could run no longer.
Somewhere far off sounded a crashing, but it grew fainter, and at last Dave said, “Whew! I guess he’s gone.”
Under the trees it was almost totally dark. Josh could barely see his friends’ white, frightened faces. His voice was shaky as he said, “I guess now we know what happened to the people that disappeared on Mordor.”
“There haven’t been dinosaurs like that around for a long time back in Oldworld—but somehow they’re in this world.” Jake scrunched his eyes together, peering into the darkness. “That thing is one of the worst killers that ever walked the earth. It had teeth like chisels.”
“We’ve got to go back,” Abbie said and began to weep again. “We can’t go on like this!”
“But we can’t go back, Abbie,” Dave said. His face was pale, but he seemed to remember that Goél said he was the leader. “Let’s get back to camp. We’re out of here in the morning. We’ll stick to the trees. We’ll get to the village, and then we’ll be all right.”
They almost tiptoed, returning to the campsite.
“What if that thing comes back tonight?” Wash asked when they arrived. “I wouldn’t be more than a mouthful for that monster.”
“We’d better move over among the trees,” Dave said. “And we’ll leave before daylight to get away from this place.”
Jake said, “If we don’t, we’re liable to run into a t-rex again—or other things just as bad.”
“What could be as bad as that?” Sarah shivered.
“Well,” Jake said, “if there’s one kind of dinosaur here, there’s probably others. Some of them are a lot bigger than a t-rex, but some are smaller and faster. If it had been a velociraptor that had come after us, we’d be goners.”
“Are they bigger than one of them rexes?” Reb asked.
“No. They weren’t all that big, but they were quick. And they had talons like sickles on each foot. They could rip other dinosaurs to pieces.”
“Let’s hope we don’t run into any of those,” Dave said fervently. “Now come on. Let’s move camp and wait for dawn.”
Nobody slept well that night, and everyone arose with scratchy eyes and empty stomachs in the morning.
“Let’s get the stuff together,” Dave said. “I want to get out of this place.”
The Sleepers spoke little as they continued along the river. Dave stopped once to check the map, then shook his head. “There are no landmarks, and I can’t tell how many miles we still have to go. All I know is, the village is on up at the very head of this river.”
Suddenly Abigail let out a scream. “Look! Look over there! In those trees!”
They all whirled. There, at some distance, something was moving.
The Sleepers were looking at a stand of very tall trees, but what was moving was no tree. Then a long neck stretched upward, and a head began to pull at the branches.
Dave stared at the creature’s massive body, its elephantlike legs, and the long, serpentine neck. “What is it?”
“I know,” Jake whispered. “That’s a brachiosaurus. It’s like one of the biggest dinosaurs that ever roamed the earth. That thing must weigh eighty tons.”
The others seemed struck dumb by the sight. There was a whole herd of the monstrous beasts.
Jake said, “I read one time where dinosaurs like this stayed together in herds to protect themselves from the meat-eating dinosaurs like the T-rex.”
“Are they dangerous?” Dave asked.
“Not like a T-rex. Of course, if one stepped on you, there’d be nothing left. But look how slow they move!”
They watched the huge beasts until Dave said nervously, “Let’s get out of here before we see something worse.”
The Seven Sleepers followed the river path for another two hours. Josh thought everyone seemed nervous now and tended to see something behind every tree.
At noon Dave called a halt again, and they threw themselves down under the shade of some huge ferns. “It can’t be too much farther,” he said. “And I sure don’t want to stay out here another night.”
“Me either,” Reb said. “That dragon back in Camelot—I’d rather face that thing than one of them T-rexes. That’s a bad critter, that is.”
They rested for a time, but when Dave said wearily, “Time to go,” they got to their feet and started down the trail once more. They were tired and hungry, and the mosquitoes had made a feast on them. But there was nothing to do but plod ahead.
Dave had just turned around to say, “Keep close now!” when Josh cried, “Look out, Dave!”
Dave whirled around, and everyone gasped.
Straight ahead down the path stood three men dressed in skins, their hair down to their shoulders—and each clutching a wicked-looking club with a stone for a head.
Dave held up a hand saying, “Greetings. We come from Goél. Peace be with you.”
The three brutal-looking men did not speak or move.
Then a movement caught Josh’s eye, and he saw several of the same kind of men appear from each side. He spun around. Two more had come up behind them, also carrying weapons and staring at the group with hard eyes.
“We’re surrounded,” Josh whispered. “What do they look like to you, Sarah?”
“They—they look like cavemen. Sort of like the pictures I’ve seen in books.”
Reb looked around at the figures and said, “What they sure don’t look like is friendly. I hope we haven’t jumped out of the frying pan into the fire!”
4
A Welcome Visitor
One of the fierce men stepped closer. He was the tallest, was strong-looking, and was rather ferocious in appeara
nce. He wore a single garment made of some sort of brown fur with a hole for his head, leaving his arms free. He had black eyes, as they all appeared to have, and clutched his war club. Holding it high, he said, “You come to Mordor.”
Dave was relieved. He had worried about whether the inhabitants of this strange land would speak a language he could understand. The man’s speech seemed to be a simplified form of common Nuworld dialect, understood almost anywhere.
Dave lifted his hand again in a peaceful gesture. Speaking slowly he said, “We come from Goél to help your people.”
The man struck his chest with his free fist. “Lom!” he said, apparently giving his name. “Warrior.” Then his eyes glittered with a strange sort of look. “You come Mordor to kill us!”
Dave was alarmed and shook his head. “No!” he cried. “We come to do you good.” He spread his hands wide in a pleading gesture. “We are from Goél.”
Lom stared at him. “I know no Goél,” he said. He came forward with raised ax until he stood no more than two feet from Dave. Slowly he reached out and plucked at Dave’s shirt curiously. Then he looked up. “You come spy! You not good people.”
Another warrior joined him, a squat, muscular man. He suddenly grabbed Sarah’s hair.
She let out a scream.
Reb jumped to help her. He was knocked flat on his back by a blow from the squatty man, who laughed roughly and said, “You fight me? I kill.”
He lifted his ax, and a cry of alarm went up from the Sleepers.
“Wait!” Dave yelled, standing over Reb and holding up both hands. “He meant no harm. Don’t hurt him!”
Lom stared at him hard. Suspicion was still in his dark eyes, but he finally seemed to make a decision. “You come,” he grunted. When they hesitated, he brandished his weapon. “Come!” he repeated loudly, and the rest of the dangerous-looking band moved in closer.
“Come on,” Dave said quickly. “We’ll go with them.”
The Sleepers found themselves herded like sheep. From time to time Lom would call out something to the other members of his party. But when the Sleepers tried to speak, one of the band would shout and wave his ax.
Their captors were obviously in better condition than the Sleepers, for the young people were soon gasping for breath. Lom led them into jungle and across streams, and once Josh muttered, “They must have feet like iron! They’re stepping on sharp rocks that hurt me even through my boots.”
Caves That Time Forgot Page 3